It’s important in real estate, and also in navigation sports such as orienteering and ARDF. Fundamentally, all location information is the same. Whether it is derived using map and compass or received as a latitude and longitude from a GPS instrument: a location is simply a position on Earth.
If you are only carrying a map and compass then a lat/lon position will not be of much use to you. You need a position that is referenced to your map. With a map-referenced location, you can point to where you are on the map, and identify feature locations relative to where you are standing. You can derive optimal routes to where you need to go. You’ve got all you need.
If, in addition to a map and compass, you are carrying a handheld computer, then a lat/lon position becomes much more useful to you. Although a lat/lon position is not referenced to your map, it is referenced to the Earth’s surface. So with a single known position on your map (such as a waypoint set at the Start) lat/lon data can be referenced to your map, allowing you to view your distance and magnetic compass direction relative to the Start. That information can be provided in text format in meters and bearing angle in degrees magnetic so that a glance will give you immediate confirmation of your approximate location on the map.
But a lat/lon position can be much more useful than that, especially if you have lots and lots of lat/lon positions and a computer capable of calculating great-circle trigonometry equations. Just about all modern micro-controllers can do that. Here is a sampling of some of the cool features that can be readily implemented using GPS location and compass direction information:
o A display of your complete track since leaving the Start along the path to your current location.
o Any waypoints you set along the way, such as fox locations.
o The exclusion zones around the Start and any found foxes, and your position relative to those exclusion zones.
o Bearings you have taken and the precise locations at which they were taken.
o Intersections of the bearings you have taken and an estimated location of the fox based on those intersections.
o Distance and compass direction to the estimated fox locations – even an arrow (or audio indication) pointing the way.
o Straight-path navigation guidance with cross-track error in any direction you choose.
o Distance traveled along your route or any segment of your route.
o More. How much more depends on one’s imagination, know-how, and processing power.
Although a graphical display (no map needed) would be ideal for presenting the above information, audio tones and synthesized voice played in one’s headphones can be even more effective at allowing one’s eyes to remain on the paper map and trail ahead.
There seems to be general agreement that showing a competitor their map location would provide an unfair advantage. But is it a greater advantage than all the navigation assistance that lat/lon location data can provide? We shouldn’t be surprised that GPS simplifies a navigation sport. Map position and latitude/longitude are exactly the same things: positions on Earth’s surface.
Some will argue that their GPS equipment doesn’t work all that well, and isn’t much of an advantage. That might be true right now. But that will change. ARDF receiver builders don’t have the skills and knowledge of smartphone or GPS device manufacturers. But take a look at some of the GPS-based apps available for Android and iOS, or features of handheld GPS devices. They use GPS data, standard position filtering algorithms, and widely-available trigonometric equations. The apps and devices aren’t optimized for ARDF, but they provide many of the features listed above. And they do them very well indeed. That is the future.
There is an unwritten rule that most competitors recognize upon seeing it, even if they had never contemplated it before: ARDF competitors should not receive navigation assistance from man-made signals coming from outside the competition boundary. It would not be fair play for observers to radio their bearing measurements to their friends competing on the course. How, then, is it right for competitors to carry receivers that let them receive navigation assistance from Earth-orbiting satellites? ARDF is about using the fox signals for navigation – that is what defines ARDF.
GPS, GLONASS, and similar technologies are not comparable to having a receiver that displays a fox’s signal strength. They aren’t even comparable to having a processor convert the signal strength to an estimate of meters to the fox. Navigation systems providing lat/lon position data work unlike any other type of instrument and support features that no other technology can. They hand you location. Your precise location. No thinking required.
I like GPS very much. I have worked with it professionally and as a hobby. It can do tremendous things. It might be used to help simplify navigation sports to avoid discouraging beginners. It definitely simplifies course design and supports accurate course setting. As much as I like GPS technology, I would never want to compete against it.
