[amsat-bb] FoxTelem Version 1.03 released

[Patrick STODDARD (WD9EWK/VA7EWK)]

Chris,

Thanks for the announcement of the new version 1.03 of the FoxTelem
software. I downloaded it and put it on one of my Windows 10 tablets
this evening, a WinBook TW100 with 2 GB RAM and an Intel Atom Z3735
CPU. This tablet isn't like the Microsoft Surface tablets, but it
has worked well with previous versions of your FoxTelem software.
The new version, with the auto-detection for the data speed,
seems to work well on this tablet. I have another tablet with the
same Z3735 CPU, but with just 1 GB RAM, that I will test this on.
Since I am using an SDRplay receiver, I also use HDSDR to make my
RF recordings. Then I play those recordings back through HDSDR and
a virtual audio cable into FoxTelem.

After working a couple of AO-85 passes this evening, I ran my RF
recording through the previous version of FoxTelem, v1.02, for my
uploads to the AMSAT server. I decoded 40 frames from the 0302 UTC
pass, and 78 frames from the 0442 UTC pass. After I made those
uploads, I disabled uploading data to the server, disconnected
from my WiFi network in the house, and ran the same RF recordings
through the new v1.03 version. No CPU or memory issues on the tablet,
and more frames were decoded - 57 from the 0302 UTC pass, and 80
from the 0442 UTC pass.

I didn't expect to see a gain of 17 frames from the 0302 UTC RF
recording, so I reran that through the v1.02 version. For whatever
reason, I decoded 53 frames the second time I used the older
version of FoxTelem. This is still 4 less than what the new v1.03
version decoded, which seemed to be more in line with the improvement
I saw from decoding the data from the later pass.

For the passes I work over the weekend, I will run my recordings
through the v1.03 version. Since the CPU utilization on this
tablet appears to be little changed from the v1.02 version, I
think this will be fine for my situation (using the inexpensive
Windows 10 tablets to decode AO-85 data). I will also try the new
version with my FUNcube Dongle Pro+, to see how well it works
with another SDR receiver, and so I can just run FoxTelem without
the need for HDSDR running at the same time.

Thanks again for your great work on FoxTelem. Have a great weekend,
and 73!





Patrick WD9EWK/VA7EWK
http://www.wd9ewk.net/
Twitter: @WD9EWK





On Fri, Feb 5, 2016 at 7:00 PM, Chris Thompson <g0kla at arrl.net> wrote:

> This version of FoxTelem uses a new datafile format.  While we store our
> data on
> the server in an SQL database, we use a flat file database for FoxTelem.  A
> flat
> file format is nearly optimal for a program that mostly adds new data to
> the end
> of a growing list.  With that said, we need to be able to load sections of
> the
> data into memory for efficient analysis.  The new data file format allows
> that.
> If you have been downloading data from the server for analysis, you will
> see
> that this format is much faster.
>
> One major change is the ability to automatically switch between low speed
> and
> high speed.  This will help unattended stations gather as much telemetry as
> possible.  The "auto" mode actually runs both decoders at the same time, so
> make
> sure your computer has enough CPU power to cope.
>
> Graphing has been updated to support better analysis of the spacecraft by
> the
> AMSAT Operations team and amateur scientists everywhere.
>
> This version also contains new features that will be required for
> Fox-1Cliff
> and Fox-1D.
>
>