Real Time Vehicle Tracking Made Easy 207
Makarand writes "The Washington Post has an
article
about a vehicle tracking system built by a
start-up 10-20.com.
The system uses low orbit satellites for exchanging location information making it
available anywhere in the US. The tracking device,
the size of a paperback, can be installed in any vehicle and powered by a battery.
A small antenna installed on top sends signals to satellites marking its
position on a web-based map. The equipment costs around $1000 and monthly
fees range from $20 to $65. The service plan will determine how often your position will be updated by the system. The tracking system
FAQ on the company website is pretty detailed."
this could be good (Score:1, Interesting)
Car Rentals (Score:5, Interesting)
Antenna on top? (Score:5, Interesting)
Credit Card? (Score:4, Interesting)
Can I pay via a credit card?
Not at this time. We accept PayPal, corporate checks, and certified funds for payment at this time. We are currently working on accepting credit cards.
I don't know how safe I would feel doing business with a professional company that requires PayPal to accept credit cards.
So, how long before... (Score:3, Interesting)
OnStar (Score:5, Interesting)
I could see it beneficial, however, for company vehicles or the 16-year-old kid busting at the seams with testosterone.
newsworthy? (Score:2, Interesting)
Serial Ports (Score:3, Interesting)
look [10-20.com]
What are those for and are we allowed to play with them?
Not completely fool proof!!! (Score:4, Interesting)
Lojack on crack (Score:5, Interesting)
My primary experience has been with APRS, the Automatic Position Reporting System. It's in many ways similar to this system. It's used quite extensively by ham radio operators to coordinate public service activities, track storms out in tornado ally, etc.
The neat thing about APRS is that it isn't just a position tracking system, but it's a distributed network of repeating stations linked via radio and landlines. Here are some neat links you might find interesting:
Been there, doing it right now. (Score:4, Interesting)
But I guess it's nice to know that there is a commercial version avaliable.
This system is weak... (Score:3, Interesting)
I know it's not the same thing, but simply covering the antenna of a GPS unit with your hand almost always renders it useless. (I'm not suggesting you ride down the road with your hand on top of the car. My point is it should be relative simple to "break".)
"Geeze. I dunno, boss. I didn't notice it was malfunctioning when I was out on the road."
Of course bossman would probably get suspicious if it was ALWAYS not working when a particular employee was using said vehicle.
(Please be kind with your modding. I tried to submit this an hour ago but submissions were broken.)
Fines (Score:2, Interesting)
How about an open source solution instead? (Score:5, Interesting)
Our solution used XML and Web Services from end to end, doing XML/SOAP parsing on the embedded processor to a back end J2EE system and also to a
Our J2EE server was a Linux box, running Tomcat, JBoss and lots of other open source stuff, including my own open source, Java, GPS Library code [chaeron.com].
All this in our spare time, with very little expense. We blew away a lot of people when we demo'ed it at JavaOne this past Spring (the big boys like Sun/IBM/BEA et were just talking about the interoperability promise of Web Services...while were were demoing it live...to an embedded processor no less).
There's a white paper [chaeron.com] available that describes (in detail) what we did and the software/hardware that we used, for those that are interested.
And being mounted on an R/C truck gave it serious geek coolosity factor too!
So what's the big deal?
where is the security (Score:3, Interesting)
What is the time delay between a point being logged by the tracking device and that point appearing on the web page?
Usually it is less than 12 minutes.
Lets assume that in town the average speed is 30 mph. That means a car can go about 6 miles in any direction, or like 100 mile^2 area to be searched for the car. The antennae can easily be broken off.
or this
Does the tracking system work indoors or underground?
I wonder if chop shops are out in the open with line of sight to satellites or in enclosed warehouses.
I want my child to have this in their vehicle for emergency situations, but they object to my tracking their every move. What is the solution?
I understand how this sort of thing is useful in the consequences/rewards sequences of parenting, but parents making decisions because their offspring object, and not because thier offspring has earned the right to certain freedoms is just scary. It's like giving a child an Expedition not becuase the child knows how to drive it without killing other people but because thier peers(or the parents peers) will not respect them if they have anything less.
Qualcomm has been doing this for over 10 years (Score:5, Interesting)
We use OmniTracs [qualcomm.com] and virtually almost every fleet owner does the same.
It does much more then positioning tracking, allowing us 2way communications and email anywhere in the world, but it does the same thing.
It's a love-hate relationship. On one hand you hate it because they know where you are at all times, at other times I love it, as the computer guesstimates when I'm going to get somewhere and dispatches me a new load before I even deliver this one.
It's not very accurate (sometimes it tracks me 250 miles away from where I am) and a tree, bridge, or other obstruction will render it inoperable for a good minute or 2 whilst it attempts to find the satellite, but overall it's not to bad.
What is old is new (Score:5, Interesting)
When my team and I built our first company we developed a web location based application service provider (ASP). We provided solutions to a wide array of customers and their vehicles (delivery trucks, long haul trucking, cars, yachts, ferries, tug boats, & emergency services). In addition we built the system to allow for numerous mechanisms of data collection (digital cellular, analog cellular, Orbcomm satellite, GlobalWave satellite, and trials with Iridium).
For our server and client technologies we adopted Java, Linux and open source database solutions (MySQL) to cut costs. Often we were burned by these technologies as we started with good ol' JDK 1.1, first incarnations of servlets, poor, poor JDBC drivers, and waded through the issues of on and off support of Java in Internet Explorer. (Most of our clients used IE on Windows.)
We offered services including automated collection of road taxes, automated driver's logs, enhanced driver safety, and monthly and weekly reports and logs. (Among a ton of other custom services.)
Basically all of these systems have some means of positioning determination. This is commonly via GPS (Global Positioning System satellites) since good receivers are now relatively cheap and readily available. However, other positioning methodologies exist using things like radio triangulation, time and direction of arrival (TDOA), angle of arrival, and simple cell sector for ground based wireless communication networks. Contrary to what some seem to think, GPS satellites only provide *you* with *your* location, and you must use a secondary communication medium to transmit that information to somewhere useful.
We found when we competed in this market the choice of hardware technology really limited your target market. If what you want located (Found) was mostly in urban areas you could take advantage of much higher data rates and lower communication expenses. This allows you to send regular positioning updates with things like two-way text messaging to consoles in the vehicle, and other onboard vehicle sensors. In other instances (marine and aviation) you may be forced to use satellite technology. In general satellite communication is an order of magnitude lower bandwidth, higher delay, and more expensive. When it is the only means of data connectivity it is amazing, but to cut costs and deliver the larger value added services higher data rates and lower costs of cellular systems usually make more sense.
Of course there are hybrid solutions like simply storing the logged data and forward it on when you picked up the next cellular network along the vehicles travels. Or better is a true hybrid of sending small positioning and important packets infrequently in satellite coverage, and providing the richer detail on reconnection with the cellular network.
While interesting, as others have stated this idea is not new. We had this ASP up and running in 1998. And we had previous incarnations years before.
Buses (Score:3, Interesting)
I would love to be able to load up a page and see where my bus currently is so that I can better gauge when I have to leave to catch it.
Even better, something that delivers to portable devices as well (cell phones/pdas) so that when I do arrive at the bus stop, I can check to see if I just missed it and I should hop on an alternate or if it's a couple blocks away.
Seems like all the technology is in place - anyone seen a bus system doing something like this?
-h3
Real Time? (Score:3, Interesting)
What is the time delay between a point being logged by the tracking device and that point appearing on the web page?
Usually it is less than 12 minutes.
How is this real time? There is no mention [google.com] of real time at all on the web site, so where did the article submitter get this from?
Rather Obsolete (Score:2, Interesting)
Have a look at this place [rojone.com.au], excuse the clipart website but it's a MUCH better and though through product (less greedy too, no subscription fees). Uses common GPS and will call you up *on voice* (or SMS) to tell you your car is on the move (or the alarm has been set off or anything). You can even phone it up and forcibly talk to the driver, perhaps as they say to tell them that the police are following them :) Other features via phone control include remote immobilisation and all the usual GPS location/speed/heading info.
It seemed to me just such a smart product and far superior to the greedy other systems some companies have. And of course as it uses GPS it won't be useless if the manufacturer goes out of business.
I hate to sound like a bit of an add but it really irked me to see attention given to another product that just seemed to be a source of revenue through silly monthly subscription fees.
10-20 origins... (Score:3, Interesting)
"Driver 4, what's your 20?"
It's in the same vein as 10-4 for "acknowledged, affirmitive" (etc), which I'm sure you all have heard of.
(Until last week, I was a dispatcher for a courier company).