Week 11: Coordinate Systems and GPS

Presentation Slides

• Tuesday — Coordinate Systems and Projections — A refresher: datums, projections, and coordinate systems as decisions — distortion, units, and choosing a CRS for analysis.
• Thursday — GPS and Positioning — A refresher: how satellite positioning works, what limits its accuracy, and what that means for field data.

Press F for fullscreen and P for presenter view with speaker notes.

In-Class Practice

Self-check quizzes — not graded; open them on a phone or laptop as often as you like:

• Projections and Datums — Five questions on datums against projections, what every projection has to give up, and why a coordinate system is a decision rather than a setting.
• Where Am I? — Five questions on how a receiver turns a radio signal into a position: what it measures, why the extra satellite pays for the receiver's own clock, why satellite geometry matters, and what differential correction cannot remove.

Lab Assignment

Lab 10 — Avalanche Hazard

Due Saturday at 11:59 pm as one PDF report on Learning Suite — 50 points.

Reading Quiz

Read Chapters 3 and 5 of GIS Fundamentals, 7th edition (Bolstad).

Quiz 9 — Coordinate Systems and GPS on Learning Suite: open book, done independently. Due Saturday at 11:59 pm — 20 points.

Note

If you see a discrepancy between Learning Suite and this page, please let me know so I can rectify it.