Location Aware Information System (LAIS) Neftali Alverio Bryan Halter Jeff Cardillo Brian Reed Advisor: Prof. Tilman Wolf
Location Aware Information System(LAIS)
Neftali AlverioBryan HalterJeff CardilloBrian Reed
Advisor: Prof. Tilman Wolf
LAIS Project Overview
• Provide location specific information on wireless PDA– Maps, businesses, events, etc.
– Updates as you travel
• Example:– Campus tour with wireless client
• Required:– Pocket PC
– GPS device
– Internet access (wireless Ethernet or cellular)
LAIS Project Diagram
Database Design
Database Challenges
• Store location relevant information– Ranges instead of points– Large amount of information
• Efficiently query any point in the world
• Map the spherical Earth into database tables
World Subdivision
Our Cell: 1…Our Cell: 14…
Quadrant 1
Quadrant 4Quadrant 3
Quadrant 2
Cell Algorithm• Used by Scavenger & Server• Matching Latitudes & Longitudes to cells
1. Divides current cell into 4 equal pieces2. Select sub-cell by comparing Latitude & Longitude3. Repeated 16 times
• UMass Engineering Quad – 1411223332432413 • Width of cells thins out towards the poles• Find set of cells for a user given range
Local cells
Database Design
• 16 layers for data of different sizes– Finest resolution is 1/3 mile x 1/3 mile
• To store and retrieve information– Cell number is key to data– Need to calculate cell number from geographic coordinates
• Separation of locations and their information– One to many relationship
Location Finder
LAIS Location FinderChallenges
• Admin specifies location and type of information• Example:
– Banks in Amherst, MA 01003
• Challenge:– Getting GPS coordinates for address
• Commercial solutions:– Microsoft MapPoint.NET ($5,000 for student license)
• Web sources:– superpages.com and gps.algebra.com
Location Finder ProcessLocation Finder ProcessFinding Locations using superpages.comFinding Locations using superpages.com
http://yp107.superpages.com/listings.phtml?SRC=&STYPE=D&PG=L&RLO=&RLT=&CB=&C=&N=&RR=5&AL=&RE=&RT=[City]&RS=[State]&RZ=[ZipCode]&R=D&search=Find+It
URL used will have actual city state and zip filled in where red text apears
Sample of a resulting webpage with links to categories
Location Finder ProcessLocation Finder ProcessFinding Locations using superpages.comFinding Locations using superpages.com
• Search for listings on superpages.com based on admin preferences
• Use form post method per area for listings
• Parse source code to extract listings.
Sample webpage of location results for a category type.
Location Finder ProcessLocation Finder ProcessAcquiring Cell Number and GPS Acquiring Cell Number and GPS
CoordinatesCoordinates
• Break address into 2 parts after first comma from previous process.
• 253 Triangle St, Amherst, MA 01002 becomes
• 253 Triangle St
• Amherst, MA 01002
• Feed into gps.algebra site via form post
• Parse results for Latitude and Longitude.
http://gps.algebra.com/?addr1=253 Triangle St&addr2=Amherst, MA 01002
LAIS Information
Information Retrieval
Purpose• Obtain information
about locations from web
• Update automatically• Require minimal
human intervention
Challenges• Web pages lack well
defined form• All relevant data is not
in one section• HTML page not well
suited to output
Parsing Steps
Remove all but useful sections
Remove HTML Tags
Remove tabs and carriage returns
Remove extra spaces
Store to the database
Syntax Recognition
Raw HTML<br> </td> </tr> <tr>
<td width="50%" bgcolor="#ffffff"><font face="Arial"><font color="#800000"><a href="http://www.ecs.umass.edu/ece/lectures/martinez.html"> Jose Martinez
</a> </font></font> <br> <i><font
color="#800000"> University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign, Computer Science </font></i> <br><i><font color="#800000"> Title: Speculative Shared-Memory Architectures</font></i> <br><font color="#800000"> February 25, 4:00 p.m., 132 Marston</font> <br> <fontcolor="#800000"></font> </td> <td><br>
Desired OutputJose Martinez University of Illinois/Urbana-Champaign, Computer Science Title: Speculative Shared-Memory Architectures February 25, 4:00 p.m., 132 Marston
Syntax RuleToken: <br>Sections before: 3Sections after: 0
Data storage• Data is stored in a table
corresponding to the layer on which the location it refers to exists.
• Data is stored with a type, entry date, reference URL, referred to location
LAIS Client/Server
Client/Server Interactions
• Client:– Get GPS coordinates– Send request to server via wireless link
• Server:– Receive request– Query database– Generate output map
• Client:– Display page
System Demo
User Login User Preferences
University of Massachusetts Campus
Our location is the W.E.B Dubois library (marked red). Maps with a zoom of 1.5 mi (left), 1 mi (center), and .5 mi
(right)
University of Massachusetts Campus
Same location as before but with a road map shown.
Budget
• Hardware:– PDA ($500)– Server ($2,000) Donated by Microsoft– GPS Unit ($300)– Wireless Access Points ($150)
• Software– Visual Studio .NET– Microsoft SQL Server
• Submitted grant to Microsoft– Microsoft funds everything excluding the GPS