Analysis of GIOVE-A signals is an important part of the in-orbit validation phase of the Galileo program. GIOVE-A transmits the ranging signals using all the code modulations currently foreseen for the future Galileo and provides a foretaste of their performance in real-life applications. Due to the use of advanced code modulations, the ranging signals of Galileo provide significant improvement of the multipath performance as compared to current GPS. In this paper, we summarize the results of about 1.5 years of observations using the data from four antenna sites. The analysis of the elevation dependence of averaged multipath errors and the multipath time series for static data indicate significant suppression of long-range multipath by the best Galileo codes. The E5AltBOC signal is confirmed to be a multipath suppression champion for all the data sets. According to the results of the observations, the Galileo signals can be classified into 3 groups: high-performance (E5AltBOC, L1A, E6A), mediumperformance (E6BC, E5a, E5b) and an L1BC signal, which has the lowest performance among Galileo signals, but is still better than GPS-CA. The car tests have demonstrated that for kinematic multipath the intersignal differences are a lot less pronounced. The phase multipath performance is also discussed.

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This paper employs the concept of Protestant Hierotopy to explore the spiritual roots of Dutch Golden Age Painting. Hierotopic methodology, as developed by Alexei Lidov, focuses on the creation of sacred spaces as a form of human creativity. Though the Reformation may have done away with the sacred spaces of churches and sanctuaries, it introduced in their place a new kind of hierotopy: a sacralization of the whole of Creation, with a particular focus on human environments. The admiration for nature was imbued with religious feelings, while cleanliness and domesticity came to be seen as closely akin to holiness. In this paper I interpret Dutch Golden Age Painting as an iconography of this new sacrality. I argue that what we find in this art ought to be understood, not as a purely descriptive objective 'realism' conceived for its own sake, but rather as a 'fervent' or even 'sacred' naturalism motivated by admiration for God's creation and enhanced by a Protestant sense of cooperating with the Creator. Such motives can be found at work in all genres of Dutch fine art. Still lifes, especially bunches of flowers, extremely lifelike and physically impossible at the same time, can be seen as icons of God's Creation. Modest bourgeois dwellings, embellished by palace-grade Oriental carpets and marble flooring, are elevated in painted interiors to the level of veritable temples of domesticity. Early modern admiration for God's Creation was inspired by Calvinistic teachings with regards to Nature as God's manifestation, as well as by neostoic pantheism and by the contemporary scientific passion for the visible world and its study by observation. All these diverse influences worked together to inform a whole new worldview of Protestant Hierotopy in which the natural and the domestic acquired an aura of sacrality, while their representation in art took on an iconic dimension.