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Speaker:

Jonathan Raper, City University, London

Title:

Situated searching on mobile location-aware guides: what people want to know, where

Location:

Archway 2 - 1:00 pm, Thursday 2 August

Abstract:

The EU Webpark research project (http://www.webparkservices.info/) produced a mobile GIS platform for use by tourists on rented mobile devices with GPS in national parks, nature reserves, parks and open air museums. Webpark was succeeded by the project spinoff Camineo SAS (http://www.camineo.com/) which is now sucessfully marketing and installing this technology at a variety of European sites along with the partner Universities, including City University, London.

Under a User Agreement these mobile devices record where the visitors actually took the device and what information requests they made on it. As the software is web-based these requests are URLs for applications like map and trail guides, and content pages describing natural history. There are full location-aware search tools in the system that allow users to ask 'What's around me?', customised by their movement style and by their choice of search area. The visitor logs have been collected together in a GIS and have been analysed by user, through time and space, or in aggregate terms. This presentation will explore the actual questions asked by some of the 200+ visitors on their device in the Swiss National Park in the autumn of 2006, and will focus on the implications for the design of public GIS and location-based services from this experience.

Last modified: Thursday, 28-Jul-2005 17:23:30 NZST

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