method has attracted attention from both academia
and industry as it is achievable and cost-effective.
Fig. 2: Typical WiFi-based indoor localization
pipeline
A typical WiFi-based indoor localization
pipeline is shown in Figure 2. It consists of an
offline stage and an online stage. Firstly, a radio
map Ω construction is done in the offline
stage, where N is the number of fingerprints, and M
represents the number of access points plus 2 (X
and Y to represent locations). A fingerprint is a
vector v RM of RSSI received in a place n
with coordinates (,).Secondly, in the online
stage, the user's location is estimated by matching
the fingerprint of the current place to those on the
radio map. Traditional matching algorithms such as
K-Nearest Neighbors, Decision Tree, Random
Forest, [4], and Support Vector Machine classifiers,
[5] have been explored for years. WKNN can be
applied to WiFi localization by using the signal
strength (RSSI) values from nearby access points
as features. Given a set of RSSI measurements
from multiple access points, WKNN can determine
the k nearest neighbors (based on signal strength
similarity) to the query point (the device for which
localization is required). Random Forest can also
be utilized for WiFi localization. During inference,
the trained Random Forest model can predict the
location of a device based on its WiFi signal
strengths. Generally, machine learning-based
solutions achieve higher accuracy than traditional
methods, but they can be expensive because
training and tuning are required, and as the scale of
the model increases, more computational resources
are needed. Additionally, data-driven approaches
depend heavily on the distribution of training data,
so a natural trade-off between accuracy and
robustness needs to be considered. Both traditional
WiFi fingerprint-based indoor localization and
machine learning-based solutions require an offline
database, which does not align with the scenarios in
a SLAM system, where a robot explores and
locates itself without prior knowledge. Therefore,
our system proposes a WiFi SLAM solution that
can operate without an offline database.
2.3 Visual SLAM with WiFi
Due to the unique advantages and disadvantages of
camera and WiFi sensors, several methods, [3]
have been proposed to combine these two sensors
to compensate for each other’s weaknesses and
construct a more robust system.Proposed a system
that utilizes WiFi-based positioning methods, [4]
for mobile robot-based learning data collection,
localization, and tracking in indoor spaces. The
system combines the extended Viterbi algorithm,
tracking algorithm, odometer information, and a
new signal fluctuation matrix to improve the
accuracy of robot location tracking and the
effectiveness of building a high-quality WiFi Radio
Map.
With the help of WiFi information, they select
a subset of RGBD images that correspond to the
similar location range as the current frame for loop
closure detection, thus avoiding the perceptual
aliasing problem. In addition, computational
complexity can be reduced because of the low
computation overhead of determining WiFi
similarity, and the number of RGBD images in the
database that need to be searched is decreased by
filtering loop closure candidates via their WiFi
similarity. In our system, we also integrate WiFi
with visual SLAM to tackle the false loop closure
problem by associating a keyframe with
corresponding WiFi information. However, instead
of storing the WiFi fingerprint or signature, we
store a pose estimated by the WiFi SLAM module
in our system. Furthermore, our system not only
solves the perceptual aliasing problem but also
provides a coarse robot position sup- ported by our
WiFi SLAM module to make our system more
robust when visual SLAM is out of function.
Both Extended Kalman Filter (EKF), [5], [6]
and Graph Optimization are popular techniques
used for Simultaneous Localization and Mapping
(SLAM) in robotics and computer vision. EKF
SLAM uses a state vector to represent the robot’s
pose and the map’s features and estimates the state
vector by incorporating sensor measurements such
as odometry and range measurements. EKF SLAM
is computationally efficient and is widely used in
mobile robotics applications. On the other hand,
Graph Optimization represents the SLAM problem
as a graph, where nodes represent robot poses and
landmarks and edges represent constraints between
them. Graph Optimization finds the optimal
WSEAS TRANSACTIONS on INFORMATION SCIENCE and APPLICATIONS
DOI: 10.37394/23209.2024.21.37
Yi-Hsien Lu, Chia-Chihuang,
Chih-Chung Chou, Cheng-Fu Chou