Combining Location Tracking and RFID Tagging toward an Improved Research Infrastructure

Abstract

The popularity of mobile computing creates new opportunities for information sharing and collaboration through technologies like radio frequency identification (RFID) tags and location awareness technologies. This chapter discusses how these technologies, which provide subtly different information, can be used together toward increased benefit to users. This work introduces technologies for RFID and location awareness, including a survey of projects. We describe advantages of combining these technologies, illustrated through our system, TagIt, that uses these technologies in a traditional research poster environment to provide a rich multimedia experience and encourage ongoing feedback from poster viewers. An overview of TagIt is provided, including user commenting and information sharing capabilities that make use of RFID and location information. User feedback and an expert review highlights how TagIt could benefit authors, information consumers, and the research community, leading to future directions for the research community.

Key Terms in this Chapter

Radio Frequency Identification: an identification technology that combines low-cost tags with minimal internal memory and sensing capability that are attached to an object for tracking and information storing purposes

Community: the scientific community that benefits from improved research.

Information sharing: the presentation of data or multimedia content that is intended for public usage.

Authors: the creators of the information that will be shared with the public.

Tagging: merging physical objects with digital information using identification technology.

Location Awareness Systems: provide location knowledge and allow for users to share and retrieve information locally.

Consumers: persons that review the works of others for personal knowledge or improvement of work.