GPS in conjunction with cell tower triangulation can boost recognition up to 10 feet on a very good day with strong GPS reception. That said, Cell tower signal alone can give an accuracy of approximately 3 miles. When in the coverage area of two towers, the accuracy is between one quarter and half a mile.
For accuracy of a few feet that one would need inside a mall, one would need to be receiving signals from between 15 and 20 location-based transmitters. The UK is experimenting with this for guiding large ships through the extremely crowded English Channel. Stores are experimenting with BlueTooth radio transmission technologies for alerting shoppers to specials they might like whilst shopping in different areas of the store. These transmissions should also work to help blind people navigate malls and such, but the concepts are still in development. David Chittenden, MSc, MRCAA Email: dchitten...@gmail.com Mobile: +64 21 2288 288 Sent from my iPhone > On 8 Nov 2013, at 7:26, "Kevin Minor" <kmi...@windstream.net> wrote: > > Hi Sieghard. > > You’re probably right about things like stores in a mall not being in some > GPS apps, but these apps use more than the satellites to get their position. > They use triangulation from several cell towers to get a more accurate > position. This is why you can get to within ten feet or so to a location in > a place like an airport, where the satellites may be very difficult to > receive. The Seeing Eye app does this, and I’m sure other GPS apps do the > same thing as well. > > What I think will happen is malls will start producing apps, and when you > walk by a store it will vibrate your phone and alert you of items for sale at > the store, or perhaps even producing a coupon for the store on the screen. > To get these apps accessible to us VO users, we’ll need to tell the mall > owners of our needs. This could benefit us as blind users in a couple of > ways. First, it gives us easier travel in a mall. The second is people > could realize that blind people can be quite independent with the right tools. > > Just my thoughts. > > Kevin Minor, Lexington, KY > kmi...@windstream.net > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the "VIPhone" Google > Group. > > Post a new message to VIPhone by emailing viphone@googlegroups.com. > > Search and view the VIPhone archives by visiting > http://www.mail-archive.com/viphone@googlegroups.com/. > > Reach the VIPhone owner and moderators by emailing > viphone+ow...@googlegroups.com. > > Unsubscribe and leave VIPhone by emailing > viphone+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > > More VIPhone group options can be found by visiting > http://groups.google.com/group/viphone?hl=en. > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "VIPhone" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to viphone+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the "VIPhone" Google Group. Post a new message to VIPhone by emailing viphone@googlegroups.com. Search and view the VIPhone archives by visiting http://www.mail-archive.com/viphone@googlegroups.com/. Reach the VIPhone owner and moderators by emailing viphone+ow...@googlegroups.com. Unsubscribe and leave VIPhone by emailing viphone+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. More VIPhone group options can be found by visiting http://groups.google.com/group/viphone?hl=en. --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "VIPhone" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to viphone+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
