GPS interface

Dear Paulo

I am sorry if you mind contacting you directly.

I am trying to connect a GPS USB dongle to my pc and would like to record data in MATLAB.

I just need to know if I will need additional hardware or I can do it directly. I need a direction and rest I will do myself. I am trying to look for a small direction to give me go and I will be sailing the boat.

I would appreciate if you can guide me a little bit on this. I will await your reply.

Thanks you in advance.

Best Wishes

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

The connection method is different with different dongles. What kind and model are you using?

Are you trying to transfer the GPS information in "somewhat close to real time", or are you recording the waypoints in the dongle and uploading a completed path when you get home?

[Messam Abbas]

Dear Walter,

I am using Portable GPS on usb from Ublox.

I am actually trying to look (somehwat close to) real time GPS info transfer.

Other things like data logging for waypoint navigation would also be helpful but not to much extent. to put EXPLICILY "How I can start acquiring signal within MATLAB and would it require some additional hardware or I can directly setup communication by accessing USB port and reading the data available?"

Any help or direction would be highly appreciated.

Regards

[Walter Roberson]

I will need to research that particular brand/model.

Some portable USB GPS models emulate disks (like many digital cameras do), making available only waypoint files for copying.

Some portable USB GPS models do offer modes to transfer signals as they are acquired.

If a device does not already offer a mode to transfer signals as they are acquired, then the sort of "additional hardware" you would need might include something that presses the device buttons robotically to start recording, wait for a sample, stop recording... or perhaps to do OCR of the LCD display of the GPS device.

Generally speaking, if your device does not already offer a signal transfer mode, the best "additional hardware" to obtain is a different GPS that does support signal transfers.

[Messam Abbas]

Thanks for your reply, but this model actually streams data instead of logging.

All I will need to start reading the strings this device streams and make script to decode them to lats and longs and then to current location.

But do I need an interface to communicate to MATLAB or does MATLAB supports some special functions to read data from such external devices.

Thanks anyway for help. Please let me know if you find something. I appreciate your help.

Regards

[Walter Roberson]

http://www.ublox.com/images/downloads/Product_Docs/USB_with_LINUX%28GPS.G4-CS-07059%29.pdf

Or http://www.ublox.com/en/usb-drivers.html if you are using Windows

Answer 2

[Gayatri Menon]

Hi,

nmeaParser() in Navigation toolbox can be used to parse data from GPS. Serial connection can be established using serialport()

Refer the following links for more info :

https://in.mathworks.com/help/nav/ug/plot-position-using-nmea-example.html

https://in.mathworks.com/help/nav/ref/nmeaparser-system-object.html

Hope this helps

Thanks

Answer 3

[Gayatri Menon]

Hi,

This example might be helpful for you

https://in.mathworks.com/help/nav/ug/plot-position-using-nmea-example.html

Thanks

Gayatri