IBMs US 8,138,882: Securing premises using surfaced-based computing technology

From the specification of US 8,138,882:

Premises security systems, such as systems used in homes and commercial locations are primarily designed to prevent intrusion or burglaries. Components, such as photo-infrared motion sensors, ultrasonic detectors, microwave detectors, photo-electric beams, glass break detectors are commonly used to detect when someone enters, or attempts to enter, a premises and the system is "on," or "armed." When the intrusion detection system is armed and intrusion is detected, actions can be performed such as sounding an audible alarm, flashing emergency lights, and contacting public safety officials via telephone. Traditional systems, however, are either "on" or "off." When "on" an authorized person, such as the homeowner, can trip the alarm system if they fail to disarm the alarm before entering. This causes an abundance of "false alarms" that are annoying to neighbors and waste valuable public safety resources investigating such false alarms.



It has been discovered that the aforementioned challenges are resolved using an approach that uses an electronic multi-touch floor covering that has numerous sensors to identify shapes. The electronic multi-touch floor covering identifies a shape of an object that is in contact with the surface of the electronic multi-touch floor covering. An entity record is then retrieved from a data store, such as a database, with the retrieved entity record corresponding to the identified shape. Actions are then retrieved from a second data store with the actions corresponding to the retrieved entity record. The retrieved actions are then executed by the computer system.