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Can someone educate me about GPS Extension Mics for portable radios? Specifically, I need to know what kind of backend server/hardware support is needed. I'm partiuclarly curious about the output format - is it NMEA or something else? The goal is to port the info into a 3rd party CAD system.

Outdoor Personnel Location Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) Feature

The personnel outdoor location tracking GPS feature enables a dispatcher the ability to locate on-foot patrols and out of the vehicle officers who are involved in life threatening situations. The radio user’s GPS position information is sent over the ASTRO 25 Integrated Voice & Data (IV&D) network and is delivered to the dispatch operator using a third party mapping display application at the dispatch center (Mapping Application is not yet available through Motorola at this time, however an Application Developers Tool Kit is available for 3rd party vendors to use to modify existing applications. See link below for more details.)

This capability is now available on ASTRO 25 Conventional IV&D Systems and ASTRO 25 Trunking IV&D Systems.

Required equipment for operating in ASTRO 25 Conventional IV&D is as follows:

* GPS enabled XTS 5000 portable radio with Radio Software version R06.01.00 or later; includes XTS5000 Models I, II, III and Ruggedized
o

Requires ASTRO CAI Operation Mode Software Q806
o

Requires System Enhancement Software H35 (or H37, H38 in Conventional Mode only)
*

XTS 5000 Customer Programming Software (CPS) version R06.00.00 or later (RVN4181)

* GPS Remote Speaker Microphone (HMN4080)

For fielded XTS 5000 Portables that are already Conventional IMBE Digital Enabled, see FLASHport upgrade Price Pages to order a software refresh to get the GPS enabled software.

During normal operation the radio's battery capacity will be reduced by 10% to 16% based on 1 location update per minute.

NOT COMPATIBLE with Man -Down Side Connector (NTN7660), Clamshell Battery Holder (Q495, Q496, NTN9177, NTN9183).

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System Components:

The personnel location tracking solution consists of the following components:

1.

ASTRO 25 Integrated Voice & Data (IV&D) System: The personnel location tracking using GPS solution uses the ASTRO 25 IV&D system's data pipe to transport the location information.
2.

GPS Enabled ASTRO XTS 5000 Portable Subscriber: The XTS 5000 acts as a voice communications device as well as the data communications device. The XTS 5000 portable two-way radio is the virtual source of the GPS location information and contains Motorola Location Request / Response Protocol (LRRP) software.
3.

GPS Remote Speaker Microphone (RSM): The GPS Remote Speaker Microphone (RSM) houses the GPS intelligence. It communicates location information to the radio, which is displayed to the radio user and can also be sent to the dispatch operator.
4.

ASTRO Presence Notifier Application: The ASTRO Presence Notifier Application provides the presence and absence information of subscriber radios (XTS 5000) to any compatible data applications located in the Customer Enterprise Network (CEN). It interfaces with data applications and subscriber radios using User Datagram Protocol / Internet Protocol (UDP/IP).
5.

ASTRO Location Application Developers Kit (ADK): The ASTRO Location Application Developer's Kit (ADK) contains the necessary interface documentation that a third party application developers needs to request and receive location data from a XTS 5000 portable subscriber that is equipped with a GPS Remote Speaker Microphone (RSM) on ASTRO 25 IV&D Systems.

Thanks for the response. Can you explain in "plain English" these components:

System Components:

GPS Enabled ASTRO XTS 5000 Portable Subscriber: The XTS 5000 acts as a voice communications device as well as the data communications device. The XTS 5000 portable two-way radio is the virtual source of the GPS location information and contains Motorola Location Request / Response Protocol (LRRP) software.

ASTRO Presence Notifier Application: The ASTRO Presence Notifier Application provides the presence and absence information of subscriber radios (XTS 5000) to any compatible data applications located in the Customer Enterprise Network (CEN). It interfaces with data applications and subscriber radios using User Datagram Protocol / Internet Protocol (UDP/IP).

Please post what you'd like to do and it might be possible to help.

The Motorola GPS command mics do not use NMEA but a compresed XML command set that is more efficient.

The trick is that you need to establish an IP connection over the P25 network to get at the position data. This is normally done over the network infrastructure. However, there are short cuts.

If you already have the data (from the network) then it is easy to plot on Google Earth by updating a KML file dynamically or by creating a position file for the mapping product of your choice. Another option is to convert it to NMEA and use a com port redirector to simulate a direct GPS connection but this last method is quite limited when you have a bunch of radios to track.

Also in other words, if you would like to use the Motorola data solution, your looking at a system that costs a few million $ to start....

The above describes what is needed with the portables. If you are looking for vehicles you can get away with fairly cheap systems that do not require massive amounts of infrastruture (unless you need very accurate and/or wide coverage). Think of the ham radio's APRS. Similar type of setup and there are quite a few vendors out there with a public safety grade solution.

If your desiring portable coverage, get your grant writing pen out and prepare for a capital expeniture.

I am a committee member looking to implement CAD at my duty station. I'm a former IT guy and on the committee for that knowledge and not the radio side. The radio guy is slacking off in Hawaii for 1.5 weeks and I'm trying to figure out what sort of backend we need for GPS portables. This is an existing radio system utilizing Motorola Spectra mobiles and portables, and Motorola consolettes.

At this time, we have a good understanding of the mobile AVL concerns. We're looking at the CES product and I understand that we need their vehicle unit, their receive "server", their software, and API to integrate with our possible CAD vendor. I was trying to figure out what we specifically needed to implement the GPS extension mics. Ideally, I need to know the names of the various parts and pieces so we can start requesting pricing info.

The Motorola GPS commander remote speaker mics, like the HMN4080 and HMN4084, only work in a Motorola P25 digital environment and only on the XTS2500 and XTS5000 portables. They work well but must b viewed as part of a reasonably complex solution. More information on the actual units is here:

http://www.motorola.com/governmentanden ... arison.pdf

It is actually possible to use them without the whole IV&D infrastructure in limited applications but this is not supported directly by Motorola.

However, what you describe is a more of a third party solution. In any case automated location systems are more complex than most people assume and would be a little hard to mange as a do it yourself project. As you suggest there is the problems of radio to mic compatibility, then getting the data back to base without annoying users with modem tones on the voice channel, then managing the display with issue like map datum system changes, etc.

Hello All,

I'm working on a solution to provide personnel location even in GPS-denied environments such as indoors. This solution is targeted for firefighters and we would like to transmit the data over P25 radios. We have successfully demonstrated this on non-Motorola P25 radios on a simplexed non-trunked mode. Basically, we send a NMEA sentence into the side port (RS232) of one radio and it transmits it to the other radio, which outputs the NMEA sentence to its side port via RS232.

Is anyone aware of a way to do something similar on the Motorola xts5000 radios? Specifically transmit data from one radio to another without using any other infrastructure.

Thanks for anyone's help.

Regards,
Keyne