Anchors

GPS doesn't work well indoors. Anchors (formerly called reference beacons) give the positioning system fixed, known points throughout your building, so Blecon can place tracked tags inside a warehouse, office or factory floor.

An anchor is a tag that you install at a fixed place and then place on the map. Like a placed hub, it helps position the assets near it, so your zones work indoors.

How anchors work

An anchor is a regular tag configured with:

A position: the place on the map where the tag is installed.
A floor (optional): the floor the anchor is on, from the zone you place it in. Tags detected near the anchor are placed on that floor.

A hotspot (a fixed hub or a mobile device running the Blecon Agent) detects the anchor and reports it to the cloud. Because the anchor's position is known, the hotspot gets a location fix at the anchor's position. Blecon uses this fix only when it is better than the location the hotspot already has. For example, indoors a mobile device's own GPS fix can be poor or old.

Any other tag that the same hotspot detects is then positioned from the hotspot's new location. Drawn zones contain those positions, so zone entry, exit and asset counts work indoors. See Zones indoors.

An anchor is useful only when it is placed on the map. An anchor without a position has no effect.

Seeing your anchors

Select Anchors under Network in the sidebar to see every anchor in your workspace in one place. The cards at the top count All Anchors, the anchors that are Placed and the anchors that are Not placed. The list shows each anchor's name, whether it is placed, the zone it is in (with the zones above it), its floor, and when it was last detected. Anchors that are also assets in the workspace link through to their asset page.

Hubs are listed on the Hubs page, not here. You place a hub the same way as an anchor, with Move to zone on the hub's own page.

Setting up anchors

Use the Add an anchor workflow. Every workspace has it.

Go to Workflows and find Add an anchor. On a mobile device, tap Run. On a computer, scan its QR code with a mobile device.
As you fit each tag, scan its QR code. Enter an Anchor name, such as "Dock door 3", and a Position description, such as "On the pillar left of dock door 3, 2 m up". Both are optional, but the description tells whoever places the anchor exactly where it is.
Submit. Every tag you scanned becomes an anchor.
Go to Anchors under Network. The Not placed card lists the new anchors.
Choose Edit on each anchor. Its page opens.
Choose Change zone or floor. Open your building to see the zones inside it, or search for a zone by name, then choose the zone the tag is fitted in, such as "Cold Store", and choose Move here. The anchor moves to the centre of the zone and takes the zone's floor. The map shows that floor's floorplans and zones.
Drag the marker to where the position description says. Each change is saved at once.

The anchor's page also shows the zone it is in, and lets you change its name, keywords and custom fields. Only an Admin or Owner can move an anchor.

Until the anchor has a position, the dashboard warns: "Place this anchor on the map. Until it has a position, it has no effect."

Place anchors as you fit them

Give the workflow a site, and each anchor is placed when you submit it:

Go to Workflows and choose Duplicate on Add an anchor. You cannot change a default workflow, so you give the site to a copy. Give the copy a name, such as "Add an anchor: Building A".
In Site (optional), choose the zone you fit anchors in, for example your building. Click Create Workflow.
Run the copy. As you fit each tag, scan it. Where is it fitted? lists the site and the zones inside it, for example "Ground › Cold Store". Choose the zone the tag is in.
Submit. The anchor is placed at the centre of that zone, on the zone's floor, and works at once.

The centre of the zone is a first position. To make it exact, drag the anchor on its page, or click Move anchors and hubs (Move anchors when the zone has no hubs) above the zone's map and drag it there. Each move is saved when you drop it.

When to use anchors

Indoor zones: Place an anchor in each area where hotspots have no good GPS fix, so assets there get positions that your drawn zones can contain.
Mobile hotspots indoors: A device running the Blecon Agent that detects a placed anchor gets a location even when its GPS fix is poor or old.