Decoding PPP Corrections From BDS B2b Signals Using a Software-Defined Receiver: An Initial Performance Evaluation

Abstract

With the rapid development of China's BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS), the application of real-time precise point positioning (RTPPP) based on BDS has become an active research area in the field of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS). BDS has provided the service of broadcasting RTPPP information. It indicates that BDS has become the second satellite system that provides RTPPP services, following Galileo among the GNSS, but work based on this direction has yet to be explored. Therefore, this paper evaluates the performance of precise point positioning (PPP) service using a software-defined receiver (SDR). An experiment was carried out to verify the feasibility of the SDR. The PPP-B2b signal was processed to obtain PPP service information, including orbit corrections, clock corrections, and differential code bias corrections. The time-varying attributes of these corrections of BDS and GPS are evaluated, and the integrity and stability of the PPP service were analyzed. The results show the PPP-B2b signal can stably provide PPP services for satellites in the Asia-Pacific region, including centimeter to decimeter-level orbit corrections and meter-level clock corrections for BDS satellites. At the same time, PPP services provide decimeter to meter-level orbit correction and meter-level clock correction for GPS satellites. Finally, detection tip for bitstream availability in SDR is proposed. Some content which is not defined in the official document, such as the PPP-B2b frame arrangement, various correction update cycles and the progress of PPP service are discussed.