Telematics-based vehicle data acquisition architecture

1. A method of acquiring vehicle parameter data from a vehicle data bus, comprising:

providing a telematics application on a local telematics unit within a vehicle, the telematics application implemented as a software program including generic requests for vehicle parameter data that are not specific to any particular make or model of the vehicle;

providing an abstract software layer operatively disposed between the telematics application and the vehicle data bus;

executing the telematics application;

retrieving, by the abstract software layer and responsive to a request for vehicle parameter data from the telematics application, vehicle data bus configuration information from a database that stores data bus configuration information for a plurality of different types of data busses, the retrieved vehicle data bus configuration information being associated with the type of data bus used on the vehicle on which the telematics application is executed;

extracting vehicle parameter data from the vehicle data bus using the vehicle data bus configuration information retrieved from the database, the vehicle parameter data corresponding to the request for vehicle parameter data;

interpreting the retrieved vehicle parameter data; and

providing the interpreted vehicle parameter data to the telematics application to satisfy the request for vehicle parameter data.

2. A method according to claim 1 wherein the step of retrieving comprises:

establishing a wireless link to a remote server;

accessing a vehicle database with the remote server; and

downloading vehicle data bus information to the local vehicle library from the remote database.

3. A method according to claim 2 wherein the step of using further comprises passing the vehicle data bus configuration information to a protocol driver.

4. A method according to claim 1 wherein:

the telematics application comprises a vehicle diagnostics application program.

5. A method of acquiring vehicle parameter data from any of a plurality of different vehicle makes, comprising:

executing a telematics application on a local telematics unit operatively connected to a vehicle;

requesting vehicle parameter data by the telematics application;

accessing, responsive to the step of requesting vehicle parameter data, a database that stores data bus configuration information for a plurality of different vehicle makes;

querying the database to retrieve data bus configuration information for a particular vehicle make that corresponds to the vehicle;

extracting vehicle parameter data from a vehicle data bus using the vehicle data bus configuration information; and

conditionally requesting other vehicle parameter data by the telematics application depending upon the extracted vehicle parameter data.

6. A method as recited in claim 5 , wherein the step of extracting comprises passing the data bus configuration information to a protocol driver.

7. A method as recited in claim 5 , wherein the telematics application includes a plurality of requests for vehicle parameter data, the method comprising, for each request,

accessing, responsive to the step of requesting vehicle parameter data, the database that stores data bus configuration information for a plurality of different vehicle makes;

querying the database to retrieve data bus configuration information for a particular vehicle make; and

extracting vehicle parameter data from a vehicle data bus using the vehicle data bus configuration information.

8. A method as recited in claim 5 , wherein the step of accessing comprises establishing a wireless link to a remote server operatively connected to the vehicle database.

9. A method as recited in claim 5 , wherein the local telematics unit employs an open standard services delivery platform.

10. A method as recited in claim 1 , wherein the request for vehicle parameter data is a first request, and further comprising the telematics application making a second request for vehicle parameter data responsive to the interpreted data returned in response to the first request.

11. A method as recited in claim 5 , wherein the telematics application is one of a navigation application, a security application, and a diagnostic application.

12. A method of deploying a telematics application in a plurality of vehicles having different makes and/or models, wherein an abstract software layer is installed within each of the plurality of vehicles and is operatively connected to a data bus of the respective vehicle, comprising, for each vehicle:

providing a telematics application that includes a generic request to the abstract software layer for vehicle parameter data;

running the telematics application within the respective vehicle;

retrieving, by the abstract software layer and responsive to the generic request for vehicle parameter data by the telematics application, vehicle data bus configuration information from a database that stores data bus configuration information for a plurality of different types of data buses, the retrieved vehicle data bus configuration information being associated with the type of data bus used on the vehicle on which the telematics application is run;

extracting vehicle parameter data from the vehicle data bus using the vehicle data bus configuration information retrieved from the database; and

providing the extracted vehicle parameter data to the telematics application to satisfy the generic request.