Why an Open Standard?
When individuals and organisations get behind a purposeful vision, solutions to what previously seemed like big challenges become attainable.
The aim is that this Open Standard will help lower the barrier for built-environment owners and digital navigation services to make their environments, products and services inclusive from the outset as we continue to weave technology into our cities.
Once the Open Standard is adopted across the built-environment and digital navigation services alike, vision impaired people will benefit from a consistent, reliable and seamless navigation experience.
Emerging indoor navigation technologies such as Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) Beacons and 5G hold the key to opening up the world for vision impaired people. However, in order to achieve the greatest impact globally, there is a pressing need to develop a consistent standard to be implemented across wayfinding systems. This will truly open up a world where vision impaired people are no longer held back by their sight loss, removing barriers to employment, to seeing friends and family and engaging in their community.
The Wayfindr Open Standard aims to do just that. As the Open Standard develops it will give venue owners and digital navigation services the tools to implement high quality, consistent, audio wayfinding solutions. It includes an open-source demo app that enables people who download it to use BLE beacons to understand and implement the open standard with real users, in real contexts, in real time.
Our Open Standard has now been approved by the International Telecommunications Union as ITU-T F.921. We are still working to add to and improve the Open Standard. If you would like to be involved please contact us.
Download the Open Standard as a PDF
Contents
1 Getting Started
An introduction to the structure and the content of the Open Standard
2 Learning about mobility of vision impaired people
An introduction to the world of vision impaired people and their navigation and mobility techniques
3 Designing for vision impaired people
The design principles that underpin the Wayfindr Open Standard, the different types of audio instructions and the various structural elements of an audio instruction
4 Guidelines
Guidelines with various techniques for providing effective navigation instructions and creating inclusive digital navigation services
5 Wayfinding technologies
Recommendations and best practices about the whole lifecycle of a wayfinding technology, such as Bluetooth Low Energy beacons, from the installation to long-term maintenance
6 Open Source Wayfindr Demo mobile app
Information about the aim of the open-source Wayfindr Demo app, along with a link to access the source code
Using the Open Standard
As a designer, researcher or developer
Find principles and guidelines on how to provide audio instructions for wayfinding, and create inclusive navigation services
Get StartedAs a venue owner, or access consultant
Find best practices for the installation, configuration and maintenance of wayfinding technologies in your environment
Get StartedAs anyone else who is interested
Explore the Wayfindr Open Standard to find out how it can support you
Get StartedOpen Standard principles
Openness and transparency
All the processes related to the Wayfindr Open Standard development are open to the public. Any individual or organisation is invited to participate. There will be a public notice about the periods for public comment. The material of records from meetings and discussions in the Working Groups will be publicly available.
Due process
The Wayfindr Open Standard is maintained by Wayfindr.org Ltd, which is a nonprofit organisation. There will be an ongoing process for testing and revision of the Wayfindr Open Standard to ensure quality. The process for reviews and updates in the Wayfindr Open Standard will be well defined.
Availability
The Wayfindr Open Standard is available to the public at no cost both during its development (e.g. via Working Drafts and minutes) and its final stage (via the Recommendations).
Collaboration and Consensus
The maintenance of the Wayfindr Open Standard is done through collaborative decision making in the Working Groups. All views and opinions will be considered and there will be equal treatment to all parties involved in the decision making process.
Licensing
Wayfindr Open Standard is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.