d4.10.1 smartskigoggles experiment problem statement and requirements

The experiment Smart Ski Goggles aims at the experimentation of a real-time information

system implemented into a wearable data goggle (Oakley Airwave). The displayed

information about lifts, slopes, weather, hospitality, community activities and the resort in

general support users with congestion monitoring and basic navigational hints. Smart Ski

Goggles is aiming to enhance the visitor experience while skiing on the mountain. This

document explains how the experiment is set up, its requirements to stakeholders and

Experimedia components. Furthermore it contains information about ethics and privacy

aspects and describes the project schedule.

D4.10.1

SmartSkiGoggles Experiment Problem

Statement and Requirements

2014-02-11

Gerald Binder (evolaris)

www.experimedia.eu

EXPERIMEDIA Dissemination Level: PU

© Copyright evolaris and other members of the EXPERIMEDIA consortium 1

Project acronym EXPERIMEDIA

Full title Experiments in live social and networked media experiences

Grant agreement number 287966

Funding scheme Large-scale Integrating Project (IP)

Work programme topic Objective ICT-2011.1.6 Future Internet Research and Experimentation (FIRE)

Project start date 2011-10-01

Project duration 36 months

Activity 4 Experimentation

Workpackage 4.10.1 Smart Ski Goggles

Deliverable lead organisation evolaris

Authors Gerald Binder (evolaris)

Bettina Scheucher (evolaris)

Johannes Anderwald (evolaris)

Reviewers Stefan Prettenhofer (Infonova)

Aleksandra Kuczerawy (K.U. Leuven)

Version 1.0

Status Final

Dissemination level PU: Public

Due date PM27 (2013-12-31)

Delivery date 2014-02-11



Table of Contents

1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................................ 3

2. Experiment Description .................................................................................................................... 4

2.1. Learning Objectives .................................................................................................................. 5

2.2. Experiment Procedure ............................................................................................................. 6

2.3. Background ................................................................................................................................ 7

2.4. Assumptions and Preconditions ............................................................................................. 7

2.5. Parameters .................................................................................................................................. 7

2.6. Constraints ................................................................................................................................. 8

3. Ethics and Privacy .............................................................................................................................. 9

4. Experiment Design .......................................................................................................................... 11

4.1. Requirements ........................................................................................................................... 11

4.2. System Architecture ................................................................................................................ 11

4.3. Content Lifecycle .................................................................................................................... 13

5. Plan for Implementation ................................................................................................................. 15

6. Conclusion ......................................................................................................................................... 16



1. Introduction

The experiment “Smart Ski Goggles” aims to experiment with a real-time information system

implemented into a wearable data goggle (Oakley Airwave). The displayed information about

lifts, slopes, weather, hospitality, community activities and the resort in general support users

with congestion monitoring and basic navigational hints. Smart Ski Goggles is aiming to enhance

the visitor experience while skiing on the mountain.

The proposed experiment builds upon the outcomes of a field study conducted during the FIS

Alpine World Ski Championships 2013 by the competence centre for mobile communication

and innovation evolaris. The experimentation will implement an application for the Oakley

Airwave digital data goggle displaying and processing information, which was found most useful

by skiers in a real-life test. Thus the Smart Ski Goggles app will integrate real-time information

about current load and basic navigation for lifts, slopes and hospitality points of interest in the

ski area, as well as social media features. Current temperature, actual weather forecasts and

avalanche warnings will be implemented in the app to keep the users well informed about the

current conditions on the slope.

The experiment foresees the incorporation of the following EXPERIMEDIA software

components:

ECC for experiment control & monitoring

PCC for POI management

SCC for sharing status and content via social media

AVCC for image analysis of visual data of cameras

Evolaris as active member of the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) will follow a co-

creation approach in the app development and apply a well suited design science methodology to

derive a tailor-made solution right from the end users needs and requirements as starting point.

A targeted dissemination & exploitation strategy (including business model scenarios) under

strong involvement of the local stakeholders and business partners in the Schladming resort at all

stages of the experimentation will guarantee to meet the expectations and assure a maximum of

sustainability of the proposed solutions, also beyond the project’s lifetime. This is underlined by

the composition of LoS partners (resort operator, local retail expert, tourism organization and

specialized technology provider).

The objectives of this experiment are to:

analyse and define the stakeholder needs in the Schladming venue & the user needs/

requirement profile for a Smart Ski Goggles app

implement a real-time information system for a wearable ski data goggle (Oakley

Airwave) in the Schladming international ski resort

pilot the developed app in real-life settings, disseminate the results and define suitable

business models to assure long-term sustainability of project results



2. Experiment Description

Schladming is the leading international ski resort in Austria. As the host of the 2013 Alpine Ski

World Championship Schladming is worldwide known and has a strong interest in keeping the

image of a modern and progressive ski resort alive. Thus, digital services which enable a much

richer and more comfortable skiing experience are a great way to attract both, existing and new

guests. Therefore if the digital services help to distribute guests across the resort and better use

the capacity of the available ski lifts and slopes in the resort, this is also a benefit for the lift

company. This can even be expanded to the hospitality area, in that sense, that also there the

opportunity of targeting skiers with special information creates a measurable impact on attracting

guests. Overall this leads primarily also to a better experience for the guests.

During the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships 2013 evolaris conducted already a field study

on the acceptance of Oakley Airwave digital ski goggles in the Schladming resort. During this

study regular skiers were asked to test the Oakley Airwave ski data goggles with an integrated

mini display, where information like speed, altitude and airtime were shown. The overall

feedback of the testers was very positive. Wearing the goggles was for almost every tester not

distracting and they liked the speed information, though it was judged as ‘nice-to-have’. When

asked which functions the testers would appreciate in a future version of the goggles, most of

them named weather, navigation and information about slopes, huts and lifts. Context was

commonly judged as very important.

Study key findings:

the Oakley Airwave digital ski goggles were evaluated positive and as hardly distracting

the mini display was judged as ok, but with better placement possible

current information (e.g. ’speed‘) were seen as ’nice to have’

as more useful real-life information were considered:

o weather, navigation, resort information, availability of slopes, lifts

context was considered as very important:

o e.g. weather forecast more important than incoming SMS

good acceptance for wearable displays if useful applications are available

o sports (e.g. ’Lifelogging‘, ’QuantifiedSelf’)

o security (dangerous environments, mountain rescue, avalanche warnings)



Table 1: Evaluation of potential features by study participants (n= 23)

The experiment Smart Ski Goggles takes this and the inputs of the venue partner and the Letter

of Support partner to develop a targeted software for the data ski goggle and evaluate it during

the pilot phase with skiers.

The development of the software will include:

development of prototypes

backend development and EXPERIMEDIA component integration

external data integration (e.g. SkiData congestion raw data, external weather forecast

service, POI integration)

backend experimentation cockpit development (integration with ECC)

testing of first prototypes

refinement of the app concepts/prototypes for final version

final functionality testing and bug-fixing

deployment on defined platforms for real-life piloting

2.1. Learning Objectives The overall goal is to understand the practical usage potential of real-time information displayed

in data goggles. In general, we want to understand, which functionalities are useful for the skier

and which are not. This will be done by investigating an emerging technological solution and

bringing the user in at an experimental stage of a potentially upcoming commercial solution.

More concretely, we want to learn:

Which kind of real-time information and what kind of functionality do the user want to

have accessible in their data ski goggles?



How can optimized usability and user experience be designed?

How is the users’ general technology acceptance for data ski goggles?

How do users use the provided functionalities?

How could such a service being implemented in a ski resorts ecosystem?

What is the performance of real-time services based on a 3G network on the slopes and

how can it be improved?

2.2. Experiment Procedure A co-creation approach will be applied to integrate all the relevant actors and stakeholders (users,

venue operator, technology provider, …) into the conception, implementation and evaluation of

this experiment. To maximize the impact of the proposed technical solutions end-users and

stakeholders will be continuously involved in the development process.

The focus will be on the potential users. In order to maximize Quality of Experience the

potential and real users will actively take part in the experimental & explorative prototyping

within an agile development process. Thus, a four step methodology will be applied. First, two

focus groups will be conducted to discuss user requirements, screen designs and interaction

concepts. This is the basis for the conception of the Smart Ski Goggles software and a

representative online survey. This second step examines the user requirements on a

representative level and will serve as a basis for a detailed target group specification for the pilot

runs. Furthermore, this step will provide important data for the scientific analysis of the

experiment.

To examine the user experience in a real-life setting, two pilot tests will take place at the venue of

Schladming ski resort and with a representative number of participants. From the first pilot

results the revised prototype software and final release of the Smart Ski Goggles software will be

derived for the second and final pilot test. During the pilots the participants will be shortly

briefed about the system setup und provided features. Additionally the smartphone app is being

installed on the user’s smartphone. After that they are equipped with the data goggles and can

use the hardware freely for the whole pilot run (from one hour to a whole day). At the end of the

pilot run the users are asked to fill in a feedback form within the smartphone app to gain

quantitative feedback. After that there is a short group discussion to capture verbal qualitative

feedback.

All four steps of the co-creation process are tightly linked together to gain a maximum of valid

insight. Figure 1 shows an overview of the different stages and their timing.



Figure 1: Experiment Schedule (see WP/D4.10)

2.3. Background The venue partner (Schladming) has hosted the Alpine Skiing World Championship in February

2013 and thus became well-known to many new potential guests. So, the ski resort wants to

maintain its reputation as modern winter sports destination and ever new services for its guests.

This fits perfectly with our project, so it is supported in a very good way from our local partners

in Schladming.

2.4. Assumptions and Preconditions We assume the participants are regularly skiing on slopes (at least once a year), have an Android

smartphone and are downloading apps from time to time. To make sure, these assumptions are

being met, we will select the participants based on these parameters.

Furthermore, we assume there is broad 3G coverage, thus we know that it will not be 100% and

there will be some drop outs. So, we will implement a caching mechanism to download real-time

data on a regular basis (every x minutes).

Regarding the network connectivity at the lift entrances we assume that we have a LAN/WLAN

connection which we can use to send the light barrier and video analysis data to the backend

server. This was already confirmed by the lift operator (Planai-Hochwurzen Bergbahnen

GmbH).

2.5. Parameters There will be three different data sources for analyzing the waiting time at the lifts. First, the data

from the turnstiles, second the data from the light barriers und third the data from the video

analysis. We will compare data from these different sources to understand which of these data

sources (or a combination of them) are most useful for presenting the waiting time at the lifts to

the user.



2.6. Constraints We are aware that we are conducting the experiment in one specific ski resort

(Schladming/Planai), which means that we have to adapt the experiment software to its specifics

(e.g. available POIs on the slope, available resort geometry for navigation, etc.). As a result, some

experiment results might not be able to be easily transferred to another ski resort and vice versa

some needs and specifics from other ski resorts cannot be experimented within this project.



3. Ethics and Privacy

To achieve the research goals we have to analyze the usage data (Which functionality is used in

which context?) during the experiment runs done during pilots 1 and 2. Thus, we have to log

which functionalities the testers use. Furthermore, to analyze the location context of the usage

behaviour we have to log the users GPS position on the slopes. The GPS position is of special

importance for the integrated navigation feature.

Of course, the participation as tester is voluntary. We will acquire the participants with the help

of our venue partner, through an open call for testers (e.g. via our social media channels) and the

use of our Living Lab database, where we have stored hundreds of contacts to potential test

persons. In general, the participants for the pilot runs are random people, but must be 18 years

or older and they will be selected to fit to the target group we identified through our online

panel. Every tester has to sign a written consent, in which we explain how the data collected

during the experiment will be used. Only participants who sign this consent are allowed to take

part in the experiment. We will collect only as much personal data (name, gender, age) and

contact details (telephone number, e-mail address) as we need to organize the experiment runs

during pilot 1 and 2 and to have some security that the ski goggles are not being stolen. The

participants will return the goggles after the end of every test run. The conditions for

participating in the experiment are that the participants should ski on the slopes one time per

year minimum, possess an Android smartphone and have already downloaded some apps.

The collected data will be stored anonymously. This means in the collected data there will only

be a tester ID like e.g. 'sgg-pilot1-tester01'. The real name of the participant will not be part of

stored and analysed data. The collected data will be stored in real-time on the data goggles and

after the pilot conduction be transferred to the project server of Smart Ski Goggles which is

located in our headquarters in Graz/Austria. Some of the collected data will be transferred to the

backend server for the purpose of real-time monitoring of the experiment (through ECC). The

backend server is also part of our IT infrastructure in our headquarters. The processed data

contains all functionality calls through the tester together with a timestamp and location

information (GPS).

The analysis of the collected data will only be done by evolaris. No data will be given to any third

party. The recorded data will be deleted after the experiment has ended and all necessary

analytics for related dissemination activities (e.g. publications) are finished. We might use a totally

anonymized set of this data for later detail research.

The servers where the data are stored is located in our headquarters in Graz/Austria in a locked

server room. Only dedicated employees of evolaris have access to this room. The access on a

software level is only possible by evolaris employees with their login.

To analyze the amount of people waiting at the lift entrance we use video cameras to capture a

real-time view of the queue. This real-time video will instantly be analyzed by a computer at the

lift entrance. No video material will be stored. Furthermore we use data from the turnstiles and

light barriers at the lift entrances. Both sources provide completely non-personal data.



The notification to the Austria DPA will be filled due to the processing of personal data (like

names and GPS location) and that the DP law of Austria will be complied with.



4. Experiment Design

4.1. Requirements The ECC should enable the near real-time monitoring of important experiment parameters (e.g.

status of 3G connectivity). The SCC should support the project in providing a filtered stream of

Twitter tweets (e.g. with the hashtag "#Schladming"). Here it is important that not too many

tweets are pushed into the system (e.g. max 1 per hour). The AVCC should provide the

functionality to analyse a real-time video stream to find out whether few or many people are

waiting in front of a lift entrance. The initial requirement that we need the PCC to administer the

POIs on the slope is no longer valid, as we have to use the POI management by the routing

provider, so that the navigation feature is working properly.

The following metrics should be implemented (with support of the ECC as far as possible):

QoS

o Speed (Is the participant in movement, does the application work?)

o Battery Level (Overall power consumption by application)

o 3G network reception level (Service availability)

o Round trip time per feature call (Service performance measurement)

QoE

o Application Feature Call (To see which features are used where and when)

o Application Feature Usage Duration (How long is a certain feature used?)

o GPS Position (To send location-dependent notifications)

o Average user speed per slope (Detection of user tiredness)

o Retrieved/Navigated to/Completed POIs per hour (Evaluate acceptance of

navigation)

o Time between reception and reading of notification (Analysis of usage behavior)

To install and maintain the video cameras and light beams we need some support from the lift

operator. This is being organized by our venue partner Schladming 2030. Furthermore, we need

the written agreement from the lift operator that we are allowed to use the real-time SkiData data

for this experiment.

For Pilot 1 we need 10-15 participants and for the Pilot 2 we need 40-50 participants. The

recruiting will be done through our venue partner, an open call (poster, flyer, social media, …)

and our evolaris living lab, in which we have a database of hundreds of people potentially being

interested in taking part in studies. All participants will have to sign a written consent form. The

participants will get a day pass for the ski resort as incentive or a voucher for a meal and drinks.

4.2. System Architecture The Smart Ski Goggles System consists of three components. First, the Oakley Airwave is

defined as the frontend. It will be used to display real-time information, which is gathered from



the integrated sensors and from the attached smart phone. The application running on the

Oakley Airwave is referred to as the client application (see Figure 2).

The attached smartphone runs the Smart Ski Goggles Gateway application. The Smart Ski

Goggles Gateway application is responsible for connecting to the EXPERIMEDIA components

and exchange data from the client application to the Smart Ski Goggles Backend. The application

is labelled as the gateway application.

The Smart Ski Goggles backend processes information from number different sources such as

weather service, resort information service, and navigation information provider. In addition, it

receives lift utilization statistics from external components like video cameras and embedded IR-

beams sensors. The lift utilization statistics is analysed and used for providing lift capacity

utilization information to the clients. Finally, the Smart Ski Goggles backend will be used for

pushing notifications to the client. Examples will be urgent weather warnings, social updates like

new tweets, hospitality offers, or unplanned lift open/close events.

The Smart Ski Goggles backend also provides an interface for administration. This is labelled as

the admin cockpit. In the admin cockpit, the administrators can configure hospitality offers, and

send broadcast notifications to all connected users. These notifications can be weather warnings,

hospitality notifications, event notifications, and tweet notification. Unplanned lift open / close

events are automatically propagated to all connected clients.

Figure 2: Smart Ski Goggles Architecture



The Oakley Airwave is connected to the attached smart phone by Bluetooth. It uses a custom

developed message protocol to request information and receive the related responses. The

gateway application also communicates with the EXPERIMEDIA components and the Smart

Ski Goggles Backend server over 3G cellular networks. The Smart Ski Goggles Backend server is

connected via a high speed internet connection to the internet.

The Smart Ski Goggles experiment will be using three EXPERIMEDIA components. It will be

using the ECC for monitoring activity, the SCC for connecting users to social networks, and the

AVCC for video analysis of the lift utilization. Initially it was also intended to use PCC for

retrieving POIs. However, during inspection of PCC it was revealed that the interface does not

meet our requirements for saving POIs. In addition, the navigation provider also has a set of

POIs. Due to technical reasons the navigation provider cannot use external POIs. As a result the

PCC component will not be integrated in the experiment.

Besides the EXPERIMEDIA components the Smart Ski Goggles experiment will be using lift

cameras from Joanneum Research (JRS) to accumulate lift capacity statistics. Furthermore, it will

instruct an electrician from Schladming area to buy IR-beam sensors and embedded Arduino

Yun boards and deploy them at the relevant lift entrance areas.

The lift cameras will be connected to a processing node provided by the Smart Ski Goggles

experiment, which runs the JR video analysing software. The processing node and the Arduino

Yun boards will be using the W-LAN network hosted by the Schladming lift providers.

4.3. Content Lifecycle An integrated notification system provides the skier with information which might be of interest

for his skiing trip. The content therefore is mostly created through integration of automated

services, such as event information informing skiers about current events within the next days at

the skiing area, actual twitter feeds, weather warnings and up-to-date information about opening

hours and status of lifts. The latter notifies the skier if a particular lift is going to be closed or

opened throughout the course of the day. In addition, chalet owners are having the possibility to

promote special meal offers when there are any new or updated offers. This is being done

manually in the Smart Ski Goggles backend (Admin Cockpit). Basic information about the chalet

is per default integrated into the Smart Ski Goggles software and can be administered via the

backend.

The integrated weather service not only notifies the skier about weather warnings, the skier also

gets automatic updates of todays weather and a forecast. Besides textual weather preview the

service provides the application with graphical icons for each weather status, the current

temperature and the wind force.

Furthermore, the skier gets updates about lift information about all available lifts within the

skiing area including name, opening hours and type of lift. Except the time table, all other

content is provided automatically via available services; the time table has to be integrated

manually sourced from the Planai's website. The main feature here is the approximate waiting

time at the lift entrance. The data is generated by algorithms which make use of light barriers,

video cameras and access data from the turnstiles in the waiting area of the ski lift. The result is



automatically provided to the Smart Ski Goggles software. Additional resort information like

available slopes and related information are sourced through automated services. The time table

of the local bus shuttle service, sourced from related website and inserted manually, is displayed

in the software as well.

The integration of a routing service allows the application to process and display navigational

hints when navigating to a desired target. By reading out the distance for each section of a slope

the Smart Ski Goggles software is able to provide the user, besides textual output, with a

graphical representation (arrows) of navigational hints. Furthermore, the application anchors

multimedia content to physical landmarks or objects on a slope and provides pictures or videos

viewable in the ski goggle based on the skiers current location ('digital graffiti').

Finally, basic information about the skiers current speed as well as the maximum and average

speed of a finished track are displayed. The altitude of a track is also available to the skier.

Through an admin cockpit which is used as a central interface to the backend system, the

processing of data and managing of content can be done easily. This includes the configuration

of notifications like special chalet offers or the manual creation of new types of notifications,

upload and allocating pictures or videos to selected points of interest, and inserting the opening

hours of each available lift and the time table of the local bus shuttle service. Thus, the

connection of information service providers through standardized web interfaces allows for a

smooth and error-free integration.

The features and described content above is provided via a real-time application available on the

Oakley Airwave ski goggle. To establish the ability to provide real-time information the Smart

Ski Goggles application is connected to the Internet via a mobile application on a smartphone.

Therefore the user is forced to carry the smartphone during skiing in order to establish an

internet connection. The graphical user interface is developed for the special requirements of a

built-in heads-up display application within the Oakley Airwave ski goggle and the framing

condition of the available input device (wristband with buttons for

left/right/top/down/select/back).



5. Plan for Implementation

The software conception has started in October and will be finished in December. Of course,

there will be some minor updates based on findings during our on-site tests and feedback from

Pilot 1.

The implementation of software has started in November and a first version of the software has

to be finished before Pilot 1. Pilot 1 is planned to be conducted end of January. As in the last

week there is a huge event in Schladming ("Night Race") it might be that the Pilot 1 is postponed

by one week to have all needed local resources available. The participants of Pilot 1 will be

interviewed after their test runs.

As soon as the resort is fully open to the public the lift entrances can be visited and a plan can be

made, how light barriers and video cameras have to be installed. The visit will be in early

December and the installation has to be done in the first half of January at the latest. In the best

case the installation can stay there the whole winter, until Pilot 2 is finished.

After the Pilot 1 the software will be updated based on the finding during the Pilot and other

testing to version 2 which will be the software for Pilot 2. Pilot 2 will be conducted in late March

and consist of 5 consecutive days in which participants will test the software a whole day. After

the test run the participants have to fill out a digital questionnaire (via the smartphone) and 10-15

of them additionally are being interviewed. So, apart from the quantitative data measured via the

ECC, there will be a lot of qualitative feedback from the participants as well.

After the Pilot 2 the analysis of all collected data during the experiment will start and be finished

until end of May.



6. Conclusion

The experiment will provide us with deep insight how data googles with real-time information

will be used by ski tourists on the slopes. We will not only know which features are being used

and how intensive, furthermore we gain insights into the questions which QoS is necessary for

such kind of outdoor real-time services. In general this will help understanding in which

directions future research of real-time data provided by the internet and consumed via data

googles must be undertaken to enable the full potential of the future internet.

d4.10.1 smartskigoggles experiment problem statement and requirements

Documents

pu copyright evolaris

project acronym experimedia

experimedia consortium

experiment smart ski

experimedia components

experiment description

experiment procedure

experiment design