LightningMaps.org: Real-time Lightning Map

[Donald.Froula]

The "Sent" statistic on the Controller Status page does NOT mean the signal was used in the calculation of a strike. In fact, the Controller firmware has no way of knowing that.

I believed the "Received" count tracks the number of signals that exceeded their trigger threshold, plus signals from other channels that detected the same signal that caused the initial trigger.

The "Sent" statistic counts the number of signals that triggered sending a report to the server, plus all other signals that exceeded the 10% of own threshold criteria (or whatever threshold is set in the "Settings/Tracker/Ignore signals below threshold" box), which causes those additional signals to actually be sent to the server, along with the triggering channel.

For example, assume you have an H-Field and an E-Field amp. This provides channel 1A and 1B (H-Field) and 2A, 2B, and 2C (E-Field). All five channels are set to use a threshold of 120mV. "Settings/Tracker/Ignore signals below threshold" is set to the default 10%.

A signal that exceeds 120mV is detected by channel 1A. Energy is detected from the same signal on channels 1B and 2A, 2B and 2C. Therefore, the strike will cause the "Received" count on the Status page to increase by 5. The amplitudes of the additional channels are:

1B - 60mV (exceeds 10% of 120mV or 12 mV, so the signal is sent to the server as well as the triggering signal on 1A)
2A - 8mV (does NOT exceed 10% of 120mV or 12 mV, so that signal is NOT sent to the server)
2B - 6mV (does NOT exceed 10% of 120mV or 12 mV, so that signal is NOT sent to the server)
2C - 40mV (exceeds 10% of 120mV or 12 mV, so the signal is sent to the server as well as the triggering signal on 1A)

So, in this case, the number of "Sent" signals is 3, so the "Sent" count on the Status page will only be increased by 3.

The fact that a signal is "Sent" from the Controller's perspective only means that the criteria for sending a received signal to the servers has been met. It says nothing about whether those signals are actually used in the calculation of a valid strike. In fact, the "Sent" signals could all be generated by noise, and still meet the criteria for transmission to the server.

Setting the "Settings/Tracker/Ignore signals below threshold" value to 100% will insure that only signals that exceed 120mV will be sent.

There are other gating criteria that are used to determine if ANY signals are sent, like having an active network connection and a good GPS lock. You will note that after a system is powered on, the signal count will increase, but none of the signals are counted as "Good" or "Sent" until a GPS lock is achieved.

If the system works otherwise, one of the developers, please, jump in here and correct me.

Best regards,

Don
WD9DMP

A beep does not mean a valid, or a usable 'stroke'. It beeps on any signal, noise, car, pet fence, switch, etc that causes a trigger.... If you're not seeing signals on the Participants page, or low values, or not seeing them on the map, it could mean that most of your signals are noise.

1028 Florø Norway Running 2014-07-15 01:31 257 0 | 0% 0 | 0% 26 | 3%

I know that there is some noise, and I had it worse earlier.
But lately it seems to be a lot of good signals, according to waveform, and the status page :

SignalsReceived: 36255, Good: 31529, Sent: 31511
Signal RateLast second: 0, Last 60s: 0.7
as of :
RTC time2014-07-15 17:05:38
Running for13h, 5m

I also see that I get "credit" for almost every strike closer to home, but more rarely when there is a bigger distance.
Of course, this is also dependent on signal strength, and with more distance, the weaker the signals will be.
Ill make a video to show what I mean, and put it on Youtube...

Regards, Asbjorn