Granted Patent B2

US 12,435,984 · App. 16/972,486 · Granted Oct 7, 2025

Inventors: Yan Mayster (Aurora, CO); Brian Edmond Brewington (Superior, CO); Brian Daniel Shucker (Superior, CO); Marcus Bulach (Pyrmont, AU)

Assignee: GOOGLE LLC

G01C21/3461G01C21/3629G01C21/3691G01S19/42G06F16/24578G06F16/29H04L67/52

Abstract

Claims (70)

1. A computer-implemented method of determining a location suitable for use by a geographic context application, the method comprising:

accessing, by a computing system comprising one or more processors, location data and a plurality of semantic tags associated with one or more locations in a physical environment, wherein each semantic tag is descriptive of one or more features associated with a respective location, and wherein the location data is descriptive of an amount of pedestrian traffic at the one or more locations;

identifying, by the computing system, the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy one or more suitability criteria associated with suitability of each location for use by a geographic context application, wherein the geographic context application comprises an augmented reality application, and wherein the suitability criteria comprises a safety criteria that is satisfied when the amount of pedestrian traffic at a location of the one or more locations exceeds a pedestrian traffic threshold;

determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations in the physical environment based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria;

causing, by the computing system, an element of the augmented reality application to be placed at a location in the augmented reality application, wherein the location in the augmented reality application corresponds to the determined suitable location in the physical environment; and

providing, by the computing system, navigational instructions to a user to guide the user to the element of the augmented reality application placed at the determined suitable location in the physical environment.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, a safety level of each location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the plurality of semantic tags; and

determining, by the computing system, when the safety level of each respective location satisfies the one or more safety criteria.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 2 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, when the safety level of the suitable location satisfies the one or more safety criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, when a location of the one or more locations exceeds a minimum distance to a road,

determining, by the computing system, when a location of the one or more locations exceeds a minimum distance to a predefined elevation change boundary, or

determining, by the computing system, when an amount of pedestrian traffic within a predetermined distance of a location of the one or more locations exceeds the pedestrian traffic threshold.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, based at least in part on the location data, one or more paths from an initial location to the one or more locations;

determining, by the computing system, a path safety level of each path of the one or more paths based at least in part on the one or more features associated with each location of the one or more locations within a predetermined distance of the one or more paths; and

determining, by the computing system, when any of the one or more locations are associated with at least one path of the one or more paths that satisfy one or more path safety criteria.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, a capacity of each location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the plurality of semantic tags associated with each location of the one or more locations; and

determining, by the computing system, that the one or more suitability criteria for each location is at least partly satisfied when the capacity of each respective location satisfies one or more capacity criteria.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 5 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, when the capacity of the suitable location satisfies one or more capacity criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, when the location of the one or more locations exceeds a minimum physical area, or

determining, by the computing system, when the location of the one or more locations exceeds a minimum pedestrian capacity.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, a photographic aesthetic score of each location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the plurality of semantic tags, wherein the photographic aesthetic score is based at least in part on a number of photographs captured at each location of the plurality of locations; and

determining, by the computing system, when the photographic aesthetic score of the suitable location satisfies one or more photographic aesthetic criteria.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, for each respective location of the one or more locations, whether any semantic tag of the plurality of semantic tags associated with the respective location satisfies one or more aesthetic criteria; and

determining, by the computing system, when the suitable location is associated with at least one semantic tag that satisfies the one or more aesthetic criteria.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags, which of the one or more features associated with each location of the one or more locations are visible; and

determining, by the computing system, when any visible feature associated with each respective location is not aesthetically appealing.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, a convenience of each location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data associated with each location of the one or more locations; and

determining, by the computing system, when the convenience of the suitable location satisfies one or more convenience criteria.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 10 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, when the convenience of the suitable location satisfies one or more convenience criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, when a number of amenities at a location of the one or more locations exceeds a number of amenities threshold, or

determining, by the computing system, when the amount of pedestrian traffic at a location of the one or more locations is less than a pedestrian traffic convenience threshold.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 10 , wherein each location of the one or more locations is associated with one or more geographic areas in the physical environment, and wherein the determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, a suitability score for each of the one or more geographic areas based at least in part on an amount of the one or more features that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria within each of the one or more geographic areas; and

determining, by the computing system, when the suitable location is associated with a geographic area with a suitability score that satisfies one or more suitability criteria.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising:

determining, by the computing system, a type of the geographic context application; and

determining, by the computing system, a weighting of the one or more suitability criteria based at least in part on the type of the geographic context application.

14. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the determining, by the computing system, a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, by the computing system, based at least in part on the location data, an amount of network connectivity at each of the one or more locations; and

determining, by the computing system, when the amount of network connectivity at the suitable location satisfies one or more network connectivity criteria.

15. One or more tangible, non-transitory computer-readable media storing computer-readable instructions that when executed by one or more processors cause the one or more processors to perform operations, the operations comprising:

accessing location data and a plurality of semantic tags associated with one or more locations in a physical environment, wherein each semantic tag is descriptive of one or more features associated with a respective location, and wherein the location data is descriptive of an amount of pedestrian traffic at the one or more locations;

identifying the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy one or more suitability criteria associated with suitability of each location for use by a geographic context application, wherein the geographic context application comprises an augmented reality application, and wherein the suitability criteria comprises a safety criteria that is satisfied when the amount of pedestrian traffic at a location of the one or more locations exceeds a pedestrian traffic threshold;

determining a suitable location of the one or more locations in the physical environment based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria;

causing, by the computing system, an element of the augmented reality application to be placed at a location in the augmented reality application, wherein the location in the augmented reality application corresponds to the determined suitable location in the physical environment; and

providing, by the computing system, navigational instructions to a user to guide the user to the element of the augmented reality application placed at the determined suitable location in the physical environment.

16. The one or more tangible non-transitory computer-readable media of claim 15 , the operations further comprising:

determining a ranking of the one or more locations based at least in part on a proportion of the one or more suitability criteria that are satisfied at each location of the one or more locations;

generating one or more indications comprising at least a subset of the one or more locations arranged based at least in part on the ranking of the one or more locations; and

receiving an input to select a location of the one or more locations; and

generating one or more indications comprising navigational instructions from an initial location to the location that was selected by the input.

17. The one or more tangible non-transitory computer-readable media of claim 15 , further comprising generating one or more indications of the determined suitable location, wherein the one or more indications comprise one or more images of the suitable location, a map comprising the one or more locations and the suitable location, one or more textual descriptions of the suitable location, or one or more auditory descriptions of the suitable location.

18. A computing system comprising:

one or more processors;

one or more non-transitory computer-readable media storing instructions that when executed by the one or more processors cause the one or more processors to perform operations comprising:

accessing location data and a plurality of semantic tags associated with one or more locations in a physical environment, wherein each semantic tag is descriptive of one or more features associated with a respective location, and wherein the location data is descriptive of an amount of pedestrian traffic at the one or more locations in a physical environment;

identifying the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy one or more suitability criteria associated with suitability of each location for use by a geographic context application, wherein the geographic context application comprises an augmented reality application, and wherein the suitability criteria comprises a safety criteria that is satisfied when the amount of pedestrian traffic at a location of the one or more locations exceeds a pedestrian traffic threshold;

determining a suitable location of the one or more locations in the physical environment based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria;

causing, by the computing system, an element of the augmented reality application to be placed at a location in the augmented reality application, wherein the location in the augmented reality application corresponds to the determined suitable location in the physical environment; and

providing, by the computing system, navigational instructions to a user to guide the user to the element of the augmented reality application placed at the determined suitable location in the physical environment.

19. The computing system of claim 18 , wherein the determining a suitable location of the one or more locations based at least in part on the location data and the plurality of semantic tags that satisfy the one or more suitability criteria comprises:

determining, for each location of the one or more locations, the location data that is associated with a crowd density of each location of the one or more locations, wherein the crowd density is based at least in part on an amount of people at each location of the one or more locations; and

determining when the location data that is associated with the crowd density of each location of the one or more locations is within a crowd density range.

Assignments (1)

Continuity (2)

References Cited (11)