阅读说明：本技术 一种用于车机的路况规划方法及系统 (road condition planning method and system for vehicle machine ) 是由 鹿培信 沙丹 于 2018-05-31 设计创作，主要内容包括：本发明提供了一种用于车机的路况规划方法及系统。该方法包括步骤S1：获取用户的行程信息；步骤S2：基于当前位置和行程信息中的终点选择若干条导航路线；步骤S3：基于导航路线的历史路况信息和/或实时路况信息计算从当前位置到终点的行驶时间,确定导航路线；步骤S4：依照已确定的导航路线进行导航；步骤S5：根据实时路况信息确定是否需要重新规划导航路线,如果需要,则转入步骤S2。本发明还提供了一种用于前方路况预测的车机,一种车机设备和一种计算机可读存储介质。(The invention provides a road condition planning method and system for a vehicle machine. The method includes step S1: acquiring the travel information of a user; step S2: selecting a plurality of navigation routes based on the current position and the end point in the travel information; step S3: calculating the driving time from the current position to the terminal point based on the historical road condition information and/or the real-time road condition information of the navigation route, and determining the navigation route; step S4: navigating according to the determined navigation route; step S5: and determining whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the real-time road condition information, and if so, turning to the step S2. The invention also provides a vehicle machine for predicting the road condition ahead, vehicle machine equipment and a computer readable storage medium.)

1. A road condition planning method for a vehicle machine comprises the following steps:

Step S1: acquiring the travel information of a user;

Step S2: selecting a number of navigation routes based on a current location and an end point in the trip information;

step S3: calculating the driving time from the current position to the terminal point based on the historical road condition information and/or the real-time road condition information of the navigation route, and determining the navigation route;

Step S4: navigating according to the determined navigation route;

Step S5: and determining whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the real-time road condition information, and if so, turning to the step S2.

2. The traffic planning method according to claim 1, further comprising:

Step S6: judging whether the terminal is reached, if the terminal is not reached, continuing the current navigation, and turning to the step S5;

Step S7: and ending the navigation.

3. a road condition planning method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the navigation route includes a plurality of road segments from the current position to the destination, the historical road condition information includes historical data of the road segments, and the average value of the vehicle speed when the vehicle reaches each road segment is predicted according to the historical data in step S3.

4. A road condition planning method as claimed in claim 3, wherein in step S3, the total travel time of each navigation route is calculated according to the average vehicle speed when the vehicle reaches each road segment, so as to determine the navigation route with the shortest travel time.

5. A road condition planning method as claimed in claim 3, wherein the historical data comprises the average vehicle speed of the road segment over different time periods.

6. The traffic planning method according to claim 1, wherein the real-time traffic information comprises a real-time vehicle speed average and traffic events of each road segment in the navigation route.

7. A road condition planning method as claimed in claim 6, wherein the road condition event comprises traffic accidents and road closure information of all segments of the navigation route.

8. The traffic planning method according to claim 7, wherein step S3 comprises calculating the driving time from the current position to the destination according to the processing time corresponding to the traffic event, and step S5 comprises determining whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the processing time corresponding to the traffic event.

9. A car machine for road conditions planning, includes:

The acquisition module is used for acquiring the travel information of the user;

An extraction module for extracting end point information from the trip information;

The route generation module generates a plurality of navigation routes based on the current position and the terminal point information;

The route calculation module is used for calculating the running time from the current position to the terminal point according to the historical road condition information and/or the real-time road condition information of the navigation route and determining the navigation route;

and the judging module determines whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the real-time road condition information.

10. The vehicle machine of claim 9, further comprising a map storage module storing map data, said route generation module generating a plurality of navigation routes based on current location and destination information from said map data.

11. The vehicle machine of claim 9, wherein the route comparison module comprises a comparison unit for comparing the travel times of the plurality of navigation routes to determine the navigation route with the shortest travel time.

12. The vehicle machine according to claim 9, further comprising a communication module, for communicating with an external server to obtain historical road condition information and/or real-time road condition information of the navigation route.

13. The vehicle machine of claim 9, wherein the obtaining module comprises:

A receiving unit for receiving a voice input of a user; and

A voice recognition unit for performing voice recognition on the voice input to recognize the trip information.

14. In-vehicle machine apparatus comprising a memory, a processor and a computer program stored on the memory and executable on the processor, wherein the processor implements the steps of the method according to any one of claims 1 to 8 when executing the computer program.

15. A computer-readable storage medium, on which a computer program is stored which, when being executed by a processor, carries out the steps of the method according to any one of claims 1 to 8.

Technical Field

the invention relates to the field of vehicle machines, in particular to a road condition planning method and a road condition planning system for a vehicle machine.

Background

With the development of social economy, the number of motor vehicles is increasing day by day, and the development of automobile electronic technology makes people rely on navigation equipment to plan driving road sections when going out. The existing navigation device usually provides a plurality of driving road section planning modes for users, including: the shortest driving section, the shortest driving time and the like. The user can select a suitable driving road section planning mode according to the self demand so as to meet the travel demand.

However, in many cases, conventional navigation devices are based on navigation data that is fixedly stored when planning a route section. With the increase of the current urban automobile holding capacity, particularly in the morning and evening peak hours, road congestion or traffic accidents often occur. The navigation device for planning the driving road section based on the navigation data which is fixedly stored cannot obtain real-time road condition information, so that serious traffic jam exists in some planned road sections, the traveling time of a user is greatly increased, and the use experience of the user is seriously reduced.

currently, some navigation devices have considered to acquire some traffic information through a network to assist navigation, and adjust a road section plan to avoid a congested road section through the acquired traffic information. For example, although the user may be alerted to a road condition event within a certain distance in front of the user, the user may often not be able to reroute the road while traveling overhead or at high speed.

Disclosure of Invention

The following presents a simplified summary of one or more aspects in order to provide a basic understanding of such aspects. This summary is not an extensive overview of all contemplated aspects, and is intended to neither identify key or critical elements of all aspects nor delineate the scope of any or all aspects. Its sole purpose is to present some concepts of one or more aspects in a simplified form as a prelude to the more detailed description that is presented later.

in order to achieve the above object and provide a better navigation route service for locomotive users, the present invention provides a road condition planning method for a locomotive, comprising: step S1: acquiring the travel information of a user; step S2: selecting a number of navigation routes based on a current location and an end point in the trip information; step S3: calculating the driving time from the current position to the terminal point based on the historical road condition information and/or the real-time road condition information of the navigation route, and determining the navigation route; step S4: navigating according to the determined navigation route; step S5: and determining whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the real-time road condition information, and if so, turning to the step S2.

in an embodiment of the above method, the method further includes: step S6: judging whether the terminal is reached, if the terminal is not reached, continuing the current navigation, and turning to the step S5; step S7: and ending the navigation.

In an embodiment of the method, the navigation route includes a plurality of road segments from a current position to a destination, the historical road condition information includes historical data of the road segments, and the average value of the vehicle speed when the vehicle reaches each road segment is predicted according to the historical data in step S3.

In an embodiment of the above method, in step S3, the total travel time of each navigation route is calculated according to the average value of the vehicle speed when the vehicle machine reaches each road segment, so as to determine the navigation route with the shortest travel time.

In one embodiment of the above method, the historical data includes vehicle speed averages for the road segments over different time periods.

In an embodiment of the above method, the real-time traffic information includes a real-time vehicle speed average value of each road segment in the navigation route and a traffic event.

In an embodiment of the method, the road condition event includes traffic accidents and road closure information of all the segments of the navigation route.

In an embodiment of the method, step S3 includes calculating a driving time from a current position to a destination according to the processing time corresponding to the road condition event, and step S5 includes determining whether a navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the processing time corresponding to the road condition event.

The invention also provides a vehicle machine for predicting the road condition ahead, which comprises: the acquisition module is used for acquiring the travel information of the user; an extraction module for extracting end point information from the trip information; the route generation module generates a plurality of navigation routes based on the current position and the terminal point information; the route calculation module is used for calculating the running time from the current position to the terminal point according to the historical road condition information and/or the real-time road condition information of the navigation route and determining the navigation route; and the judging module determines whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the real-time road condition information.

In an embodiment of the foregoing vehicle device, the vehicle device further includes a map storage module that stores map data, and the route generation module generates a plurality of navigation routes according to the map data and based on the current position and the destination information.

In an embodiment of the aforementioned vehicle device, the route comparing module includes a comparing unit for comparing the travel time of the navigation routes to determine the navigation route according to the shortest travel time.

in an embodiment of the vehicle device, the vehicle device further includes a communication module, which communicates with an external server to obtain historical traffic information and/or real-time traffic information of the navigation route.

In an embodiment of the foregoing vehicle device, the obtaining module includes:

A receiving unit for receiving a voice input of a user; and

a voice recognition unit for performing voice recognition on the voice input to recognize the trip information.

In an embodiment of the aforementioned vehicle device, the aforementioned obtaining module includes: a receiving unit for receiving a voice input of a user; and a voice recognition unit for performing voice recognition on the voice input to recognize the navigation route.

The invention also provides the in-vehicle equipment which comprises a memory, a processor and a computer program which is stored on the memory and can run on the processor, wherein the steps of the method provided by the invention are realized when the processor executes the computer program.

The invention also provides a computer-readable storage medium, on which a computer program is stored which, when being executed by a processor, carries out the steps of the method as provided by the invention.

According to the method, the vehicle machine equipment and the computer readable storage medium provided by the invention, a more intelligent and humanized navigation function is realized, the navigation route of the user can be planned, the optimal navigation route is recommended in time according to the real-time road condition information in the vehicle machine navigation process, the user can conveniently and fast change the optimal navigation route, and the travel efficiency is improved.

It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description of the present invention are exemplary and explanatory and are intended to provide further explanation of the invention as claimed.

Drawings

The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a further understanding of the invention and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this application, illustrate embodiment(s) of the invention and together with the description serve to explain the principle of the invention. In the drawings:

Fig. 1 shows a schematic flow diagram of a method provided according to the invention.

Fig. 2 shows a schematic block diagram of a vehicle machine according to the present invention.

Wherein the figures include the following reference numerals:

In-vehicle machine 200 acquisition module 201

Extraction module 202 route generation module 203

Route calculation module 204 decision block 205

Map storage module 206 communication module 207

Detailed Description

It should be noted that the embodiments and features of the embodiments in the present application may be combined with each other without conflict.

the technical solutions in the embodiments of the present application will be clearly and completely described below with reference to the drawings in the embodiments of the present application. It is to be understood that the embodiments described are only a few embodiments of the present application and not all embodiments. The following description of at least one exemplary embodiment is merely illustrative in nature and is in no way intended to limit the application, its application, or uses. All other embodiments, which can be derived by a person skilled in the art from the embodiments given herein without making any creative effort, shall fall within the protection scope of the present application.

It is noted that the terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of example embodiments according to the present application. As used herein, the singular forms "a", "an" and "the" are intended to include the plural forms as well, and it should be understood that when the terms "comprises" and/or "comprising" are used in this specification, they specify the presence of stated features, steps, operations, devices, components, and/or combinations thereof, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise.

As described above, in order to predict the vehicle speed of the road ahead in the navigation route of the user, and recommend an optimal navigation route in time during the car navigation process, so as to facilitate the user and the user to conveniently and quickly change the optimal navigation route, the present invention provides a road condition planning method for a car machine, fig. 1 shows a schematic flow diagram of the method according to the present invention, and as shown in fig. 1, the method provided by the present invention includes step S1: acquiring the travel information of a user; step S2: selecting a number of navigation routes based on a current location and an end point in the trip information; step S3: calculating the driving time from the current position to the terminal point based on the historical road condition information and/or the real-time road condition information of the navigation route, and determining the navigation route; step S4: navigating according to the determined navigation route; step S5: and determining whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the real-time road condition information, and if so, turning to the step S2, namely re-planning the navigation route.

Further, the road condition planning method provided by the present invention further includes step S6: judging whether the terminal is reached, if the terminal is not reached, continuing the current navigation, and turning to the step S5; step S7: and ending the navigation.

In another embodiment, the navigation route includes a plurality of road segments from the current location to the terminal point. Each navigation route is an independent path, and one path comprises a plurality of road sections which are connected end to end. The historical road condition information includes historical data of the road segments, and the average value of the vehicle speed when the vehicle reaches each road segment is predicted according to the historical data of the road segments in step S3.

As can be readily appreciated, congestion or traffic accidents often occur on the road sections traveled by some locomotives, thereby causing users relying on existing navigation devices to encounter traffic jams while traveling, and forcing increased travel time. However, further observation of the road conditions of these road sections shows that the congestion condition usually shows a certain regularity. For example, in the morning peak of monday and the morning peak of friday, the average vehicle speed of the road section is far lower than the average vehicle speed in the same time period from tuesday to thursday, and the average vehicle speed in the noon time period on weekends is far lower than the average vehicle speed in the noon time period on weekdays. Particularly, in the morning and evening peak hours of a working day and some hours of public holidays, some road sections connecting the elevated roads and the expressway and the on-off ramps of the elevated roads are seriously congested, and the traffic is relatively smooth in other time periods. Therefore, if the regular road conditions can be effectively utilized, the travel efficiency of the user can be undoubtedly improved.

the road conditions of all road sections in the city can be statistically analyzed based on the analysis content. For example, for a certain road segment, historical data of vehicle passing speeds of the certain road segment in different time segments are collected, the historical data can be obtained from a public traffic information database (a historical road condition server), or a special server can be arranged, and the historical data can be obtained in various modes such as network and broadcasting. In order to enable the collected historical data to reflect the road condition of the road section more truly and comprehensively, the collection period can be set to be longer, and the collection points can be set to be more. For example, historical data may be collected of vehicle transit speeds for the road segment over multiple time periods of the same working day for the last month, three months, or half a year. In a specific embodiment of the present invention, the collection period may be set to three months, and the historical data of the vehicle passing speed of the road segment in different time periods of the same working day or non-working day is collected to determine the vehicle speed average value of the road segment in a specific time period, i.e. the historical data includes the vehicle speed average value of each road segment in different time periods.

In another embodiment, in step S3, the total travel time of each navigation route is calculated according to the average vehicle speed when the vehicle reaches each road segment, that is, the travel time of each road segment in one navigation route is accumulated to obtain the travel time of a single navigation route. Then, the navigation routes are compared, and the navigation route is determined by the shortest driving time.

For example, the car machine acquires the travel information of the user, so as to obtain the travel end point of the user. Three navigation routes R1, R2, R3 are assumed to be selected according to the current position and the end of travel. Wherein the navigation route R1 comprises road segments A1, A2 and A3 which are connected in sequence, the navigation route R2 comprises road segments B1, B2, B3 and B4 which are connected in sequence, and the navigation route R3 comprises road segments C1, C2, C3, C4 and C5 which are connected in sequence.

According to the road sections A1, A2 and A3 of the navigation route R1, a user can obtain historical road condition information of the road sections A1, A2 and A3, the vehicle speed average value of the road sections A1, A2 and A3 in the current time period is determined, the time T _A1, T _A2 and T _A3 required by a locomotive to pass through the road sections A1, A2 and A3 can be obtained according to the distance length of the road sections A1, A2 and A3 divided by the vehicle speed average value of the road sections in the current time period, the travel time T _R1 of the navigation route R1 is equal to T _A1 + T _A2 + T _A3, the travel time T _R2 and T _R3 of the navigation routes R2 and R3 can be obtained in the same way, the sizes of T _R1, T _R2 and T _R3 are compared, and the travel time of the navigation route R2 is determined to be navigated on the assumption that the travel time of the T _R2 is the shortest.

_{A1 A1 A2 A3 R1 A1 A2 A3 R2 R3 R1 R2 R3 R3}The method includes calculating a time T of a vehicle, calculating a time T of the vehicle, and a time T of the vehicle.

It should be understood by those skilled in the art that the above examples are only for illustrating the idea of the method provided by the present invention, and the time period, the vehicle speed average, and the distance length may be set or selected according to different actual driving environments.

in another embodiment, the real-time traffic information includes real-time vehicle speed averages of the road segments in the navigation route and traffic events. Further, the road condition event includes traffic accidents and road closure information of all road segments of the navigation route. In step S3, if one or more road segments in the navigation route are completely new road segments without corresponding historical road condition information, the road segments may calculate the driving time of each road segment according to the real-time vehicle speed average value, and further calculate the total driving time. The road condition event comprises traffic accidents and road closing information of all road sections of the navigation route, and is not only based on the current road section or the road condition event occurring within 3-5 kilometers. The navigation route is determined by the road condition events of the entire section of the navigation route in step S3, and it is determined whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned by the road condition events of the entire section of the navigation route in step S5. For example, when a user enters an overhead or highway, only nearby road condition events are prompted, the existing navigation route of the user cannot be changed, and whether events which possibly affect vehicle traveling occur or not in the whole road section can be known by performing road condition event prompting in a wider range, so that the user is reminded to avoid the events, and a more reasonable navigation route is recommended.

In another embodiment, the step S3 includes calculating the driving time from the current position to the destination according to the processing time corresponding to the road condition event, and the step S5 includes determining whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the processing time corresponding to the road condition event. As different types of traffic accidents often require different processing times to restore road clearance. Of course, the corresponding processing time may also be adjusted for different road conditions according to different road segment types, such as 4 lanes, 6 lanes, or one-way lanes. As shown in table 1, only different traffic events are classified, corresponding to different processing times.

TABLE 1

Road conditions event	Required processing time
		Accident of bicycle	1 hour
Accident of multiple vehicles	2 hours
		Road closure	Time period of road closure
…………	…………

For example, three navigation routes R1, R2, R3 are selected at step S2 according to the current position and the travel end. Wherein the navigation route R1 comprises road segments A1, A2 and A3 which are connected in sequence, the navigation route R2 comprises road segments B1, B2, B3 and B4 which are connected in sequence, and the navigation route R3 comprises road segments C1, C2, C3, C4 and C5 which are connected in sequence. And according to the road condition events in the real-time road condition information, acquiring that a single-vehicle accident happens to the road section B4 at 10:00 am, and implementing road closure to the road section C3 at 9-11 am. When it is judged from table 1 that the section B4 requires 1 hour of accident handling time, it is estimated that the section B4 can return to the average value of the historical vehicle speeds by 11 am in anticipation of the completion of the 11:00 handling. It is estimated from the historical road condition information that the time when the locomotive arrives at the section B4 is 11:15 am, that is, when the locomotive arrives at the section B4, the section B4 can be restored to the historical vehicle speed average value, so the driving time of the navigation route R2 is continuously calculated according to the historical road condition information. Next, it is determined from table 1 that the road block at the link C3 is a road block, and the time when the locomotive arrives at the link C3 is estimated to be 11:30 am, and the time period when the locomotive is still in the road block at the link C3 is a time period in which an excessively long travel time is required for the link C3. And determining that the travel time of the navigation route R1 is the shortest based on the travel times of the three navigation routes R1, R2 and R3, and selecting R1 as the determined navigation route. In step S4, navigation is performed in accordance with the navigation route R1. In step S5, it is determined whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the real-time traffic information, and whether a traffic event that may affect the vehicle traveling occurs or occurs in the whole road segment is known. Assuming that a multi-vehicle accident occurred at 10:20 am in the road segment A3, it can be presumed that the road segment A3 to 12:20 am could be restored to the historical vehicle speed average. The time of the locomotive reaching the section A3 is 11:10 a.m. estimated according to the historical road condition information, namely, when the locomotive reaches the section A1, the section A1 cannot recover to the average value of the historical vehicle speed. It is therefore necessary to go to step S2 to reselect several navigation routes based on the current position and the end point in the trip information.

it should be understood by those skilled in the art that the foregoing examples are only for illustrating the idea of the method provided by the present invention, and the types of the road condition events and the required processing time can be set or selected according to different driving environments.

the invention also provides a vehicle machine, and fig. 2 shows a module schematic diagram of the vehicle machine provided by the invention. As shown in fig. 2, the car machine 200 provided by the present invention includes an obtaining module 201, configured to obtain travel information of a user; an extraction module 202, configured to extract end point information from the trip information; a route generation module 203 for generating a plurality of navigation routes based on the current position and the destination information; the route calculation module 204 is used for calculating the running time from the current position to the terminal point according to the historical road condition information and/or the real-time road condition information of the navigation route and determining the navigation route; the determining module 205 determines whether the navigation route needs to be re-planned according to the real-time traffic information.

In one embodiment, the obtaining module 201 may include a receiving unit for receiving a voice input of a user, and a voice recognition unit for performing voice recognition on the voice input to recognize the trip information. In the above embodiment, the trip information of the user may be the trip information that is pre-stored in the vehicle machine in the voice input mode during the current or previous vehicle using process of the user, and after receiving the voice input of the user and recognizing the voice input, the vehicle machine provided by the invention automatically stores the trip information about the user, so as to intelligently provide the trip road condition planning for the user.

In another embodiment, the car machine 200 further comprises a map storage module 206 for storing map data. The route generation module 203 generates several navigation routes based on the current position and the end point information from the map data stored on the map storage module 206.

In another embodiment, the vehicle 200 further includes a communication module 207, which can communicate with an external server to obtain historical traffic information and real-time traffic information of the navigation route. In addition, the car machine 200 can update the map data stored on the map storage module 206 through the communication module 207.

In another embodiment, the route calculation module 204 includes a comparison unit capable of comparing the travel times of several navigation routes to determine the navigation route with the shortest travel time.

The invention also provides the in-vehicle equipment which comprises a memory, a processor and a computer program which is stored on the memory and can run on the processor, wherein the processor realizes the steps in the method when executing the computer program.

The invention also provides a computer-readable storage medium, on which a computer program is stored which, when being executed by a processor, carries out the steps of the above-mentioned method.

The specific implementation manner and technical effect of the vehicle device and the computer-readable storage medium can be referred to the above embodiments of the road condition planning method provided by the present invention, and are not described herein again.

Those of skill would further appreciate that the various illustrative logical blocks, modules, circuits, and algorithm steps described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented as electronic hardware, computer software, or combinations of both. To clearly illustrate this interchangeability of hardware and software, various illustrative components, blocks, modules, circuits, and steps have been described above generally in terms of their functionality. Whether such functionality is implemented as hardware or software depends upon the particular application and design constraints imposed on the overall system. Skilled artisans may implement the described functionality in varying ways for each particular application, but such implementation decisions should not be interpreted as causing a departure from the scope of the present invention.

The various illustrative logical modules, and circuits described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented or performed with a general purpose processor, a Digital Signal Processor (DSP), an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device, discrete gate or transistor logic, discrete hardware components, or any combination thereof designed to perform the functions described herein. A general purpose processor may be a microprocessor, but in the alternative, the processor may be any conventional processor, controller, microcontroller, or state machine. A processor may also be implemented as a combination of computing devices, e.g., a combination of a DSP and a microprocessor, a plurality of microprocessors, one or more microprocessors in conjunction with a DSP core, or any other such configuration.

The steps of a method or algorithm described in connection with the embodiments disclosed herein may be embodied directly in hardware, in a software module executed by a processor, or in a combination of the two. A software module may reside in RAM memory, flash memory, ROM memory, EPROM memory, EEPROM memory, registers, hard disk, a removable disk, a CD-ROM, or any other form of storage medium known in the art. An exemplary storage medium is coupled to the processor such the processor can 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 storage medium may reside in an ASIC. The ASIC may reside in a user terminal. In the alternative, the processor and the storage medium may reside as discrete components in a user terminal.

In one or more exemplary embodiments, the functions described may be implemented in hardware, software, firmware, or any combination thereof. If implemented in software as a computer program product, the functions may be stored on or transmitted over as one or more instructions or code on a computer-readable medium. Computer-readable media includes both computer storage media and communication media including any medium that facilitates transfer of a computer program from one place to another. A storage media may be any available media that can be accessed by a computer. By way of example, and not limitation, such computer-readable media can comprise RAM, ROM, EEPROM, CD-ROM or other optical disk storage, magnetic disk storage or other magnetic storage devices, or any other medium that can be used to carry or store desired program code in the form of instructions or data structures and that can be accessed by a computer. Any connection is properly termed a computer-readable medium. For example, if the software is transmitted from a web site, server, or other remote source using a coaxial cable, fiber optic cable, twisted pair, Digital Subscriber Line (DSL), or wireless technologies such as infrared, radio, and microwave, then the coaxial cable, fiber optic cable, twisted pair, DSL, or wireless technologies such as infrared, radio, and microwave are included in the definition of medium. Disk (disk) and disc (disc), as used herein, includes Compact Disc (CD), laser disc, optical disc, Digital Versatile Disc (DVD), floppy disk and blu-ray disc where disks (disks) usually reproduce data magnetically, while discs (discs) reproduce data optically with lasers. Combinations of the above should also be included within the scope of computer-readable media.

It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made to the above-described exemplary embodiments of the present invention without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. Thus, it is intended that the present invention cover the modifications and variations of this invention provided they come within the scope of the appended claims and their equivalents.