Indoor location based services challenges, requirements and usability of current solutions
Introduction
Location Based Services (LBS), such as navigation, Location Based Social Networking (LBSN), asset finding and tracking, are used by many people widely around the world [1], [2]. About three quarters (74%) of smartphone device owners are active users of LBS [3] (Pew Research 2013). However, when used indoors, applications have difficulty providing the same level of positioning accuracy, continuity and reliability as outdoors [4]. Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) are the most widely used positioning technology for outdoor use [5]. However their signals can be easily blocked, attenuated or reflected [6]. This makes them unreliable indoors, making it impossible to seamlessly use them for positioning across outdoor and indoor environments. Many life-saving services, such as for emergencies and security, could be improved hugely if indoor LBS could address this challenge. In addition, although people spend most of their time inside, indoor LBS generates less than 25% of total revenue (ABI research 2015). If LBS could overcome these challenges, its market will develop and more users will be attracted. This paper identifies these challenges using a survey of the latest research and the results of a survey conducted by the authors. The paper also evaluates current solutions and uses this analysis to identify the most suitable solution among those currently available.
Research into the challenges presented by LBS is on-going [4], [7], [8], [9]. This paper considers their findings, in addition to a comprehensive survey targeting ordinary LBS users, application developers, component providers and companies, market analysts and content providers. This synthesizes both the technical and non-technical challenges in one study. The most important challenge identified by this paper is providing Quality of Positioning Services (QoPS) — the functional and non-functional parameters that include accuracy, availability, and cost (both to the user and for infrastructure deployment) including the availability, continuity, and accuracy of positioning services for indoor use. Other major challenges are identified as concerns over privacy associated with location data and the overall cost of services.
Some of these challenges, including accuracy and reliability, are directly linked to the effectiveness of positioning technologies while others, such as cost and privacy, are closely related to them. However, there are some issues that are independent, such as the business model used and the social acceptability of an application. The latter have been reviewed elsewhere [10].
This paper reviews the technologies which are currently being used as solutions to these challenges. Also, based on the results of a survey, a literature review and analysis on the available systems, this paper compiles the requirements of current LBS applications. By comparing the technological requirements of LBS applications and the available solutions, the paper assesses the usability of the current technologies for five application categories.
In addition, an analytical tool is described to evaluate the usability and fitness-to-purpose of each positioning technology for specific applications. The application requirements might differ slightly from the general category it falls into. This tool uses the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) [11] to select the most appropriate technology among those currently available according to the positional requirements for the application. AHP is a powerful tool for systematic multi-criteria decision-making. The developed tool is sufficiently flexible that it can assess new LBS applications, which are currently emerging very frequently.
In section two, the structure of the survey and the process of the identification of LBS challenges and requirements are explained. Section three studies the current solutions to the identified challenges and a usability analysis tool is introduced and used.
Section snippets
Identification of indoor LBS requirements and challenges
Although some of the challenges in the development of LBS are shared by a wide range of applications, their impact can vary from one application to another. For example, the availability and the accuracy of indoor positioning services is one of the major obstacles for indoor applications. The main positioning technology, Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) such as GPS, is not usually available. A lack of accurate positioning is a major issue for tracking and navigation services. However,
Positioning requirements and solutions
Reliable, inexpensive indoor positioning is needed for many LBS applications. It needs to be able to localize users accurately and work seamlessly with outdoor positioning technologies [18]. In this subsection we review positioning technologies from a quality-of-service point of view to give a clearer picture of what is the biggest challenge to achieving this.
In general, localization technologies can be categorized into three main groups: Beacon-based positioning technologies, Dead-Reckoning
Discussion
Indoor LBS has not yet found its position in the market, despite the fact that people spend most of their time inside buildings, e.g. offices and apartments. Indoor LBS faces several technical and non-technical challenges and this paper has studied the three most important ones, according to a survey conducted, including indoor positioning, availability of indoor maps, and location privacy.
In terms of positioning technologies, the usability analysis of current solutions for different segments
Conclusion
Indoor LBS is not commonly implemented in mobile services due to the many technical challenges that remain. This paper has analyzed the requirements and challenges of providing indoor LBS by reviewing the available literature and conducting a survey. The main requirements of indoor LBS applications were determined and challenges were identified. Aspects related to quality of service (including availability, accuracy, and cost) were identified as the major challenges. The development of
Acknowledgments
This research was supported financially by EU FP7 Marie Curie Initial Training Network MULTI-POS (Multi-technology Positioning Professionals) [grant number 316528].
The corresponding author has moved since the initial submission of the paper. Her work, presented in this paper, has been done at the Nottingham Geospatial Institute, The University of Nottingham.
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