Patent ID: 8019352

Claim:
A system for locating a position of one or more wireless communications devices within a physical environment, comprising: a plurality of wireless or optical communications devices deployed within said physical environment; one or more measuring devices positioned or positionable at one or more locations within said physical environment, said one or more measuring devices measuring RF channel characteristics or the performance metrics of the plurality of wireless or optical devices; a computer comprising: a computer controller which identifies the one or more locations of the one or more wireless or optical communication devices within said physical environment in response to measurements taken by the measurement device in conjunction with a site specific environmental model of the physical environment along with a plurality of tables, the plurality of tables having stored RF channel characteristics or stored performance metrics; and wherein the computer controller providing: the site specific environmental model of said physical environment including representations of the plurality of wireless or optical communications devices deployed within said physical environment; the plurality of tables, each associated with a specific point in the physical environment modeled by said site specific environmental model, and each containing one or more RF channel characteristics or performance metrics of at least one wireless or optical device, wherein each of the plurality of tables stores a correlation between said one or more RF channel characteristics, the performance metrics, and one or more locations within said site specific environmental model; and the computer controller identifying the one or more locations of the one or more wireless or optical communications devices within said physical environment based on one or more closest matching tables of said plurality of tables to said RF channel characteristics or the performance metrics measured with said one or more measuring devices, and further based on the position of the specific point in the physical environment modeled by the site specific environmental model associated with said one or more closest matching tables, wherein the one or more locations are correlated locations, and the correlated locations are identified based on a comparison between the one or more measured RF channel characteristics or the measured performance metrics with the RF channel characteristics and the performance metrics values within the plurality of tables.