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Second Galileo Test Satellite Now in Orbit
Simon (S2) writes to mention that Europe's second Galileo navigation satellite reached orbit this past weekend. Galileo is promising to offer several technological advances in comparison to the US-based GPS system but no longer promises to be a guaranteed service. "The Galileo programme now seems certain to go ahead, after a prolonged and painful shift from partly-private financing of the construction to public funds taken from unspent EU farm subsidies. This money would normally have been returned to donor nations, with the UK, Germany and the Netherlands as the biggest three. London MPs have expressed doubt as to whether the UK will receive value for the money it will pay, but have acknowledged that the British government doesn't actually have any choice about Galileo under EU funding rules."
Galileo is intended to provide more precise measurements to all users than available through GPS or GLONASS, better positioning services at high latitudes and an independent positioning system upon which European nations can rely even in times of war or political disagreement.
The last part is less of an issue now...
A reason given for Galileo as an independent system was that, though GPS is now widely used worldwide for civilian applications, it is a military system which as recently as 2000 had Selective Availability (SA) that could be enabled in particular areas of coverage during times of war, and therefore Galileo's proponents argue that civil infrastructure, including aeroplane navigation and landing, should not rely solely upon GPS. On May 1, 2000, the President of the United States signed an order disabling SA, and in late 2001, the entity managing GPS confirmed that the intent is to never re-enable selective availability.[14]. Though Selective Availability still exists, on September 19 2007, the US Department of Defense announced that they would not procure any more satellites capable of implementing Selective Availability.[15] This means the next wave of Block IIF satellites launching in 2009 will no longer support SA. As older satellites are deorbited and replaced, as part of the GPS Modernization program, SA will cease to exist. The modernization program also contains standardized features that allow GPS III and Galileo systems to inter-operate, allowing a new receiver to utilize both systems to improve accuracy.
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Galileo is a GPS. The US military system that everybody refers to incorrectly as "the GPS" is really called Navstar.
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
Currently the GPS system is being upgraded to offer increased accuracy and additional features. This is known as GPS III and is scheduled to be fully operational by 2011 to 2013 (or roughly the same time as Galileo is supposed to be). According to some sources, it will enable accuracies down to 1m un-augmented.
At least according to the German Wikipedia page on Galileo, it actually is compatible to GPS.