QGPS

A GPS Information Program Written In Qt 3

Update 11/15/2005: Alright, I re-wrote much of the core functionality, and now the device can be started/stopped from the menu bar. I'm almost done getting the configuration dialog completed. Also, I changed the look of the interface a bit. I'm gonna try and see if I can't get some kind of simple vertical progress bar made to show signal strength. You can get a copy of the source through CVS, just poke around on the SourceForge project page ( link).

Update 11/14/2005: The project is now hosted on SourceForge. The new address of this page is http://qgps.sourceforge.net. The page on http://www.acidforum.net/qgps will be removed shortly. I'm working on getting a copy of the initial source code release onto SF, so please be patient. Thanks - Robin.

Here is a link to the source. Warning: it's ugly! I am in the process of re-writing the base code to make it a little prettier and more streamlined. Also, as you'll notice, it unpacks to "qgpsdevice", and compiles as the same. I'm changing that as well. However, it does function. Make sure that you have the Qt libraries WITH THREAD SUPPORT. To compile, type "make" and run it by typing "./qgpsdevice". I haven't run "make install" on my system, so I don't know what'll happen.

Overview

QGPS is a small GPS status program written from scratch in Qt. It is designed to work with a NMEA-compliant GPS device that outputs the GGA, GSA, GSV, and RMC strings. Aside from displaying latitude, longitude, and elevation, it also reports satellite signal strength (Signal to Noise Ratio) and positions in the sky using a custom widget (QSatelliteTrack). QGPS uses a custom class called QGPSDevice that inherits QThread, which allows it to read the data from the GPS in the background, while the GUI runs it's event loop, allowing full interaction with the program while listening to the GPS.

Also, I'm sure that there could be some good use of QGPSDevice and QGPSSatelliteTracker outside of this application. Any application written in Qt could use these classes to interface with a GPS, like a wardriving app or a plotter, etc. After I get this app semi-finallized, I'm going to build QGPSDevice and QGPSSatelliteTracker as plugins for Qt, so that others can incorporate them into their apps.

Features

So far, QGPS can:

Read a GPS reciever
Parse GGA, GSA, GSV, and RMC strings (mostly)
Display latitude, longitude, altitude, heading, speed, and magnetic variation, as well as satellite signal strength and positions
Displays UTC time in status bar
Can display NMEA output (needs work)

These are some features that I would like to see / am working on:

Read saved NMEA strings from a file and play back at a set speed
More robust interface to QGPSDevice and QSatelliteTrack
Being able to see the travelled satellite path in the QSatelliteTrack
Being able to see your travelled path
Compass / Pointer showing your direction
Configuration dialog - as of now, serial port is hard-coded (easy fix, just lazy)
Support for proprietary strings from Garmins, Magellans, Lorans, etc (might work on once I get my new StreetPilot :)
Prettier interface (icons, vertical progress bars, nicer status bar)
A Windows port would be cool :)
Whatever!!!

And, of course, some bugs I can't figure out yet:

Crashes unexpectedly sometimes with the following: "X Error: BadLength(poly request too large or internal Xlib length error) 16" (I think it has something to do with the updateEvent() function in QGPSSatelliteTrack)
Crashes unexpectedly sometimes with the following: "qgpsdevice: Fatal IO error: client killed" (has something to do with the QGPSDevice class, probably near read()???)
Satellites seem to bounce around really fast in the satellite tracker, maybe that's normal??? (perhaps my algorithm needs work)

Help Wanted!

Interested in helping me develop this program? No problem, just shoot me an email at neozenkai [ at ] cox [dot] net. My PGP public key is:

        
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Any help is appreciated, from debugging, GUI designing, translation, to new classes and widgets, etc. Just drop me a line and I'll get back to you if I can :)

Licensing / Copying

Oh, by the way, QGPS is FREE!!! Not only becuase of the Qt license, but because I am a firm believer in free software. QGPS is licensed under the GNU General Public License, a copy of which can be found here. You may use my code, as long as you give me credit for it!

About the Developer

I'm Robin Gingras, and I'm a programmer. I live in Florida, go to college, and I enjoy working with computers and cool devices like GPS recievers. I write in C, C++, Visual Basic, PHP, Python, and I'm learning Java and C#. I'm an advocate of free software, and every program that I write (barring licensing issues) is licensed under the GNU General Public License, or an equivalent free software license.