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The Ephemeral Communication
and Positioning API
Some use cases Fredrik Beckman
A simple implementation
of a “Uber like” Taxi
dispatch system
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A Superior Taxi service
“It’s late and it’s raining. You need a cab so you use the cab company’s app to order it.
With the order confirmation you also get a pin on a map representing the cab so you can follow it on its way to you. When it is approaching you know when it is time to step out into the rainy street and get into the car.
You arrive at your destination. Pay the driver (since the app hasn’t had those payment features released yet), get out and watch him drive off, as you realize that you’ve left your briefcase in the backseat.
So you bring out the app again, tap on the cabs pin and talk to the driver directly. He turns around and you pick up your briefcase, with a warm feeling of good user experience and remembering to use the same cab company next time you need one.”
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The user story
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Delivering to a person
anywhere and anytime,
not only to an address or
a post office
Mobile commerce that is
truly mobile
Last Mile Delivery redefined
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“You are on a windsurfing vacation. It’s
that perfect day, beautiful sun and a
strong wind.
You crash and break your mast.
Well isn’t that too bad, no more surfing
this season since you are leaving
tomorrow. But one of the locals comes
to your rescue. He has the “Surfer
Dude Deliveries” app, a local dealer
with onsite deliveries.
You browse through the online store
and find a used mast at a bargain
price, order it, pay with your PayPal
account and approve sharing your
position with the shop.
Half an hour later a VW bus arrives at
the beach just where you are waiting
and tanning. The mast is perfect!”
Delivery Anywhere
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“Back home again you finally manage to invite that girl to a restaurant.
You have a great time and things really click. She leaves to powder her nose and you decide to do something romantic.
You know there is an online flower shop close by so you place an order and agrees to share your position.
Your date returns and you decide to take a stroll in this beautiful evening, knowing that the surprise will still work since the shop has your ID and tracks your position.
Walking down the street you are caught up by the flower delivery guy on his bicycle and he hands over the bouquet of roses to your date.
Success!”
Truly mobile commerce
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Events, fairs, theme
parks, etc. attracts many
visitors.
Ephemeral messaging
and positioning is a tool
for superior visitor
service.
Superior visitor service
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“You received a V.I.P. discount coupon in the
park app a few days ago and decide to bring
the family for an all day out.
You pass the gate and get a notification asking
if you want to download the days program.
Hmmm…quite a lot going on today and many
wills in the family. You decide to split up and
meet again in an hour.
When that hour has passed you are back at
the meeting point, but where are the kids? You
wait a few minutes and start to wonder where
they are. You call them and no answer.
So you ping them and get their current position
on the park map. Oh…they are still on the
rollercoaster. No wonder they didn’t answer. So
you send them a message and tell them to
meet you outside the candy shop.
But the candy shop is closed. So you open the
customer service chat and ask which shops
are open. They send you the position and the
right store is highlighted on the map. You
forward the chat message to your kids and ask
them to meet you there instead.”
A day with the family
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People move over vast
areas and when
something happen it is
essential to know where
they are, even if there is
only 2G/GPRS network
coverage.
But family members
position is highly private
information.
Safety applications
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“A couple of years ago the two PingPal founders Fred and
Andy were doing one of their favorite things; downhill
skiing. The lift broke down and they got separated and
went powder hunting on their own. Fred didn’t find
anything but ice and roots so he tried calling Andy that of
course didn’t answer. He could:
1. Have crashed
2. Gone to the Apres-ski
3. Found powder and too busy to hear the phone or bother
to stop.”
A good ski resort app has to perform well in a challenging
environment:
• It’s got to work in low connection speeds, meaning
minimal data signaling and locally stored maps.
2G/GPRS has the best coverage and reach so that
must be sufficient.
• Radio towers quite far away means high power
signaling, meaning straining battery and nowhere to
re-charge. So it is important to minimize data traffic.
• Using the GPS requires heavy calculations and
power draining, so constant tracking and sending
positions at short intervals is out of the question.
Positions should be shared only when needed.
• Automatic positioning should be possible at
emergencies.
• Be able to position ad hoc groups of people, for
instance a one-day skiing party loosely joining a
mountain guide.
Safety at a ski resort
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Not everyone or everything has a
smartphone
Equestrian sports are highly popular in
many countries, and in Sweden that is
the sport that tops the injury statistics
for teenage girls.
The equestrian riding schools have the
safety responsibility for their students
but accidents do happen. Horses scare
easily and the rider gets thrown off.
If the rider is out of sight a good safety
app would send an alarm automatically
and pinpoint the rider’s position.
Since a runaway horse can run quite
far before calming down the service
should also include a positioning
device mounted on the horse.
Horses can be dangerous
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Team management in
the field that complies
with employee privacy
rules and legislations
Mobile Workforce Management
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The project manager set up temporary with
sub-suppliers like electricians, plumbers,
etc, sharing information and engaging in
online discussion knowing that the shared
data, like drawings, maps, legal documents,
contracts and discussion will “evaporate”
and not end up in the pocket of the sub-
supplier and incidentally brought to a
competitor .
To effectively manage the site you need to
know where people and material deliveries
are. However, in many countries it is illegal
to track co-workers in the field, but you still
want to be able to manage the people.
Today the only option is to call and ask
where they are, but that can be inconvenient
if you are dispatching hundreds of
resources.
With ephemeral positioning you get the
same level of integrity protection as the
simple phone call especially if you give the
user the possibility to control to whom and
when his position should be shared.
A construction site
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The PingPal Solution
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Inside PingPal
“Perceived fixed line”
Chat, Position, Data
P2P streaming, VoIP
Persistent Connection
UniPush™
Distributed Logic
Privacy Protection
Ephemeral messaging
Asynchronous API calls
User & group management
Scaling
Dashboard
Routing
Transaction
Authentication
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