Positioning and Routing with Bluetooth Low Energy
Trinh, Tung (2016)
Trinh, Tung
Metropolia Ammattikorkeakoulu
2016
All rights reserved
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-201804104373
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-201804104373
Tiivistelmä
This thesis report is based on the investigation and application of Bluetooth technology, in specific Bluetooth Low Energy. Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) refers to Bluetooth 4.0 or above Core Specification, which emphasizes low power consumption, low cost, low bandwidth, and simplified communication protocol compared to classic Bluetooth. It uses proximity, a relative distance between objects of interest as the main measurement. This is the main difference to the majority that use location, an absolute position of one object upon a coordinate.
The main references for the topic came from a commercial project done by the author with Luxus Oy for a shopping mall. The project made use of iBeacon which is a Bluetooth Low Energy protocol, in addition to a web service and beacon recognition framework provided by a third party. The goal of this study was to create an ecosystem that monitors and records the user proximity of the application with BLE devices. These devices were installed at shop entrances and they handed out pre-determined rewards.
Although the project was successful to a point, it was not able to take full benefit from advantages of Bluetooth technology. The problems acknowledged during the project development are discussed in the study. One challenge was caused by BLE and its inconsistency in interactivity. No feasible solution was found to this problem partly because of time limits. The development team had to conclude that the problem lies in the premature nature of BLE. Another problem was the vertical sensitivity in proximity when reading the beacon. This caused false positive results and discouraging customers to visit each shop for rewards. This was solved by reducing the required proximity level of the mobile application and the BLE device.
Finally, this study discusses how iBeacons system to indoor routing or navigation could be further developed.
The main references for the topic came from a commercial project done by the author with Luxus Oy for a shopping mall. The project made use of iBeacon which is a Bluetooth Low Energy protocol, in addition to a web service and beacon recognition framework provided by a third party. The goal of this study was to create an ecosystem that monitors and records the user proximity of the application with BLE devices. These devices were installed at shop entrances and they handed out pre-determined rewards.
Although the project was successful to a point, it was not able to take full benefit from advantages of Bluetooth technology. The problems acknowledged during the project development are discussed in the study. One challenge was caused by BLE and its inconsistency in interactivity. No feasible solution was found to this problem partly because of time limits. The development team had to conclude that the problem lies in the premature nature of BLE. Another problem was the vertical sensitivity in proximity when reading the beacon. This caused false positive results and discouraging customers to visit each shop for rewards. This was solved by reducing the required proximity level of the mobile application and the BLE device.
Finally, this study discusses how iBeacons system to indoor routing or navigation could be further developed.