GB2256515A

GB2256515A - Interactive remote control

Info

Publication number: GB2256515A
Application number: GB9112193A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Jia-Ming Shyu
Original assignee: North Pacific Automation Corp
Current assignee: North Pacific Automation Corp
Priority date: 1991-06-06
Filing date: 1991-06-06
Publication date: 1992-12-09
Also published as: GB9112193D0

Abstract

An interactive remote controller, and an electric appliance controlled by it each comprise a transmitter and a receiver. The controller, besides transmitting control signals to the appliance, will activate the appliance to, transmit information or control signals to the controller which displays the information. <IMAGE>

Description

INTERACTIVE REMOTE CONTROLLER This invention relates to a remote controller of one or more than one appliances and, more particularly, to a remote controller which will receive signals and display information transmitted by the appliance(s). A typical application is a remote controller for an air conditioner. The air conditioner, besides receiving the control and query signals of the remote controller and responding to it, can send the information of air condition (temperature, barometric pressure and humidity, etc.) of the indoor and outdoor air, operational status and maintaining instructions and so on, to the remote controller for display; and the on/off of the remote controller can also be remotely controlled by the air conditioner.

The conventional remote controller of an air conditioner, a TV set, or a VCR, may display the setting status of the appliance based on the user's command. However, it can not get the information of whether the setting is done or the other operating status of the appliance is under control. Under this condition, the user may have to try to do setting and adjusting repeatedly that makes the user feel boring and inconvenient and also causes unnecessary load on the appliance. And often, the display of the appliance is too small and inconvenient for a faraway user to see.

For example, since an air conditioner has already installed several sensors such as a thermometer, a humidiometer and a barometer for the control system, the user can use them directly from a remote controller of the air conditioner to acquire the condition information of the indoor and outdoor air without installing any extra sensing facilities according to this invention.

In addition, the conventional remote controller can only control the appliance unilaterally but can not receive the information or control demand of the appliance which achieves an interactive control between the remote controller and the appliance.

Moreover, a conventional remote controller usually can only control a specific appliance but can not selectively control several appliances.

As a result, the main object of this invention is to provide a remote controller which enables the user to acquire the operational status of the controlled appliance and various information provided by the appliance.

Another object of this invention is to provide a device that an appliance can communicate with its remote controller by sending information and control signals interactively.

A further object of this invention is to provide a method that a remote controller can communicate with and interactively control several appliances.

In the present invention, an appliance and its remote controller are equipped with a set of transmitter and receiver respectively. The transmitter and receiver enable the remote controller and the appliance to communicate with each other by sending and receiving information and control signals interactively. The operational relationship between the appliance and the remote controller is not limited to one to one; that is, several appliances and remote controllers can communicate with and interactively control each other by monitoring identification codes in the transmission.

The invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 is a view schematically illustrating an embodiment of this invention which shows a single appliance and a remote controller.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating the transmission and control procedure for several appliances and remote controllers according to this invention.

As FIG. 1 shows, this invention can be applied to an appliance 1 (such as an air conditioner) and its remote controller 2. The appliance 1 includes a major functional unit 10 which is operated based on the control of a control unit 13 (such as a microcomputer). The control unit 13 is connected to a transmitter 11 (includes an encoder) and a receiver 12 (includes a decoder) which can transmit signals to and receive signals from the remote controller 2; the control unit 13 includes a power trigger 130 which stays in a waiting status and supplies power only to the receiver 12 when the appliance 1 stops operating, and turns. on the whole power till the receiver 12 obtains the turnon or other control signals transmitted from the remote controller 2; at the same time, the transmitter 11 sends signals to the remote controller 2 with respect to the operational status of the appliance 1.

The remote controller 2 also includes a transmitter 21 and a receiver 22 which transmits signals to and receives signals from the appliance 1 respectively. A control unit 23 (such as a microcomputer) encodes and decodes the transmitted and received signals and actuates a display 24 (such as a LCD) or an unshown speaker to indicate the related information with figures or sound. The control unit 23 also includes a power trigger 230 which stays in a waiting status and supplies power only to an ON/CALL key 251 and an OFF key 252; when the ON/CALL key 251 is functioned, it triggers the transmitter 21 to send a specific control signal to the appliance 1, and powers the receiver 22 at the same time. When the receiver 22 receives the response signal from the appliance 1, the power trigger 230 powers the display 24 and other function keys 253.This kind of step-by-step control will save the power of the remote controller 2 and prolong the life of the batteries therein. The control unit 23 also includes a timer 231 which will automatically turn the remote controller 2 off and get into a waiting status when the keys 251, 252, 253 are not operated over a certain time. After the appliance 1 is on, the remote control signal triggered by the OFF key 252 turns the appliance 1 off. The transmitter 11, 21 and the receiver 12, 22 can be achieved through prior arts such as infrared rays, ultrasonic wave or radio which are not necessary to be described in detail herein.

The remote controller 2 interacting with the appliance I is described as follows. As mentioned above, the remote controller 2 may remotely turn the appliance 1 on, then receive the already-turn-on signal of the appliance 1 and actuate its display 24. The response signals of the appliance 1 include the operational status of the appliance 1 (such as maintaining instructions and the preset operation target value for the air conditioner) and the related data and suggestions (such as the indoor/outdoor temperature, humidity, oxygen content and carbon-dioxide content, weather prediction and suggestions for better control and modulation) and are displayed on the display 24 for user's reference and selection. The user may select the setting by the function keys 253 and remotely control the operation of the appliance 1 via the transmitter 21. After the appliance 1 is turned on, the signals generated from the ON/CALL key 251 will activate the appliance 1 to transmit the operational status and the related data and suggestions of the appliance 1. The user can use them as reference or make modulation based on them. When the OFF key 252 triggers an turn-off signal to the appliance 1, the receiver 22 monitors the response signal of the appliance 1 which will be turned off, then makes the control unit 23 turn off the main power of the remote controller 2 and saves energy. Besides, the appliance 1 may have some unshown function keys which enables the user to send specific control signals which make the remote controller 2 respond correspondingly.For example, when the user is looking for the remote controller 2, he can punch a function key of the appliance 1, then the transmitter 11 sends out signals which will be received by the receiver 22 of the remote controller 2. The user will then be informed the location of the remote controller 2 by way of lights or sound generated by it.

If the appliance 1 contains a clock in the control unit 13, the time information can be transmitted to and displayed on the remote controller 2; and if the remote controller 2 also contains a clock, the time thereof can be adjusted by the time information transmitted from the appliance 1, or vice versa. This transmission and adjustment can be automatically operated when the appliance and remote controller are turning on.

Further, by including identification codes in the transmission signals, several appliances and remote controllers can communicate with and interactively control each other. FIG. 2 shows an embodiment of the transmission procedure for several appliances and remote controllers. Each appliance and remote controller are given with respective identification codes.

The method for them to orderly communicate in a channel without interference is described hereinafter. Each transmitted information from a source to its target can be formed in a format as: < start code, identification code of the source, identification codes of the target, content of the information, end code > , By means of the start and end codes and a transmission control manner of random order, several information transmitted by a single channel will not be overlapped or interfered with each other. Each appliance 1 and remote controller 2 monitor the transmission channel with their receivers 11, 22 (FIG. 1), and decode the information by the control units 13, 23 to know if it is called by another.When it is called or triggered from any functional key punched by users, it executes responding operation, such as turn on the whole power, calculate and fetch required data, and prepares to transmit. Before transmission, it generates a random time value and delays that period, then monitors if the channel is free so as to prevent synchronous transmissions. The delay and monitoring will be repeated if the channel is occupied.

When a group of appliances and remote controllers sharing a channel start to use, any of them can first transmit a query signal for gathering identification codes of the others, then store and display them for use in further transmission after receiving the response. By means of aforesaid query and transmission procedures, a remote controller for controlling and displaying functions of several appliances, several remote controllers for an appliance, or several remote controllers communicating with several appliances can be achieved.

This invention enables the remote controller to acquire the operational status and kinds of information of the appliance, and the remote controller can also receive control signals from the appliance and react accordingly. The numbers of the appliance and the remote controller and the sending information and control signals can be designed according to various functions of the remote controller and the appliance. Any modification without departing from the spirit of this invention is included in the scope of the appended claims.

Claims

1. A remote controller for remote-controlling at least an appliance equipped with a receiver and a transmitter, and receiving information and control signals of said appliance, said remote controller comprising: a transmitter for transmitting function signals set by a user to said appliance; a receiver for receiving information and control signals from said appliance; a display unit for displaying the received, transmitted information; and a control unit for controlling the operation of said transmitter, said receiver and said display unit.

2. The remote controller of claim 1 wherein said control unit comprises an ON/CALL key, an OFF key and several other function keys for generating signals to control on and off of said appliance, call said appliance for information, and modulate operation of said appliance.

3. The remote controller of claim 2 wherein said control unit comprises a power trigger which stays in a waiting status while said controller is not in use, and provides power only to said ON/CALL key and said OFF key; when said ON/CALL key is functioned, said transmitter is motivated to send a specific signal to said appliance remotely, and said receiver, when receiving a response signal from said appliance, turns on power to supply said display unit and said other function keys; when said OFF key is triggered to send a signal to said appliance, said receiver monitors said appliance sending a turn-off responding signal, then said control unit turns off the main power of said remote controller accordingly, so as to save energy of said remote controller.

4. The remote controller of claim 2 wherein said information from said appliance includes operational status of said appliance, suggestions for modulation of said appliance and data detected and generated by said appliance.

5. The remote controller of claim 1 wherein each of said remote controller and said appliance is given with an identification code; each information transmitted from a source to its target comprises: start code, identification code of the source, identification codes of the target, content of the information and end code; by means of said start and end codes and a transmission control manner, information from different sources transmitted by a single channel will not be overlapped each other; said transmission control manner is as follows: each appliance and remote controller monitors said channel, and decodes each information to check if it is called by another; when it is called or triggered from itself, it executes responding operation, then generates a random time value, delays that period and monitors if said channel is free for starting transmission, said delay and monitoring is repeated if said channel is occupied so as to prevent synchronous transmission; when a group of appliances and remote controllers sharing a channel start to use, any of them can transmit a query signal and gather identification codes responded from others around it, then stores and displays said codes for use in further transmission.

6. A remote controller according to claim 1, substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to the drawings.