Micro-Macro Place Model for Mobile Location Accuracy
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Solution Overview
Problem
Mobile devices often struggle to determine their location accurately, especially in areas with poor signal reception or limited resources, leading to inoperable location-based functionalities.
Innovation Solution
The use of relationships between micro and macro places of relevance, where micro places are identified through WiFi scans and associated with macro places using a place model, allowing for location-aware features without precise GPS coordinates, and enabling error correction and enhanced location-based services.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If GPS-based location services are used to determine device position, then location accuracy is improved, but power consumption increases and functionality is lost in poor signal areas
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments location determination into two levels: macro-location using power-efficient WiFi scans for general area identification, and micro-location using GPS only when needed for precise positioning. This segmentation allows the device to maintain location awareness with reduced power consumption by avoiding continuous GPS operation.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces WiFi access points as intermediary elements between the device and GPS satellite system. By using WiFi scans as an intermediate location determination method, the system can obtain approximate location data without consuming GPS-level power, enabling location-based functionality in areas where GPS signals are weak or unavailable.
2Measurement precision
If GPS signals are used for location determination, then location accuracy is improved, but functionality becomes unavailable in areas with poor signal reception
Solution Approach 1:
The patent changes the measurement parameter from GPS satellite signal strength to WiFi access point signal characteristics. By monitoring WiFi BSSIDs and signal strengths, the system can determine location in environments where GPS signals are blocked or weak, such as indoor locations, thereby maintaining functionality availability across diverse environments.
Solution Approach 2:
WiFi networks serve as intermediary infrastructure that enables location determination in GPS-denied environments. The system uses WiFi access points as intermediate reference points to infer location, allowing location-based services to function reliably in areas with poor GPS reception.
3Use of energy by moving object
If WiFi scans are used instead of GPS, then power efficiency is improved, but location precision decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a two-tier location system where WiFi scans provide macro-location (general area) and GPS provides micro-location (precise position). This segmentation allows the system to achieve sufficient precision for many location-based services using only power-efficient WiFi scanning, reserving GPS for cases requiring high precision.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs partial location determination using WiFi scans alone for applications that don't require GPS-level precision. By using WiFi location data for macro-location needs (such as determining general vicinity for nearby store advertisements), the system achieves adequate precision with reduced power consumption, applying excessive action only when necessary.
Data Source
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AI summary
Methods, systems, computer-readable media, and apparatuses for utilizing relationships between places of relevance are presented. In some embodiments, a mobile computing device may obtain information indicative of a micro-place of relevance visited by the mobile device at a first time. The information may be based on measurements taken by the mobile device at the first time. Further, the mobile device may derive an attribute of the visit to the micro-place of relevance based on the obtained information and a place model that associates micro-places of relevance with macro-places of relevance.