Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Applications
ABSTRACT 1. INTRODUCTION
Location-based services (LBSs) play more and more impor- Location based services (LBSs) are quickly growing in
tant roles in our daily life with the prevalence of mobile prevalence with the advances of wireless communication and
devices and the internet. Location modeling is a signif- mobile devices. Facing sophisticated applications, such as
icant research topic in LBSs, which is needed to provide location-based instant messaging and location-based alerts,
a well-defined representation of location knowledge for lo- LBSs are expected to provide more intelligent services for
cation browsing, navigation and query processing. In this large user community. Location model is an essential part
paper, we propose that a topological structure can be at- of location aware applications, which requires the represen-
tached to an exit-location space model, which can preserve tation of location knowledge to be understandable and ca-
the topology and distance semantics between locations (ex- pable of capturing the rich semantics of the physical world.
its). The Q-analysis developed by R. H. Atkin is used to Much research has been demanded and carried out in de-
analyze the semantic information of the model. Compared veloping location models to describe the physical space and
with those existing models which only reveal the relation- properties of the objects contained in it.
ships between two entities, this novel model can provide the In this paper, we focus on designing a semantic loca-
analysis of n-ary relationships (i.e., the relations among n en- tion model for indoor applications. Compared with out-
tities) from both local and global viewpoints. Moreover, by door environments, the indoor environments are inherently
using the rich structures obtained from the topological anal- diverse and much more highly structured. In general, an
ysis, we define a semantic distance which can support more outdoor environment can be clearly described by the univer-
meaningful navigation and queries on complicated indoor sal longitude-latitude-altitude coordinate system. However,
environments. Examples are described in detail to demon- this coordinate system is not really suitable for indoor envi-
strate the effectiveness of our model. ronments since each indoor environment has its own way to
describe its locations which have various contexts. There-
fore, the location model with rich structures is needed for
Categories and Subject Descriptors indoor applications which can capture complicated relation-
H.2 [Information Systems]: Database Management; H.3.2 ships among locations, such as the type of a location (room
[Information Storage and Retrieval]: Content Analy- or corridor), the connective structure of n locations, etc.
sis and Indexing; H.3.3 [Information Storage and Re- We propose in this paper the use of Q-analysis devised by
trieval]: Information Search and Retrieval. R. H. Atkin to semantic location model for indoor applica-
tions. The indoor space is modeled by two types of entities:
locations and exits, where a location is a bounded geometric
General Terms area with one or more exits and an exit is a boundary point
Algorithms and Theory. through which a user can leave or enter a location [28][20].
Based on this model, we construct an exit-location matrix
A, of which the elements aij are only one of the two val-
Keywords ues 1 and 0, with 1 (respectively 0) indicating the presence
Semantic Location Model, Topology, Q-analysis, Connec- (respectively absence) of the ith exit in the jth location.
tiveness, Simplicial Family. Hence this matrix is an incidence matrix. A simplex, which
is a basic object in the study of algebraic topology, is at-
tached to each column of the incidence matrix, and then
the collection of these simplexes forms a simplicial family.
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for The Q-analysis is applied to analyze the topological struc-
personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are ture of the location model, which is a technique of multidi-
not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies
bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. To copy otherwise, to
mensional data analysis that makes us observe the semantic
republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific structure of the indoor space from both local and global per-
permission and/or a fee. spectives. In comparison with existing symbolic models, the
ACM GIS ’08 , November 5-7, 2008. Irvine, CA, USA. Q-analysis method is like a microscope and therefore makes
(c) 2008 ACM ISBN 978-1-60558-323-5/08/11...$5.00.
us do much deeper investigations into structures of an in- tary benefits and drawbacks [24]. To overcome their weak-
door environment. Our topology-based model can reveal nesses, hybrid location models are proposed by [29][24][12],
the n-ary relationships (i.e., the relations among n entities) which are combinations of symbolic and geometric models.
such as hole, star and hub, as well as basic relationships be- The common basic idea under these hybrid models is that
tween two entities, such as containment and connectedness. objects are organized in a hierarchy in which every level
Furthermore, by using the rich structures obtained from the is a refinement of its previous and then each object in the
topological analysis, a semantic distance can be defined to hierarchy is given its own coordinate system [26]. More-
support more meaningful navigation and queries on compli- over, coordinate systems of subspaces and superspaces can
cated indoor environments. be transformed between two spaces [24].
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. Section 2 Pradhan [34] introduced a semantic representation of ob-
discusses the related work on modeling locations. Section 3 jects, which is totally different from symbolic and geometric
reviews the basic concepts of algebraic topology which are representations. The semantic representation provides the
the foundations of the core subjects of the paper. In Sec- contextual information of an object, which can characterize
tion 4, we first represent the indoor space as an exit-location the situation around the object [36]. Another semantic loca-
matrix, and then build the topological location model by at- tion model for indoor navigation was developed by Hu and
taching the mathematical structure of simplex to each col- Lee [19][20]. The model consists of two types of entities: lo-
umn/row of the matrix. Based on this model, some topolog- cation and exit. It is actually a graph-based symbolic model,
ical characteristics are derived to reveal semantic relation- but it can be derived from the geometric representation of
ships among locations. By using the information obtained the indoor space [38][28]. The hierarchical structure of the
from the topological analysis, we explore the potential ap- model is consistent with human cognition during navigation
plications of the model and give a comparison analysis of the and therefore it is more suitable for display on mobile de-
new model and existing location models in Section 5. The vices than a plain floor plan. However, this model can not
last section summarizes the results obtained in this paper fully support object moving and can deal with only one type
and discusses directions for future work. of relation “reachability” [28].
Further related work in this direction includes Ye et al.
2. RELATED WORK [38] who proposed a unified space model for more complex
environment based on lattice and graph models, as well as
This section will give an overview of existing location mod-
O’Connell et al. [32], Pederson [33] and Schlieder et al. [35]
els, which can be mainly classified into symbolic and geomet-
who build models for mobile objects or users.
ric models [29][9].
In a symbolic location model, all objects are represented
as symbols and referred to by names. Based on the inclusion 3. MATHEMATICAL FOUNDATIONS
relation between two sets, these symbols can be divided into Q-analysis proposed by R. H. Atkin (standard references
sets and subsets, and then form a hierarchical structure, are [3][5][6][1][2][4]) is a technique of multidimensional data
such as a tree or a lattice [20][26][12][25]. A representa- analysis, which makes us observe the space from both lo-
tive example of symbolic models is the semantic location cal and global perspectives. Data structures are revealed
model presented by Brumitt and Shafer [10]. The model by techniques of algebraic topology, which impose noth-
is not a geometric model since it can represent containment ing on the data and “let the data speak for themselves”
and connectedness relationships within a space and not with [8][16]. Compared with the theories of graph and network,
any specific geometric position of the object in that space. Q-analysis can explore n-ary relationships (i.e., the relation-
Moreover, it has a lattice structure and a friendly naming ships among n entities) as well as the relationships between
system, which allow a person to perform queries according two things, which are more important for some practical
to semantic information of symbols. The prime advantage problems [30][13]. Q-analysis has been successfully applied
of symbolic models is that they have clear representation to many fields, such as geographical studies [8], social and
of spatial relationships with semantic information which is planning sciences [1][2][4][7][17], mass media [18], artificial
easily understandable for humans. However, it is a heavy intelligence [21][37], information retrieval [11][27][30][31], data-
cost to construct and maintain symbolic models manually. base interaction [22], spatial databases [23][14], and so forth.
In a geometric location model, the physical space is rep- The followings are the basic concepts of algebraic topol-
resented as the Euclidean space and the objects therein are ogy, including simplex, simplicial family, and Q-analysis which
represented as points, lines, regions or volumes in the Eu- are foundations of the core subjects of the paper [31][30].
clidean space. Each object in the geometric model is de- A simplex is a basic element of algebraic topology, and
scribed by the set of coordinates defined in the Euclidean every simplex has a dimension. A 0-dimensional simplex is
space. Distance between two objects can be calculated based a point in the Euclidean space IRN , a 1-simplex is a line
on their coordinates. There are no set inclusion relation- segment joining two points and a 2-simplex is a triangle.
ships between two objects like the above symbolic models. Figure 1 shows four simplexes of dimension k = 0, 1, 2, and
A well known application based on the geometric model is 3, respectively. The formal definition is given as follows.
the GPS coordinate system, where locations are described
by the universal longitude-latitude-altitude coordinate sys- Definition 1. Let v0 , v1 , . . . , vk be k + 1 points of IRN
tem [26][24][29]. Geometric models have the following ad- in general position (i.e., the vectors − v− → −−→ −−→
0 v1 , v0 v2 , . . . , v0 vk are
vantages: they provide accurate position representation for linearly independent). We denote by σ k = (v0 , v1 , . . . , vk )
objects and support more flexible ways to retrieve location the smallest convex set spanned by these points. We call σ k
information. However, they have weak structures and can a simplex of dimension k (or a k-simplex) and v0 , v1 , . . . , vk
not reflect well semantic relationships among objects. the vertices of the simplex. A q-simplex spanned by a subset
In fact, symbolic and geometric models have complemen- of these vertices is called a q-face of σ k . We use the notation
maximum value of q = q ∗ the maximal L-chain, denoted by
∗
Cab (L). We say that σa and σb are q ∗ -connected if they are
connected by a maximal chain.
The relation “is q-connected to” on a simplicial family Σ
obeys the following three conditions: “reflexivity”, “symme-
try” and “transitivity”, therefore it is an equivalence rela-
tion, which is represented as rq . We have the following “Q-
analysis” structure on a simplicial family.
Definition 4. The relation “is q-connected to” on a sim-
Figure 1: From left to right—simplexes of respective plicial family Σ, is an equivalence relation which is de-
dimensions 0, 1, 2, and 3. noted rq . Let Σq be the set of simplexes in Σ with dimension
greater than or equal to q, where q = 0, 1, . . . , dimΣ. Then
rq partitions Σq into equivalence classes of q-connected sim-
plexes. These equivalence classes are called the q-connected
components of Σ. Qq denotes the number of q-connected
components in Σ. The determination of the components and
Qq for each value of q is termed a Q-analysis of Σ.
1 e5
The computation of a hole structure is related to the σL 4
1
σL 3
mathematical concept “homology group”, which is beyond
the scope of the knowledge of this paper. Figure 6: Location simplicial family generated by
columns of the Table 3.
4.2.3 Q-analysis of a Simplicial Family
Based on Definition 4, we know that Q-analysis is a tech-
nique of multidimensional data analysis and makes us ob-
serve a simplicial family from both local and global angles.
The following example gives a detailed illustration.
Example 4. Table 4 gives the Q-analysis result of the
simplicial family in Example 3 according to Definition 4 and e2
Algorithm 1. Since the highest dimension of location sim- e3 e5
plexes is 2, the Q-analysis of the simplicial family has 3
levels, q = 0, 1, 2 respectively. The level q = 2 consists of L1 e1
L2
those simplexes with dimension greater than or equal to 2, e4
2 2 2
so this level contains two simplexes σL and σL . Since σL
2
1 2 1
L3
and σL2 are not 2-connected to each other but 2-connected
2 2
to itself respectively by a chain of length zero, σL 1
and σL 2
forms two 2-connected components. Next, at the level q = 1,
1 1 2
two more location simplexes σL3 and σL4 come in. σL1 and Figure 7: An exit-location area in a building.
2
σL 2
are 1-connected by a chain of length 1 because they have
two common exits e3 and e4 , therefore they are merged to e3
1
form a 1-connected component at the level q = 1. σL 3
and
1
σL4 both are 1-connected to itself and thus form two one- e5
member components. All the four location simplexes form a
larger 0-connected component at the level q = 0 since σL 2
is e2
1
1
2 2 1 1
1-connected to σL2 , σL2 is 0-connected to σL4 , and σL4 is 0- σL 3
connected to σL 1
. Moreover, the value Qq denotes the num- e1 e4
3
ber of q-connected components at each q-level. This structure 2
vector provides a measure of some of the global structure of a σL 2
2
simplicial family while each q-connected component captures σL 1
the local structure information of a simplicial family.
Figure 8: The simplexes corresponding to Figure 7.
Potential applications of the local and global information
are discussed in Section 5.
8, we have
4.2.4 Eccentricity ImpL1 (e) =
1
= 1;
In a building, an exit is a connector between two locations 1
or a boundary point opening into the outside of the build-
ing. For each location, the importance of its exits is different. 2 1
ImpL2 (e) = = ;
For example, if a location has only one exit, then this exit 4 2
is very important for the location since it is the only entity
2
connecting this location to others, while if a location has ImpL3 (e) =
.
many exits and some of them can open simultaneously into 3
the other location, then the importance of its exits is small. We can see that the importance of exit e1 for location L1
This information is important for a mobile user. For exam- gets the maximum value since it is the only exit leaving or
ple, a person may estimate how many ways he/she has to entering location L1 .
leave a location through its exits based on this information.
We will define a measure to quantify the above information.
Given a simplicial family, eccentricity (ecc) of a simplex We give the complete pseudo-code for computing “impor-
has been devised to measure the extent to which the simplex tance” of exits as below.
is integrated into the simplicial family [3]. The formula for
calculating eccentricity of a simplex σ is given by
4.2.5 Star and Hub
In our location model, rooms and corridors are all repre-
q̂ − q̌ sented as location simplexes. It is valuable to differentiate
ecc(σ) = , (3)
q̂ + 1 types of locations in an indoor environment since it may
where q̂ is called top-q and denotes the dimension of simplex aid in limiting queries about locations [10]. The following
σ, and q̌ is called bottom-q and is the largest number of definitions † and proposition can help us solve this problem.
vertices minus 1 that σ shares with any simplex. Definition 5. Let the star of a simplex σ in a simplicial
Based on Equation 3, we can calculate the eccentricity of family K be defined as
each location simplex. Let e be the exit of location L, then
0 0 0
the importance of exit e for location L (denoted by ImpL (e)) star(σ) = {σ |σ is q-near to σ, σ ∈ K}; (5)
is defined as
that is,
q̌ + 1
ImpL (e) = 1 − ecc(σL ) = . (4) 0 0 0
q̂ + 1 star(σ) = {σ |σ ∩ σ . σ, σ ∈ K}. (6)
The range of importance measure is at the interval [0, 1]. Definition 6. Let fi , i = 1, 2, . . . , s be the subsets of the
The larger the value is, the more important the exit for its simplexes of K. Let F be a set of these subsets, that is,
location is.
†
We have tailored the original definition of “star” in Q-
Example 5. Considering the exits in Figure 7 and Figure analysis to fit our present application.
Dimension Number of components
at level q List of components
q Qq
2 2 1 1
0 1 {σL 1
, σL 2
, σL 3
, σL 4
}
2 2 1 1
1 3 {σL1 , σL2 } {σL3 } {σL 4
}
2 2
2 2 {σL 1
} {σL 2
}