Zebra Technologies Corporation

Zhijia Yuan

David S Koch

Raghavendra Tenkasi Shankar

A method of detecting sensor obstructions in a computing device includes: at an emitter, emitting a beam of light through a scan window toward a treaded surface; at an image sensor, for a sequence of positions of the computing device along the treaded surface: capturing a sequence of images corresponding to the sequence of positions, each image in the sequence having a first region and a second region; wherein the first regions depict a first subset of reflections of the beam of light originating from a first depth range; and wherein the second regions depict a second subset of the reflections originating from a second depth range; at a controller: receiving the sequence of images; determining, based on the second regions, whether an intensity of the second subset of the reflections exceeds a occlusion threshold; and when the determination is affirmative, generating an alert indicating obstruction of the scan window.

Computing device and method of detecting sensor obstructions

A device for measuring tread depth includes: an image sensor; first and second depth sensing modules spaced apart along a separation axis, each including (i) an emitter configured to emit a beam of light, and (ii) an optical assembly configured to direct reflections of the beam of light onto a respective region of the image sensor; a controller connected to the image sensor and configured, responsive to the device traversing a treaded surface, to: receive, from the image sensor, a sequence of images corresponding to sequential positions of the device traversing the treaded surface in a travel direction substantially perpendicular to the separation axis, the sequence of images depicting successive reflections of the beams from the treaded surface; determine, for each image in the sequence of images, a first depth measurement and a second depth measurement; and store, in a memory, the first and second depth measurements.

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Pittsburgh, PA, United States of America

Zhijia Yuan