bramfrank
BramFrank
OK, I admit it. I wrote this long post and then closed my browser before loading it. What a pain. Maybe this second go will be better? I don't think so, but here goes;
My son recently got his driver's license and has been racking up some miles with his friends. There is a navigator in the car that has a tracklog, but Robbie has been concealing his travels from me.
He's a good kid, but a bit secretive.
What to do?
My friend distributes a product called a GPS Snitch from a Canadian company called Blackline. The 'snitch comprises a small GPS/GSM tracking device in a housing with a battery that allows a charged unit to operate for a week or more. It can be vehicle powered, in which case everything apparently works 'better'. He sold me one at his cost. I subscribed for a year of service and wired it to the car's electrical system and stuffed the tracker under the dash.
Naturally, at about that time my son came to understand my concerns (explaining that navigators can also be useful in fighting tickets and defining locations to keep one out of trouble, and telling him that if the odometer and the navigator mileage were significantly different he'd lose his driving priviledges seems to have solved the problem) and now leaves the navigator on.
Even so, when he is out it is good to be able to see where he is and to sometimes check on his driving speed - and if anyone should steal the car I will be able to tell the authorities where it is . . . all of which got me to thinking that I might stick one on my bike. It certainly is small enough.
The thing uses a GPS receiver and reports over the local GSM cellular network under a variety of conditions;
1. It can be polled through their web based software
2. It can report on a schedule that can run for up to 2 weeks (at any time you can simply reinitialise the schedule) and get reports as often as every 15 minutes
3. It can report on motion - the motion alarm can be manually initialised from the unit or remotely over the network
4. It can report when the unit moves outside of a security perimeter. In this case it reports every 5 minutes for up to 2 hours, then resets the new perimeter to wherever it is and has stopped moving.
5. There's a 'continuous tracking' mode that gets reports sequentyially, as fast as the network allows - generally between every 10 and 30 seconds.
Reports include location, speed, heading and signal quality. They are stored in the provider's database and can be queried via the web. Their mapping is fully integrated with Google and the tracks can be exported to Google Earth as temporary waypoints if you wish.
You can also get reports if the device moves out of range or back into range of the cellular network, though these reports don't include location, speed and heading data for obvious reasons.
Reports of alarms and such can be delivered to your cell phone. I have internet access on my phone, so I can then take the report and display the car's location on receipt of a report if I wish.
The snitch is apparently also being used for tracking larger pets and to help people who may have relatives with Alzheimers - slip a unit in their pocket and they won't get TOO far from sight. Snitch is pretty small.
The company also has a neat Blackberry application that is free. You can set up your friends with the app and you can then use it to find out where they ar (if they've enabled the queries and you are on their list). You can also deal with your snitches. Not bad for 'free'.
They also seem to have an automatically arming variant for vehicle alarm use - it has an RFID tag you put on your key ring and if the car moves when the keys are not there, the unit sends an alarm and (I think) they will call the police if you set it up for that. There are also a marine unit to protect your watercraft and a personal safety unit - the latter has a panic button.
Service for the Snitch itself isn't free. For the Snitch there's a one time charge to start the account (waived on an a prepaid annual account) and the monthly fee is $15 . . . the annual fee is $169. I have no idea about the plans for their other products.
OK, I sound like a shill.
I plan to stick the device on my bike (here's the motorcycle content). Ought to be neat to set up a reporting shedule for the road trip and, in the event that the bike is stolen, it can be located.
Why am I posting this? Because I think that if I ask, we can probably set up a group buy for some minimum number of these things. I can't say if the service would be cheaper (because I haven't asked), but I suspect if we had enough people, they would give us a decent group discount.
The company's web site is www.gpssnitch.com
My son recently got his driver's license and has been racking up some miles with his friends. There is a navigator in the car that has a tracklog, but Robbie has been concealing his travels from me.
He's a good kid, but a bit secretive.
What to do?
My friend distributes a product called a GPS Snitch from a Canadian company called Blackline. The 'snitch comprises a small GPS/GSM tracking device in a housing with a battery that allows a charged unit to operate for a week or more. It can be vehicle powered, in which case everything apparently works 'better'. He sold me one at his cost. I subscribed for a year of service and wired it to the car's electrical system and stuffed the tracker under the dash.
Naturally, at about that time my son came to understand my concerns (explaining that navigators can also be useful in fighting tickets and defining locations to keep one out of trouble, and telling him that if the odometer and the navigator mileage were significantly different he'd lose his driving priviledges seems to have solved the problem) and now leaves the navigator on.
Even so, when he is out it is good to be able to see where he is and to sometimes check on his driving speed - and if anyone should steal the car I will be able to tell the authorities where it is . . . all of which got me to thinking that I might stick one on my bike. It certainly is small enough.
The thing uses a GPS receiver and reports over the local GSM cellular network under a variety of conditions;
1. It can be polled through their web based software
2. It can report on a schedule that can run for up to 2 weeks (at any time you can simply reinitialise the schedule) and get reports as often as every 15 minutes
3. It can report on motion - the motion alarm can be manually initialised from the unit or remotely over the network
4. It can report when the unit moves outside of a security perimeter. In this case it reports every 5 minutes for up to 2 hours, then resets the new perimeter to wherever it is and has stopped moving.
5. There's a 'continuous tracking' mode that gets reports sequentyially, as fast as the network allows - generally between every 10 and 30 seconds.
Reports include location, speed, heading and signal quality. They are stored in the provider's database and can be queried via the web. Their mapping is fully integrated with Google and the tracks can be exported to Google Earth as temporary waypoints if you wish.
You can also get reports if the device moves out of range or back into range of the cellular network, though these reports don't include location, speed and heading data for obvious reasons.
Reports of alarms and such can be delivered to your cell phone. I have internet access on my phone, so I can then take the report and display the car's location on receipt of a report if I wish.
The snitch is apparently also being used for tracking larger pets and to help people who may have relatives with Alzheimers - slip a unit in their pocket and they won't get TOO far from sight. Snitch is pretty small.
The company also has a neat Blackberry application that is free. You can set up your friends with the app and you can then use it to find out where they ar (if they've enabled the queries and you are on their list). You can also deal with your snitches. Not bad for 'free'.
They also seem to have an automatically arming variant for vehicle alarm use - it has an RFID tag you put on your key ring and if the car moves when the keys are not there, the unit sends an alarm and (I think) they will call the police if you set it up for that. There are also a marine unit to protect your watercraft and a personal safety unit - the latter has a panic button.
Service for the Snitch itself isn't free. For the Snitch there's a one time charge to start the account (waived on an a prepaid annual account) and the monthly fee is $15 . . . the annual fee is $169. I have no idea about the plans for their other products.
OK, I sound like a shill.
I plan to stick the device on my bike (here's the motorcycle content). Ought to be neat to set up a reporting shedule for the road trip and, in the event that the bike is stolen, it can be located.
Why am I posting this? Because I think that if I ask, we can probably set up a group buy for some minimum number of these things. I can't say if the service would be cheaper (because I haven't asked), but I suspect if we had enough people, they would give us a decent group discount.
The company's web site is www.gpssnitch.com
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