Learning EGNOS

The EGNOS Project Office is making valuable contributions to the training and education of future GNSS professionals. ESA provided services like the EMS (EGNOS Message Server) and SISNeT (Signal-In-Space through the interNET), which were developed to enhance satellite navigation applications have also been found to be largely effective in SBAS (Satellite Based Augmentation System) education. There have been guest lectures in universities all over Europe and in addition some software tools based on the above mentioned services have been developed.

The first release of the SISNeTlab software was in the year 2005 followed by an updated version 2.0 in 2006. The year 2006 also saw the release of two new easy to use software tools, the SISNeT User Application Software and the SBAS TeACHER. The EGNOS book, published by ESA was released in the year 2007. The EGNOS User Guide for application developers was released in 2009. The SBAS MeNTOR arrived in 2009 and the SBAS Simulator in 2010.

A User Guide for EGNOS Application Developers is available and can be downloaded from the website of CNES.

In addition to the practical approach, the EGNOS Book (Ref: SP1303) will be a valuable resource for SBAS students, teachers and other GNSS professionals. This book produced by ESA and industry is a technical book and presents a complete view of the EGNOS mission, system and architecture; provides a review of key GNSS fundamental concepts; introduces other existing/planned SBAS systems; presents and discusses EGNOS performance and applications; and has dedicated Chapters for the future GNSS systems, including GALILEO and the planned modernisation programmes of GPS, Glonass and EGNOS.

Under the excellent technical supervision of our Editors, Dr.Javier Ventura-Traveset (European Space Agency) and Dr.Didier Flament (Alcatel Alenia Space), this book has been mostly co-authored by people working at the companies and organisations which worked very hard during the 8 years of EGNOS development and qualification and contributed to the success of EGNOS; from the European Space Agency, European organisation in charge of the EGNOS Technical development, to Alcatel Alenia Space, EGNOS Industry Prime Contractor, to the over 40 European companies, all around Europe.

This book can be ordered through the ESA publications.

The SBAS Simulator is a is a satellite based navigation systems simulation software. The main concept which led to the creation of the SBAS Simulator was to allow understanding and learning SBAS systems. Therefore, the tool is dedicated to everybody, from general to professional, with an interest in SBAS systems. It is a system volume simulator which allows providing performance based on simplified macro models.

One of the first tools released to the education community, SISNeTlab is a user-friendly tool to quickly and easily post-process the EGNOS messages archived on the EMS (EGNOS Message Server). With its numerous functionalities this tool also serves to monitor the EGNOS performance with the help of graphical results. After the success of its first release in 2005, the version 2.0 of this tool was released at the end of 2006, incorporating a lot more functionalities.

The SISNeT User Application Software is an application which analyzes in real time the EGNOS messages sent by the internet-based SISNeT server and display their contents through a user friendly graphical interface. This tool was intitally developed to help users develop their own applications based on the SISNeT platform. In addition to this primary functionality, it was realised that this tool had a potential for the educational community. Hence it was later adapted to also fit the use of an EGNOS student and is today one of the pillars of the EGNOS project office contribution to education.

ESA in association with Iguassu software systems has developed a simple tool, aptly named the SBAS MeNTOR (SBAS MEssage GENeraTOR). This tool is an evolution of the SBAS TeACHER and allows to create or decode a sequence of SBAS messages over a selected time period. While the SBAS TeACHER allows to encode or decode one SBAS message at a time, the SBAS MeNTOR can work with EMS like files for data over a selected time period.

The SBAS TeACHER (SBAS Tool for Education And Contributor to Harness EGNOS Research) developed by Iguassu Software Systems for ESA is a Teacher in the true sense. It allows the user to build a SBAS message from scratch. It clearly shows the various components of the EGNOS message including Preamble, Message Type, the Message and the CRC. Likewise it also allows to decode a given message. This completes a suite of tools developed by ESA to serve the educational community.

The EGNOS newsletter in December 2006 was a special issue dedicated to the contribution of EGNOS to the education community.