AcouController: Motion Based Acoustic Remote Control for Smart Devices

Smart devices have become increasingly popular. However, it is challenging to accurately and rapidly identify and control the desired device among a number of smart devices. We present AcouController, a motion-based device control approach that allows users to efficiently control the target smart device by performing a simple motion with their smartphones. Utilizing the microphone commonly built into smart devices, AcouController employs an acoustic technique to estimate the distance change as an indicator for target identification. To improve performance, we find the optimal motion pattern for target identification with the best spatial resolution. To mitigate errors in target identification, AcouController performs a joint phase analysis of signals with different frequencies and leverages the average distance during repeated motion patterns. AcouController provides multiple motion patterns for different control commands and recognizes the motion pattern with the Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU). The experimental results show that AcouController can achieve target identification with a resolution of 5° for up to 5 devices within 5 meters and an accuracy of 99% for the recognition of four different motion patterns.