Global Navigation Satellite Systems Engineering, Policy, and Design
A new GNSS-centric application programming interface (API) library for Android and IoT developers is on the verge of appearing, and is now accepting registrations for its software development kit. The Fulfilling Enhanced Location Accuracy in the Mass Market through Initial Galileo Services (FLAMINGO) reportedly achieves half-meter accuracy in a smartphone.
By Inside GNSS
At the 12th EU Space Conference in Brussels, Thierry Breton made his first appearance as the new European Commissioner for Internal Market, and a remarkable appearance it was.
By Peter Gutierrez
Plans have been submitted for a rocket launch site in the north of Scotland that could boost communications satellites into orbit in two years. No word has come regarding the possibility of launching satellites of the United Kingdom’s a-borning GNSS from this facility, but the prospect is intriguing.
By Alan Cameron
European Space Agency (ESA) top brass welcomed journalists to the Agency’s headquarters in Paris for its annual New Year’s press launch. On hand was the Director General as well as ESA’s Galileo guru Paul Verhoef, who spoke one-on-one with Inside GNSS.
By Peter Gutierrez
The European GNSS Agency (GSA) has published the Q3 2019 performance report. This report covers the period when a technical incident caused by an equipment malfunction in Galileo last July resulted in a six-day interruption in Galileo navigation and timing services.
By Inside GNSS
Sapcorda Services GmbH announced the release of its Safe And Precise Augmentation (SAPA) Premium GNSS positioning service, providing GNSS corrections via internet and satellite.
By Inside GNSS
The Galileo Return Link Service, which sends an automatic acknowledgement message to people activating a distress signal, in distress to receive automatic acknowledgement that their signal has been received, was declared operational on January 21.
By Inside GNSS
I strode into the plenary session of the ION International Technical Meeting, primed and ready for a barrage of modernity, of out-in-front advances in precision positioning, navigation and timing. The first thing I saw was a 7-foot tall cesium beam tube, an early atomic clock from the 1950s.
By Alan Cameron
A new European Union Agency for the Space Program (EUSPA) will succeed and expand the current European GNSS Agency (GSA), which has been managing the EU’s Galileo satellite system for 15 years.
By Inside GNSS
By Inside GNSSIn lead position on a sleigh rising from the North Pole to a height of 200 meters — standard cruising altitude for global package delivery — at 2100 hours UTC on December 24 — the youngest will hopefully be asleep by then and there’s plenty of territory to cover before dawn breaks, time’s a-wasting — navigator Rudolph will see between 40 and 45 GNSS satellites glistening in the night sky.
A version of the NeQuick G ionospheric model algorithm to help single-frequency receivers to estimate and correct for the ionospheric propagation delay is now available for download from the Galileo Service Center (GSC) website). Using a new coding approach, this version is the result of intensive effort by engineers at the EU’s Joint Research Centre.
By Inside GNSS
An innovative positioning engine based on a safety-oriented paradigm uses a dual-frequency GNSS receiver, automotive cameras, accurate maps, low-cost inertial sensors and vehicle odometry. The real-time integrity layer bounds the error of each estimated value with a confidence level for safe navigation.
By Inside GNSS
This summer, French railway company SNCF performed successful tests of an autonomous train, using Galileo-enabled receivers. The vehicle ran a distance of four kilometers with the help of remote control. SNCF intends to develop its own prototypes of autonomous freight and passenger trains by 2023.
By Inside GNSS
The Institute of Navigation’s (ION) Satellite Division presented Professor Peter Teunissen with its Johannes Kepler Award September 20, 2019 at the ION GNSS+ Conference in Miami, Florida. Prof. Teunissen was recognized for his influential and groundbreaking contributions to the algorithmic foundations of satellite navigation, and for sustained dedication to the global education of the next generation of navigation engineers.
By Inside GNSS
The introduction of a new generation of mass-market chips based on multi GNSS dual frequency measurements, already being commercialized and integrated in smartphones by major manufacturers, is contributing to a new level of positioning accuracy in the mass-market location-based services.
By Paolo Crosta et al.
