GPS - The Beginning

GPS is a complex technology, but understanding it can be easy if you understand the steps gradually. This GPS tutorial tries to give explanation about GPS, ranging from a basic understanding of GPS principles and also developed into the advanced GPS applications. Hopefully this tutorial will be useful.

How did GPS appear?

This idea originally came from from the idea on how our current existence, where we are, and invitation to go to a place we've never been before.. Sometimes, knowing the address of a place does not necessarily mean that we can find it easily. There are similarities or possible addresses. This is certainly the one that underlies the emergence of GPS.

Navigation and positioning systems are essential in a variety of activities and processes and it still considered a complicated thing to this day. Over the years people trying to simplify the technological development of a sequence of technological applications, but sometimes this simplication can be harmful.

Finally, the United States Department of Defense decided that they must have some form of very precise technology about the exact position of a location anywhere on this earth. Fortunatelly, at that time they had 12 million dollars fund as a good foundation to build such technology.

Why the U.S. Defense Department developed a GPS?

At that time there was a kind of arms race of the ICBM, so that it was an interesting thing in terms of determining the exact location of the location of missile fired by the enemy. Of course, by knowing the precise location, we could destroy the enemy before they strike.

It was not too difficult at that time to find the weapon launch sites since most of them were fired from Soviet mainland. However, most types of nuclear weapons were fired from the ocean. Of course, to maintain American power, they must find a way to find the right position, even though it was in the middle of a vast ocean, in a matter of hours. And they found the GPS. GPS or global positioning system, is a system that changes the navigation system to date.

Differential GPS is a form of cooperation of the two GPS receivers, a GPS receiver is in still position and other GPS receivers move down the area to be mapped. So one GPS receiver is a base station (reference GPS) and other GPS receiver is the GPS Rover. Keep in mind, for Differential GPS, not only limited to using only 2 GPS receiver, you can use 3, 4 or whatever the GPS receiver. What is important is one of them must be the base station.

By Cahyo Wijaa