All about GPS: Sherlock Holmes' Guide to the Global Positioning System [Illustrated] [Paperback]

Jerry Huang (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1588202542 | ISBN-13: 978-1588202543 | Publication Date: December 2000 | Edition: illustrated edition

How much fun is a Global Positioning System? Just ask Sherlock Holmes, Big Ben and science fiction writers, who have a go at GPS in this collection of fact and fantasy.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A delightful treatment of the GPS, I enjoyed the booklet very much! -- Ms. Dava Sobel, Author of the number 1 bestseller "Longitude". May 25, 1999

Marvelous! -- General James A. Abrahamson USAF retired, former director of Strategic Defense Initiative SDI or "Star War" program and NASA's associate administrator directing the Space Shuttle. July 1, 1997

WOW! Finally a GPS hi-tech literature everybody can read. It is GPS for fun and concepts. Up to the operation, applications and future of GPS. -- Dr. Young of Ace Investment Group. Dec. 1, 1997 --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

From the Publisher

You may think that Einstein, satellites, computers...things like that are esoteric. As a matter of fact, they can be fun and easy!

If you are not interested in any technical details, the suggested readings are Chapter 1, a modern Sherlock Holmes detective story. Chapter 4, A Tale of Two Brothers, the pseudo science fiction and Chapter 5, Navigation stories, the past and future. Chapter 2 and 3 are for those who feel like to know some more about GPS. Chapter 0 is the prelude.

This military state-of-the-art has made its way to the consumer electronics, GPS is in your everyday life. Many more applications are still waiting for your discovery of GPS! --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 132 pages
• Publisher: Authorhouse; illustrated edition edition (December 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1588202542
• ISBN-13: 978-1588202543
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,682,311 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great GPS intro for the layman!, March 14, 2000

By 

Gerald Petrey (Tucson, AZ United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: All About GPS: Sherlock Holmes' Guide to the Global Positioning System (Paperback)

This is a great, short introduction to GPS which is easy to read and understand and yet covers the essentials of GPS operation in a fun and interesting way. The author discusses a lot of scientific history and discoveries along the way to make it even more than just a GPS book. It should be inspiring to anyone with an interest in science and technology. The Sherlock Holmes story adds to the flavor of the book. As another brillant detective (and reviewer) deduced, the author's native language is not English and thus they are many grammatical errors but this does not take away much from the technical value of this book. As a GPS navigation systems engineer, I would highly recommend it to anyone with an interest in how GPS really works.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The beginners' best choice!, February 16, 2000

By 

Steve Linmaze (Silicon Valley, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: All About GPS: Sherlock Holmes' Guide to the Global Positioning System (Paperback)

I checked the book's accompanying web site ALLGPS.com before I bought it. If a reader is looking for good examples of the fundamental sciences, modern technologies and GPS resources, I think this is it. The other reviews also acknowledge it is the first rate in GPS. While it is a good idea to suggest a surrogate writer, I can not see this easy and fun GPS entry level booklet may cause any upset. English, being the language of the world, is a means of communication, not for rhetoric only. As a decent teacher and fair critic, I'd like to say this book is very helpful to my science class.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars cacher, October 11, 2006

By 

cacher (Texas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: All About GPS: Sherlock Holmes' Guide to the Global Positioning System (Paperback)

This book is an easy read - however, it reads like it was first written in some other language, then translated to english. Lots of good factual information about how GPS works, but I just can't get over the poor grammar. One of the reasons I bought the book is it says Gen Abrahamson was a reviewer. Given the poor grammar, etc., I seriously doubt that Gen Abe read this, much less made any comments about it. It would not have passed his test.