Positioning

Overview

The Playground Positioning service provides simple positioning of GSM devices. The service can be used as a standalone service for acquiring coordinates for a specific device, or you can bundle the Positioning service with other services. The positioning information can be requested for a single device or a group of devices. It is possible to subscribe to location notifications.
The Playground Lab will provide a location simulator for running demos/proof of concepts.    

Features

The Playground Positioning Service currently has the following features:

• Get the position of a terminal
• Get position for a group of terminals
• Get the distance from a location to a terminal

Usage Examples

Buddy List

You have a Buddy List application on your cell phone where you can locate your buddies. One day you are in town and the time for lunch is approaching. You check to see if any of your buddies are nearby. When you do not find anyone close to you, you ask to be notified when the first one is within 500 meters of you. After a while you are notified about a buddy near by. You text the buddy and you decide to meet up at Starbucks for lunch.

To find the closest Starbucks you start your Starbucks locator application and check which one is closest to you and your buddy.

Search Team Localization

The service gives rescue organisations the opportunity to locate team candidates and volunteers in case of an emergency. An operator may enquire the GSM network for location of rescue team candidates.

Candidates may be registered with skills, and then the organisation can locate candidates with the right skills.

The operator can distribute SMS messages to qualified candidates closest to the area in question from the application.

Java Code Sample:

// The example below shows how to obtain the location
// of a handset by invoking the TerminalLocation web service.

// replace 12345678 with an actual MSISDN
org.apache.axis.types.URI address = new org.apache.axis.types.URI (
        "tel", "12345678");  
TerminalLocation terminallocation = 
        terminallocationService.getTerminalLocation();
locationInformation = terminallocation.getLocation(address,1,2);
if(li != null){
  float lat = locationInformation.getLatitude();
  float lon = locationInformation.getLongitude();
} 

Resources

playground Tutorials

API descriptions