location aware apps: patterns and solutions - ben butchart - jisc digital festival 2014

Location Aware Apps: Patterns & Solutions

Ben Butchart

Team Leader: Software Engineering, EDINA Jisc

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Ben Butchart [email protected]

Users of smartphones, tablets, and other devices expect position with the highest level of accuracy, always available, with the least amount of power consumed.

GPS Worldhttp://gpsworld.com/putting-the-ultra-low-power-in-geofence/

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Location Awareness awareness


Pins on Maps

Characteristics:

• Periodic location update to track user (blue dot).

• Pins /markers display Points of Interest (POIs).

• Armchair accessible.

Examples:• Google Maps, Apple Maps, Bing Maps

Power Management:• Good. (foreground only).

http://datenform.de/map-kassel-1.jpg

Constraints:• Foreground only• User manually pans map.• Network access

Options:• Augmented Reality View• 3d View

Related Patterns:• POIs Near Me• GPS

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POIS Near Me

Characteristics:• Periodic location update to

track user (blue dot). • Pins /markers display Points

of Interest (POIs) in vicinity

Examples:• Google Maps, Apple Maps, Bing Maps• AR: Wikitude, Layar, Junaio

Power Management:• Good. (usually by

request, foreground only).

Constraints:• Foreground only.• User requests POI update.• Network Access

Options:• Routing• Augmented Reality View• 3d View

Related Patterns:• Pins On Maps

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Geofence Notify

Characteristics:• User proximity to POI triggers

a notification or other background activity (audio)

• Can work in background (with device in pocket)

• Always checking location.

Examples:• Google Keep• iReminders• Family Locator • IfThisThenThat

Power Management:• Can be expensive


Constraints:• Hard for developer to control

OS driven behaviour.

Options:• Wakeful• Start on boot• widgets

Related Patterns:• Geofence Soundscape• Scavenger Hunt• Activity Detection

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Geofence Notification Anti-patterns

• Start activity directly (without notification) • Geofence DIY

http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-sysapps/2013Apr/att-0104/Geolocation_API_Modifications_for_Web_Applications_April_2013.pdf

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Geofence Soundscape

Characteristics:• Sounds/ acoustic /video tracks

provide ongoing immersive background.

• Different sounds layered / altered according to location.

• Location updates always on in geofence.

• Media always playing (while in geofence)

Examples:• Inception The App• Forgotten Futures

Power Management:• Expensive (near geofence)• Medium (away from geofence)


OS driven behaviour.

Options:• Wakeful• Start on boot• Transition events only• Activity detection

Related Patterns:• Geofence Notify• Activity Detection

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Data capture / Geo-tagging

Characteristics:• User can use device to

capture images, text, audio, GPS tracks and other sensor observations

• Captured assets are geo referenced (e.g. have lon, lat, altitude)

Examples:• Fieldtrip GB• iSpot• LeafWatch• Fulcrum• Evernote

Power Management:• Good (foreground only) • Medium (GPS track capture)

Constraints:• Sync’ing complex• GPS not always accurate

enough.

Options:• Sync to cloud to share.• Create active geofences.• Display on map.

Related Patterns:• Pins on Maps• POIs Near Me• Geofence Notify• Scavenger Hunt

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Scavenger Hunt

Characteristics:• One POI provides clue /

directions to discover next POI.

• User collects POIs / assets to gain points or arrive at final destination to collect prize.

Examples:• Ingres

Power Management:• Good (foreground only)• Medium (geofence modem)• Low (geofence native)

Constraints:• GPS • game engine.

Options:• Use geo-fences.• Augmented Reality visualisation.• Computer vision capture .• Create clues/content for other users to

discover (geo/ computer -caching).• Mix with real world clues / prizes (geo

caching)• Display on map.

Related Patterns:• Pins on Maps.• POIs Near Me.• Geofence Notify.• Data capture.

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Activity Detection

Characteristics:• System detect user activity

modes such as walking, in car, resting.

• Uses sensor fusion (gyroscope, accelerometer) as well as GPS / WIFI.

Examples:• Where’s My Car• Dude, Where’s My Car

Power Management:• Good (built in sensor fusion)• Low (developer implementation)


OS driven behaviour.• Requires data connection

Options:• Use with geo-fences.• Use with data capture.

Related Patterns:• Pins on Maps.• POIs Near Me.• Geofence Notify.• Data Capture

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Marauders Map

Characteristics:• Event triggered by a virtual

character rather than device location.

• Virtual character follows pre-defined route

• Geo-fence triggered by user’s proximity to virtual character as user “follows/accompanies” virtual character.

• http://dlib-brown.edina.ac.uk/openstacktestlink3.html

• Work in progress!

Power Management:• Good (foreground only)• Medium (geofence modem)• Low (geofence native)


Options:• Armchair mode.

Related Patterns:• Pins on Maps.• POIs Near Me.• Geofence Notify.• Data capture.

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Bomb SitesProject Zero: Disease Infection ModellingWomens WalksSpatial Memories

Example Location Aware Use Cases

Featured Concepts:

Other Suggested Concepts / Thoughts:

Campus tourLibrary reminder3D- GeologyBuilding AnatomyStudent Society / Club App

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Possible exention to Jisc funded Bomb site project (http://www.bombsight.org/) Disclaimer: this was idea I mooted about 2 years ago with project manager (Dr. Kate Jones) but not currently part of project or planned as far as I know. So only using idea as an example for design exercise.

Bomb Site – The night the bombs fell

We want to recreate some sense of the experience of Londoners during a single night during the London Blitz in 1941, using data from the National Archives that details the location, type and time that bombs fell during one of the heaviest nights of bombing during the Blitz. User will step back in time and be able to hear the Air Raid warnings at same time people heard the 50 years ago, they will hear bombs falling and explosions in the distance or nearby and be able see where their nearest shelter would have been as bombs start falling closer to their location.

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http://www.bombsight.org/

http://www.bombsight.org/


Patient Zero

Patient Zero project at Threshold Festival: http://sciencegrrl.co.uk/patient-zero-project/

One of the oldest and most common techniques in disease ecology ismathematical modelling. At its most basic level, it uses a set of equationsthat predict how the numbers of people infected by a disease in a populationwill change through time. The aim of the Patient Zero project is to explaininfectious disease modelling by simulating an epidemic with people attendinga local festival playing the part of the population experiencing theinfection.

We are Manda Minter, Beth Levick and Cassie Raby, and all three of us arePhD students in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behaviour at theUniversity of Liverpool. We have developed the project together with theLiverpool ScienceGrrl Chapter and the Forgotten Futures app.

We are each researching how disease moves through populations: leptospirosisin urban slums in Brazil; wildlife plague in Kazahstan; and baboons inNamibia. We are all interested in how we can describe the spread of diseaseand try to make predictions about how it might move in the future.(Use R programming language) Ji

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http://sciencegrrl.co.uk/patient-zero-project/







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In a short project in partnership with the London School of Economics (LSE), EDINA have produced a smartphone app for showcasing content from the LSE's recently acquired Women's Library.The Women's Library @ LSE collections document all aspects of women's lives, with a particular emphasis on the lives of women in the UK and the great political, economic and social changes of the past 150 years.The print collections include over 60,000 books and pamphlets and 3,000 periodical titles. The archive and museum collections include over 500 archives and 5,000 museum objects, including photographs, posters, badges, banners, textiles and ceramics.This short project concentrated on a sample of these resources, geolocatingthem and providing a smartphone interface with which to interact and discover key content – showcasing in particular content related to the suffragette movement. Using a smartphone, users can undertake guided walks around a number of London based walks and at key points discover more detail about some of the LSE Womens Library Collection relevant to that specific location.

Womens Walks

http://www.lse.ac.uk/library/collections/featuredCollections/womensLibraryLSE.aspx


Spatial Memories

An App enabling people with disabilities to become more independent and less reliant on others in making spatially aware reminders, hints and checklists using a personalised interface. The goal of the project is to develop a proof of concept smartphone App that will allow individual learners to record oral instructions, make text and audio notes, capture images, and associate these with locations, routes and activities. The aim is to improve the user’s confidence in different working and learning environments and assist them to live more independently.

The project has been funded through the ‘Good to go’ strand of the Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) programme. ‘Good to Go’ is about increasing independence in unfamiliar or challenging environments by giving people easy access to the information they need when they need it.

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location aware apps: patterns and solutions - ben butchart - jisc digital festival 2014

Education