WO2012041732A1

WO2012041732A1 - A method and means for acquiring path information on the basis of mobile terminal handover information

Info

Publication number: WO2012041732A1
Application number: PCT/EP2011/066198
Authority: WO
Inventors: Wei Qiu; Lei Ming Xu
Original assignee: Siemens AG; Siemens Corp
Current assignee: Siemens AG; Siemens Corp
Priority date: 2010-09-30
Filing date: 2011-09-19
Publication date: 2012-04-05
Anticipated expiration: 2013-03-30
Also published as: CN102446413A

Abstract

The present invention relates to a method for acquiring path information on the basis of the handover information of a mobile terminal, which method comprises: acquiring the handover information of the mobile terminal, which handover information comprises at least one handover sequence of the mobile terminal, with the handover sequence comprising at least two handovers of the mobile terminal; determining, according to the handover sequence, a handover pattern, which handover pattern comprises the handovers in said handover sequence, at least one road section where said handovers can occur, and the correlation between said handovers and said road section; determining the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern, with the nodes in the handover pattern being said at least one road section or said handovers in the handover sequence; and searching, according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern, for a path with the highest credibility corresponding to the handover sequence, with this path being composed of at least one stretch of said road section. The present invention further provides corresponding means for acquiring path information. The technical solution provided by the present invention can reduce the costs of intelligent traffic applications without affecting currently available devices.

Description

A method and means for acquiring path information on the basis of mobile terminal handover information

Technical field

The present invention relates to the field of information technology, and in particular to the technology based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information .

Background art

Currently, the technology of mobile FCD (floating car data) has attracted more and more attention, and brings the possibility of achieving low-cost traffic condition

evaluation. Generally, the mobile FCD technology includes: creating a handover pattern, extracting data from mobile networks, which data is usually a handover sequence, and matching this handover sequence with the handover pattern, so as to obtain a possible path, and the map matching or other traffic applications can be finished finally according to this path. The above handover pattern is usually obtained by several preliminary actual road measurements, i.e. by

repeating the measurement on a path to obtain the handovers that may take place on this path and associating the path with the handovers. The monitoring of traffic flow can be achieved by the FCD technology without the aid of GPS (global positioning system) data, without the modification of the infrastructures of the currently available mobile networks, without laying infrastructures afresh, and without changing the mobile terminals.

In the mobile FCD technology, the continuous handover information extracted from the mobile networks includes, for example, the ID of a source cell and the ID of a target cell For example, after several road measurements, handover 1 is the handover from cell 1 to cell 2, which may occur in road sections 1, 2 and 3; handover 2 is the handover from cell 2 to cell 4, which may occur in road sections 1 and 4; and handover 3 is the handover from cell 3 to cell 6, which may occur in road sections 5, 6 and 7. According to the above data, the resultant handover pattern is as shown in Fig. 1.

However, after a handover sequence is obtained from the mobile network, there will be a variety of paths to which this sequence corresponds, and thus the difficulty and key part of FCD technology is how to exactly determine a path to which this handover sequence corresponds. If the

corresponding path of the handover sequence cannot be exactly determined, the applications and evaluations of traffic information may vary greatly from the actual situation, thus it is very difficult to achieve the wide application of FCD technology .

Contents of the invention

In light of the above shortcomings of the prior art, the object of the present invention is to provide a method base on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information, so as to learn more accurate mobile paths of mobile terminals.

The embodiments of the present invention further provide means based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information.

The embodiments of the present invention provide the following technical solution for solving the above technical problems .

The embodiments of the present invention provide a method based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information, said method comprising:

acquiring the handover information of a mobile terminal, which includes at least one handover sequence of said mobile terminal, wherein said handover sequence includes at least two handovers of said mobile terminal; determining, according to said handover sequence, a handover pattern which includes the handovers in said

handover sequence, at least one road section where said handovers can occur, and the correlation between said

handovers and said road section;

determining the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, wherein the nodes are said at least one road section or the handovers in said handover sequence; and

searching, according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern for a path with the highest credibility corresponding to the handover sequence, with said path being composed of at least one stretch of said road section;

wherein, the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern is determined by one of the following or a

combination thereof:

the parameters of said handovers per se, the geometric topological relationships of said road section, the

restriction of road conditions of said road section, and the traffic flow conditions of said road section.

The embodiments of the present invention provide means based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information, said means comprising:

an acquiring module for acquiring the handover

information of a mobile terminal, with said handover

information including at least one handover sequence of said mobile terminal and said handover sequence including at least two handovers of said mobile terminal;

a pattern module for determining, according to the handover sequence, a handover pattern, with said handover pattern including the handovers in said handover sequence, at least one road section where said handovers can occur, and the correlation between said handovers and said road section; a first confidence module for determining the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern according to a

confidence parameter, with the nodes in said handover pattern being said at least one road section or the handovers in said handover sequence and said confidence parameter includes one of the following or any combination thereof: the parameters of said handovers per se, the geometric topological

relationship of said road section, the restriction of road conditions of said road section, and the traffic flow conditions of said road section;

a computing module for searching, according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern, for a path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence, with said path being composed of at least one stretch of said road section.

By way of the technical solutions provided by the embodiments of the present invention, a path with higher probability corresponding to the handover information can obtained based on the handover information of mobile terminals according to the handover pattern and the

credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern, thereby enabling the traffic applications to use the handover information to obtain an accurate result.

Brief description of the accompanying drawings

The features, characteristics and advantages of the embodiments of the present invention will become more apparent by way of the detailed description hereafter in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:

Fig. 1 is a flow chart of a method based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments of the present invention;

Fig. 2a is a schematic diagram of a handover pattern provided by the embodiments of the present invention;

Fig. 2b is a schematic diagram of another handover pattern provided by the embodiments of the present invention

Fig. 2c is a schematic diagram of still another handover pattern provided by the embodiments of the present invention

Fig. 2d is a schematic diagram of yet another handover pattern provided by the embodiments of the present invention Fig. 3 is a flow chart of a method based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments of the present invention;

Fig. 4a is a structural schematic diagram of means based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments of the present invention;

Fig. 4b is a structural schematic diagram of another means based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments of th present invention;

Fig. 4c is a structural schematic diagram of still another means based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments o the present invention;

Fig. 4d is a structural schematic diagram of yet another means based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments of th present invention;

Fig. 4e is a structural schematic diagram of even still another device based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments o the present invention; and

Fig. 4f is a structural schematic diagram of yet still another device based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments o the present invention.

Exemplary embodiments

Fig. 1 is a method based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments of the present invention. This method comprises:

Step 101: acquiring the handover information of a mobil terminal .

In this embodiment and the following embodiments, th mobile terminal can be, for example, a mobile mainframe, cell phone, etc., without limitation. Also, the access network for this mobile terminal is not limited, for example, it can be a WLAN network, a GSM network, a UMTS network or other wireless network.

In this embodiment, the handover information is, for example, a handover sequence constructed for a series of handovers of the same mobile terminal. In this case, each handover can include for example the ID of a source cell and the ID of a target cell, the occurrence position of the handover, and other information. That is, the handover information at least contains two handovers.

Step 102: determining a handover pattern according to the handover sequence.

In this embodiment, the handover pattern includes the handovers in this handover sequence, at least one path where these handovers can take place, and the correlation of these handovers and paths. The handover pattern is, for example, the patterns shown in Figs. 2a, and 2b. In this embodiment, the handover pattern can also be represented in the form of table, and it can in particular refer to table 1.

Table 1 Handover Pattern

Step 103: determining the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern.

As can be seen from Figs. 2a and 2b, the nodes in the handover pattern can be either a handover or a road section. In this embodiment, the credibility of the nodes can be determined for example according to one of the following: parameters of the handovers per se, the geometric topological relationship of the road section, the restriction of road conditions of the road section, and the traffic flow

conditions of the road section or any combination thereof.

The parameters of the handovers per se therein include for example one of the following or any combination thereof: the frequency of handover occurrence, the maximum deviation of the handover occurrence position, and the mean square deviation of the handover occurrence position. The way of determining the credibility of the nodes according to the parameters of the handovers per se is herein described by using the following three modes as examples.

Mode I: the higher the handover occurrence probability, the more credible it is, that is, the higher the handover occurrence probability, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to that handover is. For example,

according to previous data of road measurements, the road section was traveled 10 times, in which handover 1 occurred times while handover 2 occurred 3 times, therefore the credibility of handover 1 is higher than that of handover 2. For convenience of calculation, for example, the credibility of handover 1 is 0.7 while the credibility of handover 2 is 0.3.

Mode II: the smaller the maximum deviation of the handover occurrence position, the more credible the handover is. That is, the smaller the maximum deviation between the handover position and the theoretical handover position of each handover, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to this handover.

Mode III: the smaller the mean square deviation of the handover occurrence position, the more credible the handover is. That is, the smaller the mean square deviation between the handover position and the theoretical handover position of each handover, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to this handover is. The above three modes can be used alone or combined in any way to determine the credibility of the nodes. During practical implementation, the above three modes can use for example the occurrence probability, the maximum deviation, the mean square deviation, etc. as parameters for a function to compute the credibility of the nodes.

In this embodiment, the geometric topological

relationship of the road section includes for example one of the following or any combination thereof: the included angle between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in the handover sequence; the connection relationship between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in the handover sequence; and the distance between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in the handover sequence. In this case, the connection relationship between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in the handover sequence is for example one of the following: the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers are the same road section; the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers are the road sections connected end to end; the road sections

corresponding to successively adjoining handovers are

connected by one road section; and the road sections

corresponding to successively adjoining handovers are

connected by a plurality of road sections.

In this embodiment, for example, the following manner can be used to determine the credibility of the nodes.

Mode I : the closer the included angle formed between the road sections where two successively adjoining handovers are located is to 180°, the more credible it is, that is, the closer the included angle between the road sections

corresponding to successively adjoining handovers is to 180°, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to the road section is. It is because usually the probability of reverse driving is very low in normal driving behavior.

Alternatively, mode I can also be expressed as: the larger the included angle between the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers, the higher the

credibility of the node corresponding to this road section.

Mode II: the fewer the number of connected road sections between the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to this road section is. In particular, for example, if two successive handovers are on the same road section, i.e. the road sections corresponding to two

successively adjoining handovers are the same road section, then the credibility of the node corresponding to this road section is the highest; if the road sections corresponding to the two successive handovers are connected end to end, then the credibility of the node corresponding to these two road sections is the second highest; if the road sections

corresponding to the two successive handovers are connected via one road section, then the credibility of the node corresponding to these two road sections is the third

highest; and if the road sections corresponding to the two successive handovers are connected via more road sections, then the credibility of the node corresponding to these two road sections is reduced successively.

Mode III: the shorter the distance between the road sections corresponding to two successively adjoining

handovers, the higher the credibility of the node

corresponding to this handover is.

The above three modes can be used alone or combined in any way to determine the credibility of the nodes. During practical implementation, the above three modes can use for example any one of the included angle between the road sections, the number of road sections separating them, and the distance separating them, or any combination thereof as parameters for a function to compute the credibility of the nodes .

In this embodiment, it is not only possible to set credibility for the nodes of the handover pattern, but also possible to set credibility for the connections between the nodes in the handover pattern.

For example, a handover pattern as shown in Fig. 2c can be formed according to the handover sequence, and in this handover pattern, the road section is used as node, and there is no connection relationship between the road sections corresponding to the same handover while there is a

connection relationship between the road section

corresponding to the former handover and the road section corresponding to the latter handover in the successively adjoining handovers.

Regarding the handover pattern as shown in Fig. 2c, the manner of the above three modes determining the credibility of the nodes according to the geometric topological

relationship of road sections can be used to determine the credibility of the connection between nodes. For example as to a given connection, the closer the included angle between the two end road sections is to 180°, the higher the credibility of the connection; and/or the lower the number of connected road sections between the two end road sections, the higher the credibility of the

connection; and/or the shorter the distance between the two end road sections, the higher the credibility of this connection .

Likewise, during practical implementation, a function can be used in calculation to determine the credibility of the connection between nodes. In this embodiment, for example, the credibility of the nodes and/or the connection between nodes can be determined according to the restriction of path conditions of the road section. The restriction of path conditions can include the driving speed of the road section and/or the driving speed restriction of the road section, etc.

For example as to the road section where the driving speed is too fast or too slow, the credibility of the node or connection corresponding to this road section is reduced. Especially as to the road section where the driving speed exceeds the speed restriction of that road section, the credibility of the node or connection corresponding to this road section is significantly reduced. In this case, the driving speed of this road section can be calculated, for example, by dividing the length of the road section by the time difference before and after handover of this road section . In this embodiment, the restriction of path conditions of the road section can be used not only to determine the credibility of the nodes and/or the connection between nodes, but also to exclude paths so as to improve the speed and efficiency of searching for the most credible path. For example, a road section in which the driving speed exceeds the speed restriction of the road section can be excluded, without being taken into account any more.

In this embodiment, for example, the credibility of the nodes and/or the connection between nodes can be determined according to the traffic flow conditions of the road section. Traffic flow conditions includes for example the driving speeds of the successively adjoining road sections. For example as to a given road section, if the driving speed difference between this road section and that of the former or the latter road section is too large, then the credibility of the nodes and/or the connection between nodes corresponding to this road section is reduced. Alternatively, the traffic monitoring information can also be combined, and if the traffic monitoring information shows that the travel in one certain road section is unblocked, then in the case that the calculated driving speed is obviously lower than the speed of the unblocked travel, then the credibility of the nodes and/or the connection between the nodes corresponding to this road section is reduced; and if the traffic

monitoring information shows that one certain road section is jammed, then in the case that the calculated driving speed is apparently higher than the speed of the jammed travel, then the credibility of the nodes and/or the connection between the nodes corresponding to this road section is reduced. Those skilled in the art can obtain other manners of determining the credibility of the nodes and connection between nodes from the above examples.

These above modes can be used alone or combined to determine the credibility of the nodes and/or the connection between nodes. During practical implementation, it is not only possible to calculate using a function with the above values as parameters but also possible to directly set the credibility of the nodes and/or the connection between the nodes by the above manner. In the following it will be described in detail by taking the credibility of connection between nodes being determined by the geometric topological relationship of the road section as an example. If the road sections connecting two ends are the same road section, then the credibility of this connection is set to be 1; if the road sections connecting two ends are connected end to end, then the credibility of the connection is set to be 0.8; if the road sections connecting two ends are connected via one road section, then the credibility of the connection is set to be 0.6; if the road sections connecting two ends are connected via two road sections, then the credibility of the connection is set to be 0.4; and if the road sections connecting two ends are connected via more sections, then the credibility of the connection is set to be 0.2.

Step 104: searching, according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern, for a path with the highest credibility corresponding to the handover sequence.

In this embodiment, if step 103 also determines the credibility of the connection between nodes, then step 104 also includes searching for a path with the highest

credibility corresponding to the handover sequence according to the credibility of the connection between nodes.

In this embodiment, the road section with the highest credibility consists of at least one road section, and these road sections may be of the highest credibility, or may not be of the highest credibility but have the highest

accumulated credibility. In step 104, for example, the handover pattern can be traversed with a breadth-first branch-and-bound approach so as to obtain the path with the highest credibility

corresponding to this handover sequence. When the breadth- first branch-and-bound approach is used, for example, it can always select a node with the highest probability when selecting a node to be expanded, so as to enter the branches which most probably have the optimal solution as quickly as possible; and it can also abandon the subnodes which lead to infeasible branches or non-optimal solution during the expansion of nodes. Accordingly, the searching process can be accelerated and the processing efficiency can be improved.

In step 104, for example, the handover pattern can also be traversed with a depth-first branch backtracking approach to obtain the path with the highest credibility, and this method sifts out the nodes which are less than one certain feasibility solution, i.e. the node is no longer computed, which can further improve the processing speed. In step 104, for example, it is also possible to use the dynamic programming approach to search for the path with highest credibility corresponding to the handover sequence. Detailed description of the dynamic programming approach can be found at http ://en. wikipedia . org/wiki/Dynamic programming . Since the computation complexity of the dynamic programming approach is low, the efficiency is high and the space

consumption is not large, it can be used as a relatively preferred solution. For example, this embodiment and the following embodiments are described using the dynamic

programming approach as an example.

From the above examples, those skilled in the art can also obtain approaches for searching for the path with highest credibility corresponding to the handover sequence applying other approaches.

The method based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information provided by the embodiments of the present invention can utilize the handover information of a mobile terminal to determine the driving path of this mobile terminal, and can further carry out other traffic information applications according to this driving path, for example to judge the traffic conditions on the roads of a city. Since the handover information of the mobile terminal can be obtained from currently available networks, it is not required to build new infrastructures or to modify the mobile terminals, therefore its application costs are low and it is easy to promote. Moreover, according to the technical

solution in the above embodiments, it is possible to

determine the driving path more accurately, avoiding

subsequent application mistakes caused by deviation during the determination of driving path, and enabling the handover information of the mobile terminal to be widely applied in the field of traffic. At the same time, the technical

solution provided by the embodiments of the present invention can improve processing speed and efficiency while ensuring accuracy .

In the following the method based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path provided by the embodiments of the present invention is described in detail in conjunction with Fig. 3.

Step 301, acquire the handover information of a mobile terminal .

This handover information includes handover sequence 1, with handover sequence 1 including handover 1, handover 2, handover 3 and handover 4. In this case, taking handover 1 a an example, it includes the ID of a target cell and the ID o a source cell, and the handover occurrence position.

Step 302, determine a handover pattern according to the handover sequence.

It can be known from previous road measurement data that handover 1 can occur on road section 1, road section 2, or road section 3; handover 2 can occur on road section 1, and road section 4; handover 3 can occur on road section 5, road section 6, and road section 7; and handover 4 can occur on road section 8 and road section 9. Thereby, a handover pattern as shown in Fig. 2c can be formed.

Step 303, determine the credibility of the connection between the nodes in the handover pattern.

Referring to the embodiment shown in Fig. 1, the

credibility of the connection between the nodes in the handover pattern is determined. As shown in Fig. 2d, the credibility of the connection between nodes is marked in the handover pattern according to the handover pattern shown in Fig. 2c. Step 304, according to the credibility of the connection between nodes in the handover pattern, compute the

credibility of the optimal path from the starting point to each node according to the order of the handover sequence.

The results obtained by computation are as shown in table 2.

Table 2: table of accumulated credibility

In this embodiment, for example, the above computation results can be stored.

Step 305: record the previous adjoining node on the

optimal path of each node. For convenience of description, this previous node is referred to as the optimal previous adjoining node. The recording results are as shown in table 3.

Table 3: table of optimal previous adjoining nodes

Road sections

corresponding

Handover 1 Handover 2 Handover 3 Handover 4 to the

handovers

First section - 0 1 1

Second

- 1 0 1 section

Third section - 0 Step 306, record the way of connection with the optimal previous adjoining node. The recording results are as shown in table 4.

Table 4: table of connections with the optimal previous adjoining nodes

Step 307, reversely infer the optimal path from the optimal previous adjoining node.

Firstly, the optimal paths reversely inferred from the optimal previous adjoining node are as follows: the first road section corresponding to handover 1, the first road section corresponding to handover 2, the second road section corresponding to handover 3, and the second road section corresponding to handover 4. Then the final path is obtained according to the connection table.

According to the method provided by the embodiments of the present invention, the path corresponding to the handover sequence can be determined with higher accuracy in a shorter time with less storage space occupation, thereby enabling the handover information of mobile terminals to be applied in traffic applications without building new infrastructures or modifying the mobile terminals and also enabling cost

reduction.

The above embodiments can refer to each other, and the steps of the methods disclosed in the embodiments can be achieved by software, hardware or a combination thereof.

The embodiments of the present invention further provi means based on mobile terminal handover information for acquiring path information. The means can be, for example, single device, or integrated into a device in the

communication network or in an intelligent traffic device.

As shown in Fig. 4a, this means comprises: an acquiring module 401 for acquiring the handover information of a mobile terminal. This handover information can refer to, for

example, the embodiment as shown in Fig. 1: a pattern module 402 for determining a handover pattern according to the handover sequence, which handover pattern includes the handovers in a handover sequence, at least one road section where the handovers can occur, and the correlation between the handovers and the road sections, with the nodes in the handover pattern being the handovers or road sections; a first confidence module 403 for determining the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern according to a

confidence parameter; and a computing module 404 for

searching for a path with the highest credibility

corresponding to the handover sequence according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern, wherein the path is composed of at least one stretch of the road

sections. In this embodiment, the confidence parameter includes for example one of the following or any combination thereof: the parameters of the handovers per se, the

geometric topological relationship of the road section, the restriction of path conditions of the road section, and the traffic flow conditions of the road section.

The means provided by the embodiments of the present invention can be used, for example, to perform the method provided in the above method embodiments. Also, with the means provided by this embodiment, the mobile path of a mobile terminal can be obtained accurately based on the handover information of the mobile terminal, so that it can be used in a variety of traffic applications. Moreover, during the determination of the path of the mobile terminal, this means is faster, occupies less storage space, and is more accurate, and can meet the requirements of the

intelligent traffic system.

As shown in Figs. 4b, 4c and 4d, in this embodiment, the computing module 404 can also include, for example, one of the following: a first computing submodule 4041 for

traversing the handover pattern with a breadth-first branch- and-bound approach to obtain the path with the highest credibility corresponding to the handover sequence according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern; a second computing submodule 4042 for traversing the handover pattern with a depth-first branch backtracking algorithm to obtain the path with the highest credibility corresponding t the handover sequence according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern; and a third computing

submodule 4043 for processing the handover pattern with a dynamic programming approach to obtain the path with the highest credibility corresponding to the handover sequence according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern. The particular implementation of the above computin module 404 and its submodules can refer to the embodiment shown in Fig . 1.

As shown in Fig. 4e, in this embodiment, this means can also include a second confidence module 405 for determining the credibility of the connection between nodes in the handover pattern. In this case, the nodes in this handover pattern are road sections, and there is no connection between the road sections corresponding to the same handover in the handover sequence, while there is connection between the road sections corresponding to the former handover and the road section corresponding to the latter handover in the

successively adjoining handovers. The second confidence module 405 for example can determine the credibility of the connection according to one of the following or any

combination thereof: the geometric topological relationship of the road sections connecting two ends, the restriction of path conditions of the road sections connecting two ends, and the traffic flow conditions of the road sections connecting two ends. The computing module 404 can also be used, for example for searching for a path with the highest credibility corresponding to the handover sequence according to the credibility of connections and nodes. Correspondingly, the submodules included in the computing module 404 can also be used for traversing or processing according to the

credibility of the nodes and connections.

As shown in Fig. 4f, in this embodiment, the first confidence module 403 can, for example, include one of the following or any combination thereof: a first confidence submodule 4031 for determining the credibility of the nodes and/or connections corresponding to the handover according to the occurrence probability of the handover, and particularly the higher the handover occurrence probability is, the higher the credibility of the node and/or connection corresponding to the handover is; a second confidence submodule 4032 for determining the credibility of the nodes and/or connections corresponding to the handover according to the handover occurrence position, and particularly the smaller the maximum deviation of the handover occurrence position, the higher the credibility of the node and/or connection corresponding to the handover is, and/or, the smaller the mean square

deviation of the handover occurrence position, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to the handover; a third confidence submodule 4033 for determining the

credibility of the nodes and/or connections corresponding to the handover according to the included angle between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in the handover sequence, and particularly the closer the included angle is to 180°, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to the road section is, that is, the larger the included angle, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to the road section; a fourth confidence submodule 4034 for determining the credibility of the nodes and/or connections corresponding to the handover according to the number of connected road sections between the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining

handovers in the handover sequence, and particularly the fewer the number of connected road sections, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to the road section; a fifth confidence submodule 4035 for determining the

credibility of the nodes and/or connections corresponding to the handover according to the distance between the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining

handovers in the handover sequence, and particularly the shorter the distance is, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to the road section is; a sixth confidence submodule 4036 for determining the credibility of the nodes and/or connections corresponding to the road sections according to the driving speed of the road section and/or the driving speed restriction of the road section, the particular implementation of which can refer to the embodiment shown in Fig. 1; and a seventh confidence submodule 4037 for

determining the credibility of the nodes and/or connections corresponding to the road sections according to the driving speed of the successively adjoining road sections of the road sections, the particular implementation of which can refer to the embodiment shown in Fig. 1. In this embodiment, the above confidence submodule can also be provided in the first confidence module 403 and the second confidence module 405 respectively, i.e. the submodules for determining the

credibility of the nodes are provided in the first confidence module 403 while the submodules for determining the

credibility of connection between nodes are provided in the second confidence module 405.

The means provided by this embodiment can apply the handover information of the mobile terminal to the

intelligent traffic system, and the costs are relatively low and the processing speed is relatively fast.

It should be appreciated by those skilled in the art that, various variations and modifications can be made to each of the embodiments of the present invention without departing from the spirit of the present invention, and all these variations and modifications are in the protection scope of the present invention. Therefore, the protection scope of the present invention is to be defined by the attached claims.

Claims

1. A method for acquiring path information on the basis of the handover information of a mobile terminal, said method comprising:

(301) acquiring the handover information of the mobile terminal, with said handover information comprising at least one handover sequence of said mobile terminal and said handover sequence comprising at least two handovers of said mobile terminal;

(302) determining, according to said handover sequence, a handover pattern, with said handover pattern comprising the handovers in said handover sequence, at least one road section where said handovers can occur, and the correlation between said handovers and said road section;

(303) determining the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, with the nodes in said handover pattern being said at least one road section or the handovers in said handover sequence; and

searching, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, for a path with the highest

credibility corresponding to said handover sequence, with said path being composed of at least one stretch of said road section;

wherein, the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern is determined according to one of the following or any combination thereof:

the parameters of said handovers per se, the geometric topological relationship of said road section, restriction of road conditions of said road section, and traffic flow conditions of said road section.

2. The method as claimed in claim 1, characterized in that said searching, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, for a path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence comprises one of the following: traversing, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, said handover pattern using a breadth- first branch-and-bound approach, so as to obtain the path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence;

traversing, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, said handover pattern by using a depth-first branch-backtracking algorithm, so as to obtain the path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence; and

processing, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, said handover pattern by using a dynamic programming approach, so as to obtain the path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence.

3. The method as claimed in claim 1, characterized in that

the nodes in said handover pattern are said road

sections, and there is no connection between the road

sections corresponding to the same handover in said handover sequence, while there is a connection between the road section corresponding to the former handover and the road section corresponding to the latter handover in successively adjoining handovers; and

said method further comprises: determining the

credibility of the connection between said road sections, wherein the credibility of said connection is determined according to one of the following or any combination thereof: a geometric topological relationship of said road section connecting two ends, restriction of road conditions of said road sections connecting two ends, and traffic flow

conditions of said road sections connecting two ends; and

said searching, according to the credibility of the nodes in the handover pattern, for a path with the highest

credibility corresponding to said handover sequence

comprises: searching for the path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence according to the credibility of said connection and of said nodes.

4. The method as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that said parameters of said handovers per se comprises one of the following or any combination thereof: the occurrence probability of said handovers, the maximum deviation of the occurrence position of said handovers, and the mean square deviation of the occurrence position of said handovers.

5. The method as claimed in claim 4, characterized in that said determining of the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern comprises one of the following or any combination thereof:

the higher the occurrence probability of said handovers, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said handovers ;

the smaller the maximum deviation of the occurrence position of said handovers, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said handovers; and

the smaller the mean square deviation of the occurrence position of said handovers, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said handovers.

6. The method as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that the geometric topological relationship of said road section comprises one of the following or any combination thereof:

the included angle between the road sections

corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence;

the connection relationship between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence; and

the distance between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence.

7. The method as claimed in claim 6, characterized in that said determining of the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern comprises one of the following or any combination thereof:

the closer the included angle between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence is to 180°, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said road section;

the fewer the number of connected road sections between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence, the higher the

credibility of the node corresponding to said road section; and

the shorter the distance between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said road section.

8. The method as claimed in claim 6, characterized in that the connection relationship between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence comprises one of the following:

the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence being the same road section;

the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence being road sections connected end to end;

the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence being connected by one road section; and

the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence being connected by a plurality of road sections.

9. The method as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that said restriction of road conditions of said road section comprises: the driving speed of said road section and/or the driving speed restriction of said road section.

10. The method as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that said traffic flow condition of said road section comprises: the driving speed of the successively adjoining road sections of said road section.

11. Means for acquiring path information on the basis of the handover information of a mobile terminal, said means comprising :

an acquiring module (401) for acquiring the handover information of the mobile terminal, with said handover information comprising at least one handover sequence of said mobile terminal and said handover sequence comprising at least two handovers of said mobile terminal;

a pattern module (402) for determining, according to said handover sequence, a handover pattern, with said handover pattern comprising the handovers in said handover sequence, at least one road section where said handovers can occur, and the correlation between said handovers and said road section; a first confidence module (403) for determining,

according to a confidence parameter, the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, with the nodes in said handover pattern being said at least one road section or said handovers in said handover sequence, and said confidence parameters comprising one of the following or any combination thereof: the parameters of said handovers per se, the

geometric topological relationship of said road section, the restriction of road conditions of said road section, and traffic flow conditions of said road section; and

a computing module (404) for searching, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, for a path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence, with said path being composed of at least one stretch of said road section.

12. The means as claimed in claim 11, characterized in that said computing module (404) comprises one of the

following :

a first computing submodule (4041) for traversing, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, said handover pattern by using a breadth-first branch-and-bound approach, so as to obtain the path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence; a second computing submodule (4042) for traversing, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, said handover pattern by using a depth-first branch backtracking algorithm, so as to obtain the path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence; and

a third computing submodule (4043) for processing, according to the credibility of the nodes in said handover pattern, said handover pattern by using a dynamic programming approach, so as to obtain the path with the highest

credibility corresponding to said handover sequence.

13. The means as claimed in claim 11, characterized in that said means further comprises a second confidence module (405) for determining the credibility of the connections between the nodes in said handover pattern, wherein, the nodes in said handover pattern are said road section, and there is no connection between the road sections

corresponding to the same handover in said handover sequence, while there is a connection between the road section

corresponding to the former handover and the road section corresponding to the latter handover in successively

adjoining handovers, and the credibility of the connection between said nodes is determined by said second confidence module according to one of the following or any combination thereof: the geometric topological relationship of said road sections connecting two ends, restriction of road conditions of said road sections connecting two ends, and traffic flow conditions of said road sections connecting two ends; and

said computing module (404) is particularly used for searching, according to the credibility of said connection and said nodes for a path with the highest credibility corresponding to said handover sequence.

14. The means as claimed in any one of claims 11 to 13, characterized in that said first confidence module (403) comprises one of the following or any combination thereof: a first confidence submodule (4031) for determining, according to the occurrence probability of said handovers in said handover sequence, the credibility of the nodes

corresponding to said handovers, and the higher the

occurrence probability of said handovers, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said handovers;

a second confidence submodule (4032) for determining, according to the occurrence position of the handovers in said handover sequence, the credibility of the nodes corresponding to said handovers, and the smaller the maximum deviation of the occurrence position of said handovers, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said handovers, and/or, the smaller the mean square deviation of the

occurrence position of said handovers, the higher the

credibility of the node corresponding to said handovers;

a third confidence submodule (4033) for determining, according to the included angle between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence, the credibility of the nodes corresponding to said handovers, and the closer the included angle between the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence is to 180°, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said road section;

a fourth confidence submodule (4034) for determining, according to the number of connected road sections between the road sections corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence, the credibility of the nodes corresponding to said handovers, and the fewer the number of connected road sections between the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence, the higher the credibility of the node corresponding to said road section;

a fifth confidence submodule (4035) for determining, according to the distance between the road sections

corresponding to successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence, the credibility of the nodes corresponding to said handovers, and the shorter the distance between the road sections corresponding to the successively adjoining handovers in said handover sequence, the higher the

credibility of the node corresponding to said road section; a sixth confidence submodule (4036) for determining, according to the driving speed of said road section and/or the driving speed restriction of said road section, the credibility of the nodes corresponding to said road section; and

a seventh confidence submodule (4037) for determining, according to the driving speed of the successively adjoining road sections of said road section, the credibility of the nodes corresponding to said road section.