Visitors will be heading in the right direction
A cutting-edge navigation system for mobiles will help visitors to the expo find their way around the massive National Exhibition and Convention Center.
As well as the problem of size — the center covers 1.47 million square meters — weak satellite signals mean any existing navigation system would fail to run effectively inside the building.
However, a team from Tongji University has developed a new system for the expo.
Team leader Liu Erwu, a professor from Tongji College’s Department of Electronics and Information Engineering, said they had used a positioning algorithm, the Dynamic Weighted Evolution for Location Tracking, which they developed independently, together with the technologies of artificial intelligence, virtual reality and the Internet of Things to create the system.
It can even work without satellite or wireless Internet signals as it uses signals sent by mobile phone sensors, geomagnetic signals and visible signals.
The system has been embedded in the official CIIE application and the WeChat mini program of CIIE, which both have Chinese and English versions.
To use the system, visitors download the official app and click on “Navigation.”
If they prefer using WeChat, they can scan a QR code to open a mini program, and click on “Floor Plan.”
“We hope to enable visitors to find their destinations on their own and effectively reduce the burden on the service staff in the exhibition center,” said Liu.
On-site test by student volunteers
The map was becoming smarter and more precise in the two weeks leading up to the expo thanks to over 100 volunteers from Tongji University who had been tested it at the site since October 24.
Yao Yixing, who majors in civil engineering, was one of the volunteers who walked up and down the mammoth of the exhibition center every day with a phone in their hands.
“We found that at some spots the app couldn’t precisely show different floors, and the voice guide has no sound,” he said. “We reported the bugs and they got them solved.”
Luo Fan, who studies technology economics and management, was in charge of the app-testing volunteers.
During the two weeks of testing, almost all volunteers walked over 20,000 steps every day. Accordingly, the app has been well-perfected and can direct users from door to door, she said.
“We feel very proud that experts from our university developed such a cutting-edge indoor navigation app,” she said.
From Monday, the volunteers from Tongji University, joined by some other volunteers from Shanghai University of Political Science and Law, will be found in different spots within the site to help visitors use the app.