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NAVIGATION SYSTEM FOR A VEHICLE
CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED
APPLICATIONS
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The present application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/624,381, filed Jan. 18,2007, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,490,007, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/645,762, filed Aug. 20, 2003, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,167,796, which claims priority ofU.S. provisional applications, Ser. No. 60/406,166, filedAug. 27, 2002 by Taylor et al. for VEHICLE NAVIGATION SYSTEM FOR USE WITH A TELEMATICS SYSTEM; Ser. No. 60/405, 392, filedAug. 23,2002 by KevinC. McCarthy for VEHICLE 15 NAVIGATION SYSTEM FOR USE WITH A TELEMATICS SYSTEM; and Ser. No. 60/404,906, filedAug. 21, 2002 by Taylor for BIOMETRIC VEHICLE SEATING ADJUSTMENT SYSTEM, and patent application Ser. No. 10/645,762 is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 20 10/456,599, filed Jun. 6, 2003 by Weller et al. for INTERIOR REARVIEW MIRROR SYSTEM WITH COMPASS, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,004,593, and patent application Ser. No. 10/645,762 is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/287,178, filed Nov. 4, 2002 by McCarthy et 25 al. for NAVIGATION SYSTEM FOR A VEHICLE, now U.S. Pat. No. 6,678,614, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/799,414, filed Mar. 5, 2001 by McCarthy et al. for COMPLETE MIRROR-BASED GLOBAL-POSITIONING SYSTEM (GPS) NAVIGATION 30 SOLUTION, now U.S. Pat. No. 6,477,464, which claims priority of U.S. provisional application, Ser. No. 60/187,960, filed Mar. 9, 2000 by McCarthy et al., all of which are hereby incorporated herein by reference in their entireties; and patent application Ser. No. 11/624,381 is also a continuation-in-part 35 of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/755,915, filed Jan. 13, 2004 entitled VIDEO MIRROR SYSTEMS INCORPORATING AN ACCESSORY MODULE, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,446, 650, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/793,002, filed Feb. 26,2001, now U.S. Pat. No. 6,690, 40 268, which claims benefit of U.S. provisional applications, Ser. No. 60/263,680, filed Jan. 23,2001; Ser. No. 60/243,986, filed Oct. 27, 2000; Ser. No. 60/238,483, filed Oct. 6, 2000; Ser. No. 60/237,077, filed Sep. 30,2000; Ser. No. 60/234,412, filed Sep. 21, 2000; Ser. No. 60/218,336, filed Jul. 14, 2000; 45 and Ser. No. 60/186,520, filed Mar. 2, 2000; patent application Ser. No. 11/624,381 is also a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/054,633, filed Jan. 22, 2002, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,195,381, which claims priority from and incorporates by reference in their entireties U.S. provisional 50 applications, Ser. No. 60/346,733, filed Jan. 7, 2002, entitled IMPROVED VEHICULAR LIGHTING SYSTEM, by Applicants John O. Lindahl and Niall R. Lynam; Ser. No. 60/263,680, filed Jan. 23, 2001; Ser. No. 60/271,466, filed Feb. 26, 2001; and Ser. No. 60/315,384, filedAug. 28, 2001, 55 and which is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/793,002, entitled VIDEO MIRROR SYSTEMS INCORPORATING AN ACCESSORY MODULE, filed Feb. 26, 2001, now U.S. Pat. No. 6,690,268.
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to telematics systems for vehicles and, more particularly, to telematics systems which may provide driving instructions or directions to 65 a driver of a vehicle or which may provide other controls to an accessory or system of the vehicle. The present invention also
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relates generally to vehicle seating adjustment systems and, more particularly, to vehicle seating adjustment systems with memory adjustment.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
In-vehicle telematics systems or vehicle-based telematics systems, such as General Motor's ONSTAR®, Daimler's TELEAIDTM, Ford's RESCU® or the like, are common in vehicles today. Such telematics systems involve a telecommunication link from the vehicle to an operator or a voice input system at a service center or the like external to the vehicle. The driver of the vehicle may connect or communicate with an operator at the service center to request directions to a targeted location. The service center may provide directions to the targeted location based on the known position of the vehicle, which may be given to the service center operator by the driver, or which may be known by the operator via a link to a global positioning system (GPS) of the vehicle.
However, in such concierge-type systems, typically all of the road names, exits to take, and directional headings/directions are given verbally by the service center operator to the driver all together while the driver is driving the vehicle. The driver is then typically expected to remember several directional driving instructions and often has difficulty in remembering the full directions. Although the driver may optionally remain on the line with the service center operator until the driver reaches the intended destination, which may take many minutes, such as ten, fifteen, twenty minutes or more, and/or the driver may call back to the service center for updated directions, these actions increase the cost of the service, since the service center typically charges for such calls.
Therefore, there is a need in the art for a navigation system that overcomes the shortcomings of the prior art.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is intended to provide instructions or directions to a driver of a vehicle which are keyed or coded or linked to respective geographic locations, such that the particular instructions are provided in response to the geographic position of the vehicle at least generally corresponding to the particular geographic location associated with the particular instruction. The particular instructions are thus provided to the driver of the vehicle only when the geographic position of the vehicle is at or near the predetermined or preset waypoints or geographic locations corresponding to the respective particular instructions.
According to an aspect of the present invention, a navigation system for a vehicle includes a vehicle-based telematics system, a vehicle-based global positioning system and a control. The telematics system is operable to receive a user input and to download directional information from a remote source to the control of the vehicle in response to the user input (often, for instance, in ONSTAR®, the user input may be a request from the driver to the remote source or service center operator for directions to a particular destination) and an initial geographic position of the vehicle, such as typically determined by the vehicle-based global positioning system. The directional information comprises at least two instructions, with each instruction being coded to or associated with or linked to a respective geographic location or waypoint. The control is operable to provide an output corresponding to each of the at least two instructions in response to a then current geographic position of the vehicle. The control is operable to provide each instruction only when the then current geographic position of the vehicle at least generally matches or
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