Mark your calendars! Stanford University’s Per Enge and Frank van Diggelen have teamed up to teach a massively open online course (MOOC) about GPS basics during the fall of 2014.

When is the Course Offered?

The course itself, titled GPS: An Introduction to Satellite Navigation, with an interactive Worldwide Laboratory using Smartphones, takes place between October 13 and November 24 and focuses attention on the basics of GPS using smartphones.

Each week during the course a new lesson, or module, will be released along with a series of short quizzes to accompany the lessons. Some weeks will also require participation in a GPS lab, which is conducted outside with your smartphone or tablet. During these labs it is up to you to collect data and share it with the virtual classroom.

The fact that the class is offered online means that you have the flexibility to participate according to your own schedule. You have the option of doing all the week’s work in one sitting or breaking it up into small chunks during office lunch hours or whenever is convenient for you. Read the rest of this entry »

K9 dogs in Arizona test out new GPS tracking units to track their location and health status.

Three dogs that work for the Arizona Department of Public Safety department are testing out brand new GPS tracking devices. The devices utilize global positioning system (GPS) technology that is constantly being upgraded for more advanced data tracking abilities. What was previously used for mainly for mapping and navigational properties is now helping organizations all over the world get up-to-date data analysis, including police departments.

The GPS trackers will keep track of where the police dogs are and how they are doing, health-wise. It uses various data to gather and analyze this information, including the temperature and behavior of the dogs, and mapping technology to look at their movements and find their location.

In addition, the GPS tracking device are helping the Arizona police department with K9 training and for learning the searching patterns the dogs use to search for a missing item or person.

Especially in the summer, heat is a concern for police dogs that work long days out in the sun. The core temperature of the dogs is consistently tracked to protect their health and safety when Arizona heat gets up to 100 or more. Read the rest of this entry »

Cargo Thefts in the U.S.

Cargo thefts occur all over the United States, from the Pacific Northwest to the East Coast. However, while every state does experience some type of cargo theft, just four states are showing a considerably higher rate of thefts.

Experts believe the criminals are becoming smarter, knowing not only what states tend to have the cargo they are looking for, but those with environmental conditions and other elements that make it easier to steal from these trucks. They know the larger, more populated states tend to have the more and higher quality products, including food, clothing, pharmaceutical drugs, and electronics.

FreightWatch, a leader in leader in logistics security services, believes that recent trends of cargo thefts in four states in particular are a sign of what is to come. They compiled a list of the items that are stolen most often from trucks, as well as what states they are stolen from. Through their detailed statistics, four states in the U.S. pose a higher risk for cargo theft.

States with the Most Cargo Thefts

FreightWatch compiled statistics that looked at the number of cargo thefts in the U.S., and how many of those thefts occurred in what states. They found that there were a total of 946 cargo thefts during 2012, which on its own was already much higher than the previous year. Among the thefts, the vast majority of them were in California, Florida, Texas, and New Jersey. Read the rest of this entry »

The GPS tracking of fleets is fairly commonplace among businesses today that have tight budgets yet rely heavily upon the ability of drivers to transport passengers or goods efficiently from one location to the next. In the case of cab companies, there was initial fear that the costs of installing GPS devices on all taxis would be prohibitive.

As technology has improved and the costs have gone down, though, many taxi cab businesses are discovering that GPS tracking for taxi cabs fleets is a very cost effective solution that helps them accomplish many business goals, like those listed below.

Provides Customers with more Accurate ETAs

When people call for taxi service, they’re usually ready to go or very nearly ready to go when the call is made. This means they are waiting the remainder of the time. Traffic, speed limits, and location of nearest available taxi all play critical roles in the estimated time of arrival you provide callers with. GPS taxi tracking helps you make much more accurate judgments about the ETA that takes these mitigating factors into account.

Assists Drivers in Navigating Around Traffic Problems

Traffic happens. In some cases, there’s just no getting around it, but most of the time, if you know the right side streets and alternate routes to take, you can make good time while avoiding stalled traffic due to accidents and other events. Read the rest of this entry »

Thanks to GPS tracking technology, experts now understand more about how a single dog is able to herd a flock of sheep.

A recent study published in the Journal of The Royal Society Interface reveals information about the tricks and techniques sheepdogs used to herd sheep. In fact, herding sheep is often done by a single dog, which is proven to be both a mystery and unbelievable feat to many people. That’s because herding sheep is no difficult task, yet one skilled sheepdog is able to convince dozens of them to move efficiently in the same direction.

Finally, through this study, the big question is answered. Researchers at the Uppsala University in Sweden fitted a herd of 46 female merino sheep and a well-trained Australian Kelpie sheepdog so that they could analyze the data and determine exactly how it works. The tracking devices were each encased in small backpacks that were placed on each of the animals.

The GPS tracking data was collected as the dog successfully herded the sheep. Researchers then poured over the data and created a computer model of the entire scene in front of them. What they found is that the dog uses very specific techniques to get the sheep to move in one direction. Read the rest of this entry »