A System for Fine-Grained Zone-Based Positioning Using Bluetooth - Term Paper Example

RESEARCH PAPER FOR CONFERENCE: A SYSTEM FOR FINE-GRAINED ZONE-BASED POSITIONING USING BLUETOOTH Student Name: Naif Ali AL Mudawi Student ID: 15674945 Supervisor: Dr. Seng Loke 30/05/2011 Latrobe University, Australia Acknowledgement I would like to thank God for all the blessings that I have in my life. In addition, I would like to thank Dr. Seng Loke for directing and supporting me. In addition, I would like to thank my mother and my wife for their constant support. Abstract Systems of location have had a growing trend of becoming one of the most important applications used in computing. This research introduces a mobile application which shows the location of a user and demonstrates how location can be accurately identified using Bluetooth technology by developing algorithms for fine-grained zone-based positioning using multiple Bluetooth sensors and implementing the positioning system using JavaME. Introduction Location systems have become one of the most promising areas in mobile computing and rapid developments in communications technology have contributed to growing interest. However, implementation is yet to be done extensively. Bluetooth technology is favored by one of the location systems because it uses short-range frequencies. Location systems consist of a number of sensors deployed in a particular area and they are able to identify the current location of a user within a coverage area by comparing the signal received with a database, linking to signals sent from transmitters from a specific location. Bluetooth uses a short-range radio signal, and in order to locate the user, many communication services are needed in the vicinity of the user. These communication services are referred to as “call zones”. In total, the connection needs to be completed in less than 10.24 seconds, and during this time, any information connection is made possible. A GPS sends radio signals in order to detect locations, which uses electromagnetic signals which allow the user to define the location by using a triangulation method. However, the GPS must receive signals directly from the satellite, making it almost useless at home and in dense urban areas. For a good indoor environment result, many sensors should be used. Bluetooth devices can communicate with the network via an access point and they are able to exchange location information with each other. If the position changes, it will be updated. In order to achieve the best connectivity, the master in the piconet should be allowed to choose the best channel for mobile nodes (either master or slave), providing the highest possible bandwidth. Lack of synchronization between mobile devices will make the implementation of transformation processes and the sharing of channels difficult. In recent years, much research has been carried out regarding the establishment of positioning systems, which has created a base for the further development of these systems. Of these systems, the most popular is the Global Positioning System (GPS) has the characteristic of determining one’s location outdoors and not indoors. In this paper, I will discuss these systems, and the proposed system which aims to identify positions in an indoor environment. Keywords: Bluetooth, mobile, stationary reference, positioning, ones, algorithm Outline of thesis This thesis is organized as follows. Chapter 2 will present the background of Bluetooth technology in positioning systems and describe some of its features used in server communication. Important protocols will be outlined. Chapter 3 will introduce several applications that were used in the past and cover the concept and architecture of the proposed system along with its realization. The fourth chapter will discuss issues related to implementation and a description of system components and classes in more detail. System performance will also be evaluated in this chapter. Finally, this thesis will conclude by suggesting future work and recommendations. Aims and contributions of the research This research aims to investigate fine-grained zone-based positioning using Bluetooth technology and investigate the minimum size of zones that can be achieved by Bluetooth overlapping, and will clarify the shape of Bluetooth zones, and the speed at which a user can be positioned within a zone. It will also develop algorithms for fine-grained zone-based positioning using multiple Bluetooth sensors. The contributions of this research are as follows: It highlights the minimum size of the zone that can be achieved by using a stationary reference Bluetooth device to create overlaps. The developed application will play a key role in Bluetooth technology by highlighting the shape and extent of Bluetooth zones. System components Below is the list of equipment used in this research for this prototype. One Mobile phone which has a Bluetooth module. Four laptops, each equipped with Bluetooth Protocol Stack Chapter 2: Background In today’s world, location-based services have become more important because of their many applications in detecting locations. There are many technologies to support positioning systems such as GMS, GPS, and Bluetooth that are available today. Bluetooth is a wireless network technology that has been invented as an alternative to cabled systems and is used to connect devices as shown in Figure 1. Figure 1: Some devices which use Bluetooth technology. The next table will show briefly the characteristics of Bluetooth that enable it by using low-cost transceiver microchips to provide a relatively cheap and short range method of communication. These vary in power consumption and physical range and are organized by three classes. Class Maximum Permitted Power mW (dBm) Range (approximate) Class 1 100 mW (20 dBm) 100 meters Class 2 2.5 mW (4 dBm) 10 meters Class 3 1 mW (0 dBm) 1 meter Table 1: Key features in Bluetooth design. Figure 2: Shows the piconet, the master device at the center of the piconet and the other devices around it are the slaves. Figure 3: Bluetooth protocol stock. Figure 4: The Service Discovery Protocols. Chapter 3: Related work Bluetooth positioning There are many Bluetooth-based positioning systems that have been proposed over the past few years. These applications have generally assisted in creating a well-developed positioning system. However, these applications also require an extensively deployed infrastructure, which will allow any Bluetooth device to be used to determine a location. Many of these applications can be further developed and applied. There are many methods which can be used in positioning systems such as Angle of Arrival (AOA), Cell Identity (CI), Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA) and Time of Arrival (TOA). Zone based positioning Previous systems ensure that a user can be located via sensors which are located in different zones. However, areas can be covered by many sensors and therefore these sensors can overlap in a particular area. ParcTab is one of the technological systems that can be used to identify location. Others include Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI) and Radio Detection and Ranging (RADAR). A typical application of the proposed system is to track students at universities, as shown in Figure 5. Figure 5: Application tracing a user’s location. Figure 6: Example of the available search options. Point based positioning This system determines the user's point within the zone by providing more specific details within the area including coordinates. It also has the ability to track user movement within the area. The server system requires the composition of a location map to be able to provide the service. This requires many access points to provide automatic updates. A new mobile device system based on Bluetooth technology suitable for the indoor environment has been introduced for this purpose. Chapter4: Concept and Architecture of System (figure 7) Figure 7: System architecture The proposed application is based on the identification of the reference area by a stationary reference Bluetooth device, which contributes to the application identifying a zone using Bluetooth technology. The architecture divides the system into various components that seamlessly interact providing a practical solution to the positioning problem in indoor campuses. The system follows typical client/server architecture, with the client (mobile) running an application specifically built for this project, and the server, which is a stationary reference Bluetooth device. The application can be installed on any mobile phone which supports a Java application. Figure 8: System architecture Some of the terminology used in the application are: Stationary Reference Bluetooth Device (SRBD) is a device used to create an area where mobile devices can be located Reference Area is the area covered by a stationary reference Bluetooth device. Zone which might comprise one reference area or an overlapping of reference areas Recently, different types of communication have contributed to the identification of places by using 3G or using Wi-Fi especially outdoors. Chapter 5: Prototype Implementation and Evaluation Set up This application was developed by using Java ME to implement the mobile MIDlet. The stationary reference Bluetooth devices used to develop this application were four laptops; Toshiba Satellite L500-21T, Dell Latitude D500, Toshiba Satellite U405 and Asus A42J. The mobile used in this application was a Nokia (N70). The mobile device A mobile device must have Bluetooth functionality. This Bluetooth-enabled mobile phone is able to discover the stationary reference Bluetooth device by using a Bluetooth protocol (Service Discovery Protocol) stack which is required. The device being used in this application is shown in Figure 9. Figure 9: The Nokia N70. The phone used must be: Programmable; Bluetooth-enabled; Enable API to have access to Bluetooth functionality. Laptops Four laptops (S1, S2, S3 and S4) were used as stationary reference Bluetooth devices. The minimum requirement for each laptop is that it is Bluetooth-enabled. Figure 10: All laptops have Bluetooth software The place of experimentation This application will investigate Bluetooth positioning in two setting: first, within the indoor environment (figure 11); and second in the outdoor environment (figure 12). The reason for these two different approaches is to obtain different results, which can then be compared in order to help us understand how the zone positioning technique is different between indoor and outdoor environments. Figure 12: Outdoor environment for experimentation Figure11: Indoor environment for experimentation System overview A stationary reference Bluetooth device is a device used to create an area that has Bluetooth technology using four stationary reference Bluetooth devices (figure 13). Figure 13: Distribution of a stationary reference Bluetooth device. The mobile application is responsible for initiating Bluetooth discovery and maintaining user inputs. An algorithm is used to find the users location (Figure 19). if(res[0]==1 && res[1]==0 && res[2]==0 && res[3]==0 listDev.append( "You're in Zone1.", null) ; else if(res[0]==1 && res[1]==1 && res[2]==0 && res[3]==0) listDev.append( "You're in Zone2.", null ) ; else if(res[0]==0 && res[1]==1 && res[2]==0 && res[3]==0) listDev.append( "You're in Zone3.", null ) ; else if(res[0]==0 && res[1]==1 && res[2]==1 && res[3]==0) listDev.append( "You're in Zone4.", null ) ; else if(res[0]==1 && res[1]==1 && res[2]==1 && res[3]==0) listDev.append( "You're in Zone5.", null ( ; else if(res[0]==1 && res[1]==1 && res[2]==0 && res[3]==1) listDev.append( "You're in Zone6.", null ) ; else if(res[0]==1 && res[1]==0 && res[2]==0 && res[3]==1( listDev.append( "You're in Zone7.", null( ; else if(res[0]==1 && res[1]==1 && res[2]==1 && res[3]==1) listDev.append( "You're in Zone8.", null ) ; else if(res[0]==0 && res[1]==1 && res[2]==1 && res[3]==1) listDev.append( "You are in Zone9.", null(; else if(res[0]==1 && res[1]==0 && res[2]==1 && res[3]==1( listDev.append( "You're in Zone10.", null( ; else if(res[0]==0 && res[1]==0 && res[2]==1 && res[3]==0( listDev.append( "You're in Zone11.", null(; else if(res[0]==0 && res[1]==0 && res[2]==1 && res[3]==1( listDev.append( "You're in Zone12.", null( else if(res[0]==0 && res[1]==0 && res[2]==0 && res[3]==1( listDev.append( "You're in Zone13.", null) ; else if(res[0]==0 && res[1]==0 && res[2]==0 && res[3]==1( listDev.append( "You're in Zone14.", null(; else if(res[0]==1 && res[1]==0 && res[2]==1 && res[3]==0( listDev.append( "You're in Zone15.", null( ; Figure 19: Algorithm used to determine the user’s location. Using Bluetooth for zone based positioning Table 3 will clearly show the overlap between stationary reference Bluetooth devices and displays the shape and size of each zone which is covered by stationary reference Bluetooth devices Table 2 clearly highlights the overlap between areas by stationary reference Bluetooth devices, and displays zones where a user can be located. Table 4 and 5 will demonstrate that there is a very clear difference in signal strength between the stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an indoor and an outdoor environment. Bluetooth Devices in an Indoor Environment creates an overlap and a mobile device that is discovered by the two will be considered to be in the overlap zone (Table 2). Three stationary reference Bluetooth devices shield there reference areas, which can overlap to create many zones. Figure 14: Mobile application lifecycle. Figure 15: The main screen of the application Figure 16: The second screen of the application Figure 17: The message shown when the user is discovered Figure 18: The message shown when the user is outside the zones Four stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an indoor and outdoor environment have different signal strengths and lead to numerous overlaps that may not occur every time. Table 2: Shows the possibility of device detection by two stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an indoor environment. Table 3: Shows the possibility of the detection of devices by three stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an indoor environment Table 4: Shows the possibility of the detection of devices by four stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an indoor environment. Table 5: Shows the possibility of the detection of devices by four stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an outdoor environment. Figure 20: One reference area created by one stationary reference Bluetooth device in an indoor environment Figure 21: Two reference areas created by stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an indoor environment. Figure 22: The reference area created by three stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an indoor environment. Figure 23: The zones due to the reference areas from the four stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an indoor environment. Figure 24: The reference area created by four stationary reference Bluetooth devices in an outdoor environment Performance study The application began by scanning one stationary reference Bluetooth device, which it scanned ten times, in order to determine the average time it takes to find the location. The average time it took the application to discover one stationary reference Bluetooth device was 10.76 seconds. The time taken to discover that the mobile device is in the zone due to the overlap of the reference areas of two stationary reference Bluetooth devices was 10.75 seconds. The average time taken by the application to discover that it is in zone found by four overlapping reference areas, which was 10.87 seconds and 10.89 seconds respectively. Table 6 illustrates these findings clearly. Figure 25: Average time to detect overlap Table 6: The values of the 10 test times. Summary There are differences in the shapes of the zones. Zones in the indoor environment were much closer, and also the small size of each zone made them more meaningful and visible compared to the outdoor environment Conclusion Summary and contribution This paper has described how Bluetooth technology can be used to provide and identify a user’s location. It has also highlighted the benefits of Bluetooth technology. It also proposed a method to solve some of the deficiencies prevalent in previous Bluetooth systems and explained how to implement them. This paper has discussed some of the characteristics of Bluetooth technology and the various types of protocols, concept and architecture. Future work Future improvements to this application may increase its effectiveness by reducing the amount of time it requires to determine the location of a user. Speed at which a user enters and leaves a Bluetooth zone can also play a key role in Bluetooth positioning systems. Developing algorithms for fine-grained zone-based positioning, using multiple Bluetooth sensors and addition of intelligence will improve the application. References [1] Ahuja, D. C., Hardy, A., Kanji, I.‟A Bluetooth Based Local Positioning System”. Proceedings of the ENGG, 2007, pp. 41-42. 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[10] Rodriguez, M., Pece, J.P., Escudero, C.J. ‟In-building location using Bluetooth”.In Proceedings of the International Workshop on Wireless Ad Hoc Networks, 2005. [11] Thongthammachart, S., and Olesen, H.‟ Bluetooth enables in-door mobile location services”. Vehicular Technology Conference, 2003. VTC 2003-Spring. The 57th IEEE Semiannual, 2003 vol.3, pp. 2023 - 2027 . Read More