A Mobile Solution for Location Based Tourism Information in Rural Areas.

Handheld mobile applications will become a driving economic factor for the developments in telecommunication industry and also for the acceptance and public utilisation of the EU initiative Galileo. This paper will briefly describe a prototype of a mobile multimedia tourism information system for outdoor activities and an user oriented data management tools. Tourism information mostly is geographically related information and therefore, interesting location aware applications can be offered. A PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) in connection with GPS function allows to guide tourists to the desired sights or to hiking and biking tours of a tourism region. For a multimedia visualisation of tourism information pictures, sound, text and video elements were integrated in order to record the effectiveness of the mobile device. Cartographic illustrations using satellite images and digital maps are the base for an innovative presentation of tourism information in there spatial context. Mobile devices offers the possibility of an innovative presentation of tourism information and fulfils user desires to information provision.