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Tourist Information Voice System (TIVS)

1. 30 min 20 min 10 min videos e Support DivX and MPEG e Use Windows Media Player e Develop a data entry application for POIs including localised text and text to speech e Input POI data for field testing e Define general interest areas for general commentary e Obtain map data for Queensland and Western Australia e Generalise data e Manipulate and symbolise data e Background music MP3 files e Randomised selection of music using Windows Media Player e Atleast 1 hour of music A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Module General Field Testing Website Allowing access to online updates users can download and upload GPS tours access PDF Documentation Tasks Improve code scalability system architecture performance Detailed testing of calibration and testing on different geographic scales Web server for real time updates Technical and user manuals Update diagrams TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Chapter 3 COMMERCIAL PROTOTYPE Industry Partners SJK Consulting Drive Western Australia Specifications The technologies used for the prototype include GIS software MapWinGIS GPS receivers notebook computers and GPRS The Master database is in SQL Server the applications uses SQLite Bluetooth data sync and was written in Visual Studio net using Net framework 2 The software for visualising the data and reading GPS locations was written in house Th
2. are weighted according to tour types Images can also be stored for each POI and their attributes Travellers can view their location and the location of POIs mentioned in the commentary on the map When a POI item is being mentioned in the commentary it is highlighted on the map and if it has an associated image this is shown over the map Audio commentary is received via headsets worn by each member of the group If MP3 files of the commentary are stored in the database then these are the audio files delivered to the group If however the attributes are stored as text only the text to speech engine is used As audio commentary is being delivered it is also shown as text The bus driver can also choose to show videos during the tour The look ahead algorithm calculates the POIs and the items to include in the commentary based on the tour type location of the bus throw distances speed direction etc The POIs and items are arranged in a queue and the queue is updated whenever items of commentary are finished or every 15 seconds TIVS is also able to receive real time updates to the commentary via GPRS During the tour the application records the POIs and items mentioned and this information could be used to create a PDF showing the location of the POIs mentioned during the tour lists of POIs and their URLs which can be downloaded from the web post tour support Technologies The technologies used for the commercial prototype include
3. personalised commentary according to user interests commentary in any language provided information is stored in the database in the appropriate language support for group tours improved knowledge of a location as it delivers information via audio text images and video provides greater flexibility to the travellers as they do not have to follow a set route and can choose to visit POIs in any order the delivery of ad hoc commentary the look ahead algorithm determines which POIs and items to mention in the commentary depending on your interests the speed and direction you are travelling in etc allows for the delivery real time up to date information on the fly updates can be used for any length of tour a one hour tour or a tour lasting 2 weeks application can also be used to train and prompt tour guides Objectives of the Study The purpose of the current study was to develop a commercial prototype of TIVS by completing software development calibration and field testing for application 1 developed as part of project STCRC project 80050 to develop a website to support LBS solutions for the Australian travel and tourism industry Two prototypes were developed as a result of application 1 STCRC project 80050 a pedestrian prototype and a bus tour prototype The bus tour prototype was the one chosen to develop into a commercial prototype The reason for this choice was the need for support for group tours an importan
4. Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Chapter 5 MODULES TIVS is made up of the following modules layers Look Ahead Algorithm Map Display GPS Reading Data Access History User Interface Data Creation Data Update Speech Database Structure Video Music Data Entry Application Website See layer diagram Figure 9 and data flow diagram Figure 10 Layer Diagram User Layer oo _ SOUS Business Layer Look Ahead Update Service Graphics Audio Player Application Layer Data Controllers GPS Interpreter TIVS Controller Data Layer intemal External COM Port Sounds API File System Database Database Figure 9 Layer Diagram 18 COM Port Send MMEA g g GPS Interpreter Mapping Engine 2 SQLite Database ia aa Interface Data Source TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Data Flow Diagram Ss User Interface S O POI graphics and details Play Location Item File System Sound Reference Log Current Position Details Retneve Updates send Position SSS er Play Sound oo g Retrieve Data Save Data Sounds API 1 External SQL Database Figure 10 Data Flow Diagram 19 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Chapter 6 SPECIFICATIONS OF TIVS MODULES Look Ahead Algorithm Role e To decide on the optimum items and locations to mention during the tour Scope
5. e GPS GIS Text to speech GPRS Bluetooth SQL Server Data sync Net framework 2 Significance The significance of TIVS is e tis a geography smart tour guide for tour groups and individuals delivering audio text and graphics via mobile devices e tis a multi lingual tour guide commentary can be delivered in any language provided the information is recorded in the database in the appropriate language e ts delivery of ad hoc commentary incorporates the look ahead algorithm for POI detection this detects and arranges POIs and items in a queue according to tour type bearing speed distance etc e On the fly updates can be received via GPRS yi TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Key Stakeholders Stakeholders Benefits Tourism Improved service offerings superior value added personalised services Organisations Supports the tourist in all three phases of their activity Improved services for group tours Potential source of revenue Improved access to SMTEs and tourism organisations Tourists Improves the experience and knowledge of the traveller Personalised value added location and time specific services Information by the interests of the group or individual the location of the tourist vehicle able to receive real time updates via GPRS Improved safety Improves the experience in a group tour situation Increased satisfaction of the traveller Advantages TIVS offers tourists many advantages
6. environment the location of the bus or tourist is recorded using GPS and TIVS delivers audio commentary to individuals based on their location proximity to various POIs and interests tour type For example a user may specify architecture as their primary interest in which case the commentary will give a higher weighting to such information The application not only allows for the delivery of location specific and personalised information but also organises the commentary on the POIs in a queue in order to optimise the delivery of suitable information TIVS uses mobile technologies to deliver information on POIs according to the interests of the traveller their location speed direction etc TIVS delivers audio images video and text in order to enhance the experience and knowledge of tourists Real time up to date information on POIs mentioned in the commentary is another key feature Two TIVS prototypes were developed for project 80050 a bus tour version for notebook computers and a pedestrian version for small screen devices These two prototypes differed in terms of their interface and their interactivity The purpose of the bus tour version was to develop an application for tour groups allowing members of the group to receive audio commentary in any language It was developed for notebook computers and provided the bus has a screen tourists can see their location on a map the location of POIs mentioned in the commentary images vid
7. required GPS connection notebook recharger FM transmitter camera etc Recharging devices at night GPS notebook etc is a problem if camping Large distances exist between POIs in outback large areas with no commentary 4WDs are very bumpy and it was difficult to click on buttons under such conditions buses are more stable and offer a smoother ride e Additional commentary is needed on areas where POIs might be e g whales can often be seen along the coast ahead or you are entering a wildflower area area rather than point features e Distances between updates is a significant issue GPRS coverage is often only available in the towns and so updates for all possible POIs ahead before the next location where GPRS coverage is available need to be obtained How should the update area be defined Road noise is an issue Commentary should include information on topographic features vegetation geology etc TIVS should be used to deliver safety information to tourists This is very important for the Outback The interface should show coordinates in decimal degrees 1X A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Future Actions The testing of this prototype led to the identification of the significance of TIVS for 4WD tag along type tours The following enhancements must occur in order to take TIVS to the next stage e Interactive version for 4WD tag along tours needs to be created Identify suitab
8. the appropriate language It allows for the delivery of ad hoc commentary It allows for on the fly updates synchronisation via GPRS The Look ahead Algorithm for POI detection detects and arranges POIs and items in a queue according to tour type location bearing speed distance etc The application was also written in house eradicating the need to publish third party libraries Hence it offers greater flexibility in the pricing of the final product Purpose of Report This report is intended for STCRC in order to provide information on the commercial prototype of TIVS what the application can do its purpose and significance how it works as well as technical information on the system in particular the modules their role issues and scope This report also discusses the results of field tests in Queensland and Western Australia as well as future enhancements required for tag along type tours TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Chapter 2 METHODOLOGY 10 1 12 Module Interface Look Ahead Algorithm Decides on the optimum POIs and items to mention during the tour this will depend on a number of factors such as tour type bearing distance speed etc Map display Draws information on screen shows arrows and location of bus Speech Plays direction speech on first location item of each POI Says sound files Online Update Allows users to view real time up to date information via GPRS
9. the system is busy however it will wait until there is space into which to insert the commentary The closer the vehicle is the less space it will look for e g at 10 km the system looks for 10 items at 9 km for 9 items etc Once the vehicle is within 5 km it is treated as a normal feature Video Tourists can also view videos as they travel around Drivers can choose from 1 hour 30 minute 20 minute or 10 minute videos DivX and MPEG formats are supported and videos are played using Windows Media Player a TIVS ma x Fie Tools Debug Movies All F Exmouth to Karijini avi Update Small b Outback road safety avi Options Medium Western Australia Exmouth Ningaloo Reef avi Enter Log Large Western Australia The Blowholes awi ro T On_the_road_to Carnarvon avi Western Australia Geraldton H M 4 5 _ S dnev_Memorial avi Western Australia Wild Flowers avi Local Time 13 77 2007 2 59 56 PM Bearing 104 Interlude Music Cae GP Active S Location of Interest QO Current Location of Mote oO Previously talked about Location VW Points to Direction of Trawel a Foints to Current Location V Points to Previous Location Long MM 12760427 Lat MM 3323744 Speed kmph 0 Figure 7 Selecting Videos 16 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS New Log Users can also record information on their current location Tools Enter Log for example recording the location of a good restaurant a TIVS Fil
10. these issues by providing personalised tour commentary to tour groups whether they are travelling by bus boat 4WD etc The travellers can listen to the commentary using headphones and can also see text images V A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups maps etc via the screen in the vehicle Each tour will differ according to the interests of the group the route taken the speed of the vehicle etc Before a tour begins the tour company loads the data for the tour map data POI data music general commentary onto the notebook When the tour group boards the bus the driver selects the type of tour the group is interested in e g architecture history wildflowers etc and whether to play music or general commentary when there are no POIs to talk about The tour then begins and the location of the bus is recorded using GPS The bus requires an LCD screen with a resolution of at least 1280 x 1024 pixels and a physical size of 17 inches so that the travellers can view the TIVS interface from anywhere in the bus The focus of the interface is a map showing the location of the bus and POIs For each POI e g Parliament House a number of attributes items of commentary e g This building was built in 1894 on the site of the former are recorded in the database as both text and MP3 files A throw distance is also entered for each POI i e the distance within which the POI should be commented on and items
11. using Windows Media Player e Atleast 1 hour of music Scope e Not integral e Fills in gaps in commentary which is particularly important in rural areas Problems e Need a large number of music files otherwise the same songs are repeated often This is a significant issue when there are long gaps in commentary e Random selection can result in the same songs being repeated many times Data Entry Application Role e Application for entering general interest commentary e An application for entering data on POIs text sound files and images e Users begin by entering tour types e g architecture history gardens etc and then enter information on POIs see Figures 13 and 14 ee E TIVS Data Entry Joan fol Locations Tour Types Tour Types Status Figure 13 Data Entry Application Tour Types 26 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS OCEANSIDE BEST WESTERN SEABREEZE RESORT E Camarvon Hospitality Inn DALES GORGE CAR PARK DALES GORGE TURN OFF Registration Station on Weano Rd on w DEC Registration Station on road to Dales Gi GERALDTON MARITIME MUSEUM GNARLOO BAY GNARLOO STATION OCEAN PARK E GERALDTON MARITIME MUSEUM Location Item Details Delete ix Figure 14 Data Entry Application POI Data e For each POI the tourism organisation must enter the name of the POI coordinates URL and rank
12. want long periods of silence in regional areas in urban areas the commentary will be very dense and it may not be possible to include all POIs e For real time data updates it is necessary to send the updates ahead of time so they are already in the system before the vehicle arrives at the relevant POI for example as the bus approaches Dreamworld the system checks the GPRS signal and sends the updated information to the notebook The system must work out what information to send to the bus location specific and send it ahead of time e Map data for the commercial version of the prototype will need to be obtained by STCRC o Problem of reselling data 30 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Chapter 8 EVALUATION Field testing of the commercial prototype was carried out in Brisbane and in Western Australia and the application performed very well Field testing in Brisbane was undertaken largely in the Graceville area driving in a car and walking around the park The application was installed on a notebook computer and required a vehicle and a driver USB or Bluetooth GPS headphones or speakers GPRS mobile phone and data connectors While a few small issues were identified they were quickly rectified and TIVS was deemed to be ready to be tested during a six day trip in Western Australia Testing was undertaken under the assumption the prototype was designed specifically for a bus tour For this reason the interface was des
13. 200 m and the throw distance for a vineyard 600 m The distance chosen will depend on the type of POI and the topography The recommended minimum throw is 100 m and the recommended maximum is 40 km e g for a mountain If the vehicle does not enter the throw distance the POI will not be mentioned These distances must be carefully chosen and may need fine tuning by the tour company If inappropriate distances are entered the POI may not be commented on despite the close proximity of the vehicle or the item may be commented on even though the POI is some distance away on the other side of the river and cannot be seen 12 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS a TIVS File Tools Debug iea t Local Time 13 77 2007 3 01 03 PM Bearing 104 Interlude Music Pause GPS Active A Location of Interest 6 Current Location of Hote oO Previously talked about Location Points to Direction of Trawel Points to Current Location V Points to Previous Location Lat MM 3323744 Speed kmph 0 Long MM 12760427 Figure 5 Interface with Throw Distances Shown On Tour As the bus continues along its route the system calculates which POIs and items to include in the commentary If there are no POIs for the next two minutes the overview map is shown Level 3 If after two minutes there are still no POIs the system will play music or the general commentary At least one hour of music should be stored as individual MP3 f
14. 7 TourType Location tem _ref_modifier LocationItem Mame LocationIkem Ranking LocationItem_IsTitle LocationIkem_IsFirsk Locationltem_Language_ref Location _ Locationitem_Lanquage_ref_id LocationIkern_id Language_id Location tem SoundFile LocationItem_ImageFile Display _Text Language Speech_Text 1 Language _id Language_Mame Location Longitude Location Latitude Location Throw GeneralCommentary Ref id Location_id Seneral_TH General_TY GSeneral_BY Seneral_By Location GeneralCommentary Location _LastUpdate Figure 11 Laptop Local Database Entity Relationship Diagram Locations Locationltems Location_ Locationitem_Id Location Location tem LocationId LocationIbern Flank Location kem Text Log Message Log DateStamp Figure 12 Sandbox Database Entity Relationship Diagram Video Role e To allows tourists to view short videos during the tour particularly when there are gaps in commentary e Users can choose from 10 minute 20 minute 30 minute or 1 hr videos e Supports DivX and MPEG e Uses Windows Media Player Scope e Not integral to system e More important in rural areas where there are large gaps in commentary 25 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Music Role e To allow background music to be played is periods of silence over 2 min e Music stored as a large number of MP3 files e Randomised selection of music
15. BE UNIVERSITY D BEBUNIVERSITY A new way to think Chopard ants fies cweir UNIVERSITY OF YA MONASH University CANBERRA Australia s Capital University wow Charles Darwin VICTORIA ANEW g NIVERSITY UNIVERSITY THOUGHT Australia University of South Australia COMME RCIALISATION e c 5 EVALUATE COMMUNICATE EVOLVE EC3 a wholly owned subsidiary company takes the outcomes from the relevant STCRC research develops them for market and delivers them to industry as products and services EC3 delivers significant benefits to the STCRC through the provision of a wide range of business services both nationally and internationally z R sti eee KEY EC3 PRODUCTS Gearthcheck a8 ipat Chairman Stephen Gregg Chief Executive lan Kean Director of Research Prof David Simmons CRC For Sustainable Tourism Pty Ltd Gold Coast Campus Griffith University Queensland 4222 Australia ABN 53077 407 286 Telephone 61 7 5552 8172 Facsimile 61 7 5552 8171 Website www crctourism com au Bookshop www crctourism com au bookshop Email info crctourism com au Sustainable Tourism Cooperative Research Centre STCRC is established under the Australian Government s Cooperative Research Centres Program STCRC is the world s leading scientific institution delivering research to support the Sustainability of travel and tourism one of the world s largest and fastest growing Industries introduction STCRC ha
16. FACTORS AUTHORS List of Figures Figure 1 Interface for Bus Tour Prototype Figure 2 Selecting the Zoom Level Figure 3 TIVS Laptop Settings Figure 5 Interface with Throw Distances Shown Figure 6 General Interest Boxes Figure 7 Selecting Videos Figure amp Logging Information on your Location Figure 9 Layer Diagram Figure 10 Data Flow Diagram Figure 11 Laptop Local Database Entity Relationship Diagram Figure 12 Sandbox Database Entity Relationship Diagram Figure 13 Data Entry Application Tour Types Figure 14 Data Entry Application POI Data Figure 15 Data Entry Application Location Items Figure 16 Data Entry Application Videos Figure 17 Field Testing in Swan Valley Figure 18 TIVS Setup in 1 4WD Figure 19 Field Testing En route to Exmouth Figure 20 The Pinnacles Figure 21 HMAS Sydney Memorial Figure 22 Data Collection in the Cervantes 1V 26 29 30 31 36 36 36 36 37 38 41 42 10 13 15 16 17 18 19 25 25 26 27 28 28 3 32 32 33 34 34 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS SUMMARY Tourist Information Voice System TIVS Location Based Services LBS are systems which utilise the location of a mobile device in order to collect or deliver information They allow for the delivery of location and time specific personalised value added services to users on the move These services include fleet tracking concierge services routing and navigation emergency se
17. GPS Reads current location of bus pedestrian and converts to UTM coordinates Trip log Records POIs and items trip log in SQLite mentioned in commentary Video Allows tourists to view short videos on POIs and regions Data Entry Interface Application for entering data on POIs text sound files and images and general commentary Map Data Preparation Maps show streets parks water land etc Music Background music to play in periods of silence Tasks e Enhancement of map interface e Improve timing e g map location every second features every 3 seconds e Choice of music or general commentary for gaps e Pause button e Improvements to efficiency and overall enhancement e Field testing and calibration e Implement dynamic visualisation effects e Allow for 3 zoom levels e Fine tuning e Interface with text to speech engine e text to speech conversion and testing e Application on web server allowing updates to be sent and received e Real world testing e Implement text to speech conversion e Generalised GPS Capture improve current version by making it more generic and better at handling error corrections e Implement auto find for GPS devices e Change to Mercator owing to problem of crossing UTM zones e Driver can give tour details to tour company via USB allowing them to develop strategies for post tour support e Ability to run stand alone video e Drivers can choose from drop down list 1 hr
18. IVS a location aware and feature triggered commentary system for tour groups Pramod Sharma Devon Wilson Stephen Kelly ISBNs 9781921521317 pbk 9781921521324 pdf Notes Bibliography Subjects Sightseeing business Australia Electronic information resources Australia Tours Other Authors Contributors Wilson Devon Kelly Stephen James 1970 Dewey Number 338 47910285 Copyright CRC for Sustainable Tourism Pty Ltd 2009 All rights reserved Apart from fair dealing for the purposes of study research criticism or review as permitted under the Copyright Act no part of this book may be reproduced by any process without written permission from the publisher All rights reserved Apart from fair dealing for the purposes of study research criticism or review as permitted under the Copyright Act no part of this book may be reproduced by any process without written permission from the publisher Any enquiries should be directed to General Manager Communications and Industry Extension or Publishing Manager info crctourism com au First published in Australia in 2009 by CRC for Sustainable Tourism Pty Ltd Printed in Australia Gold Coast Queensland Acknowledgements The Sustainable Tourism Cooperative Research Centre established and supported under the Australian Government s Cooperative Research Centres Program funded this research Map Data Sciences provided map data for field testing Field testing in WA was onl
19. TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS A location aware and feature triggered commentary system for tour groups SUSTAINABLE TOURISM Pramod Sharma Devon Wilson and Stephen Kelly A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Disclaimer The technical reports present data and its analysis meta studies and conceptual studies and are considered to be of value to industry government or other researchers Unlike STCRC s Monograph series these reports have not been subjected to an external peer review process As such the scientific accuracy and merit of the research reported here is the responsibility of the authors who should be contacted for clarification of any content Author contact details are at the back of this report While all reasonable efforts have been made to gather the most current and appropriate information the Sustainable Tourism Cooperative Research Centre STCRC does not give any warranty as to the correctness completeness or suitability of the information and shall in no event be liable for any loss or damage that might be suffered as a result of reliance on this information We d love to know what you think of our new research titles If you have five minutes to spare please visit our website or click on the link below to complete our online survey STCRC Tech Report Feedback National Library of Australia Cataloguing in Publication Entry Tourist information voice system T
20. an give tour details to tour company via USB Records POIs and items trip log in allowing them to develop strategies for post tour support SQLite mentioned in commentary 9 Video Ability to run stand alone video Allows tourists to view short videos on Drivers can choose from drop down list 1 hr 30 min 20 min POIs and regions 10 min videos Support DivX and MPEG Uses Windows Media Player 10 Data Entry Interface Develop a data entry application for POIs including localised Application for entering data on POIs text and text to speech text sound files and images and Input POI data for field testing general commentary Define general interest areas for general commentary 11 Map Data Preparation Obtain map data for QLD and Western Australia Maps show streets parks water land Generalise data etc Manipulate and symbolise data 12 Music Background music MP3 files Background music to play in periods of Randomised selection of music using Windows Media Player silence At least 1 hour of music 13 General Improve code scalability system architecture performance 14 Field Testing Detailed testing of calibration and testing on different geographic scales 15 Website Web server for real time updates Allowing access to online updates users can download and upload GPS tours access PDF 16 Documentation Technical and user manuals Update diagrams viii TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Key Findings Field testing of the comme
21. another major issue as without coverage users cannot access real time up to date information and must rely on locally stored data The use of GPS also results in a number of limitations e GPS will not work inside buildings In such a case Wi Fi or Bluetooth could be used for locating the mobile device e Limited positional accuracy around 10m o The accuracy of the user s location is also affected by map scale o A threshold GPS error has been defined so that locations GPS readings within 10m are treated as coincident e Problems in urban environments e g urban canyons e Users must have a GPS receiver connected to laptop via USB or Bluetooth Mobile cartography also involves different requirements and constraints to traditional cartography o Requires very simple generalised uncluttered dynamic and interactive maps o Issues of symbology high colour contrast widely recognizable symbology etc label placement etc Other issues are more application specific Look ahead algorithm e Which factors should influence POI and item ranking e How should the system calculate which location items to include in the commentary 1 e how to fill the queue How far ahead to look e How to handle features with a large throw distance e What to do when the vehicle turns away from a feature that was to be incorporated in the commentary e Relies on precise trigonometry e Commentary density is an important issue the tour company is unlikely to
22. ardware Incorporate navigation routing Incorporate safety information Make TIVS more interactive Incorporate information on hotels online bookings Add data collected during tests in Western Australia to POI database 36 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Chapter 10 CONCLUSION Location Based Services have already begun to revolutionise the Australian tourism industry by providing location and time specific personalised value added services to users on the move Given the consumer driven demand for access to information services and applications anywhere anytime there will be an ever increasing demand by tourists for access to such applications whilst on the move LBS can support the tourist in all three phases of their activity especially in the on tour stage This is particularly important given the changing requirements of travellers today Travellers today have less time to spend planning a trip want greater flexibility during a trip and take shorter breaks more often TIVS is a feature triggered location aware multi lingual tour guide for tour groups and individuals It uses GIS GPS and wireless technologies to deliver audio text images and video to tourists on the move The commentary delivered will depend on the interests of the group individual their location speed direction etc The significance of TIVS is that it delivers ad hoc commentary based on the location of the traveller and their interests Real time u
23. are said they cannot be repeated within one hour In this case music will play in the meantime 14 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Figure 6 General Interest Boxes In a single tour the vehicle may travel through several general interest regions and the system will deliver the commentary relevant to the location of the bus When the general interest commentary is being played the map will be displayed at Level 2 Images may also be attached to each item in the general interest commentary and will be displayed over the map 15 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Breaks During the day the bus may stop at a number of locations to allow the tour group to get out of the bus view the sights buy refreshments etc For this reason a pause button has been included on the interface to pause the commentary see Figure 1 When the group is ready to resume the commentary they click on the pause button again If the pause button is not used then the commentary for the current location will be said and after 2 minutes of silence either the music or general interest commentary will start Long Range Location If the vehicle is within the throw of a long range location a feature with a large throw distance such as a mountain then the system will wait until the queue is empty before inserting it in the commentary If there is nothing else to say the system will comment on all items straight away If
24. atabase unless the order is out weighted by tour type There will also be the option to view POIs and items in the queue and their rankings as a list for developers Tour companies will be able to adjust the above values for ranking features and their attributes A default general tour type is also needed for when a tour type is not specified It is the tenacity value that determines how far ahead the system will look The default tenacity value is 12 8 x 15 second slots or two minutes The path of the bus is divided into 15 second slots as each item in the commentary goes for up to 15 seconds it assumes the bus will continue to travel in the same direction at the same speed The tenacity value helps manage the items to be inserted in the queue The look ahead algorithm will try to fill the entire queue up to the tenacity value The tenacity value affects the quantity commentary density and accuracy of information delivered Speed is another important factor impacting on the features and items mentioned The speed and direction of the vehicle user is calculated every few seconds The algorithm will also assume the bus will continue to move in the same direction as the last two GPS points The zoom level for the notebook version depends on the speed of the vehicle and features to be included in the commentary 1 e in the queue The zoom level for a highway will be larger than that for local streets There are three zoom levels level 1 2 k
25. ates via GPRS e Improved safety e Improves the experience in a group tour situation e Increased satisfaction of the traveller Advantages TIVS offers tourists many advantages Commentary can be personalised according to user interests Commentary can be in any language provided information is stored in the database in the appropriate language Group tours are supported Location knowledge is improved as it delivers information via audio text images and video It provides greater flexibility to the travellers as they do not have to follow a set route and can choose to visit POIs in any order o The delivery of ad hoc commentary The look ahead algorithm determines which POIs and items to mention in the commentary depending on your interests the speed and direction you are travelling in etc It allows for the delivery real time up to date information on the fly updates It can be used for any length of tour a one hour tour or a tour lasting two weeks The application can also be used to train and prompt tour guides Significance TIVS offers a unique service to tourists in many ways It is quite different to other LBS applications for the tourism industry in that It is a geography smart tour guide for tour groups and individuals It delivers audio text and graphics via mobile devices It is a multi lingual tour guide commentary can be delivered in any language provided the information is recorded in the database in
26. ay to listen to the sound file Sa Gael Image Gick Choose button to load an Image file must be a jpeg jpg Path lt Unknown P Figure 16 Data Entry Application Videos TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Website Role e Allows access to real time updates via GPRS e Users can download and upload GPS tours Scope e Not integral to the working of TIVS but is a key feature of TIVS Problems e GPRS coverage is limited in rural areas e How far ahead to look for updates especially in rural or outback Australia when there are large areas without coverage e Size and shape of shape of search area 29 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Chapter 7 ISSUES There were quite a few challenges problems faced in the development of this prototype The first of these relate to the limitations of mobile devices such as laptops e Limited battery life 2 3 hours e Resolution for the bus tour we assume a minimum resolution of 1280 x 1024 ppi Bus screen size is another issue minimum requirement of 17 inches as people need to be able to see the screen from the back of the bus The use of GPRS for real time updates is also problematic First of all mobile phone networks have less bandwidth more latency less connection stability and less predictable availability Peng amp Tsou 2003 p 467 GPRS only allow for up to 115 kbps Coverage is
27. c These audio commentary systems however still require customers to follow a set route and to keep pace with the commentary or stop and start the audio It is difficult to skip exhibits or items and many items of interest are not mentioned While commentary can be provided in different languages all users receive the same commentary regardless of their interests e g Tourcaster Tours by MP3 Tour Mate etc In recognition of these limitations and the changing needs of tourists taking shorter breaks more often with limited time to spend planning a trip wanting greater flexibility during a trip etc a new range of audio tour guides have been developed which deliver audio commentary based on the location of the customer The location of the traveller is identified using a variety of means including GPS infrared Bluetooth and RFID technology These audio guides allow users to choose their own route view exhibits in any order and to move at their own pace e g Travel by GPS Tour Guides Audio Augmented Reality BEATS Frontier GPS Tour Guide etc Owing to advances in mobile technology and the increased consumer demand for services anywhere anytime a number of these audio guides now offer personalised and location aware audio commentary personalised according to interests language preference etc Some also allow access to multimedia content via small screen devices e g Antenna Audio ATS Heritage Audio Tours Node Explorer Multimedia To
28. d Users should be able to zoom in and out Head phones cannot be worn by the driver of the vehicle and are not necessary in this environment FM transmitters improve sound quality Initial testing in Western Australia was undertaken in the Swan Valley and TIVS performed extremely well in this local environment Some issues identified were e Throw distances entered were too large and need to be tested suitable distances vary according to the type of POI and topography It will take some fine tuning to get this right e Pre recorded MP3 files were the better means of delivering audio commentary as text to speech was not natural missed emphases was too fast etc TIVS was then evaluated during a six day trip from Perth to Geraldton Carnarvon Exmouth and back to Perth This tour encompassed a range of different environments with varying densities of POIs The following issues were identified during this trip e Battery lives of laptop and GPS were an issue unless the car has an inverter or a car charger Inverters and car chargers only work while the engine is on A rugged notebook is required Size and weight of notebook Volume was an issue in the car until we used an FM transmitter The heat emitted by a notebook is a significant problem if the notebook in on someone s lap GPS devices drop out from being unplugged and the computer going to sleep There was a loss of Bluetooth connection between GPS and notebook unstable Many cables are
29. dates and sends the text to the bus Updates are text only maximum of 150 characters and the text to speech engine converts it to audio 15 seconds maximum If there is no GPRS coverage then no updates can be received There is only one update per POI and once it is said it 1s thrown out not cached Not all updates sent to the vehicle will be said as they may not all fall within the area for which commentary is calculated The tour bus company must have suitable GPRS plans to allow for updates General Interest Commentary The general interest commentary is general commentary on a region such as Brisbane the Gold Coast or Perth and can include any information on the region such as demographics history vegetation weather etc It will only be played if the driver of the vehicle selects to play general interest commentary when there are gaps in the commentary of more than two minutes Each state is divided into non overlapping boxes with boxes equating to tourism regions see Figure 6 General commentary for each region is recorded in the POI database and audio should be recorded in a different voice to the POI data to allow travellers to distinguish between the two commentaries The general interest commentary for each tourism region should contain at least 100 items each up to 15 seconds If the audio is recorded as MP3 files then they will be said otherwise the text to speech engine will be used Once items of general interest commentary
30. duate and Postgraduate courses at 2 universities contract e Has provided technical solutions for over 30 organisations multi national organisations Universities Federal State and Local Governments as well as private and publicly listed companies in Australia for the past 13 years as an independent contractor Email steve sjk net au 42 Travel and tourism industry e Academic researchers Government policy makers INDUSTRY PARTNERS ae lis Parks brates Waria a mart VIOTORIA ee Victoria TOURISM Dourtire ae Shur tNsiann WETTEN AUS PRALIA Plas orny iss X j OAWTAS Gold Coast City Council Phy A Re Department oF ft AUSTRALIAN FEDERATION M Gur ereroreren aur frfu coal OF TRAVEL AGENIS May TOURISM NT ay NORTHERN TERRITORY ai Tourism Tasmania be setae AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TOURISM M South Australia A brilliant blend Tourism fustvalia ATEC Australian Touram lport Council ao fee Te e New products services and technologies Uptake of research finding by business government and academe Improved business productivity Industry ready post graduate students Public good benefits for tourism destinations UNIVERSITY PARTNERS E E geente Curtin TECHNOLOGY SYDNEY University of Technology ECU UNSW fc Us Griffith e THE UNIVERSITY MURDOCH p wy OF QUEENSLAND UNIVERSITY AUSTRALIA yt x Southern Cross LA TRO
31. e Config XML File Config XML File Implemented Please note that while the data type column was meant to store these values in the prototype many of the values were hard coded 4 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups REFERENCES Peng Z amp Tsou M 2003 Internet GIS distributed geographic information services for the internet and wireless networks Wiley New York Peterson B 2007 The Battle for the Anywhere Consumer Yankee Group Research Inc URL http www yankeegroup com live conferences CTIA AnywhereConsumerBoyd pdf AUTHORS Dr Pramod Sharma Theme Leader ICT Program Cooperative Research Centre for Sustainable Tourism Current position and qualifications PhD Senior Lecturer GIS Program Coordinator School of Geography Planning amp Architecture The University of Queensland Board Member International Federation for Information Technology in Tourism IFITT Australia Research interests include applications of Geographical Information Systems GIS LBS in particular knowledge management in tourism industry technology transfer development of information and communications technology applications in tourism and the use of information technology in the management of SMEs Recent grants and key projects are e 2002 WebMAIL 180 000 ITOL Program of NOIE Project Leader 2000 2002 Tourism Online Getting Value 700 000 Funded by DISR CRC Tou
32. e any number of attributes can be recorded e g information on architecture shopping history etc Each of these categories of information are also weighted so that information can be filtered according to tour group interests There will be a restricted list of tour types to choose from history architecture sports etc and attributes will be differentially weighted according to the tour type These tour types categories of information and their weightings as well as distance and speed will determine the audio output see Look Ahead Algorithm For example if the main interest of a tour group is architecture then the architecture information will have the highest weighting and will always feature in the commentary for that particular tour ahead of other attributes The commentary for each category attribute will be up to 15 seconds per attribute The title of a POI will also be treated as an attribute and will always be said before other attributes are mentioned The tour company will enter the tour types to be supported and choose the POIs attributes and their weightings for the different tour types They will also need to enter a throw distance for each POI It may take some time to refine these specifications tour types weightings throw distances etc 24 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Tour lype_Location_ref Tour lype_Locationltem_ret Tour Type TourType_id TourType_ Name TourType Location ref modifier j
33. e Can download to USB Scope e Not integral e Justa value added service Problems e No major issues e The best way to get this information to the user Making it user friendly is time consuming 22 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS User Interface Role e Allows users to record information on their current location e Allows users to change zoom levels e Allows users to view their location on a map and the location of POIs e Allows users to view summaries of POIs coordinates etc on screen e Contains maps menus text coordinates etc e Allows users to pause the application e Allows users to choose to hear either music or general interest commentary during gaps in commentary e Updates every three seconds Scope e Integral Problems e Written in C Data Creation Role e Preparing the map data to be displayed data manipulation e Creating the maps to be displayed in ArcMap e Defining general interest areas non overlapping boxes which equate to tourism regions e Recording sound scripts and putting them in appropriate directories o Text to speech will be implemented Scope e One off process Problems e Defining general interest areas e Finding sample data e Level of generalisation of data to minimise storage e Selecting symbolisation colour line width etc e Dynamic label placement e No real interface was created so it was time consuming to create test data Data Update Role e Synchronises location
34. e GPS receiver is important for identifying the location of the bus or tourist The prototype also supports both the unconnected and connected mobile tourist The unconnected mobile tourist is unable to receive real time data updates during the tour In areas where users have access to a wireless network GPRS they are able to received real time up to date information and so are connected mobile tourists The coverage of wireless networks is a major issue for this application see below Interface The interface for the bus tour prototype was developed for a notebook computer see Figure 1 The assumptions made are that the bus has an LCD screen with a minimum resolution of 1280 x 1024 pixels and a minimum size of 17 inches The focus of the screen is a map showing the location of the bus the location of POIs in blue the last POI featured in the commentary in yellow and the current POI featuring in the commentary in red as well as yellow and red arrows pointing to the last POI featured in the commentary yellow and the current POI featuring in the commentary red The location of the bus is recorded by GPS every second and the map is updated every three seconds The map faces the same direction as the bus rather than north and the map data includes the street network parks rivers railway lines towns etc There are three zoom levels and the zoom level chosen will depend in the speed of the bus but users can also select a particula
35. e Integral part of system Problems e Complicated e Hard to work out e Will take a number of years of use to fine tune POIs and items to be mentioned in the commentary are arranged in a queue and the forward looking algorithm is updated when the item has finished talking or every 15 seconds and the queue is changed The system will work out which POIs and items attributes to place in the queue Factors used to calculate which POIs are to be included in the queue and their ranking are e the location s default value 10 to 10 e the tour type modifier e bearing eight directions e other factors see Appendix A The values of each of these factors will be mathematically combined Negative numbers will result in POIs being less likely to be included in the commentary The factors used to determine which items attributes are mentioned for each POI and their rank are e the location s final value location s rank e location item s tour type modifier There are around 30 factors which can be used and the algorithm relies on very precise trigonometry see Appendix B It is the overall weightings of items that will determine how many items are mentioned for each POI Once a location item s weighting is less than the weighting of the next first item that POI will stop being discussed and the commentary on the next location will begin see Appendix A Items will be listed in the queue in the order in which they are recorded in the d
36. e Tools Debug Local Time 13 77 2007 2 44 09 PM Bearing 104 To the left you will see AVIS Geraldton GPS Active Location of Interest _ Current Location of Mote a New Log m oE Oo Previously talked about Location Lagging Details x Points to Direction of Travel Enter details below about your current position Points to Current Location Wwe saw a nice restaurant here Foints to Previous Location Log New Message Long MM 12758927 _ Lat MM 3323744 Speed kmph 0 Figure 8 Logging Information on your Location Post Tour During the tour the system records the POIs and items mentioned A routine allows the driver to download this information onto a USB key and give it to the tour company The tour company can then use this information for post tour support For example it could be used to create a PDF showing the location of POIs mentioned The PDF could also include a list of POIs and the relevant URLs Members of the group could download this document via the Web Such PDFs could be updated once a day and users could select their particular tour based on tour name and date These URLs could allow tourism organisations to check who provided the links and so give discounts to the bus tour company Other options for post tour support would be to produce CDs or DVD of the tour audio text images video etc 17 A Location
37. each House Long MM 12758927 Lat MM 3323744 Speed kmph 0 Figure 1 Interface for Bus Tour Prototype al TNS File Tools Debug Movies Update Options Suburb Arterial Highway Disable TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Local Time 13 77 2007 2 58 30 PM Bearing 104 Dins m Aa A E gt Se ru GPS Active D Location of Interest 6 Current Location of Hote QO Previously talked about Location ai Points to Direction of Trawel Points to Current Location V Points to Previous Location Long MM 12759427 Lat MM 3323744 Speed kmph 0 Figure 2 Selecting the Zoom Level A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Select Your Tour to Start Uptions and Settings Synchronse with Server Synchronises Location Data with server Other Options i 16 Sma TEU Tour Name Drive Through UG St Lucia Campus Tour ype C General Commentary Interlude Music Ao Seconds to go Figure 3 TIVS Laptop Settings 10 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Master Database SQL Server Data Business Rules Hi Bus Interface Q AL Web Server Figure 4 System Architecture 11 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Chapter 4 STORY BOARD Pre Tour The tour company must load the data for the tour This includes the map data streets landuse rivers POI data tour types POIs their coordi
38. echnologies The technologies used for the commercial prototype include e GPS GIS Text to speech GPRS Bluetooth SQL Server Data sync Net framework 2 Stakeholders The stakeholder focus for this commercial prototype is the tour group travelling in a local physical environment such as a national park or tour bus This application will allow tourism organisations and SMTEs to provide superior tours to travellers In particular it allows tour companies offering guided tours to enhance their services through the delivery of feature triggered commentary in any language The stakeholders are e Tourism organisations and SMTEs offering guided tours for tour groups o Bus o Train o Boat Ete TIVS offers many advantages to both tourism organisations and travellers business and leisure travellers A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Stakeholders Benefits Tourism e Improved service offerings superior value added personalised services Organisations e Supports the tourist in all three phases of their activity e Improved services for group tours e Potential source of revenue e Improved access to SMTEs and tourism organisations Tourists e Improves the experience and knowledge of the traveller e Personalised value added location and time specific services information by the interests of the group or individual the location of the tourist vehicle able to receive real time upd
39. ed on the POT s final value tour type modifier and the location items default value see Appendix A There are up to 30 factors which could be used and the algorithm relies on precise trigonometry see Appendix B Once a location s item ranking is less than the ranking of the next POI s first item that POI will no longer be discussed and commentary on the next POI will begin see Appendix A Tenacity values determine how far ahead the system will look and the default is 2 minutes 8 x 15 second slots The system will try to fill the entire queue with commentary Nor is commentary on POIs repeated during a single tour If the vehicle is stopped e g at traffic lights the commentary will continue to play but if it stops for more than 2 minutes the general commentary or music will play There is potentially a photograph or image associated with each item in the database It 1s important to have a photograph of each POI to help tourists identify the POI being commented on Recommended image size is a maximum of 100 kb If a photo is associated with a POI then it will be shown over the map The bus is also able to receive real time updates to the commentary via GPRS e g the tiger exhibit at Dream World is closed for the day The system looks for updates within a certain distance or geographical box 5 minutes ahead and checks for updates every two minutes The coordinates of the vehicle are sent to the server and the server then searches for up
40. en evaluated during a six day trip from Perth to Geraldton Carnarvon Exmouth and back to Perth This is a typical trip that Drive Western Australia would expect tourists to do from Perth and took in attractions such as the Pinnacles see Figures 20 and 21 Figure 20 The Pinnacles 33 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups i 4 Ke ee C my ALSO UG caja m4 vg lame etm AV me Figure 21 HMAS Sydney Memorial Most tourists would spend at least a week travelling so the time frame was very realistic It covered a range of different environments with varying densities of POIs The fact that it was employed in Outback Australia also made us very aware of the difficulties of using TIVS in such remote areas As with the Swan Valley test this trip was also used to collect data for TIVS and to collect data for the podcast Figure 22 Data Collection in the Cervantes 34 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS The following issues were identified during this six day trip Battery life of the laptop and GPS was an issue unless the vehicle had an inverter Car chargers were also important but only one device could be connected at a time Inverters and car chargers can only charge while the engine is on A ruggedised notebook is required Size and weight of notebook could be an issue especially when on a person s lap better to mount device in the vehicle Volume was an issue i
41. ensure the mountain isn t missed Initially however we will assume that all tours that deviate away from a LongRangeLocation will always return gt PE fe aS i z Agsumptlona We assume ihal any giver map will only have a lined pumier ef LongRangeLocallns as many overlapplig LongRangalecalians may cause piooessing issues peed of algerihm LongRangeLocalions are nol considered Higani locations as they will qaiverally Ta easy te wle 40 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Factors Used to Calculate Ranking Two ranks will be calculated using a number of circumstantial pre inputted and pre defined factors to determine the best way to order the talk queue To generate a list of ranked Locations use the following factors A The Locations Default Value B The Location s Tour Type Modifier Nb A and B will bo added and given to the look ahead algorithm as a single integer number C The Current Bearing on the Location FFL FFR 7 MEDIUM FL F 5 F FR GOOD 7 GOOD 10 Ra il sd 10 5 5 RL if i RR V BAD 10 re RRR D The formula YEE to get a factor of distance 10 E Throw distance Shorter throws are more important because there is less chance of picking h up in a later part of the tour To generate a list of ranked Locationitems Use the following factors A It s Locations Final Value B The Lecationitem s Tour Type Modifier G The Locationltem s Default Va
42. eo text etc The purpose of the pedestrian version was to allow individuals to receive audio commentary images video text etc as they walk around a local environment i e output for a single user The objectives of this current study the subject of this report were e to develop a commercial prototype of TIVS by completing software development calibration and field testing for application 1 developed as part of project 80050 e to develop a website to support LBS solutions for the Australian travel and tourism industry The bus tour prototype was the one chosen to develop into a commercial prototype The reason for this choice was the need for support for group tours an important market for tourism in Australia and the lack of existing applications in this area Bus Tour Version The bus tour version provides commentary in a tour group situation In typical group tours the tour guide can be very hard to hear and understand especially in urban environments no matter how close you are to the tour guide and all members of the group jostle for a position close to the guide All groups are also given the same commentary While many audio commentary systems do exist they are not designed for group tours TIVS addresses these issues by providing personalised tour commentary to tour groups whether they are travelling by bus boat 4WD etc The travellers can listen to the commentary using headphones and can see text images maps
43. er the LocationltemTenacity the more pa accurate it will be but with limited foresight If the lookahead is toa short however some xX LongRangeLocations will not function properly my r r4 i Default will be 12 The LocationltemTenacity will only se make a significant impact in or around sparsely populated areas as dense areas should nearly always fill the queue Assumplions Operators may wan boa specify boih lheaccinicy and ouantity of information read by the Systeam This numberassists us in doing his mathematically 39 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups LongRangeLocations Best Fit Algorithm LongRangeLocations are going to be predefined by operators and read from the database We will default the definition to 5000mtrs LongRangeLocations wait until the queue is quite empty before inserting themselves The closer you are to the coordinates of the LongRangeLocation the less space it looks for when trying to insert the Location into the queue defined by IF VECTOR 10000 THEN LOOK FOR 10 CLEAR SPACES FOR EACH Km lt 10Km SPACE REQUIREMENT 7 iLa AT 000m look for 6 spaces in the queue IF VECTOR 5000 THEN TREAT AS NORMAL LOCATION Additional Notation It may become necessary to later include vector bearing relationship into the LongRangeLocation Best Fit Algorithm so if the tour starts moving away from the location steps are taken to
44. etc on the screen of the bus laptop Each tour will differ according to the interests of the group the route taken the speed of the vehicle etc Before a tour begins the tour company loads the data for the tour map data POI data music general commentary onto the notebook When the tour group boards the bus the driver selects the type of tour the group is interested in e g architecture history wildflowers etc and whether to play music or general commentary when there are no POIs to talk about The tour then begins and the location of the bus is recorded using GPS The bus requires an LCD screen with a resolution of at least 1280 x 1024 pixels and a physical size of 17 inches so that the travellers can view the TIVS interface from anywhere in the bus The focus of the interface is a map showing the location of the bus and POIs TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS For each POI e g Parliament House a number of attributes items of commentary e g This building was built in 1894 on the site of the former are recorded in the database as both text and MP3 files A throw distance is also entered for each POI 1 e the distance within which the POI should be commented on and items are weighted according to tour types Images can also be stored for each POI and their attributes Travellers can view their location and the location of POIs mentioned in the commentary on the map When a POI item is being mentioned in the commentary it
45. ew their location on a map as well as the location of POIs TIVS delivers audio images video and text in order to enhance the experience and knowledge of tourists Real time up to date information on POIs mentioned in the commentary is another key feature Two prototypes were developed as part of this application a bus tour version for notebook computers and a pedestrian version for small screen devices These two prototypes differ in terms of their interface and their interactivity The purpose of the bus tour version was to develop an application for tour groups allowing members of the group to receive audio commentary in any language It was developed for notebook computers and provided the bus has a screen tourists can also see their location on a map the location of POIs mentioned in the commentary images video text etc The purpose of the pedestrian version was to allow individuals to receive audio commentary as they walk around a local environment i e output for a single user Bus Tour Version The bus tour version provides commentary in a tour group situation In typical group tours the tour guide can be very hard to hear and understand especially in urban environments no matter how close you are to the tour guide and all members of the group jostle for a position close to the guide All groups are also given the same commentary While many audio commentary systems do exist they are not designed for group tours TIVS addresses
46. g needs of travellers today taking shorter breaks more often with limited time to spend planning a trip wanting greater flexibility during the trip etc and the ways in which a mobile commentary system could improve the experience and knowledge of today s tourists A commentary system offers many advantages over the traditional guide books maps and tourist information centres Guidebooks can be very bulky difficult and heavy to carry around and one often does not have time to read all the details before or during a trip Maps can also be a pain to carry around and difficult to follow especially tourist maps that are not to scale Tourist information centres are not always open or accessible Tourism organisations such as museums and art galleries have offered audio commentaries cassettes CDs MP3 players etc for some time but these also suffer from a number of limitations namely users must follow a set path visit features in a set order and are restricted to features included in the audio Mobile technologies however mean that users can be delivered information on features based on their location e g using GPS can follow any route and visit features in any order They can receive information on any feature based on their interests and can easily skip features TIVS uses mobile technologies to deliver information on Points of Interest POIs according to the interests of the traveller their location speed direction etc They can vi
47. igned to be read from some distance away the map data was very generalised roads railway lines etc were merged together roads and places were not labelled minimal text was put on screen the interface allowed for minimal interactivity and so on It was not however tested in an actual bus although this was the original intention of the Western Australia trials Initial field testing in Western Australia was undertaken during a four hour tour of the Swan Valley visiting wineries the Margaret River Chocolate Factory Guildford Hotel etc See Figure 17 LV 44 6 adig n EET P Mo i a Figure 17 Field Testing in Swan Valley This trial was undertaken in a 4WD and TIVS performed very well It was also used as a data collection exercise with data collected on POIs coordinates photographs video etc This material could be used by TIVS in the future and was also used by Drive Western Australia to create a podcast of the trial 31 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Secondly TIVS was tested during a six day trip from Perth to Exmouth and back to Perth While this commercial prototype was designed for bus tours testing in Western Australia was undertaken for tag along tours or global gypsies type tours Testing was undertaken with Drive Western Australia and these are the types of tours they envisage TIVS being used for Hence testing was undertaken in 4WDs with TIVS being used in tw
48. iles The music is then randomly selected by the system When the system identifies POIs and items to include in the commentary the map switches to a more localised map and the music or general interest commentary stops The commentary for each POI is stored in a master database For each POI a number of attributes items of commentary are recorded we have been using a maximum of 10 but any number can be used The title of the POI is treated as an attribute and the database records commentary as text and MP3 files If it is stored as MP3 files then they are used to deliver audio commentary Each sound file can be up to 15 seconds If the commentary is stored as text only then the text to speech engine is used text to speech should also be up to 15 seconds POIs and items of commentary are also weighted according to tour type The Look Ahead Algorithm calculates which POIs and items to include in the commentary The POIs and items are arranged in a queue and the queue is updated whenever an item has finished being commented on or every 15 seconds If the sound file is only six seconds long then the algorithm is recalculated after six seconds The system calculates which POIs to include in the commentary based on the location s default value tour type 13 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups modifier bearing distance throw distance etc see Appendix A The items of commentary on the POI are chosen bas
49. ing Then the relevant tour types and modifier must be entered the modifier is how important the POI on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 the most important e Any number of items commentary can be entered for each POI The title of the POI is also recorded as an item Each location item has a name and ranking on a scale of to 10 with 10 the highest e For each location item display text must be entered text displayed on the TIVS interface and also the text to be said e Relevant tour types and modifiers are recorded for each item e For each item commentary can be entered as an MP3 file recommended and an image can be recorded see figure 15 e This is also the interface for entering videos that can be viewed during the tour DivX and MPEG see figure 16 Scope e Integral to system Problems Text to speech engine is used to convert text to audio if no audio files MP3 are stored for an item This results in commentary which is unnatural lacking expression etc 27 28 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups al frmLocationltemModify Data LocationID 23 LocationitemiD E Name Planetarium Ranking 2 ls First F Yes ls Title E Yes Display Text ite gack ae den One r Ba e adie iee freedom wall Mt Cootha specialist library and the Botanic Gardens Restaurant Speech Text Glick Choose button to load a Sound file Path Comman sounds 23 BrisBotanicGan Press pl
50. is highlighted on the map and if it has an associated image this is shown over the map Audio commentary is received via headsets worn by each member of the group If MP3 files of the commentary are stored in the database then these are the audio files delivered to the group If however the attributes are stored as text only the text to speech engine is used As audio commentary is being delivered it is also shown as text The bus driver can also choose to show videos during the tour The look ahead algorithm calculates the POIs and the items to include in the commentary based on the tour type location of the bus throw distances speed direction etc The POIs and items are arranged in a queue and the queue is updated whenever an item of commentary is completed or every 15 seconds TIVS is also able to receive real time updates to the commentary via GPRS During the tour the application records the POIs and items mentioned during the tour and this information could be used to create a PDF showing the location of the POIs mentioned during the tour including lists of POIs and their URLs which can be downloaded from the web post tour support Environment The tourist environment covered by this application is the local tourist environment such as Brisbane the Blue Mountains the Gold Coast a national park or tour bus Currently the application is restricted to outdoor environments owing to the positioning technology used i e GPS T
51. item and online computer e Allows users to receive real time updates via GPRS e Text to speech implemented e Updates locations items and sounds written in house Scope e Not integral e Needs to be done periodically for consistency Problems e How to handle a connection drop out e Distances between updates e g in Outback 23 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Speech Role e Interface to text to speech engine e Text to speech conversion e Commentary is broken into many parts broken into different directories according to language location and item e Plays direction speech e g to your left is on first location item Scope e Integral to system e Will run without sound Problems e How to handle the saying of sound files Volume is an issue in car resolved using FM transmitter Size of sound files High cost when professionals are used to generate sound files Difficult to alter Text to speech audio is unnatural lacks expression etc Database Structure Role e The data structure that stores the central repository Master Table e CRC naming conventions used throughout e Centralised database has enough information to send updates update modifier values Scope e One off process Problems e No identified problems See Figures 11 and 12 The master database stores the information commentary on the various POIs that can feature in the tour For each POI e g Sydney opera hous
52. iving the adoption of such services in the workplace Mobility is the future of business and consumer services and the most successful players will be those that allow consumers to be mobile and connected Consumers are driving the demand for access to information services and applications anywhere anytime Such mobile applications offer users a more efficient and cost effective means of performing existing tasks Peterson 2007 Tourism is just one area in which LBS can improve the user s experience and knowledge The on tour support of the traveller has traditionally been through the use of printed guide books maps tourist information centres and tour guides Printed guidebooks however are heavy and bulky to carry around and are difficult to read whilst on the move and still see the sights Furthermore many travellers do not have the time to read a guidebook before or during a trip and Maps can also be awkward to carry around and difficult to follow especially tourist maps that are not to scale Tourist information centres are not always open or accessible With regard to tour guides tours are conducted in groups with everyone jostling to see and hear the commentary can be difficult to hear and understand each group receives the same commentary In order to address some of these issues many tourism organisations have developed audio commentaries for individuals cassettes CDs MP3 players etc for museums historic sites exhibitions et
53. l feature POI see Appendix A Whenever there are large gaps in the commentary music or general interest commentary e g on Sydney will start up for example in areas with a low density of POIs such as regional areas This general interest commentary will contain up to 100 items and each item is said only once although the commentary can be said at any time Hence items of the general commentary mentioned in a previous period of silence will not be repeated the next time the general commentary starts up again on a single tour Instead the general commentary will start where the commentary stopped in the previous gap The commentary for each feature is also only said once per tour so if you travel straight past the POI again later on the same tour the commentary is not repeated Currently the system only supports short sound bites although in future longer sound bites will need to be incorporated in order to allow narratives on particular regions and POIs Display Role e Drawing information on the screen e Rotating map e Converting POIs to screen coordinates e Pointing arrows to last and current POI e Displaying the location of the bus e 3 zoom levels e Dynamic visualisation Scope e Integral part of system Problems e Speed of drawing e Synchronisation of rotation data and images TIVS uses MapWinGIS to display shapefiles converted to Mercator coordinates This module then also must display render the information on the sc
54. le hardware for 4WD use Incorporate navigation routing into TIVS Incorporate safety information into TIVS Make TIVS more interactive for ease of use Incorporate information on hotels online bookings Add data collected during test in Western Australia to POI database TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Chapter 1 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Background Location Based Services LBS are systems which utilise the location of a mobile device in order to collect or deliver information They allow for the delivery of location and time specific personalised value added services to users on the move These services include fleet tracking concierge services routing and navigation emergency services and tour guides Such services are revolutionising the tourism industry as they can support the tourist in all three phases of their activity particularly during the on tour stage Until such services were developed travellers relied on guidebooks maps and tourist information centres for their on tour support LBS can enhance the knowledge and experience of the tourist by providing location and time specific information e g where is the nearest open museum as well as offering improved safety e g weather alerts emergency response etc The key here is the delivery of services when consumers need them the most that is in unfamiliar environments While these services are predominantly consumer services consumers are also dr
55. lue 41 e CR a o e a al Boe a l a lt AA AB TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS APPENDIX B CONSIDERED FACTORS Factors that could be considered in Look Ahead Calculation The following number of factors could be considered during the look ahead algorithm Factors Location Default Value Location Tour Type Modifier Current Bearing Forward Left Modifier Forward Modifier Forward Right Modifier Rear Left Modifier Rear Modifier Rear Right Modifier Forward Left Bearing Forward Bearing Forward Right Bearing Rear Left Bearing Rear Bearing Rear Right Bearing Current Vector Distance Integer Divided By 10 LocationItem Parent Value LocationItem Default Value LocationItem Tour Type Modifier Location Throw Distance Point To Location Vector Distance System Tenacity Available Queue From Last To System Tenacity Value Point To Longrangeltem Vector Distance Every 10 Second Stopped Vector Distance To Maximum Stopped State Condition True False Queue Item 2 LocationItem Ranking Throw distance percentage to current GPS point vector 180 229 315 360 N A 0 0 0 N A N A 12 N A N A N A N A N A N A Data Type Database Database Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Config XML File Database Database Database Config XML Fil
56. m across level 2 20 km across and level 3 80 km across overview map 20 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS The tour company data entry person will enter a throw distance for each POI The minimum throw distance will be 100 m and the maximum 40 km for a large feature such as a mountain a recommended minimum and maximum which can be altered The throw distance is important for determining the area within which a POI should feature in the commentary One problem with the use of a throw distance of course is having a statue or other feature with a large throw on the other side of a building so it is out of view but still within the throw distance to feature in the commentary For features with a large throw long range locations the system will wait until the queue is empty or there is enough space before inserting it in the commentary If the user is within the throw of the long range feature and the system has nothing else to say it will comment on the long range location straight way otherwise it will wait If the system has nothing to else to say it will look for 10 items to comment on i e comment on all items for that feature The closer the user is to this feature the less space it looks for when trying to insert the POI into the queue e g at 10 km the system looks for 10 spaces at 9 km it looks for 9 spaces at 8 km it looks for 8 spaces etc When the user is within 5 km of a long range feature it is treated as a norma
57. mportant for the Outback The interface should show coordinates in decimal degrees Different environments result in different needs for the traveller It would be useful to include information on hotels 35 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Chapter 9 BUSINESS MODEL AND FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS Potential Business Model for Bus Tour Prototype Revenue will be obtained from tour bus companies who purchase the application and data pay per bus installation They will be given a detailed manual on how to set it up enter tour types attributes weightings throw distances etc They may also choose to have the system set up for them for a fee Updating and maintaining the system should be done by the tour company bus company For the Bus mode prototype the following possible revenue models are envisaged e Cost of application data setup and maintenance can be built into the tour price e Free upgrades e Pay per transaction for real time updates e Additional revenue from PDF CD DVDs of tour post tour support Potential Revenue Model for Tag Along Tours Over the counter sales e g at Best Western Hotels e In line Advertising Online sales of the TIVS software and data OEM to Hire Car Companies Targeting Britz Enhancements Required for TIVS The following enhancements must occur in order to take TIVS to the next stage Interactive version for 4WD tag along tours Identify suitable h
58. n the car until we used an FM transmitter another device needing to be charged Heat emitted by notebook This is a significant problem if the notebook in on someone s lap GPS device drop out from being unplugged and the computer going to sleep Loss of Bluetooth connection between GPS and notebook unstable Number of cables required GPS connection notebook recharger FM transmitter camera etc Recharging devices at night GPS notebook FM Transmitter etc a problem if camping Large distances between POIs in the Outback large areas with no commentary AWDs are very bumpy and it was difficult to click on buttons under such conditions buses are more stable Need additional commentary on areas where POIs might be e g whales can often be seen along the coast ahead or you are entering a wild flower area area rather than point features Distances between updates is a significant issue GPRS coverage is often only available in the towns in the Outback and so updates for all possible POIs ahead before the next location where GPRS coverage is available need to be obtained whilst coverage is available How should this search area be defined Other means of obtaining real time updates need to be investigated e g via satellite Road noise is an issue Commentary should include information on topographic features vegetation geology etc TIVS should be used to deliver safety information to tourists This is very i
59. nates URLs items of commentary images MP3 files videos general commentary and music The recommended maximum per POI is 1 5 MB 650 POIs GB or 6500 POIs per 10 GB Data Updates The whole database should be replaced updated each month preferable using a USB drive rather than a wireless network If any POIs or items change then the whole database must be updated The application is also able to receive real time updates based on the location of the tour vehicle An application on a central server allows for updates to be received and sent They are text only and delivered using text to speech Start Tour When the tour starts when the group boards the bus the driver selects the tour type architecture wildflowers history shopping etc and whether to play the general commentary or music during gaps in commentary of over two minutes When the tour begins the location of the bus is recorded using GPS Preamble The first POI in the database is a fake POI designed to trigger an introduction to the tour pictures images and audio Its location is chosen so that the introduction will not interfere with the commentary to come When the bus reaches the throw of this POI the introduction is triggered Throw Distance Each POI has a specified throw distance which is entered into the POI database This is the distance within which the POI should be commented on see Figure 5 For example the throw distance of a restaurant may be
60. o of the three vehicles see Figures 18 and 19 Figure 18 TIVS Setup in 1 4WD Se oe Figure 19 Field TA En route to Exmouth 52 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS As the interface was designed for bus tours so users could view the screen from the back of the bus several changes are required for tag along type tours in a 4WD Places and roads should be labeled Map data is too generalised Roads layer must be split up into streets railways etc Interface should have a legend and scale Users should be able to click on places to find out more information interactive Symbolisation needs to be to be changed colour line thickness etc user s should be able to choose different modes offering different symbolisation Interface should include how far traveled Users should be able to zoom in and out Head phones cannot be worn by drivers and are not essential FM transmitters improve sound quality Initial testing was undertaken in the Swan Valley and TIVS performed extremely well in this local environment Some issues identified were Throw distances entered were too large and need to be tested suitable distances vary according to the type of POI and topography It will take some fine tuning to get this right Pre recorded MP3 files were the better means of delivering audio commentary as text to speech was not natural missed emphases was too fast etc After initial testing in the Swan Valley TIVS was th
61. p to date information can also be received via GPRS This commercial prototype of TIVS was developed for tour groups travelling in a local physical environment such as the Gold Coast Brisbane tour bus etc This bus tour version was developed for notebook computers and can deliver personalised audio commentary to the tour group whether they are travelling by bus boat 4WD etc Provided the vehicle has a screen tourists can also view their location and the location of POIs mentioned in the commentary on a map as well as text images and videos Evaluation of this prototype was carried out based on the assumption that the interface was meant to be seen from the back of a vehicle e g bus Field testing in Western Australia however was carried out for tag along type tours in 4WDs For this reason several changes are required to improve the interface for 4WD tours The six day trip in Western Australia also brought to our attention a number of issues associated with travelling in Outback Australia These field tests were very successful and the system performed extremely well Most importantly they enabled us to identify a new market for TIVS 4WD tours and analyse the needs of tourists travelling in 4WDs in remote areas In order to take TIVS to the next stage a number of changes need to be made to the application Future development should focus on the use of TIVS for tag along type tours 37 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commenta
62. r zoom level see Figure 2 The interface also includes the time and a summary of what has been said The commentary can be provided in any language provided the data is entered in the database in the appropriate language although labels menus etc are currently in English only Whenever the system comments on a POI it records the location of the vehicle the POI and item ID and the time in a trip log database table For this prototype the bus driver will be required to turn on the laptop open the application connect to the GPS enter the tour type required for the tour group and choose whether to play music or general commentary in periods of silence see Figure 3 The interface is fairly simple to make it easy for the bus driver The tour companies who choose to use this system will be given a detailed manual on how to set it up i e a user manual They will also have the option of having the application set up for them for a fee although they will have to enter their own tour information tour types POIs throw distances and attributes A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Local Time 13 77 2007 2 44 09 PM Bearing 104 To the left you will see ANIS Geraldton Fause GPS Active a Location of Interest Current Location of Hote O Batavia Oo Previously talked about Location ai Points to Direction of Trawel Y Points to Current Location V Points to Previous Location The B
63. rcial prototype was carried out in Brisbane and in Western Australia The application performed very well Field testing in Brisbane was undertaken largely in the Graceville area driving in a car and walking around the park The application was installed on a notebook computer and required the use of a GPS receiver While a few small issues were identified they were quickly rectified and TIVS was deemed to be ready to be tested during a real tour The real world testing of TIVS was carried out in Western Australia While this commercial prototype was designed for bus tours testing in Western Australia was undertaken for tag along tours or global gypsies type tours Testing was undertaken with Drive Western Australia These are the types of tours they envisage TIVS being used for Hence testing was undertaken in 4WDs with TIVS being used in two of the three vehicles As the interface was designed for bus tours so that users could view the screen from the back of the bus several changes are required for tag along tours in a 4WD e Places and roads should be labelled Map data is too generalised Roads layer must be split up into streets railways etc Interface should have a legend and scale Users should be able to click on places to find out more information interactive Symbolisation needs to be to be changed colour line thickness etc Users can choose different modes offering different symbolisation Interface should include how far travelle
64. reen and show the location of the user device derived from GPS This module was written in house 21 A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups GPS Reading Role e Serial handling of GPS readings e Reading the current location of the bus tourist and converting the coordinates to Mercator coordinates e Auto find for GPS devices Scope e Input only e Integral Problems e Handling outliers Obscure hardware setups Different devices Different sentence structures Serial port buffering GPS device drop out from being unplugged Computer going to sleep Uses Mercator coordinate owing to the problem of crossing UTM zones A threshold GPS error has been defined so that locations within 10 m are treated as coincident GPS however will not work in museums i e inside a building Data Access Role e Used a third party database access layer developed by Faraday Media e Interface for retrieving and saving data e Allows abstraction from data source so when the data source changes there is no need to change the logic Scope e Integral Problems e Size of sound files e Size of shapefiles when rendering History Role e Post tour support e Records the location of the vehicle the POI and item ID and time in a trip log whenever an item is being commented on e Trip log recorded in SQLite e Very simple table structure e Atthe moment it is mostly used to help with the development phase and debugging
65. rism Project to develop SMTE manager skills in information technology Project Leader 1999 2001 Decipher Prototype 1 000 000 Funded by AusIndustry Project to develop an Internet based one stop shop for tourism business information Project Leader 1999 National Online Tourism Scoping Study 48 000 Funded by ONT To review the opportunities and benefits of online technologies for the Australian tourism industry Project Leader 1994 1997 e Animal Health in Thailand and Australia improved methods in diagnosis epidemiology economics and information management 410 000 e Coordinator of the GIS IT Component 1991 1993 Oman Second Agricultural Census of Oman 8 200 000 Technical Director Email psharma optusnet com au Ms Devon Wilson Ms Devon Wilson is a full time Research Fellow at The University of Queensland Her main areas of research are Spatial Information Sciences Geographic Information Systems GIS spatial analysis and Location Based Services She is in the process of completing her PhD thesis at UQ The settlement patterns of Roman Britain a changing landscape from the Late Pre Roman Iron Age Email dwilson crctourism com au Mr Stephen Kelly Consulting Programmer Education MGIS UQ 1996 Project Experience Developed a flood model for reinsurance markets for Great Britain e 21 years programming experience 15 years GIS experience 13 years database experience e _Lectured and tutored undergra
66. rvices and tour guides Such services are revolutionising the tourism industry as they can support the tourist in all three phases of their activity particularly during the on tour stage Until such services were developed travellers relied on guidebooks maps and tourist information centres for their on tour support LBS can enhance the knowledge and experience of the tourist by providing location and time specific information e g where is the nearest open museum as well as offering improved safety e g weather alerts emergency response etc The key here is the delivery of services when consumers need them the most that is in unfamiliar environments In recognition of the potential of Location Based Services for the tourism industry this project set out to demonstrate the value of LBS and to build and evaluate applications for the Australian tourism industry As part of this project three prototypes were developed one of which was Tourist Information Voice System TIVS application 1 TIVS is a feature triggered location aware and multilingual commentary system for tour groups vehicles boats pedestrians etc The stakeholder focus for the application is the tour group travelling in a local physical environment such as a city national park or tour bus The mobile technologies enabling it are Global Positioning System GPS wireless technology and Geographic Information System GIS As a result of our research we recognised the changin
67. ry System for Tour Groups APPENDIX A LOOK AHEAD ALGORITHM DAT Compared Locationltem Weighting System In order to reduce the priority further on Locationitams as they leave the ThrowDistance of their Location 0 as future points can be inserted into the Queue Locationitem s will suffer a weighing bonus penalty depending on their proximity to their Location Coordinates Once a Locationltem s weight is less then the aggregated weight of the next Location s first item the Location will be stopped being discussed and the next higher ranked Location will begin F INSIDE THROWDISTANCE are neWwelghGig C urre niwer hi x et ELSE icf core ltems toward end of look ahead algorithm are similarly weighted Location C s post modified weight was quite low so B started Locationitems displayed based inserted its location items on their priority when compared quite soon Since there is with the next closest Location C nothing immediately after B it Location C s post modified weight displays all available was quite low so many of A s Locationltems Locationltems were considered more important the items in C lt lt Point is here current Queue Locarionliem is earlier Location Z not depicted Assumptions tems with a negatie baale welghting after factoring in TourType modifiers will not be regarded tor potential Locationitems Data Eniry Operators will have a basic idea aboul the cause and effec
68. s grown to be the largest dedicated tourism research organisation in the world with 187 million invested in tourism research programs commercialisation and education since 1997 STCRC was established in J uly 2003 under the Commonwealth Government s CRC program and is an extension of the previous Tourism CRC which operated from 1997 to 2003 Role and responsibilities The Commonwealth CRC program aims to turn research outcomes into successful new products services and technologies This enables Australian industries to be more efficient productive and competitive The program emphasises collaboration between businesses and researchers to maximise the benefits of research through utilisation commercialisation and technology transfer An education component focuses on producing graduates with skills relevant to industry needs STCRC s objectives areto enhance e the contribution of long term scientific and technological research and innovation to Australia s sustainable economic and social development e the transfer of research outputs into outcomes of economic environmental or social benefit to Australia the value of graduate researchers to Australia collaboration among researchers between searchers and industry or other users and e efficiency in the use of intellectual and other research outcomes
69. t market for tourism in Australia and the lack of existing applications in this area Vil A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups Methodology No Module Tasks 1 Interface Enhancement of map interface Improve timing e g map location every 1 second features every 3 seconds Choice of music or general commentary for gaps Pause button 2 Look Ahead Algorithm Improvements to efficiency and overall enhancement Decides on the optimum POIs and Field testing and calibration items to mention during the tour this will depend on a number of factors such as tour type bearing distance speed etc 4 Map Display Implement dynamic visualisation effects Draws information on screen shows Allow for 3 zoom levels arrows and location of bus Fine tuning 5 Speech Interface with text to speech engine Plays direction speech on first location text to speech conversion and testing item of each POI Says sound files 6 Online Update Application on web server allowing updates to be sent and Allows users to view real time up to received date information via GPRS Real world testing Implement text to speech conversion 7 GPS Generalised GPS capture improve current version by making Reads current location of it more generic and better at handling error corrections bus pedestrian and converts to UTM Implement auto find for GPS devices coordinates Change to Mercator owing to problem of crossing UTM zones 8 Trip Log Driver c
70. ts which changing Location Lacationtiem and Tour Type rankings will have Locabonitams will ocur im fhe onder of which they have been entered and which their Location has been weighed ranked GPS Emors will be handled prior to the Look Ahead Even when stopped the syatem will pass through a very minor and Incremental vector and heading by simulating a slight move of a few meters 38 TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS LocationltemTenacity Injection System The size of the queue and its minimum fill helps mange additional Locationitem inserts in to the talk Queue Tenacity of 12 CLOSER LOCATIONITEMS MANY LOCATIONITEMS Good Density Management High Information Quanity LocationltemTenacity is defined by a number stored in the database which indicates how far the look ahead should operate X During the look ahead it will try to fill the entire queue up to the value of LocationitemTenacity If after the intial load it discovers that the queue is not full to the n index it will loop through Locationltems not already queued to see if they can be inserted Ne This may push some items further along down the queue however this effect is intentional y In this example C can be moved a down because more of B can be The greater the inserted according to our LocationitemTenacity the greater X 4 the inaccuracy of the talk queue xX ranking rules The small
71. ur Guide These new guides recognise the importance of visual content A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups TIVS was developed in this context and is the culmination of several STCRC projects The purpose of the project 70164 was to carry out a scoping study for the use of Location Based Services for the Australian Tourism Industry This study examined the potential of LBS existing prototypes and applications and the challenges and limitations associated with the development of such applications As a result of this scoping study several potential application areas were identified The purpose of project 80050 was to develop and evaluate applications identified in project 70164 Three LBS prototypes and a supporting application were developed and evaluated TIVS was one of these The objective was to develop and evaluate a position based commentary system including feature triggered commentary for exhibitions tour vehicles buses pedestrians etc TIVS is a feature triggered multi lingual tour guide for tour groups and individuals in a local environment e g Brisbane It uses GIS GPS and wireless technologies in order to support the tourist in the on tour phase of their activity The aim of the application is to enable travellers to receive audio commentary based on their location Travellers can also view their location and the location of POIs on a map As a tour group or individual travels around a local
72. y possible thanks to support from Drive WA who supplied vehicles accommodation POI data etc 1i TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS CONTENTS SUMMARY vV TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS Bus Tour Version v Technologies vi Significance vi Key Stakeholders vii Advantages vii OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY VII METHODOLOGY VII KEY FINDINGS IX FUTURE ACTIONS X TOURIST INFORMATION VOICE SYSTEM TIVS 1 BACKGROUND 1 BUS TOUR VERSION 2 ENVIRONMENT 3 TECHNOLOGIES 3 STAKEHOLDERS 3 ADVANTAGES 4 SIGNIFICANCE A PURPOSE OF REPORT 4 METHODOLOGY gt COMMERCIAL PROTOTYPE 7 INDUSTRY PARTNERS 7 SPECIFICATIONS 7 INTERFACE 7 STORY BOARD 12 PRE TOUR 12 Data Updates 12 Start Tour 12 Preamble 12 Throw Distance 12 On Tour 13 General Interest Commentary 14 Breaks 16 Long Range Location 16 Video 16 New Log 17 POST TOUR 17 MODULES 18 SPECIFICATIONS OF TIVS MODULES 20 LOOK AHEAD ALGORITHM 20 DISPLAY 21 GPS READING 22 DATA ACCESS 22 HISTORY 22 USER INTERFACE 23 DATA CREATION 23 DATA UPDATE 23 SPEECH 24 DATABASE STRUCTURE 24 VIDEO 25 N ON MUSIC jp o pum o pum o A Location Aware and Feature Triggered Commentary System for Tour Groups DATA ENTRY APPLICATION Website ISSUES EVALUATION BUSINESS MODEL AND FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS POTENTIAL BUSINESS MODEL FOR BUS TOUR PROTOTYPE POTENTIAL REVENUE MODEL FOR TAG ALONG TOURS ENHANCEMENTS REQUIRED FOR TIVS CONCLUSION APPENDIX A LOOK AHEAD ALGORITHM APPENDIX B CONSIDERED

Tourist Information Voice System (TIVS)

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