Bluetooth-assisted context-awareness in educational data networks [An article from: Computers & Education]

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Description:
In this paper, we propose an auxiliary location network, to support user-independent context-awareness in educational data networks; for example, to help visitors in a museum. We assume that, in such scenarios, there exist service servers that need to be aware of user location in real-time. Specifically, we propose the implementation of a Bluetooth Location Network (BLN). The BLN is composed of small wireless nodes, which establish an spontaneous network topology at system initialization, and interact with Bluetooth-enabled user terminals (WLAN or GPRS PDAs, or WAP phones) or independent Bluetooth modems (badges). The BLN may coexist with any data protocol (IP over IEEE 802.11b or GPRS, WAP). We do not impose specialized terminal programming for location purposes, since we rely on basic Bluetooth signaling (responses to inquiry cycles). We evaluate BLN feasibility in two real educational scenarios, a school and a museum.