Beacons and BIM Models for Indoor Guidance and Location

Abstract

This research work uses a simplified approach to combine location information from a beacon’s propagation signal interaction with a mobile device sensor (accelerometer and gyroscope) with local building information to give real-time location and guidance to a user inside a building. This is an interactive process with visualisation information that can help user’s orientation inside unknown buildings and the data stored from different users can provide useful information about users’ movements inside a public building. Beacons installed on the building at specific pre-defined positions emit signals that give a geographic position with an associated imprecision, related with Bluetooth’s range. This uncertainty is handled by building layout and users’ movement in a developed system that maps users’ position, gives guidance, and stores user movements. This system is based on an App (Find Me!) for Android OS (Operating System) which captures the Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) signal coming from the beacon(s) and shows, through a map, the location of the user’s smartphone and guide him to the desired destination. Also, the beacons can deliver relevant context information. The application was tested by a panel of new and habitual campus users against traditional wayfinding alternatives yielding navigation times about 30% smaller, respectively.

Improved Bluetooth Low Energy Sensor Detection for Indoor Localization Services

“…Neburka et al [11] evaluated the performance of the RSSI-based indoor positioning system in ideal and in real environment settings, where an increased fluctuation of RSSI values was observed in the real environment settings. To overcome the inaccurate summation of the estimated positions of the RSSI, in [12,14] a three-axis accelerometer and gyroscope were used to estimate the real-time location of the user. Rozum and Sebesta [45] proposed a new method to suppress RSSI fluctuation that uses spatial diversity (the Single-Input Multiple-Output (SIMO) approach) in combination with frequency diversity.…”

“…In existing research, several innovative solutions based on BLE-based localization systems have been proposed and evaluated, including indoor guidance and location [12], indoor positioning in a retail store [13], driver assistance in indoor parking areas [14], navigation systems for car searching in indoor parking garages [15], the real-time tracking of construction laborers [16], location-enhanced activity recognition in indoor environments [17], multi-residential activity labeling for smart homes solutions [18], location system for smart home control [19], the navigation of visually impaired people in buildings [20], and elderly people monitoring [21].…”

Things2People Interaction toward Energy Savings in Shared Spaces Using BIM

“…The university where the current case is being developed already has a BIM model of the campus buildings under development [24]. This model incorporates the total mathematical portrayal of the structure, including all room names.…”

CaACBIM: A Context-aware Access Control Model for BIM

“…The interviews revealed the necessity and benefits of BIM implementation in construction planning, as well as the challenges faced by customers in implementing BIM. Ferreira et al [29] used a simplified method, combining the location information generated by interaction between beacon propagation signals and mobile device sensors (accelerometers and gyroscopes) with local building information to provide real-time positioning and guidance for users in buildings.…”