Gps Problems, Ambicom CF GPS Not Connecting Options

[misterearl]

Just bought an Ambicom/Billionton CF GPS on ebay. Although a few sources I found searching the web say this card works on insertion in a SL-5500, it of course doesn't work in mine. It shows up as a CF icon on the Z, but QueGPS doesn't see it at all. Do any of you have any tips on configuration in QueGPS that might be something to try? Or any other ideas? I suppose the GPS could be kaput, but I'd prefer not to entertain that thought, yet. Thanks.


Lee

[hvontres]

Just bought an Ambicom/Billionton CF GPS on ebay.  Although a few sources I found searching the web say this card works on insertion in a SL-5500, it of course doesn't work in mine.  It shows up as a CF icon on the Z, but QueGPS doesn't see it at all.  Do any of you have any tips on configuration in QueGPS that might be something to try?  Or any other ideas?  I suppose the GPS could be kaput, but I'd prefer not to entertain that thought, yet.  Thanks.


Lee

Try installing zroadmap. It comes with a GPS console that will show the active satelites and their signal strength. Also, you could play with gpsd from the command line. Be aware that QpeGPS will only work with the gpsd on the QpeGPS site. For more info on gpsd, check out the gpsd website. Running gpsd with the -D4 option should show you the NMEA sentences as they arrive. Another troubleshooting tip would be to just cat /dev/ttyS3 to see if the card is spiting out any data.

I hope this gets you going....

[dhns]

Another troubleshooting tip would be to just cat /dev/ttyS3 to see if the card is spiting out any data.

You should also try:
cardctl suspend
setserial -g /dev/ttyS3

if the latter says UART: unknown, try

setserial /dev/ttyS3 uart 16550A

finally, try

stty 4800 </dev/ttyS3
cardctl resume

-- hns

[misterearl]

Another troubleshooting tip would be to just cat /dev/ttyS3 to see if the card is spiting out any data.

You should also try:
cardctl suspend
setserial -g /dev/ttyS3

if the latter says UART: unknown, try

setserial /dev/ttyS3 uart 16550A

finally, try

stty 4800 </dev/ttyS3
cardctl resume

-- hns

Thanks very much for the troubleshooting tips, but... I am a rank amateur with PDAs in general, and the Zaurus is mostly a mystery to me. Where, exactly, am I to enter these commands? In the gpsd settings box in qpegps? In terminal? Sorry for the elementary level of my questions.

Lee

[totaln00b]

It might be suspending itself when you insert it into the zaurus. Once you've inserted it, in terminal, type cardctl status and report back what you get there. I can't guarantee to be able to help, but hopefully someone will!

Jo

[misterearl]

It might be suspending itself when you insert it into the zaurus. Once you've inserted it, in terminal, type cardctl status and report back what you get there. I can't guarantee to be able to help, but hopefully someone will!

Jo

Good call, totaln00b! The response in terminal is:
Socket 0:
3.3V 16-bit PC Card [suspended]
Socket 1:
no card

So, the question obviuously is: how do I un-suspend the card?
And another question is: why is Socket 1 showing no card? I have a 512MB SD card in the SD slot (which is functioning properly.) Is the CF slot in fact Socket 0?

Thanks for your help.

Lee

Between posts, I used this CF GPS card's PCMCIA adapter to check its function in a laptop - flawless - so the card integrity is definitely not the problem

[misterearl]

I managed to get the cardctl status to show:
Socket 0:
3.3V 16-bit PC Card
function 0: [ready]

by using the resume command hvontres posted,

but QpeGPS will still not see the GPS. BTW, I get a green GPSD status button, but a red GPS status button, and the message "*No GMT Signal rcvd*"

The Args: window says: -p /dev/ttyS0 -s 4800

and Host: local host Port: 2947

I tried "cat /dev/ttyS3" and got a frozen cursor in Terminal. Had to shut down and restart to get a functional prompt.

Thank goodness I have limitless patience and boundless optimism....


Lee

[totaln00b]

It might just be that you're not giving it long enough to get going. If you are getting a green gpsd icon, then that's fine. Mine then takes about five minutes to pick satellites up and set the time once it's got to that stage. If you are in a built up area it might take longer, but it needs at least 3 satellites, I think, for it to work. So patience is the name of the game...

[suid]

Change the Args to read "-p /dev/ttyS3 -s 4800" rather than ttyS0 and make sure you press <Enter> to save it - that should get things working.


Ian

[misterearl]

Change the Args to read "-p /dev/ttyS3 -s 4800" rather than ttyS0 and make sure you press <Enter> to save it - that should get things working.


Ian

That did it! Thanks, folks, for the tutorials. I had changed S0 to S3 but couldn't get it to "stick" - but once I hit Enter, I got a green GPS status indication immediately. I'm indoors right now (distraction of employment) so can't check satellite acquisition, but everything looks good - thanks again.

Lee

[misterearl]

Not content to leave well enough alone, I uninstalled qpeGPS and the reinstalled it to my SD card - for 2 reasons. When I installed it to the Z memory (as an attempt to get the GPS to work), it failed to show the few Expedia maps that it did when originally installed to the SD card; and I wanted to free up memory on the Z.

Now, the GPS fails to start AGAIN. I get a green gpsd button, but a red GPS button, as before. Cardctl status shows Ready, and the serial port is S3.

Must QpeGPS be run from the internal memory to function properly? BTW, this is version 0.9.2.3 Pre - is there a better version for the Z?

And, any idea how I can get back the Expedia maps (Western Europe mainly) that originally appeared with this package?

Thank you all.


Lee

[suid]

This all seems a bit strange ... have you managed to fix any of these problems yet ?

Can you provide a listing of /home/Zaurus/Settings/qpegps.conf ?

I've never run qpeGPS from SD card, but if there were no error messages when you installed it, then it it should be okay.

BTW, this is version 0.9.2.3 Pre - is there a better version for the

Just had a look at the download page and there's a newer version available - 0.0.2.3.1. See :-

http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.p...lease_id=162987

You'll also find the package qpegps_0.9.2.3_maps_arm.ipk there, which I think is a package of the maps that you're looking for.

Ian

[misterearl]

[quote=suid,Aug 18 2005, 03:47 AM]
This all seems a bit strange ... have you managed to fix any of these problems yet ?

Can you provide a listing of /home/Zaurus/Settings/qpegps.conf ?

<snip>

Here it is:

[color]
bearing=#000000
heading=#000000
noFix=#000000
ok=#000000
scale=#000000
[datum]
GpsDatum=1
MapsDatum=126
[download]
proxy=
[gps]
StartupMode=0
StartupPlace=
gpsd=-p /dev/ttyS3 -s 4800
host=localhost
port=2947
[icons]
[map]
path=/opt/Qtopia/qpegps/maps/
[show]
bearing=1
heading=1
time=1
[track]
path=
/home/QtPalmtop/qpegps/tracks
track_thick=2
updt_freq=10
[units]
altitude=2
distance=2
position=1
speed=3


I've installed version 0.9.2.3.1 pre, the latest available at SourceForge. This package is not accompanied by a maps component like most of the earlier version. When I try to install a maps package, the Z instructs me to uninstall the existing software first.

Previous attempts to run earlier versions - except for that brief moment when the GPS and everything else worked - have resulted in a green gpsd status button, a red GPS status button, and no map (only a crosshair) when running qpegps.

As the Brits say, it's gone pear-shaped. Thanks again for any suggestions. I'm tempted to reflash the ROM - Sharp 3.13 BTW.


Lee

[suid]

When I try to install a maps package, the Z instructs me to uninstall the existing software first.

Oops, yeah, it's actually a copy of qpeGPS and the maps. For some reason, this bundling wasn't continued in later releases. You could always just extract the maps and maps.txt from an earlier release and then copy them to your maps directory (/opt/Qtopia/qpegps/maps/). By the way, is that the directory where you're expecting the maps to be?

As for failure to pick up the GPS device, I can't thing of any helpful suggestions. If it worked once when installed to SD, it should work now. You could try running "qpegps" from the command line to see if any helpful error messages are produced.

What output do you get if you type "cardctl status" after starting qpeGPS?


Ian

[misterearl]

When I try to install a maps package, the Z instructs me to uninstall the existing software first.

Oops, yeah, it's actually a copy of qpeGPS and the maps. For some reason, this bundling wasn't continued in later releases. You could always just extract the maps and maps.txt from an earlier release and then copy them to your maps directory (/opt/Qtopia/qpegps/maps/). By the way, is that the directory where you're expecting the maps to be?

As for failure to pick up the GPS device, I can't thing of any helpful suggestions. If it worked once when installed to SD, it should work now. You could try running "qpegps" from the command line to see if any helpful error messages are produced.


What output do you get if you type "cardctl status" after starting qpeGPS?

It displays:
Socekt 0:
3.3V 16-bit PC Card
function 0: [ready]


Ian

Qpegps thinks they ought to be in /opt/Qtopia/qpegps/maps/ - I don't really know where to look.

Tried running qpegps from the Terminal prompt (with GPS CF card inserted) and I get:
card ready
stty: standard input: Input/output error
executing stty
stty: standard input: Input/output error
selection changed 0

With the GPS CF card removed, the identical messages are displayed, except the 1st is:
executing cardctl resume

Note that Qpegps starts in spite of the error messages.

Looks like there's a problem?

Thanks, Ian, for your persistence.

Lee