MSc.

Geomatic Engineering, Progress report

Developing Differential
GPS Service using the
Internet
Addai, Emmanuel Owusu
MSc Geomatic Engineering Candidate

Dr. –Ing. Collins Fosu

Supervisor, Senior Lecturer, Geomatic
Introduction

 DGPS service
 The ideal behind all differential
positioning is to correct biases on one
location with measured biases at a
known position (Afrifa A. A. , 2009)
 Its applications

 How the Internet fits into this project

Previous works

 Afrifa, 2009 – The KNUST GPS service

 Sweden – SWEPOS
 Australia – AUSPOS
 Denmark - Denish GPS Center
How different is this
project?
 Afrifa’s
 Mainly looked at the development of a
continuous reference station
 Manual upload as against administrator-
independent system
 Others
 ftp against http
ftp poses lots of security threat
Most of the others are using web services as
against windows services for this project
Study Objectives
 Providing GPS data in RINEX/DATA
format for post-processing
 Creating an independent website for
the service
 To determine the best medium of
disseminating Base station
information and corrections to GPS
users giving the limited facilities
available to this project
 To initiate real time GPS processing in
the country
Methodology

 Study existing service and determine

how best to upgrade it
 Design a comprehensive website
(i.e., using CSS,PHP, java-script
technologies)
 Design a desktop application to
execute uploads to the university’s
server
 Testing the system for further
analysis and to make proper
Progress – Website
technology
 PhP
 CSS
 Java-script
 HTML
Progress - Website
Progress - Website
Progress - Website
Progress – Desktop
Application
 Java technology
 NetBeans IDE 6.7.1
Reasons for selecting
these technologies
 Operating system independent
 Unlike Visual studio.net which requires
some rigorous http permissions whilst
uploading data to server, the java
environment arguably needs very little
or no http permissions
How system works
 The Trimble Reference Station
software version 1.02 logs data from
base station receiver onto the
desktop computer every 60 minutes.
 The upload application detects newly
created file every hour by comparing
current files with existing files
 The Application posts the file via
HTTP proxy 192.168.3.132 port 8080
to the school server
How system works
A PHP file located on the website
folder detects the posted file and
subsequently adds it to the data
page
 The PHP file then sends a message to
the desktop upload application
signaling receipt of file
 (“File dgps4709011918 .dat uploaded successfully”)
 Desktop app then scans through the
data folder and saves the names of
the files for further use
Work remaining

 Website
 Adding necessary text to web pages
 Coding in JavaScript to support data
views
 Hosting the pages on the school server
 Upload Application
 Designing an interactive desktop
interface for the service administrator
 Rounding up the codes
Decisions to consider

 The24 hour system may be

shortened to a 3/4 day service (18
hours)

A mobile service may be considered

to help subscribers/users
Schedule

 Bythe 1st week in November,

website would be hosted, and
desktop application completed

 Bythe 1st week in December, write-

up would be completed
References for this
presentation
 Afrifa, Akwasi Acheampong, 2009,
Developing A Differential Global Positioning System (DGPS)
Service in Ghana
 Sweden Positioning Service website
 Australian Positioning Service website
 Danish GPS center website