[Thumbgps-devel] USB handshake signals and Linux

[Patrick Maupin]

On Thu, Mar 15, 2012 at 1:31 PM, Eric S. Raymond <esr at thyrsus.com> wrote:

> As a workaround, GPSD picks up devices that report USB vendor-id/product-ID
> pairs associated with USB-to-serial adapters like the PL2303 that are
> commonly used for GPSes.  Because this is in fact the overwhelimingly
> most common use for USB-to-serial adapters, this bodge works for almost
> everyone almost all the time.

For what it's worth, FTDI will give you a free PID to use with their
VID with justification.  So we could have a VID/PID that uniquely
identifies our dongle, and/or a VID/PID that we can allow other
manufacturers to use for any dongle using an FTDI chip and meeting the
right specifications.

I don't know if Prolific has a similar program or not.