BlueEyes: using beacon and smart phone for visually impaired / blind people

There are currently few options for navigational aids for the blind and visually impaired (BVI) in large indoor and outdoor spaces. Such indoor and outdoor spaces can be difficult to navigate even for the general sighted population if they are disoriented due to unfamiliarity or other reasons. This paper presents an indoor wayfinding system called GuideBeacon for the blind, visually impaired, and disoriented (BVID) that assists people in navigating between any two points within indoor environments. The GuideBeacon system allows users equipped with smartphones to interact with low cost Bluetooth-based beacons deployed strategically within the indoor space of interest to navigate their surroundings. This paper describes the technical challenges faced in designing such a system, the design decisions made in building the current version of the GuideBeacon system, the solutions developed to meet the technical challenges, and results from the evaluation of the system. Results presented in this paper obtained from field testing GuideBeacon with BVI and sighted participants suggests that it can be used by the BVID for navigation in large indoor spaces independently and effectively. This paper presents novel structure for visually impaired/blind people using beacon and smart phone. The proposed structure is consisted of three parts. In the first part esp8266 module due to ultra-low power consumption, in the second part configurator application to configure these beacon and last part is mobile application to detect these beacons. The aim is to help visually impaired/blind people to knowledge the environment in which they live by. Three tests applied in real environment. The results show good performance for the suggested scheme help the visually impaired/blind people reach the desired devices location successfully without error. In conclusion, beacon and smart phone were a valid and reliable method to help the visually impaired/blind people to know the location of devices that are nearest from him in indoor and outdoor environment