BLE device indoor localization based on RSS fingerprinting mapped by propagation modes

Nowadays, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) technology has a great attention in the field of wireless localization techniques, especially in the case of indoor scenarios. Study presented in this paper explores BLE localization performance in indoor scenarios based on a received signal strength (RSS). Firstly, we present a Ray-Launching based application to emulate BLE radio frequency (RF) signal propagation in the office environment. Secondly, an appropriate measurement workplace and its setup is proposed to measure RSS values. Obtained results are used to create an RSS-fingerprinting map. Furthermore, accuracy of position determination is calculated and evaluated. Results show advantage of BLE technology for indoor localization purposes (without calibration measurement). However, its performance highly depends on the number of considered BLE nodes and on applied evaluation method (e.g. number of considered sectors).