Premise: A small change to SmartDirt that enables RTK instruments and uses a modified version of Put Me Here to give relative positioning. Sort of a laser like use case that simply gives a steady measurement based on RTK without the normal RTK use overhead.

Features

• Enable RTK instruments in SmartDirt (main focus is likely cell based but for the experiment leave all)
• Normal Lat-Long benchmarking is used by default. With no user intervention the result is just a very steady, consistent position. This doesn't make the alignment correct it just yields a steady position when fixed. (need to display instrument state somewhere
• Create a more advanced version of Put Me here:
  • Put me here with the internal phone GPS behaves the same as it does now.
  • There are several new options
    • Set Elevation allows the user to set the elevation of the current location.
  • A put me here realigns based the selected point/given elevation

Put Me Here Functions

Starting a list

• Put Me Here (no RTK)
• Put Me Here (RTK set position and elevation to the point)
• Set Elevation (for session)
• Set Rotation (RTK only, 2nd Benchmark equivalent) (do we display alignment report?, Do we Save)
• Clear Put Me Here (Back to original file settings)

With the Autonomous location SmartDirt remains the same as it currently is and has no new interface. This is the initial state when going into the program. The RTK device must be selected out of Settings to start use of RTK and extend this feature set.

With RTK available the GPS settings screen changes to look like this:

With RTK chosen as an instrument, picking a point and pressing and holding on the GPS icon presents a larger amount of choices.

Put Me Here with RTK enabled is way different than the autonomous version. Picking a point and doing a Put Me here essentially does an RTK alignment with that selected point and keeps the rotation angle established by the original two Lat-Long benchmarks. The elevation of that point is used to set any elevation offset. After pressing put me here the program prompt “Hold rod steady, does a countdown of three seconds and shoots to figure a five shot median.

Set Elevation is designed to create an accurate elevation offset to measure off a known grade without necessarily knowing the x,y position to high accuracy. It's a put me here just for elevation. For example, if I know a manhole's elevation I could setup over it, select Set Elevation, Key in the elevation at the prompt and then execute the “Hold rod steady, countdown then 5 shot sample like we do for put me here. Anything I moved to after that would show me the new elevation relative to what I had keyed in. The location would still be related to the original Benchmark Lat-Long position

2nd Point Rotation is the equivalent to shooting the second benchmark in a SmartGrade alignment. I'm debating whether to show a quick report of the deviation or even allow saving of the alignment. For now don't do either a deviation report or saving.

Clear the same as in autonomous put me here. The alignment is reset to the original Lat-Long Benchmarks alignment.

My inclination at this point is to make any of the put me here stuff only last for the session.

With an RTK put me here the cut/fill between surfaces disappears, the cut/fill between the GPS and the reference surface displays in big numbers (ala' SmartBlade), and the reference surface slides down with the shot elevation shown above it. The satellite count shows next to the GPS icon. The screen looks something like this:

Another effect is that the Track now records RTK data with elevation as survey data instead of track data and photos use the RTK lat long for positioning.

My thoughts at this time are that the RTK is an optional add-on for SmartDirt. This is strictly speculative and I'd like the first versions as a separate branch that may never go out the door. If it does become a sales product I can see a couple of paths. The first is to add this to SmartDirt and just raise the price on subsequent licenses. This is the simplest. Second option is to add an RTK license that in combination with SmartDirt turns on the more advanced GPS settings pages and enables this functionality. Don't do anything on this one for now.

We currently save GPS configuration as an XML file in the AGTEK folder. There is no sharing of it unless the user uses an outside program along with Dropbox and the like to backup this file. It's not a big deal with base/rover style configuration but the cell-base systems have way more configuration required. And any one character mistake creates an error that's finicky to identify. Long passwords, user ids, mount points, APN settings all make for a more fiddly system to setup than is preferable. The nature of the system means that all those things are pretty necessary but we may be able to share settings through access to smooth out subsequent installations and sharing of equipment. This is not something required for this story

Joe Foreman is out on a site and wants to check an elevation of a pads. Since it's a stakeless site he has very few references but he knows the first pad has been certified and it should be at elevation 455.3. He walks into the middle of the pad and presses and holds on the compass icon. He chooses set elevation and keys in 455.3 or picks “Reference Elevation” . The program takes two shots and sets the elevation offset based on either the keyed in value or the design grade at that point. From then on in that session the offset is used to calculate the cut/fill (on main screen) against the reference surface instead of the two surface calc. We blank that value and display the cut/fill similar to SmartBlade on the main screen.