A Simple Positioning System for Large-Scale Indoor Patrol Inspection Using Foot-Mounted INS, QR Code Control Points, and Smartphone

A reliable and practical personnel positioning system is necessary for large-scale indoor patrol inspection. In this study, we designed a personnel positioning system that entails the implementation of a foot-mounted inertial module, a smartphone, and pre-determined sparse QR code points. Foot-mounted inertial navigation system (Foot-INS) is self-contained system that send real-time dead-reckoning positions to a smartphone via a built-in Bluetooth module. When the inspector arrives at a planned control point area marked by the QR code, the smartphone actively scans the QR code and obtains the three-dimensional (3D) coordinates of the control point. Then, a newly developed data fusion algorithm performs real-time and post-processing fusion of the relative foot position and 3D QR code control point coordinate data. The proposed algorithm was implemented on an Android smartphone and was evaluated by extensive experiments in an indoor office building and an outdoor open-sky area. The experimental results confirmed the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed personnel positioning system. The designed system was proven to be decent, robust, and not susceptible to environmental changes. It is also low-cost, has low power consumption, is easy to operate, and is compatible with common smartphones. Moreover, the proposed personnel positioning system provides a practical application pattern of the Foot-INS.