Who knows about GPS system?

Can assisted-GPS devices be considered part of the actual Global Positioning System (i.e. user-end)?

• Assisted-GPS only devices, such as iPads with only an A-GPS chip, acquire their orbital data from a server somewhere on the surface of the earth. An actual GPS receiver receives it directly from a satellite. Some A-GPS devices, like the previously mentioned iPads, do not receive their orbital data from a satellite as they do not actually have a GPS receiver (correct me if I'm wrong and please state your source). So can these devices then still be considered part of the GPS? Or should one just consider the combination of both the A-GPS server and an A-GPS device to be an example of the user-end of the GPS? And can the A-GPS chip be considered a GPS receiver (even though it doesn't actually receive data from orbit to do any localization)? I had a very lame discussion about this today, and I think it all boils down to what one considers to be part of the user-end of the GPS.

• Answer:

  If it receives signals from the GPS satellites, even of it uses WAAS or A-GPS, it is GPS. A-GPS, in part receives the almanac from cell towers, because it is much quicker to do that (they are have their own GPS receivers), than find the satellites and trickle download the almanac. It can also provide offset data, to provide better GPS accuracy, by sending the difference between where GPS says it is, and where it actually is. If a device that provides your location it relies on data exclusively from earth based infrastructure, it technically isn't GPS.