US GPS, EU Galileo to Work Together

saintory writes "The US and EU are in talks to allow their separate GPS systems to work together. The future uses would allow enhanced location information based on two readings, among other benefits. 'The market probably will drive dual-use receivers. We think probably that single (U.S.) GPS-specific, or Galileo-specific receivers — the market will phase out in time [...] It just doesn't make sense to limit yourself to just one system'."

Comments

RAIGPS

[markov_chain]

Redundant Array of Inexpensive Global Positioning Systems

I like the way that sounds!

Re:RAIGPS

[Red Flayer]

Is that pronounce with a G-as-in-Gary or a G-as-in-siGn?

If it's the latter, maybe we need to have a talk with your parole officer.

Re:RAIGPS

[frdmfghtr]

Redundant Array of Inexpensive Global Positioning Systems

I would have gone with "Redundant Array of Expensive Global Positioning Systems" - RAEGPS or "raygaps"

Re:RAIGPS

[Anonymous Coward]

It's G-as-in-Gym, but the P is silent.

That's right, officer...

Re:RAIGPS

[elrous0]

In honor of the money that Europeans are spending on the wasteful Galileo program, the "G" and the "S" are silent.

How very...

[Xeth]

...refreshing. Seriously, I've gotten rather sick of the acrimony that seems to be building across the Atlantic. It's nice that people see this as a chance for better technology (at least in some respect) rather than pure nationalistic chest-thumping.

Re:How very...

[Xeth]

Yes, that's exactly what I was talking about, thank you.

Re:How very...

[Chanc_Gorkon]

I need to correct you on something.....the DoD and US Government think they own the world. Technically, with the military power we have, we kind of do rule the world, but most American's don't hold this attitude. It's only the attitude of our leaders and unfortunately it's almost always the lesser of two evils. No one's perfect.

With that said, I think it's a good thing to work together on having a very good global positioning system.

Re:How very...

[moosesocks]

This is especially promising, considering that the US used to intentionally degrade its own GPS signals available to civilians, for fear that it'd be used by "terrorists".

The only thing this did was to piss off a lot of legitimate users, including the FAA and the Military when the available supply of Military GPS units dried up.

Also, a very modestly inaccurate GPS signal isn't going to deter a terrorist. Rather, it's going to encourage him to build a bigger bomb, which would result in considerably more collateral damage.

Re:How very...

[MightyMartian]

You are incredibly ignorant of history if you think Russia was ever going to be Europe's friend. I trust that you are not representative of the citizens of the EU in your intense lack of knowledge of the historical forces that have pushed Russia to clash with the West. Whatever you think of the States, any person with any sense would be damned glad to have some defensive and offensive measures in place against a Russia reborn. The Bear is not your friend, not your ally, and since the EU seems remarkably incapable of recognizing that, it's little wonder that some of its members (like Poland, you should probably read their history on the subject of Russian relations) are keen to keep it from mauling them again.

Re:How very...

[DrDitto]

The U.S. is not a trustworthy ally?! Western Europe would have fallen under communism after WWII if it weren't for the U.S. Perhaps you might have been ok with that outcome.

When the U.S. was a fledgling power in the world, it tried to isolate itself from the dominate European powers at the time. The isolationist strategy ultimately failed. I suggest you re-consider history.

Re:How very...

[Iphtashu Fitz]

The only thing this did was to piss off a lot of legitimate users, including the FAA and the Military when the available supply of Military GPS units dried up.

Don't forget the US Coast Guard, who developed the Differential GPS system for boaters. It consists of a series of ground-based stations throughout the US that receive GPS signals then re-broadcast a "fixed" signal that DGPS receivers can then use for a more accurate fix. I always thought it was pretty ironic (and laughable) that one branch of the military would degrade GPS and then another branch of the military would remove that error specifically for civilian use.

Re:How very...

[SnowZero]

That's a great argument for seven years ago, but selective availability is ancient history now.

Re:How very...

[mrchaotica]

The U.S. is not a trustworthy ally?! Western Europe would have fallen under communism after WWII if it weren't for the U.S.

Nah, Western Eurpoe would have lost entirely, and fallen under NAZIism instead.

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps the US used to be a thrustworthy ally, and yes, we Europeans do have a lot to thank to the US in the WW1 and WW2 eras. However, that time is gone now, and a lot of Europeans are starting to wonder if the US is really our ally or not.

Relations with European countries has really been damaged over the past few years (thank you, Bush), and is now viewed as a country which does whatever it wants without even considering the impact on the rest of the world (ignoring the UN, not signing the Kyoto treaty, etc).

The US has dragged us all into a silly war, and even though the French had a sniper on Osama's head for 3 times, each and every time the US refused to give the shoot to kill signal.

The next president better do a better job at repairing foreign relations.

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

the US benefited from both wOrld Wars at the Expense of Europe!! Take the first one, they came in the last year and asked for terms as if they had fought all the time. What's best, you were happy to see Europe fighting itself. The second world even worse, until 1944 only Russia and England (god help France) had done anything in Europe. What's more, you took the opportunity of a weak Europe to increase your world influence inside and outside of Europe (before WWII there were no american bases in Europe, noe it is full of them). YOu made Russia an enemy of us. You created hatred against us from the middle east. The US has always been Europe's worst enemy, just remember how much they benefited and loved both World wars. Russia is a pragmatic country, they need us to buy their gas and we need their energy. We don't care what happens inside Russia, it's not our business. While you talking with your cheap ideals of imposing your values to other countries (like Russia) are fomenting all the hatred and the violence. Russia is not our friend certainly, it is our business partner. And the US is a dangerous power to us. And definately the missile shield is aimed at stopping European union. The USA is terribly afraid of that

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

Too bad your argument sort of falls apart when you consider they freed up GPS before 9/11 and haven't done anything to restrict it sense. Seriously, I think you dropped your foil hat over there.

Re:How very...

[TooMuchToDo]

The signal was not degraded because of "terrorists". It was degraded to prevent the use of GPS by an enemy to guide/navigate a rocket-propelled weapon across a continent to a target with precision accuracy. This is also the reason consumer GPS devices have an upper limit on the speed and altitude information they can provide:

http://www.gpsinformation.net/main/gpsspeed.htm

Defense department regulations prohibit standard consumer GPS receivers from functioning above 60,000 feet and 999mph (simultaneously). Most GPS receivers seem to set hard limits at EITHER 999mph or 60,000 feet.

However, this is all a moot point. The defense department has the ability to selectively degrade the civilian signal in certain geographic regions, while leaving the military signal as well as the civilian signal outside of that area intact (and accurate).

Someone who is using an ICBM (or some other sort of long-range delivery system) is not going to be using GPS. They're going to be using a combination of radar, topographic map data/recognition systems, and inertial guidance (as to prevent navigation references to be screwed with during the cruise phase of the weapon in question).

Re:How very...

[ookabooka]

What "nationalistic chest-thumping"? Actually I think it makes a lot of sense. If I was going to make some hardware, would I want it to use the EU system, the US system, or both? By using both you gain redundancy, reliability, and even accuracy.

If the EU made the first positioning system and the US made the 2nd, I'd still say making systems that only used the US's would be a bad idea. GPS-only systems will probably phase out slower due to compatibility issues. A lot of hardware out there was designed for GPS in mind and not Galileo. Anything that is designed for Galileo might as well toss in support for GPS since it already exists. I think you're just taking it the wrong way :-/

Re:How very...

[Detritus]

Selective availability never had a damn thing to do with fear of terrorists. It was intended to deny the enemy access to high-precision navigation data. Even if every terrorist shot themselves in the head tomorrow, the military would still need the ability to deny this information to enemy forces.

Re:How very...

[moosesocks]

My bad. I guess I'm confusing the rhetoric we're using against "terrorists" with the rhetoric we used against "communists".

The difference here, I suppose is that the "enemy" in the 70s and 80s had more than enough firepower to obliterate just about everything, not to mention a positioning system of their own.

Re:How very...

[wronskyMan]

The DOD does not mind the Coast Guard's DGPS since it is used for boaters in the USA. The reason for downgrading GPS has more to do with stopping other countries from using GPS-guided weapons in conflicts in other countries (where there is no DGPS); I'm sure in a Red Dawn type scenario the stateside DGPS beacons could be turned off.

Re:How very...

[megaditto]

And why not? From my recollection of European history, before 1918 Russia was an integral part of Europe. Russia's kings were genetically related to the rest of the European monarchy and constantly forming alliances with multiple European countries (you might recall that Russia was a key component of Bismarck's realpolitik). Even after the commies came to power, Russia continued to maintain reasonable relations with most of it's neighbors.

Surely, with the communist nonsense in Russia on the decline it should be welcomed back into the 'family' and eventually (once the economies are comparable) into the European Union.

I fail to see why anyone in Europe would object to being friends with Russia. Care to enlighten me?

Re:How very...

[MightyMartian]

You'd best read up on your Napoleonic era and later upon the Crimean War on the other. No one in the pre-Bolshevik era held any illusions about Russia's position. She was then and remains today an expansionist power. If you think Russia can be such a good friend, you ought to talk to the Poles (hint: only one of the partitions was during the Communist era), or the Baltic states, whose first period of Russian dominance was under the Czars. You can talk to the Turks, who found themselves increasingly under attack by Russia as it evolved its Pan-Slavism to seize the Balkans.

Russia has never been part of the "family" as you put it. It's origins in local tribes organized by Norse traders meant its formative period was largely in isolation from Western Europe, and its main cultural ties were to the Byzantines. While it has certainly adopted a great deal from the West (particularly its affinity in the 18th century for all things French), this has not shaken the underlying direction of the Russian leadership under the Czars, the Soviets or now under the post-Soviet semi-democracy as expansionist and eager to cast its influence over Eurasia. It may have spent the Gorbachev and Yeltsin years kissing up to Western Europe as it tried to recreate its economy, but now it is abandoning all such trappings, and returning to a model that is rather more familiar to those who know Russian history.

Make no mistake. France and Britain were willing, when required, to make alliances with Russia, but they never were under any illusion as to the nature of Russia's friendship. And neither should you or anyone else in the West.

Re:How very...

[blhack]

This is especially promising, considering that the US used to intentionally degrade its own GPS signals available to civilians, for fear that it'd be used by "terrorists".

get your facts straight, from wikipedia:

Selective availability

The GPS includes a feature called Selective Availability (SA) that introduces intentional, slowly changing random errors of up to a hundred meters (328 ft) into the publicly available navigation signals to confound,.........
........During the Gulf War, the shortage of military GPS units and the wide availability of civilian ones among personnel resulted in a decision to disable Selective Availability.

so no, bush isn't sitting in the white house with an evil plan to deprive you of the ability to pilot your car down the street and have it tell you to turn left in 300 feet.

Re:How very...

[smoker2]

The U.S. is not a trustworthy ally?! Western Europe would have fallen under communism after WWII if it weren't for the U.S. Perhaps you might have been ok with that outcome.

Two points :
a)Times change - Libya was a good ally once, as was Iran, as was the USSR, do you get the picture ? Past performance may not be indicative of future results.
b)The US would probably be speaking French if it wasn't for the British ! Perhaps you would have been ok with *that* outcome ?
Maybe it's your outgrown senses of entitlement and self importance that are the root causes of the present troubles ?
There is also a big difference between minding your own business, and flipping the finger to people who are in desperate need of help.

Re:How very...

[DerekLyons]

This is especially promising, considering that the US used to intentionally degrade its own GPS signals available to civilians, for fear that it'd be used by "terrorists".

Huh? SA was turned on from Day One - not because of fears of use by 'terrorists', but because it was a military system and it never occurred to anyone that it might have far reaching civilian uses.
 
 

The only thing this did was to piss off a lot of legitimate users, including the FAA and the Military when the available supply of Military GPS units dried up.

Huh? The FAA was quite happy to use GPS, and was not 'pissed off' at all. Back in the days of SA, GPS was starting to be widely used for general aviation navigation. Autolanding systems and precise navigation was a pipe dream. (More because of a lack of suitable electronics than because of SA. The electronics industry lagged badly in getting into the GPS game on both the civil and military sides of the house.)

Re:How very...

[Rich0]

Someone who is using an ICBM (or some other sort of long-range delivery system) is not going to be using GPS. They're going to be using a combination of radar, topographic map data/recognition systems, and inertial guidance (as to prevent navigation references to be screwed with during the cruise phase of the weapon in question).

Not to mention that if you can build ICBMs and nuclear warheads in sufficient quantity to actually make you unafraid of retaliation then the cost of adding a navigation package that doesn't use GPS is pretty-much small change. And the retaliation that does occur (conventional or otherwise) would make the cost of all of that gear a VERY small drop in the bucket. Nuclear war is INSANELY expensive - the best anybody can really do is try to sneak in a bomb and hope nobody figures out where it came from.

Re:How very...

[megaditto]

You make some interesting points, though I am not sure how they support your claim that Russia is not a European country.

For example, you call Russia expansionist (presumably because of the Crimea & Siberia invasions) yet you do not consider the massive Brittish, French, Spanish, and the Dutch colonies all over the World; hell, the US of A used to be a British colony, does that make the UK non-European?)

You mention some wars that evidently make Russia an outsider, yet when I look at how many conflicts there were at the time (e.g. here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_ Europe#19th_century ) it actually makes Russia fit into the European tinderbox rather nicely, wouldn't you say? I fail to see why just because Russia has occupied Poland makes it any less European; Germany has also occupied Poland, England has occupied France, Sweden has occupied Norway... what's so special about Poland?

Additionally, your cultural origins claim is also not convincing, since Byzantine empire was the Greek part of the Roman empire IIRC and Scandinavia can be considered 'European' enough.

Overall I agree with you that Putin is not exactly the guy that inspires trust, but I would rather wait and see, or even extend the welcoming hand (like Germany did to Poland and the Baltics several years ago), instead of dismissing Russia outright.

Re:How very...

[MightyMartian]

Additionally, your cultural origins claim is also not convincing, since Byzantine empire was the Greek part of the Roman empire IIRC and Scandinavia can be considered 'European' enough.

It may have been Greek, but it was also Orthodox, and created in Russia from its very roots a somewhat Oriental and Near East direction to its ambitions and interests, which still dominates it to this day. It was this keen interest in liberating Orthodoxy from its failing Turkish overlords that was a driving impetus for the series of events that lead to World War I. Russia is not European. It has never been European. It almost ought to be considered the third Eurasian continent.

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

but most American's don't hold this attitude

Oh. Pity you don't live in a democracy or anything so you could change it.

Re:How very...

[dpaton.net]

This is especially promising, considering that the US used to intentionally degrade its own GPS signals available to civilians, for fear that it'd be used by "terrorists".

Unfortunately, the military still gets better data than civilians. The degraded civilian signal is dead for now, but the normal accuracy civilian signal is still a lot worse than the normal military and licensed surveying GPS solutions can get, which are accurate to inches (1-18) instead of yards (2-10).

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

--------

US would have sunked deep in recession if it wasn't for WWII. Perhaps you might have been ok with that outcome.

When the U.S. was in recession, it tried to isolate itself from the European powers not so affected by the great depression. The isolationist strategy ultimately failed, and Roosevelt reconsidered after seing the stimulus that the war effort was having on the european countries affected by the great depression. Even thou federal expenditures tripled between 1933 and 1939 due to the war effort, it wasn't until the attack on Pearl Harbor, in 1941, that the US "joined" forces with the allies in WWII.

--------

There, corrected that for you.

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

Care to explain? French? Galileu project is funded by most EU countries (it's taken a percentage from every EU country anual budget), and some private funds.
It's not nationalism. EU can't be dependent on a service that US can cut at any time they want if they fell like it. Also the service would be more accurate for the general user, opening a wide range of aplications (better tracking systems... also due to the ranges used, it's technicaly possible to use one of the channels for data transmission... I mean, for comercial purpose, comunications, etc).

And what "twisting" are you refering? The terminals being able to use GPS and Galileu system? Well, I remember when I helped my ex with her projects paper about positioning system (Galileu had just been approved), that the terminals wouldn't be strictly Galileu only, but GPS complaint as well, so one that bought such terminals could still use both.

Re:How very...

[Chanc_Gorkon]

No. We don't live in a democracy. We live in a Constitutional Republic.

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

1. The US did not demand ruinous reparations after WW I, in fact argued against them, and for the League of Nations. Europe ignored Wilson's advice on reparations leading eventually to another war.
2. The US did not rush into the WW I part II because it was another stupid European war. Until it was attacked by Germany's ally Japan.
3. The US did not make Russia an enemy of Europe, Stalin did that by trying to swallow Europe. Those US bases in Europe prevented a total Russian success.
4. US ideals are naive but not "cheap."
5. The US is not stirring Middle Eastern hatred against Europe; European colonialism and present-day European racism have done that. Why are slums in Europe growing every year even while they are shrinking in the US? Slums are a result of racism and oppression.
6. The missile shield may be a folly but it's not aimed at dividing Europe. Europe is perfectly capable of keeping itself divided. Actually, the US wants a united Europe as a bulwark against Russia and has been a booster of Eastern European (and Turkish) membership in the EU.
7. The US has never been afraid of Europe.

Re:How very...

[jc42]

If I was going to make some hardware, would I want it to use the EU system, the US system, or both? By using both you gain redundancy, reliability, and even accuracy.

Yeah; it's good to see that there are actually some sensible people in decision-making positions in some companies. Using both systems might mean an extra antenna, and will certainly mean somewhat more software. But the result should be much more reliable.

And when the US DoD decides to reactivate the "Selective Availability" (using the code that's there but turned off right now), we can hope that the programmers have the sense to write code that believes the Galileo data when the two systems disagree. If they do this, then the DoD's error-producing code will look even sillier than it does now.

Actually, I can see them requesting occasional tests in which the GPS's errors are activated briefly. This would be a good way to test the correctness of code to deal with the errors. And smart programmers would record the data from various satellites during the test, for use in testing during normal periods. It's always good to have test data that simulates realistic failure-mode conditions.

Re:How very...

[Cyberax]

Sure. As the old saying goes: "Russia has only two friends: Russian army and Russian navy".

Nobody is going to believe in "international friendship" anymore. Everybody has their own interests, and right now Russia and Europe just have some common interests. That's OK.

Some people just don't understand how is it possible to work together with Russian without becoming a commie.

Re:How very...

[Cyberax]

Poles were always the most fierce Russian-haters in Europe. There's a lot of history going back to 16-th century and even earlier. Poland was partitioned multiple times, and after 1917 revolution happily came back to invade parts of former Russian Empire (with lots of atrocities committed on occupied territories). Right now Poland is eager to do ANYTHING to spite Russia.

Baltic states were parts of Russian Empire for a loooooooong time. But guess what, they were almost independent: they had their own language and were ruled by their local aristocracy.

Russian politic was not expansionist in the sense that Russia wanted to conquer everything in the world. Russia wanted more influence - and that's absolutely normal behavior. You can also call USA expansionist - after all, it has invaded a few countries installing marionette regimes even after the collapse of USSR.

Re:How very...

[Florian Weimer]

This is especially promising, considering that the US used to intentionally degrade its own GPS signals available to civilians, for fear that it'd be used by "terrorists".

Surprise, surprise -- the US can degrade Galileo signals as well: http://www.tagesschau.de/aktuell/meldungen/0,1185, OID2734592_REF3,00.html (But commercial GPS jammers are available as well, so it's not clear how significant this actually is.)

Re:How very...

[RockDoctor]

...refreshing. Seriously,

... the entire point of Galileo (and GloNASS) is that GPS systems are useful to lots of people, but a single system that is controlled by someone who might be an enemy in the future is worse than useless.

I've gotten rather sick of the acrimony that seems to be building across the Atlantic.

Sacked any presidents recently?

Re:How very...

[Oktober Sunset]

well that's cos Europe has the better technology this time and the US wants a bit, you can bet if the US had the better system, they would not fork it over.

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

Differential GPS ground stations don't directly broadcast a fixed signal, they have a defined lat/long/elevation and only send our what the difference is between what they have been given as coordinates, and what they calculate based on the satellites, which includes atmospheric effects on the signals and other disturbances.

Re:How very...

[MightyMartian]

Where did I say Europe and Russia should not work together? Heck, the Great Power period was full of pragmatists who were willing to enter alliances with Russia. They just weren't under the illusion that Russia was a natural European ally, because they knew better. Russia right now is becoming increasingly nationalist, which I think was fairly inevitable as it tries to crawl out of the economic stagnation of the Soviet era and the disasterously fast-paced reforms of the Yeltsin years. It is attempting again to cast its shadow of Central Asia with its tacit (and sometimes even vocal) approval of Iran, its continued support of the Serbs, its attempts to bring the Ukraine and the Baltic states to their knees, regarding them as simply errant satellites.

This sort of behavior is bad news for Europe. Maybe Russia won't be marching armies to reoccupy those regions, but it is going to use its growing economic clout, particularly with energy, along with all the dirty tricks that the KGB ever learned and some new ones tailor-made for the 21st century, to cow its ex-satellites back into submission.

Those Europeans who sit here and moan about the US missile shield should remember that Russia finds the expansion of NATO and the European Union to be just as antagonistic. They're not demonstrating their willingness to use energy as a club to strike fear in Americans, but rather to strike fear into Europeans. How some Europeans can be so blind of history and of the current geopolitical atmosphere as to actually delude themselves that Russia is now a European country baffles me. It is like Japan, flirting with Western culture, language, technology and political theory, but always fundamentally at heart something quite different. If it is to become to Europe what France eventually became to Great Britain, then it is definitely heading in the wrong direction.

Re:How very...

[Cyberax]

Why do you think that anti-missile bases in Poland are in interest of "real" (Germany, France, Italy, Denmark, etc.) European countries? Why do you think that US has the best interest of EU in mind? IMHO, US wants to plant ethnic bomb in the heart of the Europe with its support of Kosovo (which has already became a major drug trafficking route, BTW). Europe is stupid if it doesn't understand it.

I'm myself Russian currently living in Germany (and prior to that in Ukraine, Poland and Estonia). I speak with lots of people here - most of them understand that Russia is a great trade partner, sometimes an ally and sometimes a concurrent, and has its own independent politics. That's the way I like it.

And I don't think that Russia really must be a part of any union. It's unique in its own way - there's no other country with as many diverse nationalities and such a vast territory. That's also fine, IMHO.

And Russia also tries to 'strike fear' in USA (with its support of Iran and other Muslim states). It's just that Russia doesn't have a lot of ways to influence USA: USA is only a minor trade partner of Russia (less than 10%), Russia has no stakes in the American continent and any action against dollar will most probably harm Russia.

Re:How very...

[darkmeridian]

Why the anti-Americanism? They created GPS as a purely military aspect and probably didn't foresee the civilian uses of the system. The American military was worried that a rogue nation could guide cruise missiles using GPS. You see, up until then, cruise missiles needed sophisticated inertial guidance systems and terrain recognition systems to navigate. The American military was worried that GPS would allow accurate and directed cruise missiles to proliferate.

The United States figured out how to degrade the accuracy of the civilian signal in selected areas. Once this capability was obtained, the intentional error introduced to the civilian signal was set to zero.

Re:How very...

[Anonymous Coward]

So why can't Russia just behave like the other little guys (Poland, Estonia, El Salvador) instead of trying to influence the more powerful european countries?

Re:How very...

[Cyberax]

Maybe because the whole Europe can fit inside a single region of Russia?

I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[datapharmer]

I hope these two combined work better than GPS alone, because I've used GPS quite a bit and have resorted back to map and compass more than once. Between poor reception in mountainous terrain or during bad weather or while in the woods and bad information from the satellites I've pretty much given up. Heck I've seen readings that were more than 100 miles off! And this was not a single device. We had a Magellan with WAAS and a Garmin with a powered external antenna and both gave absurd readings while hiking the Pacific Crest Trail even when they had access to 5 or more satellites.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Anonymous Coward]

You realize you are getting a downgraded GPS signal? And that bad weather or mountainous terrain is going to prohibit every type of electronic communication device? Things do tend to get blocked by large, dense rocks. They also tend to reflect off them...

And commenting on the article, if Galileo and GPS don't sync up thier clocks directly, I don't see how it will work.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[CastrTroy]

Yes, civilians get a downgraded signal. That still doesn't explain why he was getting a reading 100 miles off course from where he actually was. Especially when he's picking up 5 different satellites. You probably shouldn't get an error over 100 metres let alone 100 miles.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[datapharmer]

Yes, I understand that not having line of sight effects the signal, but if the device claims to be getting a WAAS signal it should not be MILES off. I can understand if it is off by even a few hundred feet, but when it tells me I am in the wrong state it is simply useless. If the device is getting that poor of a reading it should simply tell the user it can't get a fix (which does happen if there is not enough satellites within range). My point is better error detection is needed within the devices.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[esampson]

Actually, citizens haven't had globally downgraded signals since May 1st, 2000. The US military found it could regionally downgrade signals to protect sensitive locations while allowing people in general to have full access to GPS.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Yeah, sure. But once in a while you get this nice warm glow when the GPS unit tells you that you have hiked 123.45 miles in the last six minutes.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Typoboy]

I've used my Garmin GPSes (several models over the years) in various places around the world. I know some GPS boards I have used will give spurious results on a cold or warm start, but once they have stabillized, I haven't seen it "100 miles off". Sure, better reception would help, but I don't think it is quite so broken.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[gsfprez]

poor recievers and position on your part does not constitute a problem with GPS on the operator's part.

and besides - how does adding additional signals to your already shitty location change anything? If you've got bad multipath problems or narrow FOV problems, more satellites isn't going to change anything.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[SnowZero]

And commenting on the article, if Galileo and GPS don't sync up thier clocks directly, I don't see how it will work. Of course you can combine them; It's just a question of how much additional information you can get. Worst case is that you have to treat them separately until the position is calculated, and you then combine the two independent readings, which should about halve the variance. That's nothing to sneeze at, and wouldn't require any information at all about relative clock skew. In the best case however, a device could track the long-term clock skew between the two systems (which should stay nearly fixed) by filtering on the time skew that brings separate readings into most agreement. The skew would take a long time to estimate, but once you have it, you should be able to mix and match satellites.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[megaditto]

The GP must have stumbled into a missile silo or a black 'copter NSA base!

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[kannibal_klown]

Sounds like the guy has a weird receiver.

The only time my (car) GPS was ever off by any noticeable amount was when I first powered it up. Apparently when it initializes for the first time, it starts the car off at some place in California (I think SF). After a minute or so the screen changed to the correct position and it's been fine ever since.

My "signal strength" (for lack of a better word) varies greatly during my commute. It can "see" 1-2-4 satellites depending where I am at any given moment. I drive through hilly areas (light mountains) where the trees are 2-3 stories tall, so I'm not surprised it fluxuates that much.

But even still, it's rarely off by more than a few feet (if that), and even in low conditions it's good enough to know that I'm at this crossing or what-not.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[willgps]

Of your 5 satellites visible, i would be betting one of those was a WAAS, so you can only really count the 4 sats. The critical thing is the Dilution of Precision (DOP). Your accuracy on the ground is directly proportional to the DOP. Basically, (thinking two-dimensionally here for the purpose of the exercise) you can think of this value as the area of a polygon with your receiver on one point, and the gps satellites making up the other points. Having more satellites (ie. combined constellation) along the short edge of a long skinny polygon will not significantly increase the area. Same goes for your DOP. I have done some experiments with combined GPS glonass solutions, and if you are in a crummy environment like down a trench or in a built up city, the combined solution accuracy is not always better than GPS alone. That being said, having more sats in the sky DOES increase your availability of a position because you reduce your chances of losing lock on all your sats at the same time when moving through a built up environment.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Anonymous Coward]

Ensure that your GPS unit has a sirfstar III chip inside it. The newer Garmins have them and they have excellent reception in the environments you mention.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Rorschach1]

How old are your GPS receivers? I use headless (no display) SiRF III-based receivers that sell for under $70 and they work indoors where my older, expensive Garmin units don't, and rarely give a fix less accurate than 30 feet. And that's with the built-in patch antennas.

I think Garmin's new handheld units (the GPSmap 60CSx I'm sure of) use the SiRF III chipset. If you're going to carry a GPS receiver for backpacking, get one of those, carry a couple extra sets of lithium batteries, and you're set. I still recommend carrying topo quads and a compass, just in case. Also, bring a ruler along and make sure you understand how to plot GPS readings on the map by hand. It's really not that hard, and a 7.5" quad beats a tiny GPS display any day.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Tacvek]

Of course you can combine them; It's just a question of how much additional information you can get. Worst case is that you have to treat them separately until the position is calculated, and you then combine the two independent readings, which should about halve the variance. That's nothing to sneeze at, and wouldn't require any information at all about relative clock skew. In the best case however, a device could track the long-term clock skew between the two systems (which should stay nearly fixed) by filtering on the time skew that brings separate readings into most agreement. The skew would take a long time to estimate, but once you have it, you should be able to mix and match satellites. Very true. Further, fixed ground stations are the ideal location for gathering such info. And guess what: as you probably know, there are a bunch of fixed ground stations in the NAVSTAR GPS system. They provide critical feedback about unexpected changes in the satellites orbits, or unexpected slew in the clocks. This information is then used to correct the problems (such as in the case of clock slew) or to update the ephemeris data of the satellite. (If the shift in orbit is large enough the almanac data of the constellation would be updated.) If there were to be full co-operation, then each GNSS system would check and calculate the clock slew of the other systems. Each system could provide data about the slew, The receivers (or the uses) could decide whose set of slew data will be used.

The above is already planned in the case of NAVSTAR GPS. The CNAV navigation message format (used with the L2C signal) includes a packet with exactly this information.

The L2C system should be partially operational in 2008, and fully by 2013 (or earlier). It will also provide some great improvements to the precision and accuracy of civilian GPS recovers (assuming the receiver includes support for it). A system that combines this with other GNSS systems like Galileo will add even more precision.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Anonymous Coward]

That's BS. GPS is very reliable as-is.

Sounds like you're not waiting for your almanac to be fully downloaded and/or updated.

You do realize if you power off your GPS, travel hundreds of miles, then turn it back on, it's not going very accurate until its almanac get reloaded?

In other words, you don't know how to properly use a GPS. You deserve to be lost.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[SnowZero]

Actually you're going well beyond my knowledge of GPS. You make an excellent point about using base stations to make these corrections; You're referring to WAAS, right? I guess there really isn't much of a difference between broadcasting corrections for individual satellites versus NAVSTAR-Galileo skew, assuming the protocol can support adding that information.

The more systems the merrier, if they can be made compatible. That way GPS devices can become ever more accurate while many nations share the cost. Now if only my phone didn't charge extra to use its onboard GPS...

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[jc42]

Actually, citizens haven't had globally downgraded signals since May 1st, 2000.

In the past year, I've seen this sort of behavior while driving around in the lowlands of the Boston suburbs. Not off by 100 miles, but I've seen my GPS position off by 15 to 20 miles, for periods of 10 or 15 minutes. In one case, we even had three different brands of GPS receivers, and they all showed approximately the same error.

I don't know the explanation, of course; I'm just reporting some irreproducible observations of my own eyes.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[wings]

I agree. The 60CSx has very good sensitivity. That and topo quads allow navigation just about anywhere. That's what I use mine for. The price has come waaaay down too. I paid nearly $700 for mine 18 months ago.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Carewolf]

More satelites means that he might recieve more from the narrow angle he is at, and enough to get an accurate reading. That is infact exactly what more sattelites would do, make it GPS better in currently crappy spots. It won't do anything else, because in the good areas the current lack of accuracy is intentional.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Tacvek]

WAAS is a base station system that could work. However the NAVSTAR system has base stations explicitly for the purpose of making sure the satellites are where they claim they are in the sky, etc. These stations may also be WAAS stations (They might as well be), but are run by the 50th Space Wing of the USAF or other Entities under the control of the DOD.

But basically the main important detail of my post is that the newest NAVSTAR GPS satellites (GPS III) will include new civilian signals that can significantly increase precision and accuracy, and with these new signals is a new set of data (new data protocol). It does include information on NAVSTAR-Galileo time skew information. I believe even NAVSTAR-GLOSNASS time-skew information is included.

Compatibility as in signal compatibility will not happen, but as long as a system can determine the timing information and locations of all satellites it can obviously use them as though they were one cohesive system. Since at least GPS III will include live time skew information, there seems to be minimal barriers to this.

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds like the guy has a weird receiver. The only time my (car) GPS was ever off by any noticeable amount was when I first powered it up. Apparently when it initializes for the first time, it starts the car off at some place in California (I think SF). After a minute or so the screen changed to the correct position and it's been fine ever since.

I agree; the Magellan Explorist I've used myself is a couple of years old model (the original firmware was made in 2005, I think) and the largest errors it shows in normal usage are in order of a couple of hundred meters, usually either in cities between large buildings or under a deep cover of trees and/or near a cliff. I think I've only ever seen larger errors than that when the receiver has been restarted after flying thousands of kilometers from one country to another, before it can manage to relocate itself. (I usually just specify the rough location manually in that case to make it easier for the device to catch up)

Re:I don't know about Galileo, but GPS needs help

[EmperorArthur]

The GPS system works off of triangulation. It uses the satellites positions, and the time it takes for a signal to get to the receiver. If you happen to have anything in the area that would reflect or distort the signal you run the risk of the timing data being off. Bad timing data=bad triangulation=bad GPS location.

Yay for interoperation

[Anonymous Coward]

It is fortunate for EU users they will interoperate since Galileo will never exist.

Inexpensive

[benhocking]

I do not think that word means what you think it means. :)

I have to ask

[Anonymous Coward]

Which side of the Atlantic are you talking about?

Re:I have to ask

[Xeth]

If you go digging through my post history, you can probably find out which side I'm on, but in this case I meant across in the same sense as a bridge is built across the water.

I'm sort of underwhelmed

[Control Group]

International cooperation is a good thing. And it's nice to share a standard frequency.

But I also think this is nothing more than a recognition of reality. Unless they deliberately enforced licensing restrictions preventing it, I'm quite sure the market would have provided a dual-system device very shortly after Galileo was operative.

Working Together

[Blitz22]

I hope they can keep their units straight.

Re:Working Together

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope they can keep their units straight. Hah! Navigators are great for finding the way to your sexdates, hikes and bathhouses... If only we could replace that cheesy lady voice with a deep-pitched manly one.

US ability to jam ....

[gstoddart]

Where does this leave the US ability to jam the GPS signal whenever they wanted?

I thought the reason that Europe wanted their own satellites is that the US basically reserved the right to scramble the signal whenever they wanted, and the EU didn't want to be beholden to US technology. If they broadcast on the same frequency, does this make it easier or harder for the US military to degrade the signal when they wish?

Is this a good thing in terms of assuring access? Or is this a backdoor for the US to exert more control over it? TFA is vague on that point. It would kinda suck if all they've done is water down the reasons they had for wanting to do it in the first place

Cheers

Re:US ability to jam ....

[BeeRockxs]

The scrambling affects only the US satellites, and I'm pretty sure that the signal itself also says from which satellite it is from. So you could conceivably ignore the data from the NAVSTAR-GPS satellites, and use just those from the GALILEO satellites.

Re:US ability to jam ....

[gstoddart]

The scrambling affects only the US satellites, and I'm pretty sure that the signal itself also says from which satellite it is from.

But, if they broadcast on the same frequency, couldn't they set theirs to just transmit crap on all channels and muddy the signal or lie about which satellite is actually transmitting? [ I'm not asserting this is true, I know very little about the mechanics of satellite transmissions ]

Cheers

Re:US ability to jam ....

[saintory]

From the article:

Under the agreement, which the United States says it expects to be signed this week, both EU and U.S. satellites would send information on the same radio frequency, enabling receivers to get signals from both systems and combine the data.

Does anyone have any further information on how the signals are jammed? I was under the impression that the signals would send the same data but the decryption device (hardware or software) would interpret the signals to a level of specificity based on its level of ability. For example, a consumer gets level 2 but military may get level 5, and setting the data bit at level 2 would mean levels 2, 1 and 0 can't pinpoint as well the same data that levels 4 and 5 can.

Also, how well will the consumer be able to turn on and/or off specific data streams (GPS, WAAS, Galileo)? How well will the EU and the US work together to make sure that when one wants to jam the other also complies for the same constellation of satellites servicing an area? Does this agreement make it easier to perform jamming?

Re:US ability to jam ....

[amh131]

I don't know for sure either, but it seems very unlikely to me that an existing GPS satellite would have anything like enough power to try and jam another satellite. Orbit is huge! And if there is some sort of signal authentication then you'd just not use the scrambled signals. I suppose it's possible for an existing satellite to try and spoof another one .. don't know too much about this sort of thing.

Re:US ability to jam ....

[SEE]

The effect of this agreement is to make it easier and cheaper to make dual NAVSTAR/Galileo receivers. The effect of that would be to make it harder for either the US or EU to degrade consumer GPS by messing with their satellite signals in the way the US used to do with Selective Availability -- because more people would have dual-signal devices that would use the other to correct. There has been discussion with the Russians about making GLONASS compatible with the two as well.

As far as true jamming, the US developed theater-area jamming for NAVSTAR and GLONASS back before it turned off Selective Availability. The US presumably also has or is developing jammers for Beidou/Compass and IRNSS. Adding Galileo to that list would be fairly simple even if the frequencies weren't shared.

Re:US ability to jam ....

[dunkelfalke]

if you read the news from 2003 and 2004 you'll see that usa reserved the right to jam galileo or even to destroy the galileo satellites.
cannot find them in english right now, but what i have found is this

Re:US ability to jam ....

[Anonymous Coward]

It can still be jammed pretty cheaply and easily (anyone with a bit of know how can do it) and unless the terrorist develop antiradiation missiles it would be pretty safe to do it as well.
And of course if a real war ever broke out we could just shot it down.
So this changes very little. /shrug

Re:US ability to jam ....

[Rich0]

Basically the GPS unit transmits what it thinks the time is, and where it is (this is somewhat simplified - I'm sure there is more to it in reality).

When you get signals from 3 satellites you look at the differences in times between them. There is only one point on the earth that has the precise time differences corresponding to the data available. Due to error there is some error in the calculated position, which decreases as you get more satellite data.

Now, the GPS transmits the time in the clear, and it also transmits it encrypted. Currently both streams transmit the same data, so military and civilian units are equally accurate.

However, in time of war intentional error can be introduced into the cleartext time data - making civilian GPS receivers inaccurate. The correct time will be transmitted encrypted, so military units can make use of the accurate time and get full precision.

All of this posturing between EU/US proponents is silly. Most likely both governments would agree to collaborate - a threat to either an EU member or the US would probably lead to both systems being degraded. Sure, the US probably has the capability to play hardball by threatening to shoot down or otherwise disable satellites if others don't go along, but more likely than not it wouldn't be necessary to make threats. The US isn't about to go shooting down the satellites of major trading partners anyway unless we're talking all-out nuclear war. And if nukes are flying all over the place I think the EU will be interested in shutting off Galileo since they're just as likely to be in the path of missiles as anybody.

Terrorism probably isn't on anybody's mind - GPS probably isn't all that useful to terrorists. It is more useful as a conventional military technology.

Re:US ability to jam ....

[digitalchinky]

It's mostly not possible or practical to spoof the identity of a satellite. Each has many different identifying characteristics from telemetry through to precise and very well known orbits. They also have owners that do monitor their multi-million dollar assets as closely and as regularly as the stereotypical basement geek might observe the female form on his (or perhaps her) visual display unit.

The odd 3 letter agency might possess systems that are capable of changing their orbit to a limited degree in order to view certain parts of the world a touch better, though common sense dictates that fuel supplies are not infinite and such beasts would come with a short lifespan, or be used very sparingly at best.

Jamming is one option, though we are talking two opposing systems with different owners - mutually assured jamming would be the ultimate order of the day.

Re:US ability to jam ....

[russotto]

When you get signals from 3 satellites you look at the differences in times between them.

Four, actually. You have four unknowns (x,y,z,t). You can do it with 3, normally by assuming an altitude of 0.

Now, the GPS transmits the time in the clear, and it also transmits it encrypted. Currently both streams transmit the same data, so military and civilian units are equally accurate.

However, in time of war intentional error can be introduced into the cleartext time data - making civilian GPS receivers inaccurate. The correct time will be transmitted encrypted, so military units can make use of the accurate time and get full precision.

Currently there are two signals, called IIRC C/A and Y. The satellites transmit on two frequencies. On one frequency they transmit both the C/A (Coarse/Acquisition) and the P(Y) signal, on the other only the P(Y) signal. The P(Y) signal is the encrypted version of the Y signal, which is considerably more precise than the C/A signal. The encryption is called Anti-Spoof (AS), and has been turned on permanently for some time. So military receivers still get more precise positions than civilian. They can also make use of the two different frequencies to better correct for atmospheric conditions, as the effect of the atmosphere is different at different frequencies.

They used to degrade the C/A signal, by adding jitter to the clock and ephemeris data. This was called Selective Availability (SA) but this has been discontinued. AFAIK, by "discontinued" they mean they will not turn it back on again even in time of war. Oddly, it was actually turned OFF during the first Gulf War.

Re:US ability to jam ....

[quarx]

and yes. www.mapjack.com can be very accurate without human editing of dots if there are no errors in GPS signals

Re:US ability to jam ....

[Anonymous Coward]

Where does this leave the US ability to jam the GPS signal whenever they wanted?

That ability has been assured since June 2004, when the EU bowed to US pressure in what was called an 'agreement'. The Galileo frequencies where modified so they would now fall into the same band and use the same spectral spread as civil GPS. This effectively removed any independence Galileo had from the US military.

Now, civil GPS and GALILEO will always be jammed together, totally reducing Galileo ad absurdum and effectively making it little more than a civil GPS supplement. Several international Partners left Galileo after that decision.

Re:US ability to jam ....

[dajak]

Sure, the US probably has the capability to play hardball by threatening to shoot down or otherwise disable satellites if others don't go along, but

Many countries have that capability. Sending a lot of shrapnel into orbit isn't very complicated, and if you don't have valuable satellites of your own you don't even have to aim well. China even demonstrated recently that they can shoot down satellites with ballistic missiles.

I thought the whole point....

[saibot834]

And I thought the whole point in Galileo was to be independent of USA's mercy. The US can turn off GPS at any time they want. The EU don't want to be dependent on the USA and so they build their own system.

Now perhaps this story refers to times when both Galileo _and_ GPS are working. Would that increase the accuracy so that both systems together are more effective? I don't really think so. I don't think that Galileo (which has an accuracy of 0.1 meters afaik) can be enhanced by some GPS satellites (which has an accuracy of 15 meters). They are way too old, the GPS satellites (at least, most of them).

Re:I thought the whole point....

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think that Galileo (which has an accuracy of 0.1 meters afaik) can be enhanced by some GPS satellites (which has an accuracy of 15 meters). They are way too old, the GPS satellites (at least, most of them).

On the other hand, the GPS sats are up in the sky working while the Galileos are mostly unfunded budget items. So it's a win-win situation.

Re:I thought the whole point....

[SEE]

The article is referring to 1) times when both systems were working, and 2) to the next-generation version of GPS (the planned-for-2013 Block III satellites).

Re:I thought the whole point....

[SnowZero]

Would that increase the accuracy so that both systems together are more effective? I don't really think so. Statistics says yes. No matter what the variance, any additional unbiased data improves your estimate. It may not improve it a lot, but it will improve it. In the case where there aren't enough sattelites of any one system visible though, it could mean the difference between working rather than failing.

I don't think that Galileo (which has an accuracy of 0.1 meters afaik) can be enhanced by some GPS satellites (which has an accuracy of 15 meters). They are way too old, the GPS satellites (at least, most of them). Well, it's hard to be newer that satellites which have yet to be launched... Let's revisit the accuracy when there is a Galileo constellation to speak of. Right now, the plans are for the <1m accuracy service to be encrypted, and require payment to access. To get the 0.1m accuracy, a base station (ala differential GPS) is required, so you're doing an apples to oranges comparison. The open/free service is 4m(x,y),8m(z).

Now, with the EU taking control, maybe the <1m service will now be free, but let's talk about how well it works when it actually exists.

Re:I thought the whole point....

[argStyopa]

"And I thought the whole point in Galileo was to be independent of USA's mercy. The US can turn off GPS at any time they want. The EU don't want to be dependent on the USA and so they build their own system."
"They are way too old, the GPS satellites (at least, most of them)."

Well, which is better: older working models or wonderful new technology that doesn't really exist yet?

EU Galileo Satellites in orbit: 1 of 30 (see also: Vaporware)

US GPS System: 30 known broadcasting satellites. (Some sources suggest that there are other 'dark' GPS satellites that are already orbiting 'in reserve' to backup the system as a failsafe in case of disaster or hostile action.)

I think the Galileo system sounds wonderful, but then again, so do flying cars. I'm not holding my breath waiting for either one.

GPS/GLONASS combo receivers available now.

[Animats]

Receivers that use both GPS and GLONASS satellite signals have been available for years. Maxim just announced a new receiver chip which receives both and only costs $2.95 in quantity, so that capability is likely to become more available.

GLONASS was in bad shape after the USSR tanked, but new GLONASS satellites are being launched again, and the constellation is currently about half populated. As of today, 11 GLONASS satellites are functioning, 5 are down, and one new one is being brought into position. 24 operational satellites are a full set.

The earlier GLONASS sats only had a two year design life, but the latest models have a 7 year design life, and they're going for a 10-year model. They launch a new batch every December, so they're starting to catch up.

Re:GPS/GLONASS combo receivers available now.

[TooMuchToDo]

Hopefully, GLONASS will come back into full service one day (it's always good to have options, right?):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLONASS#Current_statu s

As of May 2007, the system is not fully available, however it is maintained and remains partially operational. There were 11 operational satellites in the GLONASS system and one new satellite in its commissioning phase

In recent years, Russia has kept the satellite orbits optimized for navigating in Chechnya, increasing signal coverage there at the cost of degrading coverage in the rest of the world. As of May 2007, GLONASS availability in Russia was 45.3% and average availability for the whole Earth was down to 30.5%, with significant areas of less than 25% availability. Meaning that, at any given time of the day in Russia, there is a 45.3% likelihood that a position fix can be calculated.

In short, that's not exactly what I would call a "global positioning system"

Duh

[Anonymous Coward]

Their system is going to use ours until it is done hence they will be compatible for redundancy...
Oh this reminds me of this site I found while looking up emp's and cell jammers years ago: Green Bay packet radio or something like that; point is, his site is hilarious in the fact that he dissez the Europeans on the sub of GSM... Very persuasive in anti european ideas!!

Re:Duh

[Anonymous Coward]

here is the mirror

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:cpFkqNE5SmoJ: gbppr.dyndns.org/PROJ/mil/celljam/+&hl=en

Misguided or not, the missile shield is not...

[benhocking]

Misguided or not, the missile shield is not intended to divide you. If you want to argue that will be an unfortunate side effect, that's one thing, but if you seriously believe that it's part of a strategy of divide-and-conquer, then I truly think you're putting motives in there that don't exist.

Now, assuming that you merely meant that it would be an unfortunate side effect, you also should realize that Poland and the Czech Republic dearly want us to put the missile shield in their countries (or at least their governments do). I'm not arguing that's a sufficient reason to do so - I'm just pointing out that we're not imposing this on them. They want it. This came out quite strongly after Putin suggested that it be put in Azerbaijan instead, if the goal was truly to protect Europe from a Middle East attack.

But

[ilovegeorgebush]

Isn't Galileo having funding issues at the moment? If so, isn't this 'deal' a bit...redundant?

Coming in 2013 to a nanoparadise near you.

[Anonymous Coward]

What if mindreading equipment recorded you thinking "Louisiana Brain Death" for no good reason and everyone saw then I said I had "Louisiana Brain Death" style? Would you still think you could beat someone being so pitiful as to rely on a style to do hard things? What if someone said "Nonsense, nonsense, sense is your ass killed!" while being mindread while everyone watched and it was for a special reason? Would you cower just a little more in your invisible closet you walk around in while in public? Don't imagine, be there. 2013 - Nanoparadise on Earth, at least that's what you'll wish it was as your asshole gets
broke over a million million years and you cry until the end of time.

Re:Coming in 2013 to a nanoparadise near you.

[Anonymous Coward]

wtf are you talking about? back away from the crack pipe -- slowly.

Collaborative accuracy

[Anonymous Coward]

Single Headshot in a sea of turbans...

2-minute miles

[benhocking]

I've used a Timex GPS device during my runs for several years now, and I've never had it be that far off, but there have been occasions where I've managed to pull a 2-minute mile. I've just assumed that the GPS training has been very effective. ;)

How does this qualify as news?

[gsfprez]

This article is so thin on actual information, its incredible.

1. The Euros still have barely made 1 satellite broadcast a NAV message.. if in fact, they actually did. The most accurate discription of what the whole Galileo program has done to this point is bitch-n-moan, and put up a used Frigidaire into space with a HAM radio and a metronome hooked together with bailing wire broadcasting the opening 3 seconds of Weird Al's "Like a Surgeon" track for the last few years.

2. Teenagers keep hacking the ICD-spec'd encryption in a handful of days, thus ensuring that any possible monitary beneift the 72 countries "invovled" with Galileo will become naught once some industrious Chinese manufacturers start making receivers which bypass the payment scheme. (can you say "region-free/CCS-free DVD players?" I knew you could)

3. The Euros could shut-down Galileo anytime they wanted - why should the US depend on a system that could be shut-down anytime someone else wanted? Answer - they probably won't.

they killed the Concorde because they couldn't get along. They stopped supporting Airbus because they couldn't get along. They haven't accomplished anything of merit with Galileo because they can't get along.

Perhapse we'll just all do what we know everyone will do... what Euro's do best...

keep using GPS for free while complaining the whole while about it and keep bitching about the colonials until they're in deep shit and ask for help.

tossers.

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[BeeRockxs]

Stopped supporting Airbus? What are you talking about?

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

# 3 doesn't make much sense. If Europe actually puts together a working system, there will be, as you pointed out a large amount of red tape and argument about the running of it. Shutting it down, would take everyone involved cooperating together, which as you pointed out is unlikely and time consuming.

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[tsa]

I was going to post something along the same lines. In typical EU fashion, the Galileo project has crashed before it even really started. What's new is that now the various companies involved cannot get agreements over who does what. Unfortunately I can't find websites that tell the story. Many big EU projects fail because everybody and his dog has to have a fair share of the work/profits/whatever. So first they spend forever bickering about how things shall be done, and then they come up with the most impractical solution ever. Look at the way the Airbus A380 is built. It's a beautiful plane, but it just deserves to fail. The same happens with the Galileo project. Very annoying. The EU is a superpower but they are so busy bickering amongst themselves they don't even have time to look around and see the world pass them by.

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[DarenN]

Good rant! Bit light on reality, though.

1. The test satellite is not only alive and well, but all the control systems are being calibrated off it. The company in the same building as me in Ireland are doing data analysis from the (rather large amounts of) information that are coming from that satellite. As a result of this, the control software is also being tweaked for better performance.

2. Yup. Which is why all the problems cropped up in the first place. Loads of companies were meant to buy in (everything in the EU at the moment has to be public/private partnership, it's trendy) but they all said "thanks, but no thanks". Galileo is going ahead anyway, too much has been invested and no-one's going to back down in the EU Commission. So the UK do the usual "talking tough at home" while giving the nod in Brussels and everyone else involved has basically agreed to stump up the cash.

3. Er - yeah. Similar to how the US can shut down NAVSTAR - GPS and the Russians can shut down theirs. On the other hand, if they're all operational wouldn't it make sense for the systems to work together? Also GPS is a bit flaky over nothern europe, apparently, so it makes sense that Galileo will sort this out. Why cut GPS consumers from the states out? Or for that matter, force people to buy two receivers "just in case".

Concorde was killed because it could never be "proven" to be safe without a massive and expensive upgrade program. If we want another super-sonic passenger plane, I'm sure someone'll build one. Remember that the Concorde lasted a long time - it's first flight was in 1976! If we're point scoring, where did the concorde come from? I don't remember AA and Delta running them.

Airbus is going fine and dandy, thanks (or it will be if the A380 wiring issues get sorted). It can mostly support itself, although the factory locations are quite wide-flung, which is a PITA.

Don't know what the hell you're talking about with the "what Euro's do best"

We WILL keep using GPS for free, because we're not idiots. We will also keep bitching about your current administration, because they have failed to live up to their obligations under international treaty, and they've run rough-shod over contrary opinion since 9/11. The amount of goodwill that existed towards the US was a deep, deep well, from 1918 on, but the current administration managed to drain it, which is a pity. Lastly, we've figured out a way to keep ourselves out of deep shit in the future but for various reasons we've decided, collectively, that if we get involved in fighting outside our own borders, we better have some DAMN good reasons for it. It has something to do with the fact that Europe has been a major battleground for much of this century. Mainland US hasn't, so the scars don't run so deep. It's an interesting psychological difference.

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[WIAKywbfatw]

Are you on crack?

I ask because your rant-filled post is so thin on actual factual information, it's incredible.

For example, the US wouldn't be depending on a system that could be shut down anytime someone else wanted, because the existing, US-built and US-controlled network would be part of the alliance and would remain US-controlled. So, control that paranoia, boy.

As others have pointed out, Airbus is alive and well, and one of the world's two major civilian aircraft manufacturers.

And Concorde, for your information, stopped flying mainly because of the rise in fuel post-September 11th, which together with the Air France crash in 2000, made keeping the fleet in the air uneconomical. Even then, Virgin Atlantic offered to buy the fleet and keep it in the air, which British Airways declined to do.

By the way, even before Concorde went into commercial service, it was the US Congress that was putting up roadblocks by banning Concorde from flying over the US. Somehow, if it had been a US venture I doubt that they'd have done that.

So, before your next rant about how Europeans just can't get anything done, etc, perhaps you might want to check the facts.

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[2Y9D57]

This reply is so ill-informed, it's incredible. (That's it's, not its - illiterate as well.)

1. GIOVE-A, the first Galileo test satellite, was launched on 28 December 2005 from Baikonur Cosmodrome. It transmitted its (not it's) first navigation signal on 12 January 2006 and began transmitting complete navigation messages (i.e. with ephemeris and clock performance data) on 2nd May this year. No Frigidaire (just a commercially available satellite bus), no amateur radio (although SSTL, who built GIOVE-A, got their start building amateur radio satellites at the University of Surrey), two rubidium frequency standards (but no metronome), no baling wire (or bailing wire, either) and definitely no Weird Al.

2. Nobody has hacked any Galileo encryption. They have deduced the previously unspecified content of the signals transmitted by GIOVE-A and made out like they had discovered some big secret. The Cornell GPS lab deduced the PRN codes used by GIOVE-A - which were not secret, just not widely distributed. When the time comes, the two Galileo Public Regulated Service navigation signals will have their ranging codes and data encrypted - and no teenagers will be able to hack them - just like nobody has ever hacked the P(Y)-codes on GPS. In any case, the encryption keys will be replaceable in-service.

3. The agreement doesn't call for the US to rely on Europe. It calls for the systems to be interoperable so that, when they are both functioning, user can get quicker and more accurate fixes by having more satellites visible. Galileo will offer better performance at higher latitudes - won't someone think of the Alaskans?

Europe didn't kill Concorde. British Airways and Air France killed Concorde because it became unprofitable after a modification programme made necessary mainly by an accident caused by a piece of metal that fell off of an American airliner.

Airbus may yet get to eat Boeing's lunch - let's wait for the outcome of the Dreamliner/AB380 death match.

Your only (partially) valid criticism: it turned out that the industrial consortium that was supposed to build Galileo couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery, let alone take responsibility for a major space infrastructure project. Most likely, the European Space Agency will act as procurement agent for the system, which will then be operated by someone sensible, like Inmarsat.

Who's the tosser now?

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[smoker2]

Remember that the Concorde lasted a long time - it's first flight was in 1976!

First *commercial* flight.
It's first flight ever was roughly 6 years earlier, from France to Britain. My father worked at Filton on Concorde 002, I even have a B&W photo somewhere of me as a kid inside the hangar as they wired up the airframe.

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[Anonymous Coward]

"The EU is a superpower but they are so busy bickering amongst themselves they don't even have time to look around and see the world pass them by."

Maybe overall, that's the best thing for a superpower to do...

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can you spell European Organization for Nuclear Research (aka CERN?)? No?! Well, largest and most advanced particle physics lab in the world, and it's been around for quite some time. (Search for LHC as well while your at it).

I also remember CAMCAO and VLT (as opposed to the telescope of yours that had "miopy"). By the way.... how's Pluto this days?

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[Anonymous Coward]

Regarding the encryption - an RF engineer once explained to me how one could use a high-gain antenna to work out the encryption. If the code is long like it is in GPS then it's a bit of a hassle.

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[Anonymous Coward]

"It has something to do with the fact that Europe has been a major battleground for much of this century. Mainland US hasn't, so the scars don't run so deep. It's an interesting psychological difference"

Oh it will be for another.

There is simply no way that at least some parts of Europe won't stand up and defend themselves against inevitable collapse of European identity and second comming of Mohamed people.

The trends are against you .. but you already know that.
You just gonna have to do something about it or simply disapear as a civilization.

"he amount of goodwill that existed towards the US was a deep, deep well, from 1918 on, but the current administration managed to drain it, which is a pity. "

Oh reall ... I still remember back in 80s when I lived over there ( I was born in EU) millions of people marching against US and Reagan ... frankly a recurring theme for the last 30 years or so.
You can fool Americans but you won't fool me.

Re:How does this qualify as news?

[Anonymous Coward]

can you say ... I knew you could Can you spell? Doesn't look like it.

tossers That was spelt OK. Must be familiar with the concept.

Tinfoil hat time : they want to track your car

[Dr_Barnowl]

One reason for this sudden cooperation is that the US might want to be in on the party when it comes to the EU plans to implement a tracking system for every vehicle on its roads. This intention is revealed in UK Department for Transport documents that show that a high priority for our GPS-based "road pricing" system plans is compatibility with European systems.

Or it could be because Galileo is designed to be more effective in urban areas, which the US have taken to occupying recently.

Re:Tinfoil hat time : they want to track your car

[Tony Hoyle]

Repeat after me: GPS *receivers* are not transmitters.

Reading the daily mail you might think it's true, but then reading that rag you might think a lot of bullshit things are true.

You can't track anything with gps without a back-channel to send the data - and cars are reasonably short of those (unless you count mobile phones which can be tracked to a few metres anyway).

Re:Tinfoil hat time : they want to track your car

[Vancorps]

I would tend to think that a GPS tracking system for cars would be land based like what ships and boats use out at sea. Doesn't require the same level of transmission gear and is pretty damned reliable. You could certainly track cars as I believe that is what onStar does here in the U.S. already. Of course I suppose nothing stops car manufacturers from putting the required gear to transmit to a satellite or five.

Re:Tinfoil hat time : they want to track your car

[illegalcortex]

http://www.onstar.com/us_english/jsp/privacy_polic y.jsp

Q: Does OnStar continuously monitor my car's location?
A: No, OnStar does not continuously or routinely monitor, update or otherwise track the location of OnStar-equipped cars. OnStar only knows the location of a car when a user initiates a request for service, there is an Air Bag Deployment, an Advanced Automatic Crash Notification occurs, your OnStar equipment calls OnStar with data updates or when required to locate a car by a valid court order in criminal procedures or under exigent circumstances. OnStar requires police involvement for Stolen Vehicle Location Assistance and missing person requests.

Near as I can tell onstar uses nothing more than a cellphone and a gps receiver. It's fairly low-tech to have the cellphone phone home periodically and give it the location. Of course, having every car on the road doing this continuously would eat a lot of cellphone bandwidth.

Re:Tinfoil hat time : they want to track your car

[Kadin2048]

I would tend to think that a GPS tracking system for cars would be land based like what ships and boats use out at sea. Doesn't require the same level of transmission gear and is pretty damned reliable. You could certainly track cars as I believe that is what onStar does here in the U.S. already. Of course I suppose nothing stops car manufacturers from putting the required gear to transmit to a satellite or five.

What are you talking about, in terms of "like what ships and boats use out at sea"?

A GPS receiver is just that -- a receiver. It doesn't transmit. Full stop.

If you want to create a position reporting system, then you need some way to get the positional data back into a network. There have been various ways of accomplishing this.

Amateur radio operators have put together a very nice network called APRS, which uses 2-meter handheld radios, coupled with standard GPS receivers and interface chips, to "ping" your position to ground stations, which then dump the data onto the Internet so you can see it.

Most commercial systems, like those used on trucks, use the cellular phone network in some capacity. (Some of them use analog modems and make voice calls, others use GPRS or CSD to avoid the voice call.) But of course this costs money -- you have to pay for the cellular connection somehow, even if you only use it a few times an hour or day. This is how OnStar works (and you pay a monthly or yearly fee for it).

In order to make a "position beacon" that would work everywhere, you'd need a backhaul that didn't depend on terrestrial infrastructure -- the logical choice would be to use the Iridium network. (A network of low-orbiting, cellular-type voice communications satellites.) I suspect this is used for sea shipping and marine navigation, if you want remote position-reporting. But Iridium equipment and airtime isn't exactly cheap.

Creating a network that could tell you the position of every car on the road, in real-time, would be a big endeavor. It's probably a lot easier just to use E-Z Pass-type RFID sensors and readers at key locations (under bridges, etc.) than to try and create a wide-area network of GPS-equipped position beacons and receivers, just because in a congested area, you'd need a base station pretty much on every lamp-post in order to provide good coverage. If every car in an area was reporting its position ever minute or so, you'd quickly saturate the available capacity of the cellular and APRS networks. RFID would be a much better choice.

Re:Tinfoil hat time : they want to track your car

[petermgreen]

Near as I can tell onstar uses nothing more than a cellphone and a gps receiver. It's fairly low-tech to have the cellphone phone home periodically and give it the location. Of course, having every car on the road doing this continuously would eat a lot of cellphone bandwidth.
i'd think a dword pair would be more than enough for a cars location, we aren't talking about very much data there. The packet overheads would probablly be bigger than the data but we still aren't talking high rates.

How much bandwidth does a mobile phone use just from being left on in a moving car anyway? My guess is a well implemented auto tracking system wouldn't use much more than just leaving a mobile phone on does.

Re:Tinfoil hat time : they want to track your car

[illegalcortex]

I don't mean bandwidth purely in bytes/sec. Think of it more as capacity. I would guess that current system capacity is built around how many active mobile phones you're going to have. Since everything costs money, and having a mobile phone in use isn't going to be free, providers are going to build their capacity around what they think the maximum and average totals are going to be. I know I would. There must be some maximum at which the responsiveness of the system begins to degrade and some point at which it either totally fails (unlikely) or just stops denying new requests over the limit (more likely). I wouldn't think either of those situations would be pleasant. You'd build so that you don't come very close to this limit, but you'd try to overbuild to save money.

Putting them in a large percentage of cars would definitely change those numbers. This gets more and more true as you try to increase granularity of tracking. It's one thing to track where someone is once every three hours, another for every hour and quite another for every five minutes. At the lower granularity, you can just turn the mobile on, check in and turn it off. As you get more granular, you approach "always on" functionality. As you get to higher granularity, you call into question what they're really "tracking." Though neither are "good" to me, tracking where your car is once every three hours is definitely different than tracking where it is every five minutes.

How much does it cost?

[z-j-y]

"It just doesn't make sense to limit yourself to just one system"

If the one system is free, working, reliable, and most importantly, existing.

One system

[eebra82]

"..It just doesn't make sense to limit yourself to just one system.."

No, what we need is like 500 different systems. Just like in the world of memory cards.

Re:One system

[RAMMS EIN]

``No, what we need is like 500 different systems. Just like in the world of memory cards.''

Ahem. You're forgetting one key difference here: where the memory cards are a mess of incompatible systems, the talks mentioned in TFA are actually about making the systems compatible. This makes all the difference in the world.

Different, incompatible memory card interfaces breed lock-in (MemoryStick is close to this), data loss (once old interfaces cease being supported), energy wasted on converters, reinventing the wheel (CompactFlash now has WLAN cards as well as memory cards! We must have that, too!), and should be very frustrating to consumers.

Different, compatible navigation systems lead to more accurate data (more sattelites is better), fault-tolerance (if one system is switched off or starts providing faulty data, you can still use the other), and might actually lead to the systems competing with one another to give customers better value for their money, within the constraints of the system. It certainly wouldn't lead to the sort of frustration where you need over 5 different adapters to have a decent chance at getting at the data (the way it is with memory cards).

In short: multiple implementations of a common standard good, multiple gratuitously incompatible systems bad.

one thinks a missle shield will stop terrorism?

[sethawoolley]

do I have to add anymore than just the question?

Re:one thinks a missle shield will stop terrorism?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, you need to tell us where you came up with that assumption. Cause no one made that assertion but you.

So STFU moron.

Re:one thinks a missle shield will stop terrorism?

[oakgrove]

I'm thinking it's intended to, uh, stop missiles. Don't be a tool.

Launches?

[rlp]

Has ESA actually launched any of the Galileo satellites yet? Last I heard the program was having management and budget problems.

Re:Launches?

[icegreentea]

i think they launched a test or prototype. then they ran out of money or some crap like that.

Re:Launches?

[mykdavies]

There's one test satellite up there: Giove-A, with another due by the end of the year.

Here is how GSM network evolved according to GBPPR

[Anonymous Coward]

_F_ it ... here's the time line he had on his site::::

                1910 - 1920s -

                * U.S. Bell System develops first mobile radio telephone. It was the size of a large truck.
                * Europe kills millions and millions of people.

                1930s -

                * U.S. Bell System continues development on the mobile radio telephone.
                * Europe kills millions and millions of people.

                1940s -

                * U.S. Bell System stops development, uses copper to protect Europeans.
                * Europe kills millions and millions of people.

                1950s -

                * U.S. Bell System develops first long-range VHF mobile telephones.
                * Europe denies the whole Hitler thing.
                        Demands the U.S. protect, help, and feed them.

                1960s -

                * U.S. Bell System growing faster and faster, first radio telephone cellular network appear.
                * Europe builds a wall.

                1970s -

                * U.S. cellular phones become common. AMPS standard is started.
                * Europe wastes Marshall Plan money.
                        Does everything except build a Holocaust museum.

                1980s -

                * U.S. cellular phones become even more widespread, full country coverage.
                * Europe sells weapons to hostile countries and terrorists.
                        Never repays any WWII debts or Marshall Plan money.

                1990s -

                * U.S. cellular phone starting to move to a new, superior CDMA format.
                * Holy Shit! Europe develops GSM with Marshall Plan money, money they save
                        by denying the Holocaust, money the save by denying the whole Hitler thing,
                        money stolen from Jews, and by spying on the U.S.

                2000s -

                * U.S. has full coverage of a superior CDMA cellular format.
                * Europe brags about their "advanced" cellular network technology, which ham radio
                        operators invented, and where using, 15 years earlier.

hehehehhehe

btw: how can racist pieces of shit even like hitler:: he killed more smart white people than you can shake a stick at!

Don't ask me

[benhocking]

I'm just reporting what's been in the news. I definitely wasn't say it was a good idea - I was just trying to clarify the context around it.

OTOH, playing devil's advocate, a missile shield would (theoretically) stop missiles coming from a terrorist group were they to acquire one. It would presumably not be meant to stand alone but rather be part of an entire well thought out system (stop giggling). You could scan for dirty bombs at the border, have great devices for detecting pathogens, make your airline passengers fly naked, but none of that will stop a missile coming towards your country any more than a missile shield would prevent the discreet release of poisons into the drinking water.

Re:Don't ask me

[sethawoolley]

That's why I said "one" and not "you" since it sounded like you were merely trying to represent somebody else. But in any case, we need to fix the roots of the problem with things like atheism (and the promotion of skepticism), tolerance, rationalism, diplomacy, and measured responses, not try to patch our defenses with exponential costs that partially block one attack vector, leading to an arms race of vector defenses an workarounds.

Re:Don't ask me

[Man On Pink Corner]

OTOH, playing devil's advocate, a missile shield would (theoretically) stop missiles coming from a terrorist group were they to acquire one.

Cool. Does it work on Cessnas?

No?

Then the whole idea is kind of ridiculous, isn't it? (How'd that whole Maginot Line thing work out for the French?)

Re:Don't ask me

[PastaLover]

OTOH, playing devil's advocate, a missile shield would (theoretically) stop missiles coming from a terrorist group were they to acquire one. You're either being disingenuous or you don't know what you're talking about. The only type of missile this missile shield would stop would be an IBCM. Any other type, like the ones that terrorists would use, would not get out far enough and not take long enough to hit to be able to intercept it. Terrorists would simply be able to boat up to the country in question and launch their missile from international waters, which is definitely very frightening to think of, but it has nothing to do with the missile shield.

What a working missile shield will do is completely upset the power balance that has been in place since the cold war. It will cause all other nuclear capable countries to start working on their own missile shield and likely begin another arms race, as the only means of defeating a missile shield will probably be shear volume. It would therefore make us less secure and not more. Building one of them things is a sign of fatal short-sightedness.

Re:Don't ask me

[Anonymous Coward]

They have suicide bombers driving trucks full of non-nuclear explosives now. Heck, they can even find people to drive badly constructed improvised bombs that are far more likely to merely injure the driver than to kill more than a handful of people at a time. How difficult do you think it would be to find volunteers to risk capture and mere injury in the process driving a nuclear warhead to a target? Why fly it there ballistically?

I love posts like the parent

[Toreo asesino]

Very US biased, highly generalised, and highly negative of anything not US.

Whoever said the A380 isn't supported any more? Pure FUD - I love it!

175 orders and counting - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A380#Orders , which for the biggest plane ever manufactured by the human race is pretty good. And before you bring up the delays issue, I would point out the 747 nearly bankrupted Boeing (http://www.aviationexplorer.com/747_facts.htm) - a far cry from Airbus today.

And for fucks sake, grow up - it's entirely possible the EU + US can get along just fine. There wouldn't be much of a global market place if we didn't now would there? Sometimes it pays to get on.

In related news...

[saintory]

After the US-EU GPS story broke, the Air Force decided to announce their plans for contract bidding for the upcoming GPS III.

The truth is all in the numbers

[adsl]

It's amazing how this Galileo topic ALWAYS ends up in people slagging off against America. OK moving on: The American GPS system is a fantastic FREE product (free to uses, not free to US citizens who pay through their Federal Taxes). The rest of the world has used the system for years and benefited. Then a European venture (made up of several disparate partners) decided there was a business opportunity to launch a rival system and pay for it by offering PAY services to users, in return for increased accuracy. Unfortunately while the tests went OK the European partners did not step up to formally fund the venture. Possibly fearing the financial numbers didn't work. This alliance of the existing US service and a likely "rightsized" Galileo, probably makes huge sense. The new Galileo Satellites can be launched, in far less numbers, while accuracy can be improved by combining the signals from both systems. In other words, everybody wins here. So enough of the bickering posts please and let's congratulate the new American/European alliance and improved future GPS products.

Re:The truth is all in the numbers

[Anonymous Coward]

It's amazing how this Galileo topic ALWAYS ends up in people slagging off against America.

It's amazing how any vaguely space-related story on slasdot results in americans slagging off the rest of the world.

I love posts like yours, being small must suck

[Anonymous Coward]

"Very US biased, highly generalised, and highly negative of anything not US."

And absolutely correct. Sucks for you, but it's still true.

"175 orders and counting"

Yeah, counting BACKWARDS! That's certainly something to be proud of...

"On November 7, 2006, FedEx cancelled its order for 10 A380F freighters in favour of 15 Boeing 777 Freighters.[25] In March 2007, the last remaining customer for the A380F, UPS, announced the cancellation of its order"

AHAHAH that's really showing them Airbus.

"And before you bring up the delays issue, I would point out the 747 nearly bankrupted Boeing (http://www.aviationexplorer.com/747_facts.htm) - a far cry from Airbus today."

STFU troll, there's no such thing as "almost pregnant" and the same applies here. What you meant to say was "the 747 was a financial problem for Boeing, exactly like the A380 for Airbus".

"And for fucks sake, grow up"

Sorry, but we're not the losers who require a direct and favorable comparison to find a reason to continue living. That's you Euros, and frankly, it's pretty fucking sad.

Airbus is garbage, but what do you expect from Eurotrash?

Re:I love posts like yours, being small must suck

[megaditto]

I think one must be at least 13 to post on Slashdot.

Re:I love posts like yours, being small must suck

[Toreo asesino]

Thanks man, you said it for me :)

Re:I love posts like yours, being small must suck

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, what he said was moronic, so...

And I was right. How much that must chap your ass, huh slut?

It's a military decision...

[Etherwalk]

Think about it. It's better to have both than one in case a GPS scrambler won't knock out the Galileo signal (once it exists.) It's probably worth spending a few thousand dollars more per tank for that kind of redundancy--accurate positioning information has made a huge difference in how well modern armies fight. Ipsa scientia potest est--Knowledge itself is power.

Combined Positioning Systems

[aphxtwn]

The concept of combined receivers isn't all that unusual. There are receivers out there, primarily used in aerospace, that combine GLOSNASS and GPS to render a more accurate position.

Military use

[Laxator2]

The GPS system is capable of being re-programmed such that it will give the wrong coordinates to all but the US military. If GALILEO stays independent and keeps giving the correct coordinates a significant advantage is lost. I don't think the US military will accept that, so the getting the systems to work together may very well mean they will give the same wrong coordinates should the US military want that. I don't see the Europeans oposing such a demand.

Re:Military use

[Anonymous Coward]

The GPS system is capable of being re-programmed such that it will give the wrong coordinates to all but the US military. If GALILEO stays independent and keeps giving the correct coordinates a significant advantage is lost. I don't think the US military will accept that, so the getting the systems to work together may very well mean they will give the same wrong coordinates should the US military want that. I don't see the Europeans oposing such a demand.

With both Russian and Chinese positioning systems soon up and running, any US demands is a waste of time.

Re:Military use

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Standard GPS gives "wrong" coordinates too, it's really a question of accuracy. Selective Availability basically added to the errors, it's a question of 20 meter error or 100 meters.

GPS is for creating images?

[willgps]

Also, the article seems to imply that GPS is used for drawing pictures:

"work together to provide more accurate images and information"
"would be able to create a more accurate picture especially in areas where reception is weak"

So, farmers ploughing profanities in their fields will be able to use better fonts now. :-)
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/05/31/huge_word/

Blame Your Own Government

[Bastardchyld]

I am not trying to be snarky but... Why would a French Soldier take orders from the U.S. Government? Maybe there is a reason that the U.S. is up on its high horse.

I am currently training a new dog. He is an alpha male. If I do not put the dog on its back to show him that he has to submit to me then he will think of himself as the dominate one. Diplomacy is no different.

If your government keeps rolling over for mine, why on earth would you blame my government instead of your own?

And by the way... I for one humbly welcome our New Combined GPS System Overlods.

I think you're right

[Anonymous Coward]

So two things then.

One, why are you posting then?

And two, no one cares what you think, and you know it's true. I suggest you look into suicide, it's your only hope.

Re:I think you're right

[Anonymous Coward]

You will grow up.

Though two things you need to do to grow up a somebody: call your parents now and have them read your post. Them ask them to pay for cybersitter (it will be worth it to save you).

You are correct, and....

[Anonymous Coward]

...it goes farther than that, the DOD thing applied to all of "space". Very similar to the Monroe Doctrine, just applied to the areas above the atmosphere around the planet. Any satellites up there exist because the US allows them to exist, they have stated that they will do whatever is necessary to own space if push comes to shove, no nations excluded, even NATO nations. The US reserves the right and the DOD is tasked with maintaining the ability, to operate alone, which very easily can be interpreted as denying anything we might want to deny. This is the DOD space policy directive of 1999 which has not been changed. They liken it to the high seas and basic international law, but also have the opinion that the US must always maintain the ultimate power there, and if anything is in our national interest, it becomes "lawful". They added a little caveat and warning later on in public to warn anyone not to give satellite imagery or sensing data to anyone we might be currently at war or close to war with, and it most definetley was aimed at Europe and Galileo at that time, just so everyone would know what the stakes were.

Right now with the proposed satnav merger-you'd have to be a doofus cum laude to not smell a rat there. They just want to be able to pull the plug on demand effortlessly, without any messy jamming or trying to take satellites out. They want to be able to do it fast with a few keystrokes, or have the ability to broadcast false information, etc., which opens up a host of interesting military capabilities if you think about it a little bit.

Put it this way, there is no military downside to having more technical information and control capabilities of any satellite out there, your's or someone else's. This should be easy enough to see I think. Another example, all the foreign students inside US universities working on advanced *everything*. I hope people don't think it is all because they are such great schools. this is true but it isn't even the primary reason. the primary reason is because it's a good deal for raw intel. There's a certain high percentage of this "intellectual property" that gets developed that goes right back into the governments of the host countries of the students. Again, you'd ("you" being any foreign government looking for cheap good intel, economic or military) have to be lame to not act on this amazing opportunity to pick up great research for cheap.

They all do it, no big secrets here although people like to playact it doesn't exist.

Re:You are correct, and....

[Rich0]

While the US is certainly interested in developing ASAT capabilities I doubt they're really intending to use them anytime soon - especially against EU nations.

However, there is a legitimate concern about sensitive technology like real-time imaging getting into the hands of somebody you're at war with. If in ANY war in history somebody came along and started selling intel to the highest bidder you can be sure they'd be treated as a military target.

The EU isn't going to let private industry sell anything of high military value to anybody - it would just lead to some kind of retaliation - probably in an underhanded way (aiding corporate espionage of competitors, maybe providing data to terrorists likely to strike the EU, etc). Not many nations have high-tech gadgets useful for advanced warfare - none of them are going to just give it away to 3rd-world nations. If the EU blusters about selling satellite images to Iran or something it is probably just a negotiating tactic to get a better rate on some kind of imports/exports - the US would just find a compromise of some kind and the appropriate powers will get their take. US/EU conflict is mainly a tool for getting votes and negotiating in trade. Nobody is going to actually start a shooting war...

Cool

[Jay L]

Now I won't have to switch from one system to the other on long drives.

Limitation

[Anonymous Coward]

Likewise,

It just doesn't make sense to limit yourself to just one system

is a sleazy statement. Using GPS is not a limitation. If anything, GPS is better than Galileo because it isn't a tier-priced commercial venture. I smell something fishy about this...

Goes without saying

[DomesticatedOnion]

that your partners position is as important as yours; timing is also equally critical.

Here, good luck

[Anonymous Coward]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide

It's the only chance you have left to avoid shaming yourself and your family further.

And my parents loved my post, they hate Eurotrash just like the rest of the world does.

Remember, it's not the cowards way out in your case, it's actually a promotion. I'm not sure what you do now, but becoming a rotting corpse is guaranteed to be a step up for you.

Now eat my asshole with some jelly, cause I just made you my bitch, bitch.

Re:Here, good luck

[Anonymous Coward]

And my parents loved my post No; what happened is that you dragged your Mom down to the basement, asked her what she thought of your post, and she muttered without much conviction "Yes, of course that's lovely dear" in the manner of someone humoring a child half your age. Then she sighed and wondered where she'd went wrong with you.

My personal guess is that getting pregnant from the village idiot was probably a bad idea all round.

Re:Here, good luck

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, that was lame. I mean, you took the time to write that and the best you could come up with was the tired old basement play and "she sighed and wondered where she'd went wrong with you"? You insult worse than you post, and you post like something my dog makes.

AND I TOLD YOU TO BRING JELLY! Don't be a poor sport because you got destroyed, it's unbecoming.

                  *

NOW GET THE GOD DAMNED JELLY

"My personal guess is that getting pregnant from the village idiot was probably a bad idea all round."

What am I your therapist? What do I care about your personal problems.

Re:Here, good luck

[Anonymous Coward]

AND I TOLD YOU TO BRING JELLY! No, you told the other AC to bring Jelly, asswipe. Did you ever figure out that this "Anonymous Coward" guy is actually a bunch of different posters? Guess not.

"My personal guess is that getting pregnant from the village idiot was probably a bad idea all round." What am I your therapist? What do I care about your personal problems. I was talking about your mother, fuckwit.

The proposals include a cellular modem

[Dr_Barnowl]

The cellular modem should provide an adequate backchannel. They even go so far as to budget 100 GBP for each unit.

But the key here is still the "GPS" part. Rather than the present efforts which involve number-plate recognising cameras, or my own personal design which utilises RFID enabled number plates and existing pickup loops in the roads (installed for traffic light sensors), this proposed system can (and does) track a road vehicle anywhere it goes. This is somewhat overboard for their stated aim of reducing congestion on key roads during rush hour.

http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/roads/roadpricing/feasib ilitystudy/studyreport/feasibilitystudyofroadprici n4002?page=5#a1020

Note in particular section 4.18 which mentions Galileo in this context. If you browse around for the financials, their projected revenues should pay for Galileo in very short order.

Nothing to see, move along

[DerekLyons]

The article summary is somewhat misleading - the US and the EU decided a couple of years ago to work together and talks have been ongoing since then. The only real news here is that they are about to reach agreement.
 
I suspect the EU may be pressing for agreement to help smokescreen the fact that Galileo is badly behind schedule.

Re:Nothing to see, move along

[Anonymous Coward]

Galileo is dead for all practical purposes. They'll try to revive it with an influx of taxpayers' money, but it's too late and there are growing signs that its capabilities were greatly exaggerated. They never did a proper test out of a lab anyway.

So, more European all-talk-and-no-walk, like the European shuttle, Hermes. Only they will try harder to keep Galileo afloat because there could have been good money in it.

There's still money to be made, from people's pockets anyway.

¦~~..__--**--MOD--PARENT--UP--**--__..~~¦

[Anonymous Coward]

These are true words.

Mod parent artistic

[Anonymous Coward]

If this can be done. O slashdot moderators, we beseech thee...

GLONASS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Whatever happened to GLONASS? There was for a short time, if I recall, a dual band receiver for GPS and GLONASS.

Proceed West for 10,000 millimeters

[weinrich]

What I expect to hear from my new "dual mode" Magellan after renting a car in London and asking for directions to Big Ben.

%%%%%%%%HeY MoDs L@@K At tHiS%%%%

[Anonymous Coward]

PlEaSe MoDeRaTe PaReNt ^^UP^^

Concorde...

[YesIAmAScript]

Concorde was only ever profitable in the first place because they were sold at a loss to the initial operators. The SST had a huge line-up of orders before production, but mass outcry over sonic booms in the first flights led to many countries banning overflights and making the plane a lot less useful than it first seemed.

I'm not crapping on the Europeans over Concorde, because the US wanted to make an SST too. It seemed to make sense at the time. But in reality, the demand for such an expensive flight was rather low.

The US was fortunate in that we weren't nearly as far along on our SST when the shit hit the fan. Luck was the big difference between US and European efforts here, neither side was acting stupid.

I love posts like the parent.

[YesIAmAScript]

The A380 has 175 orders. Many are from low-quality operators who may never come up with the money. Another problem is half the orders are from one operator, and no one is sure how this operator will be able to use that many planes. Neither of these means the A380 is a failure, but they're serious issues.

The A380 is NOT the biggest plane ever manufactured by the human race.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Giant_planes_co mparison.svg

It's really uncool to make such basic mistakes when your trying to portray yourself as the voice of reason.

The 747 did almost bankrupt Boeing, and I would say that the financial issues the A380 has presented to Airbus are VERY serious, making your comment that these situations aren't similar rather hollow.

Boeing was a much smaller company at the time they were making the 747 than Airbus is now. Airbus has over 5,000 orders for A320s and has delivered 3,000 of them. When Boeing was making the 747, they had sold/booked a lot fewer planes than this.

Now, leaving the realm of fact and going into opinion, I like Airbus, but the A380 is a bad deal. I can't see how it'll ever make a true profit now. I don't know if it'll be an outright failure either, because I think the demand for a plane of this size is large (as Airbus thinks) and I think they will sell more than 175 over the life of it. But the problem is they've sunk in so much money now, I can't see how they'll ever poke their head above water by any cost-accounting system that takes into opportunity costs and such.

I think in the end they'll sell 300 or so, and they'll be in the air, doing well. A company could do a lot worse than that.

What they need to do now is get this project to bed and get back on the A350 and the narrow body market, where the real money is.

not...necessarily

[Anonymous Coward]

Once the shooting war in Iran starts in earnest-and it will-and oil gets to $200 a barrel, I'll think you'll find a host of advanced nations with good tech that overnight will become quite annoyed with the US, including most of NATO and especially China and Japan, who all need cheap (affordable anyway) oil to keep from going under economically at this point in time. They may very well want to sell/transfer technology "elsewhere" to level the playing field back down to where it used to be. And that might be satellite imagery among other things. Then it becomes poker, who is bluffing or who is holding a good hand.

Re:Here is how GSM network evolved according to GB

[Anonymous Coward]

1910 - 1920s -

* U.S. Bell System develops first mobile radio telephone. It was the size of a large truck.
* Europe unites in defence against a common aggressor while America sits idly by watching her former allies who helped secure her freedom and independance from the British decimated by the Germans, stepping in at the last minute.

1930s -

* U.S. Bell System continues development on the mobile radio telephone.
* Europe unites in defence against a common aggressor while America sits idly by watching her former allies who helped secure her freedom and independance from the British decimated by the Germans, stepping in at the last minute.

1940s -

* U.S. Bell System stops development, uses copper to protect Europeans.
* Europe unites in defence against a common aggressor while America sits idly by watching her former allies who helped secure her freedom and independance from the British decimated by the Germans, stepping in at the last minute.

1950s -

* U.S. Bell System develops first long-range VHF mobile telephones.
* US kills millions and millions of people in Asia.

1960s -

* U.S. Bell System growing faster and faster, first radio telephone cellular network appear.
* US kills millions and millions of people in Asia.

1970s -

* U.S. cellular phones become common. AMPS standard is started.
* US kills millions and millions of people in Asia.

1980s -

* U.S. cellular phones become even more widespread, full country coverage.
* US defeats Russia in the cold war at a cost of millions and millions of South American, Asian and Middle Eastern lives

1990s -

* U.S. cellular phone starting to move to a new, superior CDMA format.
*

Amazing chipset

[kt0157]

I don't know what's been done with the SiRF Star III chipset over the II but it's amazing. There's one in my car satnav and it picks up a signal indoors (like no other GPS I've owned ever has).

Help needed finding GPS (solution)! How ironic.

[B5_geek]

I have been looking for a decent GPS system that offers the following:

Real-time data tracking via USB or serial connected to a Linux laptop.
Onscreen display of maps and directions
Destination input via the unit. (Systems like the Garmin Quest only allow you to select places that you have already been to and "Save this Location")
Bonus points if it is mobile.

It _must_ be linux compatable, I refuse to run Windows just to 'unlock' the device.
I am willing/eager to use GPSBabel + Google Maps.

I know of several devices that fit 3-4 out of the above 5 points (like GlobalSat Bluetooth products). But it's not what i am looking for. And I find the elite attitude in the GPS forums to be the worst combination of #fluxbox & #gentoo. =)

Re:Help needed finding GPS (solution)! How ironic.

[B5_geek]

I forgot one othe major item. Data Logging.

I need it to save tracks/waypoints for later downloading to the PC (for GPSBabel & Google Maps)

this isn't by design

[RMH101]

...it's because the increase in accuracy is *expensive*. survey-grade GPS, such as that supplied by Trimble, also use differential GPS and land beacons to get the accuracy down to inches. This isn't practical for consumer grade navigation units, or indeed necessary. Such devices aren't licenced or restricted, they're just expensive.

power

[agurkan]

Actually it makes a lot of sense to limit yourself to a single system when you realize reading more channels with multiple protocols require a lot more power. It even makes sense to limit yourself to 12 channels rather than 20 available, if you are really concerned about power. There are GPS devices out there that use previous generation chipsets because of power constraints.

If they could somehow make the two systems act as one, and you could read a channel from one system with no extra power cost, then I agree that getting a fix from best available satellites and mixing-an-matching during the process is superior to limiting yourself to one system.

Add China's COMPASS to the list...

[Lord Satri]

And I thought the whole point in Galileo was to be independent of USA's mercy. Right. And so is China's COMPASS GPS system and Russia's GLONASS.

If you read the whole paragraph...

[benhocking]

I did address the Cessna question (the whole flippant part about flying naked). The missile shield (hopefully) would be part of a larger solution. It would prevent missiles from hitting you, not Cessnas, hence the name. Ideally, you would also have a solution for Cessnas. Call it a Cessna shield, if you like.

Again, I'm no advocate for missile shields, but I will point out the fallacy of saying things similar to "because aspirin won't cure cancer, it shouldn't be used for headaches". For that matter, being somewhat more realistic, there is no cure for (most) cancers (just like there might not be a good Cessna shield). That doesn't mean we shouldn't have cures for those things we can cure (or at least treat).

In analyzing the missile shield, the real question is what it won't stop so much as what it will stop, the likelihood of that event happening (with and without the shield), and the cost of the shield (in economic, political, military, and possibly environmental or social senses). I.e., the real question is does the benefit of the missile shield outweigh its costs? I think the answer to that is probably "no", but the Cessna perspective is not really addressing what the missile shield is designed for.

(One admitted flaw with the aspirin analogy is that the headache won't deliberately choose to morph into cancer once it sees that you have aspirin.)

Re:If you read the whole paragraph...

[Man On Pink Corner]

(One admitted flaw with the aspirin analogy is that the headache won't deliberately choose to morph into cancer once it sees that you have aspirin.)

Right; that's the reason why the Maginot Line analogy is a better one. If you are about to spend $10 billion on a proposed security measure that has any number of trivial workarounds from the enemy's point of view, that's the very definition of an asymmetric threat. (It's also the very definition of stupidity.)

There is no reason to suspect that terrorists will ever gain the infrastructure needed to launch intermediate-range missiles. If they do, they aren't terrorists any more, but hostile nation-states in their own right. Playing the "terrorism" card to justify pork-barrel handouts to defense contractors may be the trendy thing to do in Washington, but there is no reason why the rest of us should sit still for it. It's our money, after all.

Not just Iridium

[Aldric]

You also have Orbcomm, Globalstar, Inmarsat, and a couple of others that I can't remember the names of right now. All of them need clear view of the sky to transmit though which mostly likely translates into an external antennae routed through the vehicle and under the dashboard/in the engine bay (because you want to run the tracker off the vehicle battery/alternator). For this you would need the full cooperation of vehicle manufacturers to make it any way reliable and I can't see that happening easily. The UK government is underestimating the difficulty of the task by a long way. They don't even seem to have considered unit failure - how do you make someone go out of their way to have a tracker repair done when it offers them no benefit?

The reality of it...

[Anonymous Coward]

And when the US DoD decides to reactivate the "Selective Availability" (using the code that's there but turned off right now), we can hope that the programmers have the sense to write code that believes the Galileo data when the two systems disagree. If they do this, then the DoD's error-producing code will look even sillier than it does now.

The US DoD will never re-enable SA on a global basis. SA was turned off years before the 9/11 terrorist attacks and wasn't even re-enabled during or after them. SA has only since ever been used in isolated locations such as Afghanistan and Iraq. The only thing silly is you believing that if SA is re-enabled for a location, Galileo won't be degraded either.

Re:The reality of it...

[jc42]

SA was turned off years before the 9/11 terrorist attacks and wasn't even re-enabled during or after them. SA has only since ever been used in isolated locations such as Afghanistan and Iraq.

You do realize that you just contradicted yourself. You apparently agree that the DoD can enable SA for part of the set of satellites.

Also, that "in isolated locations" sounds like FUD. It's well-known that the GPS system doesn't do bidirectional conversations. Rather, the GPS satellites constantly broadcast their position and their clock's time to all receivers that can see them. A GPS satellite isn't "in" a ground location like Afghanistan or Iraq; it is in orbit. If a satellite starts sending out invalid numbers, every receiver for which that satellite is above the horizon will receive those numbers. This can't be restricted to an area like a small country.

The only thing silly is you believing that if SA is re-enabled for a location, Galileo won't be degraded either.

That's a good point, and I hope that people writing software to talk to Galileo will consider it. Galileo is owned by "Europe", which almost certainly means that NATO will have a strong influence on its design and operation. NATO is rather dominated by the US. Anyone who doesn't understand the implications is a fool.

Of course, this is just a stronger form of the more general warning: Galileo, like GPS, is a bunch of computers in orbit, subject to the usual effects of cosmic radiation, and running software developed by a bunch of different competing companies and government bureaucracies. Yes, it'll be a valuable addition to our world's navigation capabilities. But anyone who totally trusts it is a fool.

And, of course, we all know that the population running our corporations and governments has a significant "fool" component. Thus, we've already seen reports of commercial navigation for shipping and airlines that is effectively dependent on GPS, because the crews have gotten too rusty with other kinds of navigation to use it effectively in an emergency. This isn't yet true for all of them, but we are slowly moving to a world that depends totally on GPS (and Galileo and maybe GLONASS) for all navigation. So we should be having serious discussions of how to keep this world safe despite the actions of corporate and government bureaucracies.

True; geosynch sats require more gear though.

[Kadin2048]

This is true. I was sort of ignoring the geosynchronous communications satellites because they require somewhat larger antennas than Iridium does; although I suppose you could put a flat patch antenna on top of a car's roof if you wanted to use them.

But anyway, I'm in agreement with you; the whole scheme seems a bit ... half-cocked.

Re:Help needed finding GPS (solution)! How ironic.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's like some people don't even read slashdot...

Few days ago? OpenMoko.com - cell phone, linux computer and GPS device all for a bargain price? Ring any bells?

Hostile nation-states

[benhocking]

There is no reason to suspect that terrorists will ever gain the infrastructure needed to launch intermediate-range missiles. If they do, they aren't terrorists any more, but hostile nation-states in their own right. Playing the "terrorism" card to justify pork-barrel handouts to defense contractors may be the trendy thing to do in Washington, but there is no reason why the rest of us should sit still for it. It's our money, after all.

Hostile nation-states, such as Iran, in the Middle East, which the missile shield is ostensibly being built to protect us from? You do realize that no one played the "terrorism card", yet, right? I carefully chose my phrasing to avoid doing exactly that. ;) That said, I agree that it's probably not the threat to be most worried about and is not a good use of our resources. I'm just trying to keep the debate lively, and not actually trying to argue that the missile shield makes sense. :)

Re:Hostile nation-states

[Man On Pink Corner]

True; I'm probably answering an argument not made by the actual political backers of the system. That said, the Iranian mullahs can rent a Cessna just as easily as Al Qaeda henchmen can. Show your driver's license, load the nuke in the back, and borrow a callsign from Virgin Airways.

Not Differential GPS

[Discoflamingo13]

Differential GPS is the use of several GPS receivers (and possibly inertial sensors) at multiple locations on a vehicle in order to determine the vehicle's velocities, attitudes (pitch, roll, yaw), and position (latitude, longitude, and altitude). Since the most useful things a GPS user can measure using GPS are "GPS time" and the distance from the receiver to the satellite. Getting the signal from a single satellite will tell you the range "r" that you are from that one satellite - in the naive sense, all of the possible positions the receiver could be are described as a sphere with radius "r" centered on the satellite; if you know that you are not above the satellite (an important assumption in space navigation), then it's a hemisphere. Each additional satellite's range narrows down your possible position to the set of the points of intersection of all the possible ranges. Examining the changes in these distances over time will help you zero in on your true position. But knowing your position, and even your velocity, is not enough to determine if you are, say, upside-down. This is where differential GPS comes into play, since receivers at multiple locations with fixed distances between each other can determine this.

The scheme that the Coast Guard has developed is a "pseudo-lite" (false satellite) system. It is basically another satellite that a user can use to fix their position, or potentially perform differential GPS with respect to a naval vessel or airplane.

Can a devil's advocate even be disingenuous?

[benhocking]

The only type of missile this missile shield would stop would be an IBCM. Any other type, like the ones that terrorists would use, would not get out far enough and not take long enough to hit to be able to intercept it.

Right. I should have said Iran or some other Middle East country (since that is what has been officially stated anyway), and not "a terrorist group".

What a working missile shield will do is completely upset the power balance that has been in place since the cold war.

You'll notice that elsewhere I've said they're probably a bad idea. However, to complain that a missile shield won't stop planes is like complaining that aspirin won't cure cancer. The missile shield is designed to stop missiles. If it won't stop missiles, well then, that's a valid complaint. There are all kinds of other valid complaints against missile shields (as you point out), but I was addressing what I feel is an invalid complaint (that missile shields won't stop X).