Wifi positioning backends

[Stephen Wing]

As I added to the ITT thread, Navizon (the service in question) uses the 
cell ID information from the mobile phone (GSM) network that the mobile 
phone needs to work correctly.  Navizon are taking this information and 
using a database lookup to work out a rough location...

To be fair, Navizon can also use Wifi network information too, but I 
think it's power is in the mobile cell location information.

I added:

"Navizon isn't so much about true WiFi, but using the cell ID provided 
by the cellular networks for a mobile phone to provide rough location.

However, thinking this through, I'm not sure whether mobile phones can 
provide the cell ID information via a Bluetooth connection, so it may 
still require the Navizon client on the phone to calculate the 
information, and then the Geoclue Navizon backend would simply need to 
access the client on the phone somehow to get the position, and then 
provide it forward.

It might be worth asking Navizon whether there is any way to access the 
client directly - I know there is a way to access it - you can publish 
your location via an XML feed for use on the web - maybe a Geoclue 
backend could be written to access this over the internet to provide the 
information...

Certainly most people who carry a 770 / N800 will also have a mobile 
phone with them, so somehow being able to utilise the mobile phone 
network as a location information provider makes some sense to me."

Stephen