System and Method for Preventing Phone Functionality while Driving

摘要

An app designed to prevent using distracting phone functionality, including texting, on a mobile phone while driving a vehicle is disclosed. The app detects and measure attributes including the phone's orientation and change of orientation and expresses them in a coordinate system relative to the direction of motion of the vehicle. If the phone orientation is found to be consistent with a change in direction of the vehicle, or the axis of rotation of the phone is found to be consistent with itself over time, the distracting phone functionality is disabled.

主权项

1. A non-transitory machine-readable storage medium designed to prevent a user using distracting phone functionality while driving a vehicle, comprising:
machine readable instructions, stored on a mobile phone memory or in the cloud, that enable said mobile phone to perform functions comprising:
detecting a local gravity vector acting on said mobile phone;detecting a direction of motion of said mobile phone in a plane orthogonal to said local gravity vector;detecting an orientation of said mobile phone in a frame of reference relative to said direction of motion of said mobile phone; andcombining said local gravity vector, said direction of motion and said orientation of said mobile phone to determine whether or not said mobile phone is being moved in concert with a steering device when said steering device is being moved to steer said vehicle in motion, and if said mobile phone is determined as being moved in concert with said steering device when said steering device is being moved to steer said vehicle in motion, preventing distracting phone functionality by disabling said mobile phone's distracting phone functionality, and continuing to prevent said distracting phone functionality for a further predetermined period of time.