Location Based Services

LBS helps us locate position of any object on our planet. Common uses of LBS are Navigation, Mapping, Troop deployment in military, Vehicle tracking etc. All that comes to our mind whenever we talk about LBS is Global Positioning System (GPS) but LBS is not GPS. GPS is one of the several ways LBS tracking is done.

INTRODUCTION
You have gone to Market for the first time with your friend and have got lost. May be these are the series of questions that come to your mind. Where am I? What is around me? Where are they? How do I get there? Where is it? Where was I? What is my Orientation? The solution to all these questions is LBS (Location Based Services). LBS helps us locate position of any object on our planet. Common uses of LBS are Navigation, Mapping, Troop deployment in military, Vehicle tracking etc. All that comes to our mind whenever we talk about LBS is Global Positioning System (GPS) but LBS is not GPS. GPS is one of the several ways LBS tracking is done.

Positioning methods used by LBS

Satellite Based Positioning Cellular Network Based Positioning Short Range Positioning

Satellite Based Positioning

GPS Constellation consists of 24 satellites that orbit the earth every 12 yours. To use this GPS system all we need is GPS receiver. This receiver is tracked by 3 or more satellites and the calculations are done to get a correct position of The GPS receiver

Cellular Network Based Positioning

In this method the service providers Network towers calculate the position of the mobile phone by calculating the position based on the signal strength from various towers. However GPS approach gives more accurate results.

Short Range Positioning

In this method the Bluetooth talks with a local server to get position.

Application on mobile approach

A J2ME or any other platform application sits on the mobile phone and calls API's to find the position. This approach has following features A GUI based application on your mobile phone. No need of any tie-up with the service provider. However service providers may charge you for access to this service. Target devices can only be J2ME phones or any others phones that support Symbian, Pocket PC etc.

Service Provider Web service Approach

Here your server application directly queries the service provider web service which gives the mobile user position. This approach has following features Major advantage of this approach is that any mobile phone can be tracked imaterial of platform, OS etc. This approach is not suitable for Mobile maps Tie-up needed with the service provider and the service providers will charge you for this service.

Conclusion
This concludes our article on LBS. J2MEs nifty Location API gives us the power to build Location aware applications, however accuracy and feasibility of some of these APIs should be checked with respect to Target Devices. All these APIs may not be supported by some devices. Check your Target Devices specification for more details.