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The Context-Aware Mobility API allows customers and partners to create customized applications and programs that interface with the Cisco Mobility Services Engine, which is part of the Cisco Unified Wireless Network. These applications can be developed to support a variety of unique and innovative solutions including Zone/Inventory Management, Asset Tracking, Condition tracking, Presence and Network location services The API is based on Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) and XML protocols and is available and licensable to development community (customers and partners)

• Seamless integration with existing networks and applications for faster customer adoption
• Allows organizations to integrate contextual information into business processes and applications easier with tools for ease of solution development
• Meets customer needs by allowing customers to choose the right application over the right network for particular users. The API is especially appropriate for companies in which users and mobile assets move between indoor or outdoor wireless networks

Click to enlarge the diagram below which illustrates the architecture of Location Appliance

The different components of the Cisco Context-Aware Mobility Solution are:

• Mobile assets that can be devices or Wi-Fi tags manufactured by Cisco technology partners.
• Cisco Compatible Extensions program for tags: This Cisco program, open to technology partners, helps ensure that RFID tags comply to a predefined format so that the advanced information they send (such as motion, humidity and other parameters) is captured and made available to the rest of the solution, including business applications from other Cisco partners.
• Cisco Unified Wireless Network: This multipurpose network is also the only unified wired and wireless network solution to cost-effectively address the wireless network security, deployment, management, and control issues that businesses face, in addition to providing context-aware mobility.
• Cisco Mobility Services Engine: This platform hosts the Cisco Context-Aware software that captures, stores, and analyzes contextual information from multiple wireless networks.
  • RSSI: This technology running on the Cisco Mobility Services Engine can be used for devices and tags that need to be located indoors. It is based on the signal sent from the mobile asset to the different access points deployed in the facilities.
  • Chokepoint: Chokepoints use a different frequency from Wi-Fi and are deployed along zones of interest for business applications. They act as exciters for tags that come in a close range of them. These tags, in turn, send a notification over the WLAN to the Cisco Mobility Services Engine, along with the contextual data they have captured.
  • TDoA: This technology, which also runs on running on the Cisco Mobility Services Engine, is used in association with TDoA receivers that are placed outdoors or in the challenging RF environments in which some mobile assets must be located.
  • Sensor data: This type of data depends on the sensor capabilities. The information is sent over the WLAN and captured by the Cisco Context-Aware software module thanks to the Cisco compatible format.