On-ground testing for airborne GX solutions

On-air satcom solution testing and demonstration is the most common way for developers to assess satellite communications solutions and applications. Thorough testing and testing of corner cases can be both expensive and time consuming if not altogether impossible.

Testing new GX applications, usually requires an aeroplane to be at your disposal, and even then you cannot control conditions. But a new product now aims to make it possible to perform testing of GX solutions on the ground, saving time and money while allowing developers to expose applications to a wider range of scenarios than is possible to reproduce during a flight.

The Danish sitcom company, GateHouse Telecom, has applied new features to the company’s flagship product, the Global Xpress Link Emulator (GLE), which are specifically targeted the challenges characterising the aviation industry.

“When performing on-air testing for aircraft applications, you must bring a terminal and antenna with you onboard the aeroplane, and you must maintain line of sight to the satellite throughout the test. Furthermore, you cannot control weather conditions and expose your application to rough weather, such as thunder and rain. But with our new Aero-features, developers can emulate a flight trip and expose their solution to different challenges that may occur during a voyage. This enables an efficient way to test and document solutions response to common distortions,” Svend Holme Sørensen, Product Manager at GateHouse Telecom, said.

Connectivity is a must have for most airlines today. Eighty-two carriers now offer inflight WiFi, which is a 17% increase since last year, according to the 2018 WiFi Report by Routehappy. Airlines across the globe are building their connectivity and are making considerable investments in GX solutions to enhance the passenger experience.

Thomas Jensen, Director at GateHouse Telecom, stated: “As we move further into the era of ‘Connectivity’, the year 2018 and beyond is likely to see the aviation industry incorporating more and more onboard systems and hereby normalising inflight WiFi for passengers.”

The GLE is an off-air test tool that emulates a Ka-band connection with realistic bandwidth and latency. It is already used by leaders in the global satcom market, such as Honeywell, VT iDirect and Inmarsat. Gatehouse has now built on the GLE technology and applied new features designed specifically for developers servicing the aviation industry.

Satellite switching and handover imitates satellite switch, which is of course necessary for fast moving applications such as GX solutions on aeroplanes. Moreover, with the new features, the GLE can also manipulate SNR levels to emulate poor bandwidth caused by bad weather conditions or excessive use.

Svend Holme Sørensen continued: “The new features make the GLE more flexible and able to fully emulate any situation an application might experience when used on an aeroplane. With the GLE you can interface to a Network Service Device (NSD), so developers can imitate a scenario that force the application to switch between GX and BGAN. This mode can be used to test the NSD, but also all applications attached to it.”

Finally an open API provides developers and testers with a programmable interface for automising test setup, execution, monitoring and extract of test results.

Even though the new features are primarily built for developers servicing the aviation industry, they can also be used to test other software solutions, such as applications made for developers and users that are exposed to rough weather conditions.