Homemade proximity sensor for using the quest 2 outside - looking for ideas

Drew Backhouse

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Hi everyone!

I have recently discovered how much fun using the quest 2 outside with the guardian boundary turned off is. Running and jumping around with a katana in the walking dead with no real limits is truly what VR was designed for.

Of course there is a problem, running into trees... I have been trying to come up with a simple solution to keep the player in a restricted area of a big garden or a field, where the exact boundary is not vital but you just don't want to wonder too far.

A solution would be something like using one of the new apple air tags. You jam it in the grass in the middle of your field/large garden and have your phone in your pocket. When you get a specified distance away from the air tag your phone would buzz and you can pause your game and walk back to the middle, or just rotate yourself 180 degrees in the game so you can turn in the real world and carry on walking.

I'm pretty sure the apple air tag wouldn't support this kind of customisation (but maybe it does or something similar might?) but I hope you get the idea of what I'm trying to achieve.

If anyone has any ideas then please let us know!

Thanks!

- Drew

P.S./Disclaimer: Remember to be super careful not to let the lenses of your quest into sunlight if you're gonna go outside, always keep the lenses facing down towards the floor when taking it off.
 
I might be missing something here, so apologies in advance.
Why not just mark out a massive guardian area, or doesn't that work when outside?
 
I might be missing something here, so apologies in advance.
Why not just mark out a massive guardian area, or doesn't that work when outside?
25x25 feet was the max from what I remember reading on Reddit - though apparently going beyond about 15 feet doesn't work that well. That was a year or so back so may have changed since then though.

So closest thing to an airtag that is Android based and therefore you may be able to do something outside of the walled garden that is IOS is probably the Samsung Smart tags - they have bluetooth but also ultra wide band for accuracy - BT is basically useless on it's own for exact positioning using signal strength alone. But then you are also limited to using Samsung recent devices.
GPS based is also pretty useless due to the granularity for such small scale/short distance really.

What you may want to look at is something like this Best child locator safety store, Affordable Child Tracker | Mommy I'm Here, Inc. or MyKid Pod | Child Tracker | Wander Alert System - though both appear to be USA only from what I can find. Basically virtual leash devices.
 
I might be missing something here, so apologies in advance.
Why not just mark out a massive guardian area, or doesn't that work when outside?
Thanks for your comment. Yes I should have clarified this in my post. As MooCow says the limit for the built in guardian boundary is about 25x25 feet (which is a pretty impressive size and works tremendously well). However, I'm looking to find a way to extend the play area to an arbitrarily large size by turning off the boundary and using a separate device to keep me within a certain radius.

I hope that's clear!
 
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25x25 feet was the max from what I remember reading on Reddit - though apparently going beyond about 15 feet doesn't work that well. That was a year or so back so may have changed since then though.

So closest thing to an airtag that is Android based and therefore you may be able to do something outside of the walled garden that is IOS is probably the Samsung Smart tags - they have bluetooth but also ultra wide band for accuracy - BT is basically useless on it's own for exact positioning using signal strength alone. But then you are also limited to using Samsung recent devices.
GPS based is also pretty useless due to the granularity for such small scale/short distance really.

What you may want to look at is something like this Best child locator safety store, Affordable Child Tracker | Mommy I'm Here, Inc. or MyKid Pod | Child Tracker | Wander Alert System - though both appear to be USA only from what I can find. Basically virtual leash devices.
Thanks for your comment MooCow! The virtual leash device is an excellent idea, a virtual leash is exactly what I'm after. I will investigate and see if there are any manufacturers in the UK and report back if I find anything suitable down that avenue.
 
Cheers, I've only got a small guardian area so quite interesting to see how big it really goes.
 
My work has some kind of tags that vibrate and beep if you get within 2 metres of someone (due to Covid) but I'm not sure of the manufacturers. Just a heads up that a solution is probably there.
 
If using IOS devices, IBeacon's may be able to achieve what you are looking for.

They will only report Immediate: Within a few centimeters, Near: Within a couple of meters, Far: Greater than 10 meters away, but may suffice.
 
My work has some kind of tags that vibrate and beep if you get within 2 metres of someone (due to Covid) but I'm not sure of the manufacturers. Just a heads up that a solution is probably there.
Thanks for your comment Delvey. These look really interesting! The plus with something like this is you could use a bunch to mark out a perimeter and then have one on yourself, so you're not restricted to a circular play area like with the virtual tether. Although it is a more expensive option which scales up quite rapidly with play area size. But yes good to know the technology exists, thanks!
 
If using IOS devices, IBeacon's may be able to achieve what you are looking for.

They will only report Immediate: Within a few centimeters, Near: Within a couple of meters, Far: Greater than 10 meters away, but may suffice.
Hi CaptainEd. This looks like an almost perfect solution as it doesn't look to hard to write your own app to customise the distance settings. I'll try and get my hands on a second iPhone and test it out before buying a dedicated iBeacon. Thanks for the info!
 

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