EO Live Tracking & Spot Tracking Devices (Feedback)

Submitted: Wednesday, Jun 15, 2011 at 08:31

ThreadID: 86997 Views:2307 Replies:5 FollowUps:3

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ExplorOz Tracker

ExplorOz Tracker is a service that is available for Members via either of our two apps (ExplorOz Traveller, & ExplorOz Tracker), and also for Members who own a SPOT device with a "Shared Page"

The Landy

Just a check to see if anyone else using EO Tracking with a Spot Tracking device has experienced a time-delay between it publishing on the Spot Tracking share page, and the time it appears on the EO Tracking page.

I have been using Spot for about 12 months and don’t recall any significant time delay previously (maybe I hadn’t noticed!), but recently I have noted a time difference of up to three hours from the time it appears on the Spot shared page, which I understand is where EO pulls the data, to the time it appears on the EO ‘Live’ tracking page.

All parameters on my Spot account are configured correctly, and in line with the EO requirements.

It might be that this is related to my device only, or possibly a more widespread occurrence.

I have dropped David at EO a note to highlight the issue, and to check if this is within the parameters EO has set, or whether it points to a problem somewhere.... But it might be useful for David to know if others are experiencing the same issue.

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Reply By: Olsen's 4WD Tours and Training - Wednesday, Jun 15, 2011 at 12:38

Wednesday, Jun 15, 2011 at 12:38

I am running SPOT, and I've not experienced the same issue, but I have experienced the complete lack of tracking all together- working now.

AnswerID: 457506

Reply By: ExplorOz - David & Michelle - Wednesday, Jun 15, 2011 at 12:56

Wednesday, Jun 15, 2011 at 12:56

Landy,

Thanks for your email I am pasting most of the response in the thread to ensure others are aware of the answer. Please note this is for SPOT devices only and all other tracking devices are online processes so there is no poll process done.

---- Email from me to Landy -----
Thanks again for your excellent feedback and test results. I found the problem and have resolved it and improved the code for the system significantly. The reason it stopped was the trigger process was not running as often as it used to due to a program improvement in the mapping system (so in short the process was only triggering infrequently every few hours). This is the reason you got strange results. I have now adjusted the entire process to ensure it runs all the time and will trigger every 10 mins.

Basically the flow now is: if you device is active (this means I have seen an update in the last 2 hours) then you will be polled every 10 mins. If your device goes inactive (I have not seen you for at least 2 hours) then you are polled every hour until of course I see you again and you become active.

So hopefully this will resolve it fully and correctly. Again thanks for raising the issue.
--- End of email response ---

David

David (DM) & Michelle (MM)
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AnswerID: 457508

Follow Up By: Zebra400 - Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 11:21

Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 11:21

Thanks for the update David.

I think you had problems when we were in Kununurra last week. I see it is running much better now.

BTW, when are you getting more track info for the Topo250 for the Cape Leveque area?

Laurie

Zebra400

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FollowupID: 730888

Reply By: Sigmund - Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 10:19

Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 10:19

This may be partly relevant: Spot sat coverage has not been continuous over the day. Globalstar were supposed to launch the remainder of the 2nd gen sats last month to fix this.

AnswerID: 457694

Follow Up By: The Landy - Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 11:01

Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 11:01

Hi Sigmund

Possibly note in this instance, as the Spot tracking device is being picked up by their system without any delays, the problem was in the upload from Spot to EO, which David has now corrected.

Although, worth keeping the issue you highlighted in mind for coverage...

Cheers...

FollowupID: 730886

Reply By: Zebra400 - Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 11:18

Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 11:18

Landy

We have been using SPOT since it was started. There are times when positions are delayed, but from our experience these down times are quite rare.

We have travelled up from Victoria & are currently in Cpae Leveque and havent noticed any down times when we check our trip on line.

I have noticed at times, that the ExplorOz site is a behind. I noticed this in Kununurra last week - I think there must have been an issue with the ExplorOz site as my positions were being shown on the SPOT site & Sptowalla.

You can check our travels at http://www.zebra400.com/ExplorOz.htm. Currnetly it shows our position about 30 minutes ago.

Laurie

Zebra400

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AnswerID: 457704

Follow Up By: The Landy - Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 11:38

Friday, Jun 17, 2011 at 11:38

Hi Laurie

Thanks, it is the EO site that was delayed, and David at EO has taken steps to correct this (detailed above). My experience with Spot is that it updates almost immediately, and a great device. I've puit another call into David as there still appears some delay beyond what he was anticipating since the changes were made...

Just checked out your travels; we are off to the Gulf next week, and will updarte a blog along the way also...

Cheers,

FollowupID: 730891

Reply By: Member - Boobook - Saturday, Jun 18, 2011 at 07:40

Saturday, Jun 18, 2011 at 07:40

Landy, I hope you don't mind me stomping on your thread.

The HF radio club has a service where you can send your GPS position to their web site and to Facebook. It sends an email from the HF radio club to Facebook's position system.

David at EO, it would be realllllly neat if you could interface to it to add HF radio positioning as another input to the live tracking service.

AnswerID: 457775