Long ago without GPS we walked and drove the roads the best way we knew how. Getting lost, taking the wrong roads, hours of riding with no knowledge of our whereabouts. But, the GPS is a helpful invention that navigates us throughout the world. Do you know how GPS Systems work?
GPS stands for Global Positioning System. It was the first system available since the 1980’s. The system was invented by the U.S. department of defense. It was intended for military use only. http://www.pcmag.com Military added interference to the signals to ensure their own version was the only one with persistence. Even after 2000 it would be a while before they were in automobiles and cellular devices. The army, navy, and air force all contributed with designs and ideas. After it was approved by the US government it became NAVSTAR. The NAVSTAR was the first GPS launched in the 1970’s. The GPS system was later proposed to civilians by President Reagan. He proposed it so that civilians so that they wouldn’t get lost.http://www.tomtom.com
The GPS obtain signal from at least three satellites to get accurate reading of your position. The equation for measuring the distance from a satellite equation is “distance=speed of light (186,000mi/sec) time”. They can establish location within 1 centimeter and provide accurate time. There are 24 satellites that circle the earth. They circle in a precise orbit and sends signals to earth. GPS systems work in any weather condition. Time difference tells the receiver how far the satellite is. Once your position has been found, the GPS can calculate other information, such as speed, bearing, track, trip distance and distance to destination. They are powered by solar energy. They even have back up batteries for when there’...
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Now that we’ve made our way through the journey of Ken Jennings’ incredible book I feel as if it’s important for me to try to sway you to become more involved in geography. It’s a truly fascinating subject and can take you places you never thought you could ever visit. If you don’t want to leave your home, at least buy an atlas, map, or visit Google Earth. You never know what you could discover in your journey. If you don’t think maps or an atlas is your thing, you never know if you never try. Jennings created a journey, for me I would have never cared to take had it not been assigned as a college class assignment, but now I’m so glad I did. Jennings shined a different light on geocaching, and map hunting. He made it fun, interesting, and overall thrilling.
Geocaching - The Official Global GPS Cache Hunt Site. Groundspeak, Inc. Web. 07 Feb. 2012.
Although this service sounds quite convenient and has its obvious benefits, there are other issues to be considered. For example, many ethical dilemmas that play from privacy issues. In a world when at one time you could take a walk to remove yourself from the eye of another, we not may be under constant supervision of sorts. Tracking devises are easily placed in many things, cell phones, which are used by nearly all people in today's American society, are the recent and most wide spread target for GPS. Is it ethical to track someone through an everyday devices such as a cell phone, is tracking people ethical in itself? These are the questions that must be resolved before we can celebrate the positives of such technological advancements.
Bellis, Mary. "Automobile History - The History of Cars and Engines." About.com Inventors. About.com, 05 Mar. 2014. Web. 10 Apr. 2014.
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"Strange Loops - History of the Barometer." Strange Loops - History of the Barometer. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Feb. 2014.
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NavLab 5 was equipped with a portable computer, a windshield-mounted camera, a GPS receiver, and other supplementary equipment. The longest drive without human intervention was almost 70 miles. This was a great accomplishment, and showed that sometime soon these cars could be fit for the roadways across America. A similar trip was done by the University Of Parma’s VISLAB in 2010 drove 16,000 kilometers through nine countries in 100 days. They hit a bit of a roadblock in Russia where the car was involved in an accident, but it was caused by human error.
The guidance, navigation, and control system is all about the destination, current location, and path of the CEV. These devices detect the vehicle’s motion and informs the GNC what is happening. Inertial measurement units (IMUs) contain gyros to measure and provide inertial attitude and velocity data to the G...
...regarded GPS – an indispensable part of GIS. Discussions on cartographic principles, commercial GIS software programs, satellite images, aerial photos, and geodatabases are some of the other conspicuous omissions in this book. There is an inconsistency in the depth of topics explored; for example map projections are explored in great depth, while vector topology is merely glossed over. These omissions and inconsistencies would in my opinion make this book marginally less beneficial to all the three audiences together. However, there is something for all them; structure for engineers, equations for engineers and students, and GIS concepts for students, engineers and users. This book will therefore be undeniably valuable if used to complement the material in some of the other fundamental GIS books in the discipline. It has merits, but there is room for improvement.
Cell phone technology dates all the way back to 1947. “In that year researchers first developed ideas as to the possibility of creating mobile phones that used "cells" that would identify a user in whatever specific region he or she was initiating the call from” (Cell Phone World). Still the technology was very limited at the time, so much more extensive research was required. In 1968 private companies started getting involved with cell phone development, such as AT&T. The FCC (The Federal Communications Commission) then opened new frequencies and the private companies had the theory of cellular towers. Each tower would be responsible for a particular region. When a customer traveled farther a way from one region it would switch the call to a closer tower with no interruption. In 1977 public cell phone testing had begun. People in Baltimore, Chicago, and Washington were the first to be eligible for cell phone trials. In 1979 a company in Japan began doing cell phone testing with the public. Not until 1983 were cell phones really available. “The year 1988 changed many of the technologies that had become standard in the past. The Cellular Technology Industry Association was created to set realistic goals for cellular phone providers and research new applications for cell phone development” (Cell Phone World). In a way they still were not very accessible to the public, due to their extremely high operating cost to the consumer. Only the very wealthy could afford cell phones. Important heads of cooperation’s, movie stars, and top government officials were able to afford the luxury of a mobile phone.
There was a time a person would use a roadmap to get from one location to another. Some also would stop and ask for directions. Today, you seldom see paper maps and people stopping at a local gas station for directions. Many vehicles come with a navigation system that provides a real-time map of the vehicle’s current location as well as systematic directions to requested destination.
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