Between military applications and the business that continues to grow exponentially around GNSS and GPS in particular, intellectual property is of paramount importance in this industry—especially considering that the reason for every product is the reception of RF signals freely available to anyone on the entire surface of the planet.
But that hasn't stopped the open-source software movement from coming to GPS applications development.
Attendees here in Ft. Worth, Texas, at the 20th annual ION GNSS show had the chance today to hear from Ben Harris of the University of Texas at Austin. Harris, an engineering scientist at the university's Applied Research Laboratories, is the dedicated evangelist for GPS Toolkit (GPSTk). Harris spoke as part of the presentation track on new product announcements. UT's Applied Research Labs, along with its Space and Geophysics Laboratories, sponsors GPSTk.
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