Managing Beacons

What are beacons?

Beacons are Bluetooth low energy (Bluetooth LE) devices that broadcast identifying information to nearby devices. By knowing which beacons are close-by (and where those beacons are), it's possible to obtain position information even when indoors (where GPS reception is poor).

There are two technology standards for beacons - iBeacon (by Apple) and Eddystone (by Google).

For more information about beacon technology, see iBeacon and Eddystone on Wikipedia.

About iBeacon Identifiers

iBeacons have 3 identifiers:

• UUID - a GUID, ordinarily representing an organisation.
• Major Revision - a number between 0 - 65,535, ordinarily representing a location, branch or office
• Minor Revision - a number between 0 - 65,535, ordinarily representing an individual beacon

To find out more about setting Beacon identifiers, check out this article.

Adding Beacons

To work with beacons, you must have the "View Beacons" and "Manage Beacons" permissions assigned to your user role.

To add a beacon to GAP:

1. Click "Options"
2. Click "Beacons"
3. Click "+"
4. Enter a friendly name for the beacon in the "Name" text box
5. Enter the beacon identifiers (see above) in the "UUID", "Major Revision" and "Minor Revision" boxes
6. Enter the beacon's approximate range (in metres) into the "Range in meters" text box
7. Select a colour from the colour picker to represent the beacon on the map
8. Click anywhere on the map to place the beacon or enter the longitude and latitude manually via the "Longitude" and "Latitude" text boxes
9. Select a minimum zoom level at which the beacon should be displayed via the "Min Zoom" drop-down list
10. Select a tenant in which the beacon resides from the "Tenant" drop-down list
11. Click "OK"

Editing Beacons

To edit a beacon:

1. Click "Options"
2. Click "Beacons"
3. Click on the beacon's name in the list
4. Click "Edit"
5. Edit the information as required
6. Click "OK"

Deleting Beacons

To delete a beacon:

1. Click "Options"
2. Click "Beacons"
3. Click on the beacon's name in the list
4. Click "Delete"
5. Click "Yes, Delete"