That’s been one of the mantras — a controversial one, granted — of technological advance in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. It has succeeded in penetrating the global positioning, navigation, and timing vanguard, as evidenced by a handful of key presentations on the first day of the Institute of Navigation (ION) International Technical Meeting in San Diego on Monday.

Skybox Imaging, a company that is “passionate about bringing Moore’s Law to space via disruptive microsatellite technology, rapid development cycles, and a scalable web-based delivery platform,” spoke to the ION ITM plenary session in the person of Ronny Votel, an engineer leading the company’s guidance, navigation and control division. Skybox’s goal is to provide “easy access to reliable and frequent high-resolution images . . . through a “constellation of imaging microsatellites delivering high-resolution imagery of any spot on Earth multiple times per day.”

To achieve that goal, Skybox is developing a low-cost imaging satellite system:

• design life of the satellites, 3 years;
• size of the satellites, a mini-fridge;
• size of the constellation, in the tens.

Skybox will pair that flying system with web-accessible big data processing platform to capture video or images of any location on Earth within a couple of days — an unheard of delivery turnaround in the current global imaging industry, unless you happen to be a government (as in central, high, federal, perhaps military) customer.

The low-cost nature of the satellite opens the possibility of deploying tens of satellites which, when integrated together, have the potential to image any spot on Earth within an hour. Votel several times made the analogy in his talk of using an iPhone camera to capture desired imagery, and indeed that could be a next logical step in FBC development: just throw a bunch of camera phones up into orbit.

Skybox expects to launch its first two satellites later this year.

In April of last year, Wired published a fascinating history and analysis: “Smaller, Quicker, Secret, Robotic: Inside America’s New Space Force.” Between Between 1992 and 1999, the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) launched 16 faster, smaller, cheaper missions, including Mars probes and space telescopes. Ten missions succeeded; six failed. Analysts declared the initiative a failure, and to a large extent it has been forsaken. Recent public writings, though, show second thinking. “I would like to respectfully suggest that success-per-dollar is a more meaningful measurement of achievement than success per-attempt,” stated one Air Force lieutenant colonel in a treatise on program management lessons from NASA.

Could such an approach work for GNSS satellites, some of which are burdened with extraneous non-PNT payloads that make them far from FSC? Time will tell the wiser.

Microtechnology

In that FSC vein, at one of the afternoon’s technical sessions, Andrei Shkel of UC-Irvine had been scheduled to deliver a paper on “Precision Navigation and Timing Enabled by Microtechnology,” but apparently something came up and he was not able to appear. I had looked forward very much to what I anticipated would be an update to his September 2011 article in GPS World, “Microtechnology Comes of Age,” which was itself an update to a plenary talk he gave at ION ITM back in 2011. For now, that article will have satisfy us.

Other presentations in the same MEMS, atomic clock, and MicroPNT session:

Michael Bulatowicz of Northrop Grumman talked about a DARPA-backed project, the nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) gyroscope. Northrop’s development and research has shown a viable solution to producing a small (size of a U.S. quarter coin) low-power navigation grade gyro using non-vibratory technology. The company has produced two prototypes and is at work on two more. Feed the NMR gyro into Shkel’s work and who knows what you’ll get in terms of FBC PNT? Well, maybe not cheaper in the immediate future. Bulatowicz said that as an assembled device he expected its cost, at least initially, to be substantially higher than MEMS technology.

Richard Waters of Lumedyne Technologies spoke on next-generation MEMS inertial sensors with white-noise characteristics, a new paradigm based on time-domain switching for how MEMS sensors might work. TDS inertial sensors provide some key benefits: a purely digital approach, recalibration due to bias drift is not required, output is independent of oscillator conditions. Power is low, less than 1 millwatt. The device demonstrated switch stability under static conditions to –170 db. The same TDS concept can also be applied to a mechanical gyro.

QZSS

In other ION ITM first-day news, H. Tokura of the Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology talked about “The Possibility of Precise Automobile Navigatin using GPS/QZS and Galileo E5 Pseudoranges.” Currently, research and prototype automobile high-precision PNT is done with real-time kinematic (RTK) networks, but this has some disadvantages, as discussed in an article by authors from the University of Nottingham, UK, in the February issue of GPS World.

Japan’s QZSS now broadcasts L5 signals. Japan has essentially leapfrogged the United States, since the L5 signals with full CNAV message is already broadcast by satellite QZSS-1. Currently, three U.S. GPS satellites are L5 CNAV-capable, but none are broadcasting such a signal.

Tokura showed results demonstrating that pseudorange observables from L5 are basically robust enough for this task. Further investigation for L5 is required because manufacturers are still developing the tracing technique for the new L5 signal. A software-defined receiver is indicated for usage.

Hideki Yamada of Japan’s Electronic Navigation Research Institute spoke about the possibility of using only the QZSS constellation, “in case of GPS failure,” for RTK positioning in precision ag and machine control, with 4 to 7 QZSS satellites that could be launched in a future version of the constellation. QZSS has been shown to provide 10-meter accuracy in absence of GPS; now the research looks at an RTK method.

With only one satellite in orbit, RTK-QZSS cannot be tested in the field. The researchers simulated a fuller constellation by using QZS-1, Multifunctional Transport Satellites (MTSAT), a set of geostationary weather and aviation control satellites, and GPS signals. Using a JAVAD Alpha receiver, Trimble and NovAtel antennas, they obtained results with low multipath error (about 30 centimeters) in a Tokyo environment. Multi-epoch processing is necessary for RTK-QZSS. This solution can work well as a minimum backup system of high-precision position under relatively moderate DOP condition.

__________________

Living may be easy, dying may be hard. But I’m wide awake, staying up late, sending my regards.

To play fair, do not use Google or any other research, reference, or resource. Dinner guests were honor-bound not to employ their smartphones — just their smarts. You are, too.

The first six questions had known answers (at least to the gamesmasters) at the time of the dinner. The final three peered into the future, as of that evening. Two of them have since been determined. Once the Galileo question is settled, the What Do You Know Grand Winners — 10 individuals who sat and gamed together among the 21 competing tables — will be announced, and suitable tchotchkes distributed.

A special division for online contestants has been established; send your answers to editor@gpsworld.com. Any entries that are too suspiciously close to the true answers will be disqualified for use of unauthorized resources.

The accounting and awarding — and all the answers — will appear on the Wide Awake Blog in the very near future. Do not touch that dial.

Game Rules

1. What Do You Know? What’s Your CEP? consists of nine quantitative questions. Answer each question as best you can — without the aid of outside sources! Then give your error range: an upper bound and a lower bound.

Answers will be graded on how close they are to the true answer, the size of the error range given, and whether that error range encompasses the true answer. The smaller your error range, the higher your potential score — but if the true answer falls outside your error range, you score zero for that question.

2. The second and third rules pertained to “play by tables” at the dinner, and are irrelevant and thus omitted here.

4. A final trifecta of three questions asks you to predict events in the future.  After turning in your answers to these questions, game play concludes for the evening. A final Grand Prize to the winning table will be awarded after the last event.

A more detailed mathematical explanation of the scoring process is available at the scorer’s table, should you wish to see it.

And now, are you ready to play . . . .

What Do You Know??!!??!!  What’s Your CEP??!!??

1.  Estimate the distance in kilometers from Shanghai, China, to Nashville, Tennessee, along a Great Circle global route, and from that derive the number of Delta II booster rockets (used to launch GPS satellites) laid end-to-end that would cover that distance.

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer _________ 

Lower bound  ______________

­­­

2. Give the total area, in either square inches or square centimeters (specify which you are giving) of a rather substantial hat worn by Kate Middleton, Duchess of Cambridge, to a friend’s wedding in July of this year.

Kate Middleton

That hat!

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer __________ 

Lower bound  ______________

3.  Peg the number of total orbiting and operating GNSS satellites, including SBAS, as of September 20, 2012.

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer _____________   

Lower bound  ______________

4.  Jack Daniel’s, a sour mash whiskey made in Lynchburg, Tennessee and the best-selling whiskey in the world, is known for its square bottles and black label. How many shots of whiskey does a white-oak barrel of Jack Daniel’s contain?

Jack Daniel’s barrel in the Hermitage Hotel, Nashville

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer _____________   

Lower bound  ______________

5. How many of Richard Langley’s “Innovation” columns have appeared in GPS World magazine?

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer _____________  

Lower bound  ______________

6.  In his memoirs, Tony Blair mentions that, when he first met Queen Elizabeth II as Prime Minister of the UK, the Queen put him in his place by telling him,  “You are my tenth prime minister. The first was Winston. That was before you were born.”

In a similar vein, how many individuals have served as Prime Minister (official, not acting or deputy) of Japan from the beginning of the Shōwa era under Emperor Hirohito in 1926 until today? (Note:  This is the count of individual persons. A single person serving as Prime Minister several times, such as the postwar Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida, counts only once.)

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer _____________   

Lower bound  ______________

Final Trifecta

7.  Predict the number of days that will elapse between the day of the combined launch of the Galileo IOV-3 and IOV-4 satellites and the day when the first satellite of that pair is declared operational. Dates are defined based on UTC. For example, if the launch should take place on the currently scheduled date of October 10, then October 11 would be 1 day, October 31 would be 21 days, and so on.  If the launch occurs on a different date, we start counting from there.

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer _____________

Lower bound  ______________

8. Predict the number of U.S. states, out of 50, that go blue in the Presidential election on November 6, 2012 — that is, their electoral votes go to President Obama’s Democratic Party ticket.

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer _____________

Lower bound  ______________

9.  Predict the total number of combined points scored in all three NFL football games to be played on Thanksgiving, November 22: Houston Texans vs. Detroit Lions, Dallas Cowboys vs. Washington Redskins, New England Patriots vs. New York Jets.

Upper bound  ______________

Absolute answer _____________

Lower bound  ______________

_________________________________________________________________

Sleep was what I wanted, you know what I got. Wide Awake, staying up late, wishing I was not.

Not planned for in the sense of actually making provision for.  Seeing if there’s enough resource on hand. Calculating if the ecosystem will handle it.

No, wireless carriers and everyone else involved in this industry make money on data. So let’s make, make, make, more, more, more.

Did anyone happen to estimate the amount of bandwidth needed to upload and download all this data? Has anyone thought about what pressure it might bring on other spectrum users such as, perhaps, GNSS?

My guess is no, and no, and we don’t care. Because we are creating the future, don’t you see?!!?

From this brave new world sprang LightSquared, born of the ravenous need for more wireless data. It doesn’t take much time at the Mobile World Congress to see that venture as just the first very tentative probe. Armies are massed at our borders.

I didn’t get to location as a blue-chip commodity, as promised yesterday. That will have to come tomorrow.

There’s a whole lot of change coming for North America and European users, too, and much of that is being envisioned, enthusiastically promulgated, and occasionally even demonstrated at this global village of 60,000 modcom movers and shakers that congregate here every year.  Just a few examples:

• granting access to one’s location data for only a set period, from 15 minutes to 4 hours, via Glympse.
• location-based display advertising, not just coupons, but glossy little ads on your screen, called up by proximity to the advertiser, via Sofialys.
• centimeter-accurate indoor navigation, to the product on the shelf and not to its competitor product next to it on the same shelf, via Wi-Fi and near-field communication (NFC), Broadcom again but others including LocAid are talking about it too.
• An alarm clock function on your phone that will wake you (or let you sleep) at exactly the right time for that morning, based on real-time traffic and weather conditions on your commute route, from Airbiquity.

All this with either a few deft touches of the smartphone screen, or automatically enabled.

And this is just the location aspect of smartphones, which represents maybe 5 percent of what’s being talked about here.  Tons of other apps for health and entertainment and more.

Tomorrow: location as a blue-chip commodity.

Question One. The greatest challenge to realizing new technical capabilities is:

A.   staying ahead of the competition.  4.3% voted for this one.
B.   funding.  34%
C.   meeting expectations of the consumer (user).  34%
D.   establishing standards.  8.5%
E.   overcoming opposition (policy, privacy, regulations, etc..).   19.1%

Few surprises here. The biggest problems are always getting hands on the money to make a product, and then getting someone to buy the product.  The latter, of course, by making the product enough of a value proposition for the discerning prospect to buy.

Question Two. The predominate source of technical vision/innovation is:
A.     Governments.   1.7%
B.     Industry on its own.   53.3%
C.     Industry responding to government requirements.   28.3%
D.     Academia.   16.7%

Most of you out there believe you know what you are doing and are best left to yourselves to do it. Good on ya.

By the way, all the questions here were devised by Doug Taggart, president of Overlook Systems Technologies, Inc., and moderator of the plenary session at the Institute of Navigation’s (ION’s) International Technical Meeting. The ION ITM plenary took place three hours before our webinar, and audience members voted on these same questions. We then adjourned to a hotel room at the conference site and essentially re-presented a portion of the webinar content, interspersed with the polling questions.

The full 60-minute webinar, with presentations by Jules McNeff, VP Strategy and Programs, Overlook Systems Technologies, Inc., and Chuck Schue, president and CEO of UrsaNav, is available for download and replay at www.gpsworld.com/webinar (scroll down).

Question Three. Successful innovation is most dependent on:
A.     technology revolution.   11.5%
B.     technology evolution.   39.3%
C.     market demand.   34.4%
D.      project management.   6.6%
E.      funding.   8.2%

The free-market Keynesians out there are exceeded (in numbers) only by the techno visionaries, who believe that technology itself is a live organism, evolving and developing under its own impetus (perhaps aided or driven in part by market demand). Unless I’m putting words into someone’s mouth.

Question Four. Should innovative military capabilities be made available for civil/commercial exploitation?
A.      Yes, always.  The commercial spin-off value is far greater.  31.3%
B.      Sometimes.  When military capability is not compromised.   68.7%
C.      No.  Military capabilities are for military use only.  Every advantage must be protected.   0%

“Sometimes” is always a safe answer. But a coalition of free-marketers and techno visionaries made a surprisingly strong showing, garnering nearly one-third of the votes on an unequivocal up-down issue. This pushback should not be ignored by those in power.

Question Five. GPS will continue to be the world’s space-based PNT “Gold Standard”:
A.    for the next 20 years.   50%
B.    until Europe’s Galileo system is declared operational.   20.8%
C.    until China’s Compass system is declared operational.   14.6%
D.    until Glonass incorporates L1C.   8.3%
E.    it is not the Gold Standard today.   6.2%

At first glance, one might find few worries here for those who design new products with GPS uppermost or even solely in mind. On the other hand, if you combine the four non-GPS gold standard answers, you get a separate but equal body politic.

Mind you, the other 50% are not saying that any other system will surpass GPS and become a new gold standard. The question does not ask that. But it does leave the door open for anyone to conclude that there may not be a gold standard at all at some point in the future — that all or at least a plurality of systems will be equally capable, or that an interoperable, interchangeable GNSS will surpass any single system component.

Question Six. From a user perspective, what is the most concerning aspect of having access to PNT information derived from GNSS?
A.    It is susceptible to interference.   58%
B.    Without augmentation, it does not meet my needs.   26%
C.    It is overshadowing the need for complementary systems that do not have similar shortcomings.   8%
D.    No concerns.   8%

Interference is on nearly everyone’s mind. In fact, those who voted the B or C ticket can also be inferred to be driven by interference concerns, they are just taking their concern a step further by envisioning a solution. Chuck Shue’s webinar presentation (see above link) on e-Loran should be of interest to everyone here except the bottom 8.

Question Seven. Regarding GNSS systems, which is more important to design and field first?
A.      The Space segment (satellites).   21.4%
B.      The Ground Control Segment.   23.2%
C.      The User Equipment.   1.8%
D.      All are equally important, and should be fielded simultaneously.   53.6%

I feel this result is of little use to anyone except the U.S. Air Force, the European Space Agency, Roscosmos, and the China National Space Administration. And I’m pretty sure they all knew it already.

Question Eight. How does a country gain and maintain GNSS superiority?
A.      Create technological advantage (better mouse trap).   25%
B.      Create political/policy advantage (better playing field).   11.5%
C.      Create fiscal advantage (better funding).   36.5%
D.      Create public/private partnerships (better risk mitigation).   26.9%

A majority, but not a thumping one, opts for money.  Another safe vote in almost any circumstance.

David Last, another panel speaker at the morning’s plenary, made a cogent comment when this question was presented. He could understand, he said, how a country might want to gain and maintain military superiority. That’s a question of survival. But GNSS superiority? In this age of interoperability, surely that’s beside the point.

Well, we’ve tossed our chaff into the wind to see which way it blows. Now we must all put our heads down and our shoulders to the wheel, pushing on to Election ’12, coming up  November 4.

But there’s an earlier Election ’12 that takes place September 20: the return showdown between the Satellite Party and the Signal Party. The Reds and the Blues. They last contested, you may or may not remember, in the previous election year, 2008; Put to a Vote, GPS World’s Leadership Dinner — held during ION-GNSS 2008 in Savannah, Georgia — convoked a lively debate: Would the community gain more from new signals, or from more satellites? A made-up scenario that elicited important insights.

The Satellite Party has been in power since its ’08 victory. Are you better off now than you were four years ago? We will return to the hustings in Nashville during ION-GNSS, as again GPS World hosts GNSS Election ’12.

Given the current tenor of debates around the country and around the world, I have a feeling we’ll be hearing from the Occupy GPS movement as well as the two frontrunners.

“Despite a vast potential for industry growth and new jobs in Europe,” she continues, “European government bodies are not taking up the challenge. The budget dedicated to GNSS application research in European Commission FP7 was dramatically cut in 2007, and no specific budget line for GNSS application R&D is foreseen for the period post-2013. In times of much-needed jobs, decision-makers seem to plan to leave out the GNSS application R&D. This short-term strategy, depriving European citizens of the opportunity to take full advantage of a booming market, is going to cost European GNSS downstream industry and Europe dear.”

See the full Galileo Services press release.

Hear melodic accompaniment and see very flashy footwork for the following doggerel.

And now, with apologies to Mack Gordon, Harry Warren, and Glenn Miller,

Pardon me, boy
Is that the Galileo choo choo?
Track twenty-nine
Boy, you can give me a shine.
Can you afford
To miss that Galileo choo choo
And miss the ride
That R & D would provide?

There’s gonna be
A certain party at the station
But if EU won’t show support
Our downstream market will fall short
We’re all gonna cry
Without a Framework Programme loan
So Galileo choo choo
Won’t you choo-choo me home?
Galileo choo choo
Won’t you choo-choo me home?

Senator Joe McCarthy is not a good look for them.

A young attorney of my acquaintance, who also happens to be a contributing editor to this magazine, wrote me in this regard:

“Lawyers have an old saying — when you don’t have the law on your side, pound on the facts; when you don’t have the facts on your side,  pound on the law; and when you don’t have either, pound on the table.”

It appears that LightSquared has run out of technical solutions that it has variably proposed, without coming up with any to solve interference with the full range of GPS uses and users, and is now reduced to complaints about process. Engineering was never its strong suit, and there are many cautionary lessons to be learned from its near-run at GPS demolition. Financiers and lawyers can bring a whole heap of spectrum danger with just a little knowledge.

In coverage of this issue over the past year, I have tried to keep the magazine and its various newsletters away from the posturing and saber-rattling on both sides, the stock-market speculations and the wireless industry tea-leaves reading, and stick instead to the facts: test results, official statements by government agencies, and so on. You gentle readers have plenty of other outlets for hyperbole and flights of imagination that you can go to for that sort of thing, and it’s never in short supply. I hope we have served you well.

The Elephant Charge (“Dust, Sweat, and Gears”), an annual off-road motorsport charity event, brings together competitors, their families, and supporters for a wilderness weekend of GPS-driven fun and frenzy in the Zambian bush. I’m for fun, but I always wince when I see folks tearing up habitat in the name of saving it.

Elephant Charge 2010 seeks to raise funds and awareness for local conservation in Zambia, specifically for two hides, or wildlife observation posts, in Lusaka National Park along with funding for the South Luangwa, Lower Zambezi and Kafue National Parks private-sector conservation efforts. Organizers hope to attract more than 300 campers over the weekend of October 23–25 and as many day observers and participants, en route to a fundraising goal of $35,000.

Focus of the weekend is an event for car and motorbike teams that requires stamina, sweat, driving, and navigation skills through the Zambian bush. Maps showing the location and GPS coordinates of nine checkpoints are issued to teams on the evening before the race. To win, a team must complete the nine-checkpoint course in the shortest distance among competitors. Each team finds it own route between the checkpoints, in any order, through valleys, over ridges, and up (or down) escarpments. The goal of short distance explicitly encourages teams to go off-road in their vehicles. Bush roads are cut to each checkpoint and marked on the issued maps, however they never give the shortest distance.

The blog piece you are reading is armchair bushwhacking at best, and it’s hard for me to preach at a distance to Zambians on how to use, exploit, preserve, or tear up their own turf. Of course it’s heartening to see GPS enlisted in conservation and education efforts. I just wish they weren’t harming habitat — by cutting bush roads and further encouraging racers to rip off through the vegetation — in order to help preserve it.

Visit www.elephantcharge.org for more information.

Alternatively, for a terrific vicarious experience of the Africa savannahs and bush without leaving home, read either Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight by Alexandra Fuller, set in Rhodesia, Zambia, and Malawi, or Sand Rivers by Peter Mathiessen, set in Tanzania. “The crack of the dry grass, the intense heat, the startling beauty of the birds, the fleeting glimpse of wary wildlife . . .”