iBeacon is a protocol designed by Apple that sits on top of, or uses, the Bluetooth LE protocol. Think of Bluetooth LE as a standard mechanism for sending a short amount of information that can be anything. In the case of iBeacon this ‘anything’ is the UUID, major, minor and a power calibration value called the measured power. We have a post explaining these iBeacon values.
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Xerox Bluetooth Kit for AirPrint
Xerox offers a Bluetooth Kit designed for AltaLink B81XX and C81XX models, which facilitates AirPrint discovery through iBeacon technology. This kit not only provides Bluetooth connectivity but also enables iBeacon discovery, making it easier for users to find and link up with compatible Xerox printers via their Apple devices.
Additionally, the kit supports Wi-Fi Direct, allowing for mobile printing without the need for a network connection.
New Waterproof Humidity Sensor Beacon
Having a beacon being able to detect humidity (and temperature) while at the same time being waterproof is difficult to achieve because the case itself usually needs to be waterproof thus preventing the sensor on the printed circuit board from sampling the environment. The new M52-PA-S is unique in that it solves this problem by having a permeable seal on the case and a waterproof printed circuit board.
The ‘PA’ signifies this beacon also has an extra RF amplifier for a longer range up to 150m. This beacon can be used in many different modes: 1 channel advertising, 2 channels advertising, 1 + 2 advertising, sensor advertising and Meeblue fixed data. The two main advertising channels can be iBeacon, Eddystone UID, Eddystone URL or user defined. When sensor advertising, the main channels are disabled and advertising includes a unique id, temperature, humidity and battery voltage.
Can I Use My Phone as Bluetooth Beacon?
A question that often arises is, “Can I use my phone as a Bluetooth beacon?” The answer is ‘yes’.
Before we get into the details, it’s essential to understand what a Bluetooth beacon is. In simple terms, a Bluetooth beacon is a small wireless device that transmits a periodic signal to other Bluetooth-enabled devices within its range. This technology is often used for indoor positioning, sensing and other location-based services.
Technically, yes, a smartphone can function as a Bluetooth beacon. Both Android and iOS platforms offer apps to turn your phone into a beacon transmitter. However, there are some caveats.
Using your phone as a Bluetooth beacon can be a significant drain on your battery. Beacons are designed to be low-energy devices that can run for years on a single battery. Your phone, on the other hand, has many other functions that consume power, so using it as a beacon will lead to the need for frequent charging.
The range of a dedicated Bluetooth beacon can be up to 100 metres, depending on the model and settings. A smartphone’s Bluetooth range is generally much shorter, limiting its effectiveness as a beacon.
While there are apps such as Locate Beacon, Beacon Simulator (for iOS), Beacon Simulator, nRFConnect (for Android) that can turn your phone into a beacon, these are often not as reliable or feature-rich as dedicated beacon hardware. You won’t be able to change all the settings such as power, advertising period and advertising type as you would with a dedicated hardware beacon. Additionally, running such an app in the background may interfere with other phone functions and some phones eventually close long running services.
Despite these limitations, there are scenarios where using your phone as a Bluetooth beacon could be useful. If you’re a developer or a business looking to experiment with beacon technology, using a phone can be a cost-effective way to test your ideas before investing in dedicated devices.
While it’s possible to use your phone as a Bluetooth beacon, it’s generally not the most efficient or reliable method for most applications. However, for personal use or small-scale use, it can serve as a convenient alternative. If you’re considering implementing beacon technology on a larger scale, investing in inexpensive dedicated hardware is usually the better option.
Study on Visitor Behaviour in Museums
There’s new research from the Department of Architecture and Design (DAD), Turin, Italy on Technology as a tool to study visitor behaviour in museums: positioning and neuropsychological detection to identify physical & cognitive barriers (pdf).
Inclusive communication projects in museums often rely on general principles of design without considering how unique a cultural experience it should be. It’s important to study all types of visitors, especially those who feel left out, to understand their experiences better and help them feel more included. However, tracking visitors in a museum can be difficult due to the indoor environment and the need to avoid affecting their behaviour.
To tackle this, the researchers used Bluetooth to study individual experiences. They used a Raspberry Pi that can located a user based on signals from Bluetooth beacons, providing a cheap way to track visitors indoors.
This system was tested at the National Etruscan Museum of Villa Giulia in Rome, Italy. About 60 visitors were tracked, and their emotional responses were measured using a special bracelet. This data was stored and analysed to understand how visitors’ locations in the museum might relate to their emotional experiences, such as spending more time near pieces of art that have a strong emotional impact.
New Human Occupancy Sensor Beacon
The new INGICS iBS08 human detection sensor beacon uses a IT thermal sensor to detect occupancy. It’s better than a PIR sensor beacon in that it can detect the presence of a human even if they are not moving. It’s powered by a CR2450 battery and has a battery life of 1.8 years with a 30-second advertising interval.
There are two models with two distinct angles to cater to a variety of needs. The iBS08S model provides a wide field of view (FOV) of 35 degrees, making it perfect for shorter distance applications, with a detection range of up to 100cm. The iBS08L offers a narrower FOV of 10 degrees, tailored for longer distance applications and boasting a detection range of up to 250cm.
The device are equipped with the latest Bluetooth 5 technology, supporting Coded Phy, with a Bluetooth range of up to 100M.
This beacon is available by special order from BeaconZone.
The Potential of BLE Beacons in Enhancing Road Safety
Road traffic accidents have been steadily increasing, raising concerns among authorities and the public alike. A significant number of these accidents can be attributed to factors such as driver error and a blatant disregard for obeying traffic signs. While these human-induced errors persist, there is a hope on the horizon in the form of Connected and Automated Vehicles (CAVs). These vehicles, equipped with advanced technology, are anticipated to drastically reduce the number of accidents by navigating roads more safely and efficiently than traditional vehicles.
A component in the deployment and effectiveness of CAVs is Vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communication. This encompasses infrastructure-to-vehicle (I2V) and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication, acting as a bridge to enhance road safety for vehicles driven both manually by humans and automatically by systems. These modes of communication ensure that vehicles are constantly in touch with their surroundings, be it other vehicles or the infrastructure, allowing them to make informed decisions.
Enter Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons, a technology that holds significant potential for I2V communication. Their appeal lies in their affordability, compactness, low energy consumption, wide compatibility with contemporary devices, and an impressively extensive range. Given these attributes, there’s growing interest in evaluating BLE beacons’ efficacy when used as roadside units (RSUs) attached to traffic signs. The goal? To seamlessly convey time-critical information to vehicles, especially in bustling urban settings.
A comprehensive study was conducted to look into this very potential. This involved integrating a CAV development platform to discern if the vehicle could aptly receive the beacon message from a distance that allows for sufficient reaction time, especially when adhering to the speed limits set for that particular road. The study was meticulous, taking into account the road’s geometry and the varying conditions it might present, from dry surfaces to wet terrains.
Furthermore, this research wasn’t just limited to understanding the capability of BLE beacons. It also looked into testing diverse BLE beacon configurations to pinpoint the optimal setup that ensured the required distance was met for all signs. This was imperative to ensure that CAVs could safely detect the signs and respond accordingly.
The findings were promising. The results demonstrated that BLE beacons, when positioned and configured appropriately, have immense potential to be employed in time-sensitive I2V communications on urban roads. Moreover, the study succeeded in identifying the optimal beacon configurations for signs, ensuring they are detected safely by CAVs, marking a significant stride towards safer urban roads in the future.
How Far Can a Bluetooth Beacon Measure Distance?
A common misconception is that beacons can measure distance. In reality, beacons, with the exception of some specialist social distancing beacons and sensor beacons with an additional distance sensor, are designed to send signals rather than receive them.
Instead, measuring distance happens on the receiving end. Devices such as smartphones are equipped to detect these beacon signals. When a beacon sends out its Bluetooth radio signal, the receiving device knows the received signal strength (RSSI). This RSSI can be used to infer the distance between the beacon and the device.
In the proximity of a few metres, the variation in RSSI is significant enough to deduce the distance with a reasonable degree of accuracy. However, as the distance increases, the variation in RSSI becomes less pronounced. This means that while you can determine if a beacon is close or far away, pinpointing an exact distance becomes challenging.
For example, the iOS programming API, CoreBluetooth, provides classifications for the detected beacon signals. These classifications are ‘immediate’, ‘near’, and ‘far’. They don’t give a precise measurement in metres or feet but rather a general idea of the beacon’s proximity.
In terms of maximum range, depending on the specific beacon, it can be detected from distances up to 50m or even 100m. However, as mentioned earlier, at these longer ranges, the RSSI doesn’t provide a clear indication of exact distance. Instead, it offers a more general sense of whether the beacon is nearer or farther away.
Location System Anchor Optimisation
Researchers from Department of Computer Science, University of Jaén, Spain have a new paper on OBLEA: A New Methodology to Optimise Bluetooth Low Energy Anchors in Multi-occupancy Location Systems.
This paper introduces a new methodology called OBLEA, which aims to optimise BLE anchor configurations in indoor settings. It takes into account various BLE variables to enhance flexibility and applicability to different environments. The method uses a data-driven approach, aiming to obtain the best configuration with as few anchors as possible.
The OBLEA method offers a flexible framework for indoor spaces where the occupants are fitted with wrist activity bracelets (beacons) and BLE anchors are set up. The anchors then collect and aggregate data, sending it to a central point (fog node) via MQTT.
A dataset was generated with the maximum number of anchors in the indoor environment, and different configurations were then trained and tested based on this dataset. The best balance between fewer anchors and high accuracy was chosen as the optimal configuration.
This methodology was tested and optimised in a real-world scenario, in a Spanish nursing home in Alcaudete, Jaén. The experiment involved seven inhabitants in four shared double rooms. As a result of this optimisation, the inhabitants could be located in real time with an accuracy of 99.82%, using a method called the K-Nearest-Neighbour algorithm and collating the signal strength (RSSIs) in 30-second time windows.
What is the Difference Between iBeacon and Eddystone?
iBeacon, a standard developed by Apple, was introduced in 2013 as part of the iOS 7. It’s based on Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), a power-efficient variant of Bluetooth technology. The strength of iBeacon lies in its background support on iOS devices, which allows for easier detection of beacons.
Google introduced Eddystone in 2015. This protocol for beacons was developed to embrace a broader range of uses. Eddystone offers multiple frame types to cater to various data needs like URLs, unique identifiers and sensor data. One most distinctive feature of Eddystone was the Eddystone-URL, where the beacons could send out a web address. However, this has been limited by the discontinuation of Google Nearby in Android.
Despite the differences in their design and features, both iBeacon and Eddystone share common ground in their use of standard Bluetooth advertising. They send different data in the same standard Bluetooth advertising packets. This shared aspect of technology ensures that they can both communicate effectively to both iOS and Android.
While Eddystone’s versatile frame types and open protocol initially made it appealing, it has seen a decline since the discontinuation of Nearby in Android. Currently, most new systems requiring smartphone applications to detect a beacon opt for iBeacon.
However, when it comes to locating and detection using gateways rather than smartphones, iBeacon vs Eddystone becomes less relevant and the beacons’ Bluetooth MAC addresses are usually used. The advertising packets can instead be used for sensor data, for example, temperature and humidity.
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