When your visiting a strange country or city wouldn’t it be nice to be able to push a button on a hand held device, and find out exactly where you are. With the advancements that have been made with technology people are able to do this today with a GPS locator.
For safety and convenience, there are GPS locators that have been designed to look like wrist watches for children, and they are able to help parents keep track of their children at all times. Some GPS services can be tracked through a family’s home computer, while others are designed to connect to a GPS service system and a child’s location can be learned by making a phone call. A child’s location can be tracked to within five feet. This type of service can provide the parent with the nearest street address of their child, or if its requested they can contact emergency services.
Still other GPS locator units are installed in cell phones and its location can be tracked with a simple phone call. You can contact the location unit using your telephone and the cell phones whereabouts can be quickly located. As long as your child is carrying a GPS device, you can feel comfortable knowing that you will be able to locate your child anywhere using your GPS locator unit.
Keep Tabs On Anything Important To You
You can track virtually anything you want to with a GPS locator since the size of these units have grown significantly smaller over the past few years. You could even use one to track down and locate your luggage if it does not arrive on the same plane as you did, this makes finding lost luggage a lot easier for airlines. It won’t get your luggage to you any faster, but with a GPS locator inside of your suitcase you know will know where luggage is located, and how fast it is being returned to you.
With a GPS locator unit hidden inside your vehicle, you will have an extra set of eyes on the new driver in your household that is trying to earn your trust while they are driving your car. If they tell you they spent the day in school, but the GPS locator unit tells you they were at a nearby amusement park, you can use this knowledge to teach your child a lesson in honesty.
By: G. Mira
Posts Tagged ‘Home Computer’
How GPS Locators Help Find Lost People And Vehicles
December 27th, 2009Free GPS Software
November 24th, 2009
I took a look at some of the online offers for free GPS software and found, like many “free” offers there were often limits and provisos involved. Often the freeware is a scaled–down version of purchasable products. Sometimes the free product has restricted functionality with features disabled, other products are trial–based and are disabled after a certain time (hours or days or use).
An example of limited free GPS software can be found at GPS Utility. The downloadable freeware is limited 100 waypoints and 500 track points. (There are 65,000 of each in the registered version of their program.) The free program gives you a good opportunity to try before you buy, and this is the benefit of most free programs.
There are online sites that list various free GPS software and describe how to use the programs after you download them. Often individuals who have used the programs themselves develop the sites. These are great because they give you an unbiased interpretation of the benefits and disadvantages of the programs before you use them.
Using free GPS software you can download programs that allow you to retrieve and display aerial photos, topographical maps, USGS landmarks. There are programs available that allow you import scanned images and add latitude and longitude points and other data.
Free GPS software downloads are available for PDA units that are capable of communication with GPS receivers. With these downloads you can have a useful navigation assistant, location database manager, and GPS data converter.
Programs to manage GPS waypoint and route files are available for both PC and Mac users. The waypoints and route files can be saved or converted to various formats used by other mapping programs.
If you need to transfer information to and from your GPS receiver and your home computer or laptop there are several free programs that allow you to do so. There are also programs that allow Garmin GPS receivers to “talk” to one another.
Many of the programs listed here are directed at the hiking/trekker community, but there are also free programs available for auto GPS systems and marine navigational systems. I found a couple of marine navigation programs that allow you to download nautical charts and plotters.
There are free GPS software programs that allow you to download street maps that might not be included in your auto–navigation system. If you intend downloading in–vehicle software, make sure that it has audio capacity, an essential safety factor for motorists. One such program offers data for several countries with voice guidance in twelve languages.
Free GPS software is also available for downloading to your cell phone. This is mostly tracking software and can be phone specific. You might want to check with your carrier before downloading anything to your cell phone to make sure that it does not incur extra charges.
As satellites are constantly moving, it is helpful to know the optimal time for data collection in your area. There is free GPS software that includes an almanac to let you know the availability of satellites at any given time.
Some of the free GPS software is brand specific. Programs designed for a Garmin receiver may not work for a Magellan, so check out the specifications carefully, especially if you intend purchasing a registered version after your trial period. Other software works with most brands.
By: Anne King
