The Break Edit Instruction Format

The break instruction causes a processing program that's capable of recognizing such an instruction to start attempting to estimate a new satellite phase ambiguity value at the indicated epoch. Less formally, the instruction causes the program to "break" the satellite's phase continuity. This has value in circumstances where it is uncertain if a cycle slip has occurred and gives the data processing software a means to remove this uncertainty by forcing a cycle slip.

The format is very simple. The break instructions appear in a separate file, one per line. Each line contains the following, free formatted and separated by whitespace:

a satellite ID
station sequence number (always equals 1)
the year
month (January = 1)
day of month
hour (0 - 23)
minute (0 - 59)
second (0 - 59)

A sample file looks like:

    4  1  2004   9   8   7  39  30
    5  1  2004   9   8  13  45   0
    5  1  2004   9   8  14   5   0
    6  1  2004   9   8   8  45  30
    6  1  2004   9   8  11   5   0
    8  1  2004   9   8  22  45   0
    9  1  2004   9   8  10  50   0
    9  1  2004   9   8  14  28  30
   15  1  2004   9   8  12  10   0
   16  1  2004   9   8  21  25   0
   18  1  2004   9   8  11  55   0
   22  1  2004   9   8  11  55   0
   25  1  2004   9   8  15  56  30
   26  1  2004   9   8  12   7  30

$Id: break.html 24 2008-04-25 15:12:21Z mark $