gps_simple

A very simple utility to read gps information

Author

Robert Olsson [email protected]

Abstract

A very minimal program to extract NMEA messages from USB or serial port connected gps units. No dependency's could be linked statically to be independent shared libraries. Can be used to set time on systems lacking realtime clocks.

Copyright

Open-Source via GPL2

Introduction

gps needs first to be setup i NMEA mode so ASCII text can be read from the gps. This is different from the binary format. When gps is in NMEA mode gps output can be seen i.e via a terminal program. Program is ported to devtag simple USB naming by Jens Låås.

Usage

To set gps in NMEA mode

gpsctl -n -s 4800 /dev/ttyUSB0

Get velocity

gps_simple -v /dev/ttyUSB0 Speed= 1.04

Get position

gps_simple -p /dev/ttyUSB0 LON=59.510566 LAT=17.368765

Get time

gps_simple -t /dev/ttyUSB0 20110821 18:54.19

Set time

gps_simple -t /dev/ttyUSB0 20110821 18:54.19

A typical use is to run gps_simple -s /dev/gps at system boot and also at some period interval from cron daemon.

Tested

BU-353 USB Sirf III gps [on RPi].