BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to an auto clean machine, a cliff determining method and a surface determining method, and particularly relates to a cliff determining method and a surface determining method which can determine a surface type or a cliff.

2. Description of the Prior Art

As technology advances, an auto clean machine (e.g. a robot cleaner) becomes more and more popular. However, a conventional auto clean machine always has no proper mechanism for determining the existence of a cliff. The cliff can mean, for example, a height difference between two surfaces of different stairs.

Besides, different types of surface are suitable for different auto clean machine parameters. For example, the surface A is suitable for a stronger suction power or the dust thereon cannot be cleaned, and surface B is suitable for a weaker suction power or it may be damaged. However, the conventional auto clean machine cannot determine a surface type. The user must manually input the surface type to the conventional auto clean machine.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

One objective of the present invention is to provide an auto clean machine and a cliff determining method which can determine the existence of a cliff.

Another objective is to provide an auto clean machine and a surface type determining method which can determine a surface type which the auto clean machine is provided on.

One embodiment of the present invention discloses an auto clean machine, which comprises: a chassis; an internal light source, located inside the chassis, configured to emit internal light; an external light source, located outside the chassis, configured to emit external light; an optical sensor, configured to sense optical data generated according to reflected light of the external light or according to reflected light of the internal light; and a control circuit, configured to analyze optical information of the optical data. If the internal light source is activated, the external light source is de-activated and the control circuit determines variation of the optical information is larger than a variation threshold, the control circuit changes the internal light source to be non-activated and the external light source to be activated.

In one embodiment, the control circuit determines whether a cliff exists or not according to the optical information of the optical data generated according to reflected light of the external light after the internal light source is non-activated and the external light is activated.

Another embodiment of the present invention discloses: an cliff determining method applied to an electronic device comprising an internal light source configured to emit internal light and an external light source configured to emit external light, comprising: (a) activating the internal light source and de-activating the external light; (b) changing the internal light source to be non-activated and the external light source to be activated, if variation of optical information generated according to the internal light is larger than a variation threshold; and (c) determining whether a cliff exists or not according to the optical information of the optical data generated according to reflected light of the external light, after the internal light source is non-activated and the external light is activated.

Still another embodiment of the present invention discloses: a surface type determining method applied to an electronic device comprising an internal light source configured to emit internal light, comprising: (a) activating the internal light source to emit the inter light to a surface which the electronic device is provided on; and (b) determining a type of the surface according to reflected light of the internal light. In other words, the step (a) activates the internal light source to illuminate a surface which the electronic device is detecting, and the step (b) determines a type of the surface according to the optical information generated by the electronic device based on the optical data obtained from the internal light reflected off from the surface provided.

In view of above-mentioned embodiments, the existence of a cliff and the surface and the surface type can be automatically determined based on optical data. Therefore, the user does not need to manually input related information.

These and other objectives of the present invention will no doubt become obvious to those of ordinary skill in the art after reading the following detailed description of the preferred embodiment that is illustrated in the various figures and drawings.

