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Your Phone as Your Guide
‘Augmented reality’ – it’s a term used to describe a combination of virtual and physical information. Researchers at Hewlett Packard (HP) have been playing with the concept for some time and last week launched a website that offers location-based games and city walking tours.
As more mobile devices include built-in sensors to detect position, light, and motion, developers at HP’s Bristol, UK, lab have been experimenting and writing software to help people get the most from their mobile, a project known as mscapes, using location-based technologies.
The mscapes site offers a feature to allow users to customise the existing games and tours as well as create their own from scratch. By making the software available via the website, HP aim to attract a community of mscapes users who will create and share their work with others. A typical ‘mscape’ would be something like a guided city walk for visitors or guests. Users can create their own city tour via the website and download it to their phone. Text or video pictures can be incorporated into the tour as necessary. It’s also possible to create your own audio narration to guide your visitor through points of interest and give walking directions.
The mscapes software will run on phones with Windows Mobile 5.0 (or later) and so far, it only works with GPS sensors although future versions may use Bluetooth wireless and infrared sensor data. A spokesman for the project said “We think this will be a new genre and a new medium of experience”.
Mobile giant Nokia is rumoured to be developing a similar project aimed at helping people find their way around unfamiliar areas. Users will be able to point their phone at a particular building or landmark whereupon the phone software will generate a map image using GPS co-ordinates. In the US, some museums and tour companies are already using location-detecting gadgets to guide sightseers.
www.businessinberkshire.co.uk/mymobilenews
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