When pressing the GPS button in the Control Panel the hardware will be scanned for a GPS device. All available serial ports are opened and checked if they are delivering valid GPS data. This takes 2 seconds. Be sure that the correct baudrate for the GPS device has been set in the Settings menu (standard rate: 9600).

If no device is detected the button will be released. If a device has been found the button changes the color according to the numbers of satellites which have been fixed by the device: Red up to 3 satellites, yellow up to 5 and green if 6 satellites or more are available. The number of satellites, longitude, latitude and altitude delivered from the GPS device are displayed in the info line of the Control Panel beneath the status.

The current position will be shown by a GPS marker if an appropriate background map has been loaded. If GPS Track in the Settings window is checked, the movement of the position will be drawn as a line string on the background map. The color and stroke thickness are similar to the last adjustment for lines. When switching off the GPS button again, the track will be added to the sample list automatically and could be saved for future documentation purposes.