Euler Pole Calculator (EPC), version 2

The EPC software is able to estimate the Euler pole parameters of some points located on the Earth's surface within the same rigid tectonic block. I developed the software during my PhD research at Laval University and published the code first in 2014 on the SourceForge website. Since then, EPC got a good attention from the scientific community (over 60 citations according to Google Scholar). Recently in the Canadian Geodetic Survey, we are using this software for estimating and evaluating Euler pole parameters for the new North American reference frame of 2022 called NATRF 2022 (see this link). Mainly for this project, and also for making the software compatible with the newer versions of MATLAB, I updated the software to version 2.

The main window of the EPC software version 2

The new version comes with a couple of new features, bug fixes, and improvements, as follows:

 

New features:

• Origin Rate Bias (ORB) is read and estimated in the direct and inverse Euler pole problems, respectively.
• The scatter plot of the residuals are now plotted in a separate window.

Bug fixes:

• Tab order in the 'Euler Pole Parameters' panel was fixed.
• Rotation matrix in the 'topocentric2geocentric' function was corrected.
• Formula for calculating WRMS was corrected.
• The position or coordinates text box is now active and shows the current position of the mouse cursor over the map canvas.

General improvements:

• The release date of the software is printed in the welcome message at the command line and in the 'About' window (Help>About).
• The plot canvas from the lower right of the main window was removed.
• Sub-menu names changed under 'Calculate' menu: 'XYZ to LLO' changed to 'EPP XYZ to LLO', and 'LLO to XYZ' to 'EPP LLO to XYZ'.
• Added the 'Ctrl+S' shortcut for the 'File>Save...' menu.
• Added two new indicators in the status bar for 'ORB' and 'Nominal Sigma'. They can be set from 'File>Settings...' menu or by clicking on the indicators.
• Estimated velocities (output table) is now saved in scientific notation.
• 'WRMSE' changed to 'WRMS' in the main window.

Like previous versions, EPC version 2 is also available as an open source software program under the BSD license. The source code can be downloaded from the software home page at SourceForge. I am preparing a manuscript for publication to explain the new mathematical models implemented in the software as well as the results of estimating and evaluating the Euler pole parameters for NATRF2022. Stay tuned!

Addressing some processing errors in the Bernese software

I use the Bernese Processing Engine (BPE) of the Brenese GNSS software for my GPS data processing. This makes me capable to process a huge data set of RINEX observation files automatically. However, sometimes I get problem specially when I have a high number of files per day, or when I add a new station.

SINEX to GITSA GTS format conversion

Following my previous post, I recently developed a MATLAB script to convert SINEX format to GITSA GTS format, called 'snx2crd'. This script reads the SINEX output files and makes coordinates input files in the GTS format for the GITSA software.

PBO to GTS format conversion

Since the format conversion utility was removed from the current version of GITSA, users should write their own conversion script to convert their data to the GITSA native format (GTS).

EPC: Matlab software to estimate Euler pole parameters

Euler Pole Calculator (EPC) is a MATLAB software to estimate the Euler pole parameters of some points located on the Earth's surface within the same rigid tectonic block.

GDC: GPS Date Converter

GPS Date Converter (GDC) is a small utility to convert six different date formats, including: (1) decimal year, (2) year, month, day, (3) year, day of year, (4) GPS week, day of week, (5) Julian date, and (6) modified Julian date.

Geological setting of the Saint Lawrence valley

The Saint Lawrence valley region is located in an intra-plate tectonic setting since about 200 MYBP but has been the locus of several major tectonic events in the last approximately 1 GYBP