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Contents
1. ety of different configurations Thus the detailed description of the embodiments is not intended to limit the scope of the application as claimed but is merely representative of selected embodiments of the application 0055 One having ordinary skill in the art will readily understand that the application as discussed above may be practiced with steps in a different order and or with hardware elements in configurations that are different than those which are disclosed Therefore although the application has been described based upon these preferred embodiments it would be apparent to those of skill in the art that certain modifica tions variations and alternative constructions would be apparent while remaining within the spirit and scope of the application In order to determine the metes and bounds of the application therefore reference should be made to the appended claims 0056 While preferred embodiments of the present appli cation have been described it is to be understood that the embodiments described are illustrative only and the scope of the application is to be defined solely by the appended claims when considered with a full range of equivalents and modi fications e g protocols hardware devices software plat forms etc thereto What is claimed is 1 A method comprising generating a prompt to initiate a sound signal receiving the sound signal responsive to generating the prompt recording the sound si2. system could be embodied as a personal computer a server a con sole a personal digital assistant PDA a cell phone a tablet computing device a smartphone or any other suitable com puting device or combination of devices Presenting the above described functions as being performed by a system is not intended to limit the scope of the present application in any way but is intended to provide one example of many embodiments of the present application Indeed methods systems and apparatuses disclosed herein may be imple mented in localized and distributed forms consistent with computing technology 0051 It should be noted that some of the system features described in this specification have been presented as opera tions in order to more particularly emphasize their imple mentation independence For example a operation may be implemented as a hardware circuit comprising custom very large scale integration VLSI circuits or gate arrays off the shelf semiconductors such as logic chips transistors or other discrete components A operation may also be implemented in programmable hardware devices such as field program mable gate arrays programmable array logic programmable logic devices graphics processing units or the like 0052 A operation may also be at least partially imple mented in software for execution by various types of proces sors An identified unit of executable code may for instance comprise one or
3. the Signal Power Measurement and Horn ON OFF Decision modules may be considered part of the Signal Analysis module Many other embodiments of both the calibration phase processing and the sensing phase processing should be obvious to one skilled in the art 0047 The operations of a method or algorithm described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be embodied directly in hardware in a computer program executed by a processor or in a combination of the two A computer program may be embodied on a computer readable medium such as a storage medium For example a computer program may reside in random access memory RAM flash memory read only memory ROM erasable pro grammable read only memory EPROM electrically erasable programmable read only memory EEPROM registers hard disk a removable disk a compact disk read only memory CD ROM or any other form of storage medium known in the art 0048 An exemplary storage medium non transitory stor age medium may be coupled to the processor such that the processor may read information from and write information to the storage medium In the alternative the storage medium may be integral to the processor The processor and the stor age medium may reside in an application specific integrated circuit ASIC In the alternative the processor and the storage medium may reside as discrete components 0049 Although an exemplary e
4. FFT techniques For example these processing elements may output a 128 length PSD data vector every 64 milliseconds The subsequent sens US 2013 0328671 Al ing phase processing elements 430 440 450 460 and 470 in FIG 4 are intended to operate at the same rate as 420 i e they may also execute every 64 milliseconds in this example embodiment 0039 Referring to FIG 4 in this example embodiment of the Sensing Phase Sound Acquisition and Processing 180 a Determine Detection Statistic element 450 inputs both the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 that were determined during the calibration phase and the Locally Mea sured Identification Parameters 440 The Determine Detec tion Statistic processing element 450 executes an algorithm for computing a detection statistic The detection statistic algorithm is preferably motivated by some statistical detec tion theory so that the numerical value of the statistic is useful for determining whether the horn is ON or OFF A suitable reference on detection theory is Fundamentals of Statistical Signal Processing Volume 2 Detection Theory by Steven M Kay Prentice Hall 1998 0040 For example a simple approach that is consistent with the traditional Gaussian detection theory and the linear horn model of the Lemaitre et al and the linear FFT process ing is to define the processing of the Determine Detection Statistic module 450 in terms of a simple spectral amplitude matche
5. filed on even date herewith and Docket No Guardity032012 entitled Mounting Angle Calibration for an In Vehicle Accelerometer Device filed on even date here with and Docket No Guardity042012 entitled Automatic Speech Message Validation of an Emergency Teletype Text Message filed on even date herewith The contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference in their entireties FIELD OF THE APPLICATION 0002 The present application relates to user input to trans port systems and devices in vehicle data acquisition systems and transport telematics devices and more particularly the use of the horn in a vehicle or other form of transport for user input to a device or system that is located in or on the trans port BACKGROUND OF THE APPLICATION 0003 In vehicle devices and systems will refer herein to devices and systems that are installed on a vehicle Aftermar ket in vehicle devices and systems will refer to devices and systems that are installed on a vehicle after the vehicle has been manufactured i e these devices are not factory installed Although this application description will focus on the use of the horn as an input interface to aftermarket telematics devices which are electronic devices the applica tion applies to in vehicle devices and systems in general aftermarket or factory installed electronic or not The appli cation is not restricted to aftermarket devices and systems since embodiments of t
6. more physical or logical blocks of computer instructions that may for instance be organized as an object procedure or function Nevertheless the executables of an identified operation need not be physically located together but may comprise disparate instructions stored in different locations which when joined logically together comprise the operation and achieve the stated purpose for the operation Further operations may be stored on a computer readable medium which may be for instance a hard disk drive flash device random access memory RAM tape or any other such medium used to store data 0053 Indeed a operation of executable code could be a single instruction or many instructions and may even be distributed over several different code segments among dif ferent programs and across several memory devices Simi larly operational data may be identified and illustrated herein within operations and may be embodied in any suitable form and organized within any suitable type of data structure The Dec 12 2013 operational data may be collected as a single data set or may be distributed over different locations including over different storage devices and may exist at least partially merely as electronic signals on a system or network 0054 It will be readily understood that the components of the application as generally described and illustrated in the figures herein may be arranged and designed in a wide vari
7. of switch is a push button near the overhead interior light in the passenger compartment ofa vehicle that the occupants use to turn the light ON or OFF The term user here generally refers to the operator of the vehicle but may also include vehicle occupants 0009 Several undesirable systems and methods exist for providing a push button switch as a user input interface to an aftermarket device that is concealed from the user for US 2013 0328671 Al example a device that is under or inside the dash of the passenger compartment One such method for example is to mount a switch somewhere on the dash and connect the switch to the device by means of wires or wireless signaling This is undesirable cosmetically very few vehicle owners want a button glued or otherwise attached to the dashboard of their vehicle A remote wireless button creates the need fora power source and if a battery is used for power the require ment to replace or recharge the battery Another approach that is also undesirable is to rewire an existing control on the dash so that it is wired to the aftermarket device instead of being wired by the car manufacturer This approach would be dif ficult to implement result in permanent vehicle damage and may void the vehicle s warranty 0010 Voice activation may initially appear to be an attrac tive solution for providing a simple user input interface for an inaccessibly installed aftermarket device However the a
8. of the application 0025 FIG 4 is a diagram of the sensing phase of an example embodiment of the application 0026 FIG 5 depicts a diagram of a processor and a con nected memory that can be resident on one or more of the devices or modules according to an embodiment of the appli cation DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE APPLICATION 0027 The present application provides a system method and non transitory computer readable medium that provides using a vehicle horn as an inexpensive user input interface to serve the function of a simple push button switch for an in vehicle device or system The use of the vehicle horn as a user input interface to an in vehicle device or system is novel This description of example embodiments illustrates applica Dec 12 2013 tion details that take advantage of the properties of the vehicle horn sound to allow efficient processing that can be imple mented on aa processor such as a low cost processor Given these examples many other embodiments are obvious to one skilled in the art 0028 FIG 2 is a diagram of an example embodiment of the calibration phase horn sound acquisition and processing 160 of the application In this embodiment under the control of the calibration control module 280 the beginning of the Acquisition of Sound Sensor Data for Calibration 210 occurs when the operator is issued the depress the horn for 4 sec onds voice prompt The calibration process may continue mo
9. 042 Referring again to FIG 4 in this example embodi ment of the Sensing Phase Sound Acquisition and Processing 180 a Local Horn ON OFF Decision processing element 460 inputs the sequence of detection statistics D k for k 1 2 3 and for each processing block k makes a decision as to whether the vehicle horn is ON or OFF For example the detection statistic D k can be compared to a threshold T and the horn is decided to be ON if D k gt T and is decided to be OFF otherwise The threshold T may be preset or determined during the calibration phase and included in the Horn Identi fication Calibration Parameters 260 0043 Referring to FIG 4 in this example embodiment of the Sensing Phase Sound Acquisition and Processing 180 a Push Button Detection Decision 470 inputs the sequence of detection statistics D k for k 1 2 3 from the Determine Detection Statistic 450 and also inputs the sequence of local Dec 12 2013 horn ON or OFF decisions from Local Horn ON OFF Deci sion 460 The Push Button Detection Decision 470 makes the decision on whether the vehicle operator has used the horn to communicate push button to the in vehicle device and out puts this decision as shown in FIG 4 For example Push Button Detection Decision 470 may analyze the variability of the detection statistic D k sequence to determine an effective signal to noise ratio SNR for this statistic as 0044 SNR mean D k Ik 1 2 3 std D k Ik 1 2
10. 3 which is the ratio of the mean of the D k sequence to the standard deviation of the D k sequence If this SNR measurement is below some threshold Tsnr then the decision is that the button has not been pushed The sequence of local horn ON or OFF decisions may also disqualify the button pushed from being decided to be true based on the duration of the horn sound being too short A 4 second duration horn sound is required for the button pushed hypothesis to be decided true 0045 Note that any reference to an algorithm described or depicted herein is software or a computer program that is run by a processor resident on one or more devices or modules described or depicted herein FIG 5 depicts a processor 502 and a connected memory 504 that can be resident on any of the devices described or depicted herein for example the In Vehicle Device diagramed in FIG 1A 0046 A novel use of the vehicle horn as a user input interface to an in vehicle device has been described The above example embodiment illustrates application details that take advantage of the properties of the vehicle horn sound to allow efficient processing that can be implemented on a low cost processor Several of the individual process modules in both the calibration phase diagrammed in FIG 2 and the sensing phase and the calibration phase diagrammed in FIG 4 may be combined or further distributed For example in the calibration phase of FIG 2
11. DII diagnostic port and performs automatic crash notification ACN Such a telemat ics device is described in U S patent application Ser No 13 276 991 titled Detecting a Transport Emergency Event and Directly Enabling Emergency Services which is incor porated in its entirety by reference herein In this example embodiment during the calibration phase the driver is instructed to depress the horn for 4 seconds after which the device may report that it is calibrated and active The amount of time the horn should be depressed for calibration and activation can be less or more than 4 seconds If the active ACN device sometime later detects a relatively minor low speed vehicle crash the device may issue voice prompts to the driver depress the horn for 4 seconds if you want to call the 911 operator If he or she does a 911 call is immediately placed Many other use cases are available for even this one example embodiment of the application 0016 One example embodiment may provide a method that includes generating a prompt to initiate a sound signal receiving the sound signal responsive to generating the prompt recording the sound signal in memory computing a power spectral density of the sound signal determining a sound start up point and a sound drop off point of the sound signal based on signal power identified from the computed power spectral density utilizing a plurality of components of the power spectral densi
12. US 20130328671A1 as United States a2 Patent Application Publication 0 Pub No US 2013 0328671 A1 McKown et al 43 Pub Date Dec 12 2013 54 71 72 21 22 60 HORN INPUT TO IN VEHICLE DEVICES AND SYSTEMS Applicant Guardity Technologies Inc Plano TX US Inventors Russell Carl McKown Richardson TX US Joseph Thomas Mader Plano TX US Thomas Edward Mader Plano TX US Appl No 13 907 885 Filed Jun 1 2013 Related U S Application Data Provisional application No 61 658 613 filed on Jun 12 2012 Publication Classification 51 Int Cl B60Q 5 00 2006 01 52 U S Cl CPE NA Asan N GEN AEA B60Q 5 00 2013 01 USPC ceessssssssssseseessssssssessssssssvnseesssesssvesesen 340 425 5 57 ABSTRACT The present application provides a system method and non transitory computer readable medium that provides a means of using a vehicle horn as an inexpensive user input interface to serve the function of a simple push button switch for an in vehicle device or system The use of the vehicle horn as a user input interface to an in vehicle device or system is novel The description of example embodiments illustrates applica tion details that take advantage of the properties of the vehicle horn sound to allow efficient processing that can be imple mented on a low cost processor 110 s 4 20 a Vehicle Sound Processor Horn Switch Voice Prompt Gener
13. a vehicle horn with a horn control button switch a sound sensor such as a microphone and a sound processor An example method makes use of a calibration phase and a sensing phase During the calibration phase horn sound data is acquired and processed to extract horn identi fication parameters During the sensing phase sound data is acquired and processed using the horn identification param eters This sensing processing determines 1 if the detected horn sound appears to match the one used for calibration and 2 whether the vehicle driver is using the horn for normal alerting purposes to a third party or to communicate with the in vehicle device In the latter case the driver uses the vehicle horn to provide an effective push button input to the device 0013 FIGS 1A and 1B diagram a system and method respectively of an example embodiment of the present appli cation The example system of the application diagrammed in FIG 1A includes a horn sound generation apparatus sound sensing and processing apparatus and an optional voice prompt generation apparatus The horn sound generation apparatus is a horn 110 that is activated by a vehicle horn Dec 12 2013 switch 120 that the driver uses to honk the horn The sound sensing apparatus consists of a sound sensor 130 and a sound processor 140 The voice prompt generator apparatus 150 for example may be an audio player of prerecorded voice record ings In some embodiments the sound s
14. ator Sound Sensor 145 In Vehicle Push Button Device ON OFF Patent Application Publication Dec 12 2013 Sheet 1 of 8 US 2013 0328671 Al 110 i Horn Vehicle NG Hom Switch Sound Voice Prompt i 1 3 i 1 1 5 1 Sound Processor Generator Sensor NGE aa a a a a i i b 150 i i l In Vehicte Push Button Device ON OFF i 1 Patent Application Publication Dec 12 2013 Sheet 2 of 8 US 2013 0328671 Al 160 z 190 170 Acquisition of Sound Sensor Data 180 z FIG 1B Patent Application Publication Dec 12 2013 Sheet 3 of 8 US 2013 0328671 Al Acquisition of Sound Sensor Data for Calibration Power Specirum Measurement Spectrum Analysis Calibration Parameters Horn On OFF Decision Parameter Qualification Signal Power Measurement Calibration Phase Horn Sound Acquisition and Processing Calibration Quality Report FIG 2 Calibration Control a Patent Application Publication Dec 12 2013 Sheet 4 of 8 US 2013 0328671 Al 320 FIG 3A Amplitude 10 12 14 6 8 Time seconds Patent Application Publication Dec 12 2013 Sheet 5 of 8 US 2013 0328671 Al 1 2500 2500 Amplitude 3 8 Amplitude fea Q ol Ps OO j gh ee A 0 1000 2000 3000 4000 Q t000 2000 3000 4000 Frequency Hz Frequency Hz FIG 3B FIG 3C Patent Appl
15. cessful completion of the calibration phase the sound processor and voice prompt apparatus of FIG 1A may report to the user that horn input to the in vehicle device is calibrated and active 0037 FIG 4 is a diagram of an example embodiment of the Sensing Phase Sound Acquisition and Processing 180 of the application In this example sound data may be continu ously acquired by Continuous Acquisition of Sound Sensor Data 410 and processed by the Power Spectrum Measurement 420 which may be identical to the Power Spectrum Measure ment 220 of FIG 2 The PSD data from 420 is then input to a Spectrum Analysis element 430 which is similar to the Spec trum Analysis 250 in FIG 2 that is described above for the calibration phase processing An important difference is that the Spectrum Analysis 430 has no prior knowledge that the horn is ON or OFF and simply outputs a sequence of Locally Measured Identification Parameters 440 Indeed this sequence of parameters usually corresponds to sound sensor data that is acquired when the horn is OFF The parameter extraction algorithm that the Spectrum Analysis 430 uses to process the PSD data vectors during sensing is defined by the parameter extraction algorithm that the Spectrum Analysis 250 uses to process the PSD data vectors during calibration 0038 Note that in this example embodiment the Power Spectrum Measurement elements 220 and 420 are block pro cessing since they calculate a PSD using
16. d filter In this example embodiment the N sets of M PSD amplitude values at the M frequencies are such that the M frequencies are the kept the same for all N sets that con stitute the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 and we notate these amplitude values as N M element vectors HICP n where n 1 N Furthermore the Locally Measured Identification Parameters 440 consists of M PSD amplitude values at these same M frequencies and we notate these amplitude values as the M element vector LMIP A suitable detection statistic is then defined by the maximum of N vector dot products of LMIP and HICP n for n 1 N The processing sequence of this detection statistic can then be written 0041 D k max HICP n LMIP k In 1 N where D k is the detection statistic for block processing index k 1 2 3 which in the example embodiment represents the sequence of blocks that are separated by 64 milliseconds of time HICP n is an M element vector containing the n set of amplitudes in the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 LMIP k is an M element vector defined by the Locally Measured Identification Parameters 440 for the k processing block the represents vector dot product which is an element by element multiplication with summation over the products and the max In 1 N indicates the maximum with respect to the N sets of M PSD amplitude values in the calibration data in Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 0
17. e is provided Such a user interface may be readily integrated into the design of the dash or steering wheel allowing for ergonomically placed controls or touch screen displays Indeed a quality user interface to factory installed telematics systems provides a valuable feature that may be used in marketing to enhance vehicle sales 0007 In the case of many aftermarket devices however the concealed nature of the device installation is problematic to providing even a minimal user input interface These types of aftermarket telematics systems such as fleet tracking devices automatic crash notification devices and usage based insurance devices would benefit from an accessible push button switch user input interface These systems do not require a more elaborate interface such as a touch screen or keypad For example a push button switch user input inter face is desirable so the driver can respond to synthesized voice prompts in order to configure or command the telemat ics system Also an un prompted push button user input could serve as an emergency HELP MAYDAY switch to initiate contact with a telematics service center or 911 emer gency dispatch operator 0008 Note the terms switch push button and push button switch are used interchangeably here and meant to include any type of binary or ON OFF control signaling method that is easily and directly activated and or inactivated by the user An example of this type
18. ensor 130 the sound processor 140 and the voice prompt generator 150 may reside in the in vehicle device 155 as shown in FIG 1A Alterna tively these apparatus elements in other embodiments not shown may be external to the in vehicle device and the decision for Push Button ON OFF 145 may be communicated with the device via well known wireline or wireless tech niques for example by means of a Bluetooth wireless link 0014 The example method of the application diagrammed in FIG 1B consists of the Acquisition of Sound Sensor Data process 155 which involves sampling data from the sound sensor 130 the process called Calibration Phase Horn Sound Acquisition and Processing 160 which determines the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 170 and the process called Sensing Phase Sound Acquisition and Processing 180 which uses the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 170 and determines a decision for Push Button ON OFF 190 In preferred embodiments the signal processing in the cali bration phase analyzes the harmonic nature of the user s vehicle horn sound to parametrically characterize the har monics in the sound The signal processing in the sensing phase then uses these parameters to detect the presence or absence of a sound with the same parametrically defined harmonics 0015 In one example embodiment of the application the in vehicle device 155 of FIG 1A is an aftermarket telematics device that plugs into the vehicle s OB
19. erein the predetermined num ber of times per second is two times per second and the predefined time frame is four seconds 7 The method of claim 2 further comprising comparing a sequence of detection statistics to a predeter mined detection threshold and determining whether the motor vehicle horn sound is on or off based on the comparison 8 An apparatus comprising a processor configured to generate a prompt to initiate a sound signal areceiver configured to receive the sound signal responsive to the generated prompt a memory configured to record the sound signal a processor configured to compute a power spectral density of the sound signal determine a sound start up point and a sound drop off point of the sound signal based on signal power iden tified from the computed power spectral density utilize a plurality of components of the power spectral density of the sound signal between the sound start up points and sound drop off point to create a set of sound calibration parameters and process subsequent sound signals with the sound cali bration parameters to determine if they are compa rable to the sound signal 9 The apparatus of claim 8 wherein the power spectral density is computed by using a fast Fourier transform FFT performed on the sound signal 10 The apparatus of claim 8 wherein the sound signal is a motor vehicle horn sound that is recorded for a predetermined amount of time 11 The apparatus
20. fined time frame 20 The non transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 19 wherein the predetermined number of times per second is two times per second and the predefined time frame is four seconds
21. gnal in memory computing a power spectral density of the sound signal determining a sound start up point and a sound drop off point of the sound signal based on signal power identi fied from the computed power spectral density utilizing a plurality of components of the power spectral density of the sound signal between the sound start up point and the sound drop off point to create a set of sound calibration parameters and processing subsequent sound signals with the sound cali bration parameters to determine if they are comparable to the sound signal 2 The method of claim 1 wherein the power spectral density is computed by using a fast Fourier transform FFT performed on the sound signal 3 The method of claim 1 wherein the sound signal is a motor vehicle horn sound that is recorded for a predetermined amount of time 4 The method of claim 1 further comprising identifying a frequency and an amplitude of M largest tones of the sound signal the M largest tones identified as being a predefined number of sound signal compo nents above a predetermined fundamental low fre quency and designating the M largest tones as horn identification cali bration parameters US 2013 0328671 Al 5 The method of claim 4 further comprising measuring the frequency and the amplitude of the M largest tones of the sound signal for a predetermined number of times per second over a predefined time frame 6 The method of claim 5 wh
22. he application can be implemented at the vehicle manufacturing plant However as developed below a definite need for the application is associated with certain unreadily accessible aftermarket devices and systems Furthermore the application is not restricted to vehicles since operators of other forms of transport use horns as a means of warning others or gaining attention to the transport operations and the application applies to these transports as well The term vehicle will be used for readability but should be inter preted as including these other forms of transport 0004 Vehicle telematics devices and systems employ tele communications and information processing for a variety on board functions and communication capabilities Examples of vehicle telematics functions include emergency warning GPS navigation integrated hands free cell phones automatic crash notification wireless safety communica tions and automatic driving assistance Several new car manufacturers offer factory installed telematics systems in their new vehicles For example General Motors Corpora Dec 12 2013 tions offers the OnStar system Ford Corporation offers the SYNC system and Hughes Telematics offers their system through OEM arrangements with manufactures such as Mer cedes Benz Corporation 0005 Inaddition a growing aftermarket telematics device and system industry offers telematics devices for use in exist ing vehicles These afterma
23. he sound signal determining a sound start up point and a sound drop off point of the sound signal based on signal power identified from the computed power spectral density utilizing a plurality of components of the power spectral density of the sound signal between the sound start up and sound drop off points to create a set of sound calibration parameters and processing subsequent sound sig nals with the calibration parameters to determine if they are comparable to the sound signal BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 0019 FIG 1A depicts a diagram of an example system of the application that consists of horn generation apparatus sound sensing and processing apparatus and an optional voice prompt generation apparatus 0020 FIG 1B depicts a diagram of the method of the application that consists of a calibration phase and a sensing phase 0021 FIG 2 is a diagram of the calibration phase of an example embodiment of the application 0022 FIG 3A illustrates an example amplitude versus time plot of horn sound data acquired for calibration in an example embodiment of the application using an analog to digital converter when considerable background noise is present 0023 FIG 3B and FIG 3C are power spectral density PSD estimates in an example embodiment of the applica tion before and after the user depresses the horn button respectively 0024 FIG 3D illustrates the horn calibration parameters in an example embodiment
24. ication Publication Dec 12 2013 Sheet 6 of 8 US 2013 0328671 Al FIG 3D Patent Application Publication Dec 12 2013 Sheet 7 of 8 US 2013 0328671 Al 410 430 440 x 420 ieee O ccm ee Ca Para a a Kn E OE EERE i Continuous Locally Measured ahis Power Spectrum Specirum i Acquisition of Sound Measurement Analysis identification Sensor Data Parameters 260 450 x N anne 2 gan Dokar ue Parameters Statistic epee oe I te Push Button Detection Decision Sensing Phase Sound Acquisition and Processing ON OFF FIG 4 1907 Patent Application Publication Dec 12 2013 Sheet 8 of 8 US 2013 0328671 Al Processor FIG 5 US 2013 0328671 Al HORN INPUT TO IN VEHICLE DEVICES AND SYSTEMS CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 0001 This application claims priority to U S provisional application No 61 658 613 entitled Horn Input to In Ve hicle Devices and System dated Jun 12 2012 This appli cation is related to application Ser No 13 276 991 entitled Detecting a Transport Emergency Event and Directly Enabling Emergency Services filed on Oct 19 2011 and Docket No Guardity012012A entitled Qualifying Auto matic Vehicle Crash Emergency Calls to Public Safety Answering Points filed on even date herewith and Docket No Guardity012012B entitled Qualifying Automatic Vehicle Crash Emergency Calls to Public Safety Answering Points
25. mbodiment of the system method and computer readable medium of the present appli cation has been illustrated in the accompanied drawings and described in the foregoing detailed description it will be US 2013 0328671 Al understood that the application is not limited to the embodi ments disclosed but is capable of numerous rearrangements modifications and substitutions without departing from the spirit or scope of the application as set forth and defined by the following claims For example the capabilities of the systems can be performed by one or more of the operations or com ponents described herein or in a distributed architecture and may include a transmitter receiver or pair of both For example all or part of the functionality performed by the individual operations may be performed by one or more of these operations Further the functionality described herein may be performed at various times and in relation to various events internal or external to the operations or components Also the information sent between various operations can be sent between the operations via at least one of a data network the Internet a voice network an Internet Protocol network a wireless device a wired device and or via plurality of proto cols Also the messages sent or received by any of the opera tions may be sent or received directly and or via one or more of the other operations 0050 One skilled in the art will appreciate that a
26. nitoring the sound sensor for a pre determined duration for example 6 seconds after the prompt is played Note here and elsewhere that the voice prompt is a preferred but optional means of prompting the user Other well known user prompt methods and apparatus which may be used include for example a processor generated beep sound or blinking light the meaning of which might be explained in a user manual or training video For readability this description will hence forth refer only to the voice prompt implementation 0029 FIG 3A illustrates an example amplitude versus time plot of sound data acquired for calibration using an analog to digital converter with a sample rate of 8000 samples per second In this example although there is con siderable background noise it is still apparent that the horn goes ON at the first narrow arrow 310 and goes OFF at the second narrow arrow 320 This example horn data is from a 2001 Chevrolet Tahoe parked near a busy road 0030 Referring to FIG 2 the sound data is input to a Power Spectrum Measurement function 220 which computes a sequence of power spectral density PSD estimates where each PSD provides amplitude versus frequency information For example well known methods exist for using Fast Fourier Transform FFT algorithms to efficiently compute PSD esti mates for sampled and digitized data FIGS 3B and 3C are PSD estimates computed using FFT techniques on data that is located as indicated b
27. not belong to separate tones The Spectrum Analy sis 250 in this example embodiment may then output the frequency and amplitude data of the M largest tones as the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 0033 FIG 3D illustrates the Horn Identification Calibra tion Parameters 260 for a version of this example embodi ment wherein the Spectrum Analysis 250 simply records the frequency and amplitude parameters M 5 largest separated tones The 5 largest tones are identified by the letters a to e in both FIGS 3C and 3D The data in the frequency and amplitude columns of the table in FIG 3D constitute the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 0034 It is observed in practice that for horn sounds of several seconds the PSD data is nearly stationary for some vehicle horns but slowly changing for other vehicle horns Both of these types of observed vehicle horns are in agree ment with the vehicle horn model of Guillaume Lemaitre Patrick Susini Suzanne Winsberg Stephen McAdams in The Sound Quality of Car Horns Designing New Represen tative Sounds Acta Acustica united with Acustica Vol 95 2009 The slowly changing non stationary vehicle horns motivate taking multiple sets of measurements during the calibration horn sound For example the frequency and amplitude data of the M largest tones can be measured every half second for a 4 second calibration horn sound In this case the Horn Identification Calib
28. of claim 8 wherein the processor is further configured to identify a frequency and an amplitude of M largest tones of the sound signal the M largest tones identified as being a predefined number of sound signal com ponents above a predetermined fundamental low frequency and designate the M largest tones as horn identification cali bration parameters 12 The apparatus of claim 11 wherein the processor is further configured to measure the frequency and the ampli tude of the M largest tones of the sound signal for a predeter mined number of times per second over a predefined time frame 13 The apparatus of claim 12 wherein the predetermined number of times per second is two times per second and the predefined time frame is four seconds Dec 12 2013 14 The apparatus of claim 9 wherein the processor is further configured to compare a sequence of detection statis tics to a predetermined detection threshold and determine whether the motor vehicle horn sound is on or off based on the comparison 15 A non transitory computer readable storage medium configured to store instructions that when executed cause a processor to perform generating a prompt to initiate a sound signal receiving the sound signal responsive to generating the prompt recording the sound signal in memory computing a power spectral density of the sound signal determining a sound start up point and a sound drop off point of the sound signal based on signal
29. or 0036 Referring again to FIG 2 the diagrammed example embodiment of the Calibration Phase Horn Sound Acquisi tion and Processing 160 also includes a Parameter Qualifica tion 270 that inputs the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 and the signal detection information from Horn ON OFF Decision 240 The Parameter Qualification 270 decides if the calibration is satisfactory and in this example embodiment provides a Calibration Quality Report as output to the Calibration Control module 280 For example the Calibration Quality Report may based on the signal detection information from Horn ON OFF Decision 240 indicate that the horn was not properly held continuously ON as requested or that the background noise level needs to be reduced Alternatively the Calibration Quality Report may ask for a repeat calibration based on the absence of any harmonic relationships between the M 5 largest tones in the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 Note the comments in FIG 3D for examples of the expected harmonic nature of a vehicle horn sound Typically if none of the higher frequency tones have frequencies that are multiples of one of the two lowest frequency tones then the calibration is suspect and deserves to be repeated If upon repetition of the calibra tion process the data in the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 are reproduced within the expected variabil ity then the calibration may be trusted Upon suc
30. power identi fied from the computed power spectral density utilizing a plurality of components of the power spectral density of the sound signal between the sound start up point and the sound drop off point to create a set of sound calibration parameters and process subsequent sound signals with the sound calibra tion parameters to determine if they are comparable to the sound signal 16 The non transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 15 wherein the power spectral density is computed by using a fast Fourier transform FFT performed on the sound signal 17 The non transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 15 wherein the sound signal is a motor vehicle horn sound that is recorded for a predetermined amount of time 18 The non transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 15 wherein the processor is further configured to perform identifying a frequency and an amplitude of M largest tones of the sound signal the M largest tones identified as being a predefined number of sound signal compo nents above a predetermined fundamental low fre quency and designating the M largest tones as horn identification cali bration parameters 19 The non transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 18 wherein the processor is further configured to perform measuring the frequency and the amplitude of the M largest tones of the sound signal for a predetermined number of times per second over a prede
31. pproaches exist such as simply summing all of the PSD bins US 2013 0328671 Al above 500 MHz for making a horn ON OFF decision given sound data recorded in a short duration observation window immediately following a prompt for the user to honk the horn The calibration phase Horn ON OFF Decision 240 has the advantage that during calibration the user may be encouraged to reduce the ambient sound noise 0032 Referring again to FIG 2 the Horn ON OFF Deci sion 240 is input to the Spectrum Analysis 250 which also inputs the sequential PSD data vectors from the Power Spec trum Measurement 220 For example given a sound data sample rate of 8000 samples per second and block processing FFT based PSD measurement with block size of 512 real sound samples and an FFT size of NFFT 256 the Spectrum Analysis 250 may input a new 128 element PSD data vector every 64 milliseconds The PSD data vectors displayed in FIGS 3B and 3C are examples of such PSD data vectors An example embodiment of the Spectrum Analysis 250 process ing is to simply determine the frequency and amplitude of the M largest tones e g sharp spectral features for frequencies above some moderately low frequency for example 500 Hz Since individual tones may span multiple PSD frequency bins this separated tone processing is different than determining the M largest PSD data elements as is well known The M largest PSD elements may contain bins that are adjacent and hence do
32. ration Parameters 260 con sists of N 8 sequential sets of frequency and amplitude data The total number of parameters to be stored in the Horn Identification Calibration Parameters 260 for M 5 is then N M 2 or 8 5 2 80 parameters each of which can be stored in 2 bytes for a small total parameter storage requirement of 160 bytes 0035 Note that the realization that vehicle horn sound recognition can be based on a relatively simple analysis for example of efficiently computed power spectral density data is one aspect of the application Sound recognition in general however is like speech recognition in that it can be both algorithmically and computationally demanding as dis cussed for example by Michael Cowling and Renate Sitte in the article Analysis of Speech Recognition Techniques for Dec 12 2013 use ina Non Speech Sound Recognition System in Proceed ings 6th International Symposium on Digital Signal Process ing for Communication Systems 2002 and in the article Comparison of Techniques for Environmental Sound Recog nition in Pattern Recognition Letters 24 2003 Using the vehicle horn as a user input to provide the function of a push button switch for in vehicle devices is attractive in part due to the relatively straightforward signal processing required for horn sound recognition and the ability to do this processing with a low percentage of the total computational capacity of an inexpensive embedded process
33. rket telematics products enable the upgrade of older vehicles with similar telematics func tions as those available on new cars Additionally these after market telematics products may provide additional functions for example fleet tracking or the capture of vehicle telemetry data for usage based vehicle insurance rating Examples of fleet tracking devices are available from CES Wireless Cor poration and Sierra Wireless Corporation The Snapshot device from Progressive Insurance Company is a well known telematics device for usage based insurance Like several of the newer aftermarket telematics products the Snapshot device plugs into and draws power from the vehicle s stan dardized on board diagnostic port referred to as an OBDII connector The OBDII plug in devices provide a straightfor ward user installation In comparison several commercial fleet tracking devices are still rugged bricks the size of a blackboard eraser or larger that are intended for professional installation involving more elaborate mechanical mountings and custom wiring 0006 The installation location of both factory installed and certain aftermarket devices and systems may not always fall within convenient arm s reach of the operator For example a device may be installed inside the dashboard of the vehicle In the case of factory installed telematics systems these concealed locations may not be problematic if a well designed user interfac
34. ty of the sound signal between the sound start up and the sound drop off points to create a set of sound calibration parameters and processing subsequent sound signals with the calibration parameters to determine if they are comparable to the sound signal 0017 Another example embodiment may provide an apparatus that includes a processor configured to generate a prompt to initiate a sound signal a receiver configured to receive the sound signal responsive to the generated prompt US 2013 0328671 Al amemory configured to record the sound signal a processor configured to compute a power spectral density of the sound signal determine a sound start up point and a sound drop off point of the sound signal based on signal power identified from the computed power spectral density utilize a plurality of components of the power spectral density of the sound signal between the sound start up and sound drop off points to create a set of sound calibration parameters and process subsequent sound signals the calibration parameters to deter mine if they are comparable to the sound signal 0018 Another example embodiment may provide a non transitory computer readable storage medium configured to store instructions that when executed cause a processor to perform generating a prompt to initiate a sound signal receiv ing the sound signal responsive to generating the prompt recording the sound signal in memory computing a power spectral density of t
35. udio signal processing technology that is required to provide a reliable voice activation user interface has a large processing burden and may be difficult to economically justify These telematics devices plug into the OBDII connector for device mounting power source and access to vehicle diagnostic data Voice activation technology is superfluous for a simple push button switch type of user interface for these reduced cost telematics devices For example the push button switch may only be needed for user aided configuration of the device and for providing the user with HELP MAYDAY button functionality 0011 What would be optimal is an inexpensive and acces sible user input interface for in vehicle devices and systems that can serve the function of a simple push button switch For example this type of user interface is needed for low cost user installed consumer oriented OBDI mounted telemat ics devices Such an interface will allow enhanced function ality for example by allowing the user to configure and command the device in response to audio prompts and by providing the user with a HELP MAYDAY button function that can be used to obtain help in an emergency SUMMARY OF APPLICATION 0012 The present application provides systems and meth ods that use a vehicle horn to provide an inexpensive user input interface that can serve the function of a push button switch for an in vehicle device or system Example embodi ments contain
36. y the broad arrows 330 and 340 respec tively in FIG 3A FIG 3B is computed from sound data that was acquired before the user depressed the horn button and shows the spectrum of the background noise FIG 3C is computed from sound data that was acquired with the horn ON It is clear from comparing FIGS 3A 3B and 3C that the horn being ON is easier to see in the computed PSD amplitude versus frequency data than the original amplitude versus time sampled sound data 0031 Referring again to FIG 2 it is for this reason e g that the horn being ON is readily apparent in the PSD data that a Signal Power Measurement 230 inputs the PSD data from the Power Spectrum Measurement 220 and that a sub sequent Horn ON OFF Decision 240 is based on the signal power measurement from PSD data An example of a simple signal power measurement algorithm that is suitable here is to take the average of the 10 largest amplitude PSD bins above some moderately low frequency for example 500 Hz For example if there were only 7 bins above some frequency and if these 7 bins are represented by the vector PSDbins 988 25 44 82 720 51 6 33 then the average of the 2 largest bins is 9884 720 2 854 For the data shown in FIGS 3B and 3C this provides signal power measurements of 188 and 1163 respectively The Horn ON OFF Decision 240 would then be accurate using a threshold of 500 for example It is well known to those skilled in the art that many other reliable a
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