At 11:15 PM -0800 11/20/98, Chris Margaritis wrote:
>...My cheap little GPS (DeLorme) sure knows which way it's pointing. I presume
>direction is a software function, as the GPS tracks the position of several
>GPS satellite locations. Now again, I don't know how accurately it tracks
>its rotational angle against...

A GPS receiver can determine its position very accurately. What it knows
is the *distance* to several of the satellites from which (along with a
very accurate ephemeris for the satellites) it can compute a position. But
AFAIK, it can't determine the orientation of its antenna. It can sort of
do directions *if it is moving* in that it knows where it was a little
while ago and where it is now and thus can compute the direction of travel.
But of course, that's useless for determining the angular position of your
OTA.

I suppose a GPS receiver could also be made to also work like a radio
direction finder, measuring the signal strength as the antenna is rotated.
But I doubt that would be very accurate; certainly not enough to align an
LX200.

(There are electronic compasses, but again AFAIK, they are simply magnetic
compasses with a digital readout. These are no where near accurate enough
for aligning an LX200.)
---
Bill Arnett "Quantum Mechanics:
Emerald Hills, CA 37N 122W the dreams stuff is made of"

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