This week we had our presentation on thursday and practical on friday. The question for our presentation will be how logistics industry benefit from RFID technology and give example of RFID applications in the logistic industry. One of the example will be IBM in USA, how they benefit from RFID. Next we will choose our own topic regarding of RFID. Our grp will be touching on the healthcare, basically RFID in hospital. Examples of RFID in hospital are RFID patient tracking, RIFD tags for dressing in KK women and children hospital and using RFID to take patient temperatures.Mr cheng commented that our slides is interesting.

During our practical, what we had learnt is that to use RFID technology to track outdoor assets like cars in the carpark lot.And learnt how to use Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA) algorithm to determine the location of the outdoor assets.

RFID vechicle parking positioning system

• control up to 4 entrance/exit per reader
• tag can be read through winshield with metal film
• Various interface options between Reader & PC via WiFi, Bluetooth, USB, RS232
  

I learnt that wireless signal is transmitted at a regular interval by the Active RFID tag in the vehicle.Active tags have an internal battery to power them and are usually RW (tag data can be rewritten and/or modified). And its generally can transmit their data over a longer distance, the tag itself is larger than a passive tag, and has a limited operational lifespan.

There are 3 ways ways of describing an asset location:

• Real-time location: able to track car within the area in the map
• Presence: whether the car still inside the carpark lot
• Choke-point: to detect if the car leave the carpark lot

The equipment we used for the practical:

1.1Tag 1.2 Button tag(another type of tag)

Tag is a microchip combined with an antenna in a compact package; the packaging is structured to allow the RFID tag to be attached to an object to be tracked

__________________________________________________________________


2.Tag Activator

Tag Activator is a hardware component that connects tags wirelessly to the tag manager workstation, and transmits programming information to the tags.

________________________________________________________________

3.Exciter


The Exciter triggers AeroScout’s tags as they pass through a choke point to transmit a message that is received by a standard Wi-Fi Access Point or AeroScout Location Receiver.


_________________________________________________________________
4.Location Receiver


AeroScout location receivers provide robust and sophisticated location measurement capabilities packaged in small, easy to install devices designed for harsh conditions. The location receiver receives transmissions and executes sophisticated radio signal measurements and calculations that are sent to the AeroScout Engine software.

__________________________________________________________________

5.Access point




6.wireless bridge




Our task will be activating of tags using AeroScout tag manager(is a stand-alone software application that enables users and administrators to configure,program and activate AeroScout Tags for multiple asset location and tracking functions) and activator, next configure the tracking system using AeroScout engine and lastly analyze presence,chock-point & real-time location using AeroScout engine.