The recent Mobile World Congress in Barcelona had a record 60,000 attendees. Many industry companies were either exhibiting or attending to kick tires to see how the international location-based services market is faring. Industry observers are saying the focus of the trade show has gone from European-centric markets to a broader view, particularly as new technology and standards evolve and mature. read more
By Art Kalinski, GISP In the early 1990s when ArcView 2 hit the street, I was at the ESRI Users’ Conference in Palm Springs. I was walking through the poster session area and saw a map that changed my thinking about GIS. In this sea of parcel maps, land use maps, and road network displays I saw a map that... read more
Spectracom, a global provider of time and frequency test and measurement solutions, will make available its new 16-channel GPS constellation simulator, the Pendulum GSG-55, in March. The GSG-55 is the latest in the Pendulum line of GPS receiver test instruments and part of its solution set for receiving, distributing, and validating GNSS systems. read more
Three Cool Things in Geospatial Corning Glass After watching this video (5:33 in length), you may feel like buying stock in Corning Glass! How important are graphic displays to the geospatial professional? I’d say vital. I’m not sure about all the consumer glass stuff they show in the video, but it does show where glass technology is heading.... read more
This week I'm following up on my article from a couple of weeks ago about the potential effects of LightSquared's plans. As a user of high-precision GPS receivers (particularly GPS L1 sub-meter, but also dual-frequency), you should be particularly concerned about this issue. I'll tell you why. Also, I have a note on recent the solar activity. read more
New Way to Test GNSS ReceiversIn this month’s article, we look at an approach to GNSS receiver testing that uses realistic randomization of signal amplitudes based on histograms of carrier-to-noise-density ratios observed in real-world environments. It can be applied to any simulator scenario, independent of scenario details (position, date, time, motion trajectory, and so on), making it possible to control relevant parameters such as the number of satellites in view and the resulting dilution of precision independent of signal-strength distribution. The method is amenable to standardization and could help the industry to improve the testing methodology for positioning devices — to one that is more meaningfully related to real-world performance and user experience. read more
The presence of different types of devices, spanning multiple GNSS receiver types, configurations, hardware, software, and consequent widely varying capabilites, among a user mix of vehicles, cyclists, and pedestrians, poses several engineering challenges for a V2X scheme in which all road users share data with each other and with the road infrastructure. read more
For use in billing drivers in road-user charging schemes, onboard units employing GNSS must meet stringent reliability and availability requirements, and at the same time, be based on low-cost equipment systems. The SIGNATURE unit includes an assistance service which provides ephemeris data and corrections from EDAS, optimized for user location. read more
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