GPS Tracking ROI

There’s an ancient Chinese blessing (or curse) that goes something like, “May You Live In Interesting Times”. As I wend my way to the end of my 62nd year I realize, once in a while, that I am not young any more. I spend little time yearning for days one by though, my smaller waistline, my hair, very little else bothers me about the aging process … it’s part of life and I’m doing my best to live out my part in the play with a smile on my face.

Once in a while, though I do catch myself wishing that I was still young and starting over. Mainly because these “interesting times” of today involve a lot of open source sorts of thins. I can find the finest software in the world just by downloading it. Yet, Microsoft is still a rich company and there’s still a boatload of great software developers employed and earning money. I can set up a blog virtually for free, pontificate to the world … and people come and read it, people even pay to advertise on it … I wanted to write when I was younger but professional writing was a “closed shop” to most aspiring pundits. I can also find literally mind blowing maps and video imagery anywhere I care to look ,,, free to use, free to incorporate in applications … I’m here to tell you, after living most of my life on the “scarcity theory” I am very. very happy to learn that the “abundance theory” is proving to be a much better model.

One thing about those “free to use” maps, though, is that they are never quite good enough (neither are the commercial “closed source” ones either, for that matter). If I buy a map I can complain about errors to the publisher and maybe they might get ’round to making a correct in my lifetime (when I spent millions of government dollars on maps, occasionally the updates were more frequent … money talks). If I use an open source map though I don’t even have a customer/client relationship to fall back on.

What to do, what to do … if only I had whole legions of folks working for me (or the map manufacturer) who would go out and walk the trails, drive the streets, sail the waterways, all equipped with GPS devices, and report all the errors and omissions for me. Hmm, perhaps if I were Bill Gates? Or, since I am not, perhaps if someone in the GPS mapping business woke up and applied the Web 2.0 social networking principle?

Well, it looks like at least one company did. See this excellent New York Times article on updating and sharing maps. I’m very favorably impressed how the NYT, often thought of by new, “web cowboy” types does a much better job of keeping their finger on the pulse of technology and writing much better explanations that some of the “webizens” like … oh never mind, you know who you are … who will probably get around to report in this someday next week … and with a few negative comments about privacy and “Big Brother” while they’re at it.

A big tip of the blog hat to the Social Capital blog who first made it into my screen with the story this morning.

Sorry, I fogot I owed you folfs an answer.  I wrote about an innovative Jogn Deere Inc. GPS/photo-imagery service here and posed the question, How many internal cumbustion engine tractors did founder John Deere ever see?

The answer seems like it would be difficult since Mr. deer’s distinctive green and yellow machinery is recognizable the world over, even by small boys who aren’t frustrated farmers or ranchers.

But Mr. Deere died in 1888, when there were virtually no steam driven traction engines in use on American farms.   It’s unlikely he ever even saw one of these external combustion bhemoths … but the first tractor to bear the John Deere name (the Dain) and the first tractor to be a commercial success for Deere (which didn’t bear their name, it was a “Waterloo Boy product) both came along in 1912/13 … so zero would be a safe answer to the question.

And no, the Waterloo Boy didn’t have a GPS … but it would have been a better tractor if it had.

As regular readers know I can seldom pass up anything to do with the Lighter Than Air (LTA) world. There are many LTA current activities where GPS plays an important role, but this isn’t one of them … at least as of yet.

Hot air balloons are a great eye pleasure, and interesting hobby for some and even a source of aviation business revenue for a few lucky companies who make a permanent or occassional business out of offerring people an introduction to the world of flight by floating on the wind. Hot ir balloon, the most common LTA aircraft are very simple in operation, relatievly inexspensive and quite foolproof when flown well. They ahve a distinct disadvanage to some, though … they only go where the wind takes them. It’s also quite simple to get a haot air balloon emdorsement on a pilot’s icense.

Blimps, more specifically “semi-rigid airships” are widely seen at sporting events where their power to stay aloft for long periods at very low airspeeds yet travel where the pilot wills them to go be means of motors are the next step up the LTA ladder. But blmps are quite a bit more complex, very uch more exspensive to buy and operate and currently require a specifc “airship” rating for the pilot, which isn’t easy … there aren’t many flight schools that give instruction and certification tests in blimps.

Enter Alberto the “personal blimp”. A hot air balloon with an engine to allow it to manuever where the pilot tells it to, and, if developer Dan Nachbar, has his way, able to be fown with a conventilal hot air free balloon pilot’s rating.

It’s the weekend, so you don’t have to keep your nose to the grindstone. Go visit thie site of the Experimental Light Than Air XLTA Web site and learn that all the fasciantation and the fun haven’t yet gone from the world of aviation.

Have a great weekend!

Had a lot of interest from my post a few days ago about the “Strange” map using existing US states to illustrate international Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Poking around on the same site I came across this most interesting map. I always thought the states of Australia were laid out a little bit strange. Now it looks as if back in the beginning they could have been laid out even worse. Or better, guess it depends upon how you look at it.

This is a map from one of the original Australian provisional conferences where the plan for dividing up the country into individual states and forming a federation first was undertaken.

It looks to me as if they were a little too concerned with geometry and finding a way to make the states somewhat equal in size. Go take a look at the Strange Maps Australian Proposal full size, read the informative write-up and come back and tell me what you think.

As you know I’m a great believer in distributing technology to the places where it can be used most. I spent a lot of my life working for the government and working with large corporations who sometimes spend more time trying to protect “secrets” and “intellectual property” than they do innovating or accomplishing anything. I also am not much of a fan of the class of folks in formal education who devise methods to make it harder for “ordinary folk” to use technology … such as the push over the last few years to make GIS and GPS “special practitioner” qualifications and try to take technology originated for the public good and move it farther and farther away from the public.

One of the technologies that has been beyond the reach of many has been “overhead imagery”, sort of a catchall phase that covers the collecting of information by flying over an area of the ground and collecting images via sensors … most familiarly, the sensor is a camera and the imagery produced is pictures of use to the human eye.

Among others, Google has brilliantly moved the world of useable, human-interpretable imagery out of the back room with their fabulous Google Maps and Google Earth. Although many people call this imagery by the generic term “satellite”, the great majority is collected by aircraft carrying special cameras and flying precise patterns over specific areas.

Aerial photogrammetery (mapping) has always been and expensive and time consuming process. The equipment carried in the aircraft is expensive and the aircraft typically have to be expensively modified to carry it. Pilots also have to have special training to be able to do the precision aspects of the necessary flying. Back “in the day” when I was working GIS mapping projects for the USAF we frequently had to make do with outdated imagery because there was no funding to survey areas of interest on a frequent enough basis.

One of my pet peeves is how many people in the US who are all benefiting from a strong agricultural economy seldom even realize how important farming is and how much farming and ranching contributes to the economy. One of the oldest names in agriculture, John Deere has now “unlocked” many of the secrets of precision aerial mapping. With a simple “strap on” camera pod (that’s the white bullet shape in the lower right, any economical rental Cessna can be a camera platform and any normally qualified pilot can follow the GPS/computer generated cockpit display to do the precision patterns required. Fascinating use of technology and overnight another whole mysterious set of “secret key holders” now find that ordinary mortals can do what was before their secret skills.

The way they are using this system is fascinating in itself, read the full write-up in Farm and Ranch Guide here. Bonus trivia question … as most of you know or could guess, the John Deere company is named after its founder, ag inventor John Deere. For a free one year subscription to this blog, leave me a comment and tell me how many internal combustion tractors John Deere ever saw in his lifetime? (hint … you _can_ give a definitive answer). Tune in tomorrow for the answer.

Many times you have seen me mention Geographic Information Systems (BIS) here on the GSP Tracking blog.  The simplest explanation of a GIS is the programmatic connection between a map and a database.  But even what us geeks tend to think as simple is not as simple as it should e to folks whose area of expertise is elsewhere.

Roving around on www.wordpress.com the other day … the home of the excellent folks who produce the blogging software I use. WordPress, I found a user’s blog called “strange maps”.

Strange Maps indeed.  You can’t read the print very well here but if you click on the link you’ll see it’s  a map of the United States, something most people are quite familiar with, combined with the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the 50 richest countries in the world.

Without a map or visual aid the columns of GDP would just be meaningless numbers to all but economists.  Plot the “faceless” numbers onto something familiar like  a map of the States and wow … did you know that California is as rich as France?  Did you know my adopted home, the Philippines has a GDP equal to Oklahoma and all those oil wells?

Go spend a little time at Strange Maps and look round.  You’ll learn a few things about the United States and many other countries as well … and when you’re done looking?  You have a good grasp of the kinds of things you can do with a GIS as well.

And stop an think of what day it is today … 14 June.  It’s very fashionable for many, even I’m sorry to say some of my fellow Americans, to forget what that national ensign that we honor today really stands for and what so many gave up and went through to keep it flying.  It’s worth a thought, or even a prayer of thanks, no matter what your current nationality and role in life.

Let’s suppose you are one of the thousands of business owners in the US who operate “goods carrying” vehicles within either to 100 mile or 150 Mile Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) rules that I mentioned on Monday.

Both the 100 and 150 mile rule are defined as an “air mile” radius around the business’s location. An “air mile” for these purposes is a Nautical mile or, to be precise 6076 feet plus a few inches. Do not ask me why the FMCSA defined the unit of distance as an “air mile” or why they defined it as a radius of operation, but this is an example of just how far out of whack the “local driving” rules can be.

Suppose you are a business owner in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and you pick up a client in Ludington, Michigan. Here’s a likely route for a delivery … or a service call to install a new unit … “goods carrying”, remember?

Just to look it appears to be quite a distance … and it is, about 314 statute miles each way, depending on how you negotiate Chicago. You could also get there by going north from Milwaukee and around the top of Lake Michigan and over the Straights of Mackinaw Bridge, but it would be even farther that way. The round trip, then, would be well over 600 miles .. a pretty good day’s work in itself, without any time on the customer’s premises. So am I telling you that you an send people out on a trip like that without a log book, using the “100 mile rule”.

Well I’m not, but the FMCSA appears to be saying “go forth and do”. The straight line distance between the two cities is well under 100 miles, so based on what I can read of the law it would be perfectly legal.

Now admittedly I chose an extreme example to illustrate my point, but you read this far, didn’t you … so the example must have provoked some thought.

You need the tools to plan, manage and audit your driver’s performance, or you are not managing … you’re only guessing … and guessing isn’t good enough.