SparkFun RTK Mosaic - X5 - Setting Lat/Long to match output format

GPS/GNSS Enclosed Products
1

Hi SparkFun,

I purchased your SparkFun RTK Mosaic - X5 system in May for my lab.

How do you configure the Latitude/Longitude output to match “format” (Degrees, Minutes, Seconds -or- Degrees, Decimal Minutes):

  1. On the SparkFun RTK Mosaic - X5 screen

  2. On the Septentrio software GNSS Position page. I have the most current firmware loaded 4.14.10.1

Yes both the two positions are the “same” when converted in the same format.

I would like both formats to match.

Is this possible?

I am not currently using the ESP32 in the SparkFun RTK system.

Thanks,

2

Hi @JeffM ,

I believe the Position format on the X5’s internal web page is fixed in Degree, Minute, Decimal Seconds format. I don’t think it can be changed.

The position displayed on the OLED is copied directly from the NMEA GGA sentence. That format is fixed in Degrees, Decimal Minutes.

To make the format match, you would need to replace this line of code. You would need to parse the Lat DDMM.MM data and convert to DD MM SS.SS. Repeat for the Long(itude). Recompile using the Espressif IDF and upload to the ESP32. The code was compiled and tested using IDF v5.1.1.

If you want to have a go at this, please do. If you need us to do it, please open an Issue on the GitHub repo and we’ll try to find time to implement it. (No promises on how long that will take…)

Thank you for your interest in our product. It was fun to develop. The X5 is such a great chip…

Best wishes,
Paul

3

Hi Paul,

Yes you have developed a very powerful GNSS product using the X5. Looks like Ublox is playing “catch-up” with releasing the X20 this week. I see you have “pre-orders” for the board.

Let me see if I can change the code and program an external ESP32 first. I don’t want to make changes and brick my X5.

Thanks for the help.
Thank for making great products!

Jeff

4

Hi Jeff,

These instructions may help:

Cheers,
Paul

1 Like
5

Thank you Paul.

6

Hi @JeffM ,

I’ve just released version 1.0.4 of the RTK mosaic-X5 firmware. It contains the DD MM SS.SSSS formatting change you requested.

Please note that:

The time shown on the OLED is UTC, whereas the time shown on the X5 web page is GPS. There is an 18 second difference between the two - GPS time does not include leap seconds.

The altitude shown on the OLED is altitude above Mean Sea Level. The altitude shown on the X5 web page includes the Geoid separation. For me in the UK, that’s a difference of ~47m. You can recompile and upload the code with the RTK_X5_DISPLAY_ALT_WITH_GEOID_SEPARATION configuration setting selected, then the two will be the same.

Enjoy!
Paul

8

Paul,
The new code (bin file) works great. The LAT/LONG format on the SparkFun RTK screen matches the Mosaic web interface format.

  1. Down loaded the new ZIP file at: Software Setup - Product Manual - SparkFun RTK mosaic-X5 to a PC. UnZip file.
  2. Opened the FIRMWARE folder.
  3. Erased the code on the ESP32 by running the ESP32_FLASH_ERASE batch file.
  4. Programmed the ESP32 by running the ESP32_FLASHER batch file that uploads the new RTK_mosaic-X5_Firmware.bin file located in the build folder.

Everything works great!

Thank you for your support.

Jeff

9

You’re welcome Jeff - thanks for the feedback