Systems and methods for sharing data in a non-destructive testing system

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9537907-B2
Application number	US-201313747457-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 22, 2013
Priority date	Jan 22, 2013
Publication date	Jan 3, 2017
Grant date	Jan 3, 2017

Abstract

A method for sharing data in a non-destructive testing (NDT) system may include receiving, using a microprocessor, an indication of data to be shared such that the data has been acquired using one or more non-destructive testing (NDT) inspection devices. The method may also include receiving a format in which to send the data, receiving one or more recipients designated to receive the data to be shared; and automatically modifying the data into the format and sending the modified data to the recipients once the data has been acquired by the NDT inspection devices.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A process, comprising:
receiving, using a microprocessor, an indication of data to be shared, wherein the data has been acquired using one or more non-destructive testing (NDT) inspection devices during inspection of turbomachinery;
receiving a respective format indicating a method in which to send the data and a respective template indicating a layout in which to present the data for each recipient of a list of recipients associated with the data;
receiving one or more recipients of the list of recipients designated to receive the data to be shared, wherein the recipients are determined based on a defect type that corresponds to an asset being inspected by the NDT inspection devices, wherein receiving the one or more recipients comprises:
generating the list of recipients associated with the defect type and data;
receiving a broadcast of a status indicating an availability of each recipient on the list of recipients;
presenting the list of recipients associated with the displayed data upon receiving an input, wherein the list comprises the availability of each recipient on the list of recipients; and
receiving one or more inputs that correspond to the one or more recipients on the list of recipients;

automatically modifying the data into the respective format associated with each recipient of the one or more recipients and sending the modified data to each recipient of the one or more recipients once the data has been acquired by the NDT inspection devices; and
presenting the respective modified data to each recipient of the one or more recipients in a manner based on the respective template associated with the respective recipients.

2. The process of claim 1 , wherein receiving the indication of data comprises receiving a type of data generated by the NDT inspection devices.

3. The process of claim 1 , wherein the format comprises an electronic-mail message, a text message, a report, or any combination thereof.

4. The process of claim 1 , wherein automatically sending the modified data comprises sending the modified data via a cloud-computing network.

5. The process of claim 1 , wherein receiving the one or more recipients comprises receiving one or more respective preferred formats that correspond to the data.

6. The process of claim 5 , comprising automatically modifying the data into the preferred formats and sending the data modified into the preferred formats to the recipients once the data has been acquired by the NDT inspection devices when the one or more respective preferred formats have been received.

7. The process of claim 1 , wherein the list of recipients comprises information that corresponds to experience and knowledge of each expert, entity, or the combination thereof, in the list of recipients, wherein the experience and knowledge of each expert, entity, or combination thereof, is related to the NDT inspection devices, problems related to articles inspected by the NDT inspection devices, or any combination thereof.

8. The process of claim 1 , wherein the list of recipients comprise information related to a biography or resume that corresponds to each recipient in the list of recipients, wherein the biography or resume comprises a number of years of experience in an industry, equipment familiarity levels, association with pre-designated group of individuals for a particular technology, association with an organizational structure, association with an original equipment manufacturer, or any combination thereof.

9. A computing device comprising a hardware memory storing non-transitory computer instructions configured to:
display data acquired using one or more non-destructive testing (NDT) inspection devices during inspection of turbomachinery;
receive an input associated with the displayed data, wherein the input indicates that the data is to be shared;
receive a template indicating a layout associated with each recipient of a list of recipients in which to present the data;
receive one or more recipients of the list of recipients designated to receive the displayed data;
receive one or more comments corresponding to the displayed data, wherein the comments are configured to be depicted over the displayed data;
modifying the data into a respective format indicating a method in which to send the data to each recipient of the one or more recipients;
send the displayed data and the comments associated with the displayed data to each recipient of the one or more recipients, wherein the display data and the comments are displayed together using a first set of timing data associated with the comments and a second set of timing data associated with the displayed data;
present the respective displayed data and the comments in a respective format associated with each recipient of the one or more recipients and in a manner based on the respective template associated with the respective recipients; and
receive from the recipient a flag indicating whether the data is either rejected or accepted.

10. A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions configured to:
receive an indication of data to be shared, wherein the data has been acquired using one or more non-destructive testing (NDT) inspection devices during inspection of turbomachinery;
receive a respective format indicating a method in which to send the data and a respective template indicating a layout in which to present the data for each recipient of a list of recipients associated with the data;
receive one or more recipients of the list of recipients designated to receive the data to be shared, wherein receiving the one or more recipients comprises:
generating the list of recipients associated with the data, wherein the list is configured to be organized based on original equipment manufacturers (OEM) of the asset to be inspected by the one or more NDT inspection devices; and
receiving one or more inputs that correspond to the one or more recipients on the list of recipients;

receive a threshold value corresponding to an expected value associated with the data;
automatically modify the data into the respective format and send the modified data to each recipient of the one or more recipients once the data has been acquired by the NDT inspection devices when the data exceeds the threshold value; and
present the modified data in a manner based on the respective template associated with the respective recipients.

11. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 10 , wherein the NDT inspection devices comprise a borescope, a pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) camera, an eddy current inspection device, an ultrasonic inspection device, an ultrasonic flaw detector, an x-ray inspection device, a digital radiography device, or any combination thereof.

12. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 10 , wherein the format comprises an electronic-mail message, a text message, a report, or any combination thereof.

13. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 10 , wherein the instructions are configured to automatically send the modified data via a computing network.

14. The process of claim 1 , wherein a list of recipients associated with the data is ranked according to relevant expertise with regard to the selected data.

15. The computing device of claim 9 , wherein the timing data is configured to match a frame of the data to be shared with one or more data items of the comments.

16. The computing device of claim 15 , wherein the frame is associated with an image, a video, or a combination thereof.

17. The non-transitory computer readab

Assignees

• Gen Electric

Inventors

• Messinger Jason Howard
• Soorianarayanan Sekhar
• Theurer Charles Burton
• Domke Michael Christopher
• Ward Robert Carroll
• Sbihli Scott Leo
• Lambdin Thomas Eldred

Classifications

• H04W4/006

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04L67/12

  specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks · CPC title

• H04L65/403 Primary

  Arrangements for multi-party communication, e.g. for conferences (data switching systems for conference H04L12/18; arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities H04M3/56; television conferencing systems H04N7/15) · CPC title

• H04W4/18

  Information format or content conversion, e.g. adaptation by the network of the transmitted or received information for the purpose of wireless delivery to users or terminals · CPC title

• Y04S40/18

  Network protocols supporting networked applications, e.g. including control of end-device applications over a network · CPC title