Example exam questions for Geodesy and

Positioning (GIS-E1010)

October 25, 2016

1 Questions regarding concepts

1. Explain how Eratosthenes determined the size of the Earth.

2. Explain the principle of triangulation, as practiced by Snellius.

3. Explain (with a sketch!) triangulation using a plane table and alidade.
4. What was the purpose of the expeditions organized by the French Academy
of Sciences to Peru and Lapland?

5. What hypotheses did Newton and Huygens use to estimate the attening
of the Earth? How realistic were their estimates?

6. Explain the concept of height datum, and give an example.

7. How are orthometric heights dened?
8.
h = H + N.
Explain the meanings of the symbols.

9. Explain the focusin g of a measurement telescope.

10. Explain (with sketches) how an automatic level (self-levelling instrument)
works.

11. Name the three axes of a theodolite. Which of these should be perpen-
dicular on each other? What are the names of the errors when they are
not?

12. Explain the principle of forced centering, and what it is used for.
13. Discuss ambiguity resolution in electronic distance measurement. Making
a sketch would be a good idea.

1
14. What does it mean when a co-ordinate reference system is said to be
geocentric ?
15. Explain the dierence between an inertial and a co-rotating (Earth cen-
tered, Earth xed) geocentric co-ordinate reference system.

16. How does a hyperbolic radio navigation system (e.g., DECCA) work?
17. Explain the dierences between broadcast and precise ephemeris.
18. Discuss the various dierence quantities that can be constructed from GPS
observations, and what they are good for.

19. Describe the precession of the equinoxes.

20. What was the basic idea of the GRACE satellite mission?

21.
 
77.624 K/hPa 64.70 K/hPa 5748 K
NM = 106 ·(nM − 1) = (p − e)+ 1+ e.
T T T

Explain the meanings of the symbols.

2 Calculation questions (function calculator re-

quired)
1. Given is an angle α = 55◦ 160 3200 . Convert this angle to

(a) radians1 , and

(b) gons2 .

2. In a deck of playing cards, there are four cards for each of the numbers
2  10, and for the ace, which we give the number 1, and jack (11), queen
(12), and king (13). Calculate the expectancy for the number of a card ran-
domly drawn from a 52-card pack. The expectancy formula for a discrete
stochastic quantity n is
N
. X
E {n} = i · p (i) ,
i=1

with p (i) the probability of outcome i.3

1 α = 0.964, 740, 440, 313 rad
2 α = 61.417, 283, 950, 617 gon
3 E {n} = 7.

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3. The geodetic forward and inverse problems in the map plane. Given is a
point A:

xA = 6, 600, 000.000 m,
yA = 550, 000.000 m,

and measurements (azimuth and distance) to point B :

αAB = 150 gon,

sAB = 707.107 m.

(a) Solve the forward geodetic problem for point B .4

(b) Given a third point C :

xC = 6, 601, 414.214 m,
yC = 548, 585.786 m,

Solve the inverse geodetic problem for points A and C .5

xB = 6, 599, 500.000 m,
yB = 550, 500.000 m.

αAC = 350 gon,

sAC = 2000 m.