Omnitronics ALS Advanced Location Services, AGS Advanced GPS Service, ALS Server, ALS Viewer, RediTALK-Flex RediTALK-Flex VoIP Radio Dispatch Console, DX-Altus Alto DX-Altus Alto VoIP Dispatch Console, DRG Digital Radio Gateway User Manual

Figure 3 shows an example of this scenario in which Windows Firewall running on the

Database Connection Settings

When you run ALS Server for the first time, or after it restarts, it might encounter a problem while connecting with SQL Server 2014 Express. This will usually happen when the SQL Server connection settings have been changed. In this case, you will be asked to configure the connection settings by following the steps below.

Start ALSLauncher.

The

ALSLauncher

program icon appears as a program icon on the desktop or a shortcut on the

Start

menu under

Omnitronics

If you see the Database Connection Settings window similar to the one shown below, you will need to configure the connection settings:

2.1.

Select

Use SQL Server

, and then type the name of your SQL Server instance in the

SQL Server

text box.

This is COMPUTER-NAME\ALSSERVER where COMPUTER-NAME is the name of the server computer running SQL Server 2014 Express and ALSSERVER is the name of the SQL Server instance.

2.2.

Select

Use a specific user name and password

, and in the

User Name

and

Password

text boxes, type

omnitronics

for the user name and type

0mnitronics

for the password (note that the password starts with a zero, not the letter O).

2.3.

Click

ALS Server will now attempt to establish a connection to SQL Server 2014 Express using these connection settings.

Note: If you cannot connect to SQL Server 2104 Express, refer to the troubleshooting section

“Connection Problems”

on page 157.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

ALS Server and Firewalls

When you run ALS Server for the first time (after you have performed the initial setup of ALS Server), Windows Firewall (or a third-party firewall) may immediately block ALS

Server and prevent it from connecting to the ALSSERVER instance of SQL Server 2014

Express.

server computer immediately blocks ALS Server.

Figure 3. Window Firewall blocking ALS Server

In this case, select which networks you want to allow access to ALS Server, and then click

Allow access

. Once the Firewall is properly configured, the ALS Server main window should now appear. Note that if you are running the evaluation version of

ALS Server, you will see a popup message appear, as shown in Figure 4. In this case,

simply click

to show main window.

Figure 4. Message showing evaluation version

Chapter 3



Understanding the User Interface

When you start ALS Server, you will be presented with the user interface (UI) similar to the one shown Figure 5.

Alert Summary

Shows list of “alert” contacts

Subscriber Manager

Manages subscribers and groups

Subscriber Summary

Shows the status of each active subscriber

AGS Manager

Manages Advanced

GPS Service

Event Summary

Shows summary of all event activity

Figure 5. ALS Server user interface

All configuration and management of the ALS Server is done with this user interface.

If ALS Server is locked, you must provide the administration password before you can edit or change any of the configuration settings (see

“Locking and Unlocking

ALS

Server

“Product Licensing and Registration”

on page 41).

If you have not yet activated your ALS Server installation, you will be advised of how many days you have remaining in your trial period. You can continue to run the product in trial mode for a period of ninety (90) days from the date of installation. To continue using ALS Server after the trial period has expired, you will need to activate the product (see

on page 25).

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Main Toolbar

The Main Toolbar shown in Figure 42 is always visible (usually docked to the main

window) and contains the following buttons.

Figure 6. Main toolbar

Save Workspace

button allows you to save the underlying layer settings for the currently active workspace.

Devices

button shows or hides the

Advanced GPS Service Manager

window that allows the various communications ports to be configured.

Subscriber Manager

button shows or hides the

Subscriber Manager

window for adding or editing vehicle details.

Alert Summary

button shows or hides

Alert Summary

window used for entering phone numbers of contacts and associating vehicles with them.

Subscriber Summary

button shows or hides the

Subscriber Summary

window that gives an overview of each vehicle in the poll list.

Event Summary

button shows or hides the

Event Summary

window that displays a list of events that have occurred since program commencement.

Connected Users

button shows or hides the

Connected Users

window that displays a list of connected users.

Lock/Unlock

button toggles between administration or edit mode and locked mode.

About

button opens the

About

window that displays version and build information for the currently installed instance of ALS Server.

Chapter 3



Figure 7. It is divided into several panels as described below.

Status Bar

The status bar is located along the lower edge of the main window, as shown in

CAP

NUM

SCRL

Figure 7. ALS Server status bar

Message

Shows help text for menus and toolbars and the status of ALS

Server as it updates. When ALS Server is ready, it shows “Ready”.

Padlock Locked

indicates ALS Server is in “locked” mode to prevent editing or changes to the configuration settings.

Padlock Unlocked

indicates ALS Server is in “administration” mode (unlocked) so you can edit or make changes to the configuration settings as required.

Indicates you pressed the

Caps Lock

key on the keyboard to enable the caps-lock function.

Indicates you pressed the

Num Lock

key on the keyboard to enable the num-lock function.

Indicates you pressed the

Scroll Lock

key on the keyboard to enable the scroll-lock function.

When the mouse pointer hovers over a button or menu item, a tooltip appears describing its function. A

tooltip

is a brief description of the function that a button or menu item performs.

Locking and Unlocking ALS Server

You can password-protect or lock ALS Server to prevent any changes to the configuration settings (see

“Administration Settings”

on page 48). When ALS Server is locked, the

Switch Edit Mode

button on the toolbar will be enabled and a

padlock will appear in the status bar, as shown in Figure 8. This indicates that ALS

Server is now locked and you cannot perform any general editing.

Figure 8. Unlocking ALS Server to allow configuration changes

Should you need to perform any editing after ALS Server is locked, click the

Switch

Edit Mode

button on the toolbar, or select this function from the

File

menu, and

you will be prompted for the administration password, as shown in Figure 9.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Figure 9. Password prompt to unlock ALS Server

To unlock ALS Server, type the password and then click

. Once the correct password has been entered, ALS Server will revert to

administration

mode. In this mode, you can perform general editing and make changes to the configuration settings until you click the padlock button again to switch back to

locked

mode.

Changing the Layout

Windows can be undocked and moved to another position on the screen to change the layout of the main window. You can also change the size of a window and group windows together or dock one window at the side of another window.

Figure 10 shows an example of the main window layout that has been rearranged to

dock the Subscriber Summary window to the Fleet Manager.

Figure 10. Repositioning and docking a window to another window

To move a window, drag the title bar of the window to the new position. To dock windows together (stacked windows), drag the tab of the window or the title bar onto another window. If you do not want the window to dock, simply hold down the

Ctrl

key while you drag the window to the new position. To undock a window, simply double-click the window’s title bar. To change the size of a window, drag any corner of the window.

Chapter 3



Figure 11 shows the repositioning guides that you use to dock windows.

If you want to move a window to another group, drag the tab of the window to that group. To separate a window from a group, drag the tab of the window outside the group. To group windows together to form one window with multiple tabbed windows, drag the window onto the body of the target window and release the mouse over the centre positioning icon.

A blue-shaded area appears on the body of the target window when the pointer is over the correct area for grouping to occur. The shaded area indicates the position of the window after the mouse button is released.

Tab

Docks to the window as a tab

Top side

Docks to the top of window

Left side

Docks to the left side of window

Right side

Docks to the right side of window

Bottom side

Docks to the bottom of window

Figure 11. Selecting the type of docking to perform

After you change the layout, you should save it. To save the layout, open the

File

menu and then choose

Save Layout

Displaying License Information

Select

About ALS Server

on the

Help

menu to display the

About ALS Server

window, as shown in Figure 12.

Figure 12. Showing the license information

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Exiting ALS Server

When ALS Server starts, it also runs an application in the background called ALS

Launcher. This application runs as a Windows service and appears on the Windows

task tray, as shown in Figure 13.

Figure 13. ALS Launcher program icon on the Windows task tray

The ALS Launcher service continuously monitors the state of ALS Server, and if for some reason ALS Server is shut down, ALS Launcher will automatically restart it after a timeout (usually within 60 seconds). If you want to completely shut down ALS

Server, you will need to shut down the ALS Launcher service.

To shut down ALS Server

On the ALS Server main window, point to the

File

menu, and then click

Exit

This will shut down ALS Server; however, you now need to shut down ALS

Launcher.

On the Windows task tray, right-click the

ALS Launcher

program icon.

This opens the ALS Launcher context menu.

On the context menu, click

Exit

to terminate ALS Launcher.

This commences a shutdown sequence in which the ALS Launcher service will first check whether or not ALS Server is running. If ALS Server is running, ALS Launcher will automatically shut it down. Once ALS Server is no longer running, ALS

Launcher will then shut down.

Configuring ALS Server

The ALS Server user interface is partitioned into user-configurable panels each representing a different component of the server. The server also has a top-level menu which enables access to other program options. The following sections outline each of these features and how to configure them.

General Configuration

Select

General Configuration

on the

Tools

menu to display the General Configuration window. This includes several sections as described below.

Chapter 3



section is shown in Figure 14. It displays settings applicable to

Server Settings

The

Server Settings

the server computer, such as the Computer Name that ALS Viewer needs to know in order to connect with ALS Server. It also includes a field that allows you to specify which port the ALS Server will “listen” on for remote connections from ALS Viewer.

Figure 14. Configuration of server settings

Note: You should ensure these settings are configured correctly on the

ALS Viewer clients; otherwise clients will not be able to connect to the server. You should also ensure that the port used for communications is open on the server.

The other option indicates whether or not ALS Server should use a SQL Server database, and if so, what the name of the server computer is and how it should be accessed for log on purposes.

Log Settings

The

Log Settings

section is shown in Figure 15. It allows you to configure several

logging options.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Figure 15. Configuration of log settings

Log Sent Messages

Select this option to write a log line to a text file or database after each message is sent to a subscriber.

Log to Database

Log to Text Files

Select this option to write the log line to a database file.

Select this option to write the log line to a log text file. One text file will be generated per day and named as follows:

Sent Message Log YY-MM-DD.log

Folder for log files

Folder where the above log files will be stored (only relevant text files).

Redundancy

The

Redundancy

section is shown in Figure 16. It allows you to set the “role”

applicable to this instance of ALS Server. That is, whether this instance acts as the

default primary server

or the

redundant secondary server

Note: Redundancy requires a special SQL Server configuration to make it function. If you require further information about how to configure redundant ALS Server instances, please contact Omnitronics support.

Installations that have no redundant copy of ALS Server running on a second server should always have the

Default Primary Server

option selected. This ensures that

ALS Viewer clients connecting to this instance of ALS Server will receive notifications of subscriber positions and events. If this instance of ALS Server is actually the

“secondary” instance, you should clear this option.

When ALS Server is used as part of an emergency monitoring system, it may be necessary to notify system administration personnel when no ALS Viewer clients are connected. To allow these notifications, configure the

Allowed Time

and

Alert

Interval

settings.

Chapter 3



section is shown in Figure 17. Should you wish to take

Figure 16. Configuration of redundancy

Default Primary

Server

Select this option to set this instance of ALS Server as the default primary server; otherwise, clear it to set this instance as the redundant secondary server.

Allowed Time

Specifies the number of minutes that can elapse without any connections from ALS Viewer client(s) before an alert is raised.

Alert Interval

Specifies the interval in minutes at which subsequent alert notifications will be sent when no ALS Viewer clients are connected.

Google Earth – KML

The

Google Earth – KML

advantage of Google Earth's network-link facility, you can configure these settings to set up ALS Server to dynamically update a KML file.

Figure 17. Configuration of Google Earth

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

KML Output File

The location and name of the KML file to use to output appropriately formatted data for subscriber positions.

Icon URL

Icon Colour

The URL of the icon to display.

The colour to use for plotting the icon.

Icon Scale

Emergency URL

The scaling factor to use for the icon.

The URL of the emergency icon to display.

Emergency Colour

The colour to use for plotting the emergency icon.

Emergency Scale

The scaling factor to use for the emergency icon.

Label Colour

Label Scale

RSSI Icon URL

RSSI Icon Scale

The colour to use for plotting the labels.

The scaling factor to use for size of labels.

The URL of the RSSI icon to display.

The scaling factor to use for the RSSI icon.

RSSI Label Colour

The colour to use for plotting the RSSI icon labels.

RSSI Label Scale

The scaling factor to use for the RSSI icon label.

Use Timed Export

Select this option to use timed export of KML data.

Export Interval

The number of seconds between exports.

Max Position Age

Only subscribers that have reported within this period (in minutes) will be exported. To export all subscribers, set this to zero.

The other fields allow various shape, colour, label, and size features to be configured.

The Icon URL, Icon Colour, and Icon Scale settings are used as defaults, but are usually superseded by setting values for specific subscriber classes in Fleet Manager.

Also, all subscribers in an SOS/Emergency alert state will be assigned the emergency style that you configure here.

Please refer to Google Earth documentation for help in setting up the Network Link in that software. Note that use of Google Earth for mobile GPS tracking in a commercial application is likely to require a Google Earth Pro subscription.

Administration Settings

The

Administration Settings

section is shown in Figure 18. You can set a password

to lock ALS Server to prevent changes to the configuration settings.

When the

Password Protected Editing

option is selected and you have set an appropriate Password and Confirmation, ALS Server will switch to locked mode. In this mode, you cannot change any configuration settings (see

“Locking and Unlocking

on page 41).

Chapter 3



for the AGS connection similar to the one shown in Figure 20.

Figure 18. Configuration of administration settings

Advanced GPS Service Manager

The Advanced GPS Service (AGS) Manager allows you to configure and manage connections to the Omnitronics Advanced GPS Service (AGS). Click the

Devices

button on the toolbar, or select

Advanced GPS Service Manager

on the

View

menu, to open the

Advanced GPS Service Manager

window similar to the one

shown in Figure 19.

Figure 19. Advanced GPS Service Manager

When you run ALS Server for the first time, the Advanced GPS Service Manager will not have any AGS connections configured and you will not see any connection information displayed. In this case, you will need to add a new device, and then configure the connection settings associated with the device.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Adding a Device

You can use the following procedure to add a new device and then configure it to provide the connection to AGS (ALS Server can connect to as many instances of AGS as you configure in the Advanced GPS Service Manager).

To add a new device

In the Advanced GPS Service Manager window, click the

Add

button to display the Add Device window.

In the

Name

text box, type a name for the connection, such as “HTTP Server” (you can only select “Omnitronics” for the type).

Click

Once you have added the new device, you will then need to configure the Advanced

GPS Service connection associated with the device. In the Advanced GPS Service

Manager window, select the device in the list, and then click the

Properties

button

. This displays the settings for the new device, which are discussed in the following sections.

HTTP Client/Server Setup

Select the

HTTP Client/Server Setup

tab to display the HTTP Client/Server settings

Figure 20. HTTP Client/Server properties for the connection

Chapter 3



section, as shown in Figure 23, includes options for monitoring several

Configure the following settings for your environment. These must match the corresponding settings configured in AGS.

Service IP

Address/Hostname

This is the IP address, or the Windows hostname, of the computer running the AGS. If AGS is running on the same computer as ALS Server, you can use “localhost” for the hostname.

Service Port Number

Specifies the port used by AGS to send GPS information to the ALS Server. This port must match the

Event (geofence)

Port Number

configured in the AGS configuration.

ALS Port Number

Specifies the port used by the ALS Server to send geofence events to the AGS (these are then passed onto RediTALK-

Flex and Alto consoles). It must match the port specified in the

Connection Information

section of the AGS configuration.

General

Select the

General

tab to display the general settings for the AGS connection, as

shown in Figure 21.

Figure 21. General settings for the connection

Process outgoing requests

Select this option to send geofence events to AGS (these are then sent to RediTALK-Flex and Alto consoles). It is recommended to leave this option enabled.

Logging

Select the

Logging

tab to display the logging settings for the AGS connection, as

shown in Figure 22.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Figure 22. Logging settings for the connection

Radio communications events occurring between the AGS and ALS can be logged to a text file. The logging feature is disabled by default. You can specify a folder in which the logs will be saved. You can also timestamp each entry in the log. Once logging is enabled for this connection, and the log folder is specified, radio communications events will be logged for this connection.

Log incoming radio communications

Time stamp

Log Folder

Select this option to enable logging of radio communications events between ALS Server and AGS.

Select this option to timestamp each entry in the log.

Specifies the path and name of the file to use for logging.

Event Configuration

Select

Event Configuration

on the

Tools

menu to display the Event Configuration window. This includes several sections as described below.

General

The

General

high-level events. These events include the following:

•

Proximity

events occur when a subscriber moves within close proximity to other subscribers.

•

Speeding

events occur when a subscriber travels at a speed in excess of the designated speed limit.

•

Stationary

events occur when a subscriber remains stationary for a prolonged period of time.

Chapter 3



section shown in Figure 24 provides a two-stage

Figure 23. Configuration of general events

If any of these events is detected for a subscriber due its movement or close proximity to others (assuming that such events are enabled), the colour associated with the event will be used to display the subscriber on the map in ALS Viewer.

Event Monitoring

Select this option to enable event checking to be performed for each subscriber reporting its positional information.

Check Proximity

Select this option to check for proximity events, and to generate a proximity alert whenever a subscriber moves within the specified Proximity Distance of another subscriber.

Exclude Yards

Select this option to exclude yards from proximity checks.

This option is useful to reduce unnecessary alerts, which may occur in situations when units are congregating back at base for example.

Proximity Colour

The colour used to display subscribers in close proximity to other subscribers.

Proximity Distance

Distance in metres within which a proximity alert will be generated.

Check Speed

Select this option to check for speeding events to ensure subscribers are not exceeding the speed limit, and to generate a speeding alert whenever a subscriber exceeds the speed limit.

Speeding Colour

The colour used to indicate subscribers speeding.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Check Stationary

Select this option to check for stationary events, and to generate a stationary alert whenever positions from a subscriber are remain within the specified Stationary

Distance (in metres) for longer than the Stationary Time (in minutes).

Stationary Colour

The colour used to indicate subscriber is stationary for a prolonged period.

Stationary

Distance

Radius in metres that a subscriber must stay within to be considered stationary.

Stationary Time

Time in minutes that a subscriber must be stopped to be considered stationary.

Lost Communications

The

Lost Communications

mechanism for keeping track of subscribers that may no longer be operational.

Figure 24. Configuration of lost-communications events

Lost Contact Colour 1

The colour for a subscriber that has not responded with a valid GPS position for the number of minutes specified by the Lost Contact Time 1 field.

Lost Contact Time 1

This is the first stage for the lost-contact interval (in minutes) to indicate that a subscriber has not responded with a valid GPS position within a short period of time.

Chapter 3



section shown in Figure 25 allows you to select which types of

Lost Contact Colour 2

The colour for a subscriber that has not responded with a valid GPS position for the number of minutes specified by the Lost Contact Time 2 field.

Lost Contact Time 2

This is the second stage for the lost-contact interval (in minutes) to indicate that a subscriber has not responded with a valid GPS position within a substantial period of time.

If a valid response has still not been received from a subscriber within this time, it is considered “lost”. This status can be used in conjunction with a setting in ALS

Viewer to ensure that subscribers that are no longer active or lost are not displayed on the map.

Invalid GPS

The colour for a subscriber that responds with an invalid

GPS position. This is available for some types of hardware to indicate either an invalid GPS position or poor GPS quality signal has been received.

Geofence

The

Geofence

geofences to use. Selecting a geofence type allows ALS Server and ALS Viewer to trigger events associated with the geofence.

Figure 25. Configuration of geofence events

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Use No Go type

Select this option to use geofences that define a No Go Zone type. Subscribers that enter a No Go zone will trigger an event in both ALS Server and ALS Viewer.

Use Speed type

Select this option to use geofences that define a Speed Zone type. Subscribers that exceed the designated speed limit for this zone will trigger an event in both ALS Server and ALS

Viewer.

Use Yard type

Select this option to use geofences that define a Yard type.

Designed for future use in flagging events when vehicles enter a designated yard.

Use Site type

Use Confinement type

Select this option to use geofences that define a Site type.

Designed for future use in flagging events when vehicles enter a designated site.

Select this option to use geofences that define a

Confinement type. Designed to restrict movement of subscribers within particular confines.

Use Blast Event type

Use Emergency type

Select this option to use geofences that define a Blast Event type. Designed for use in mining applications where buffers around a specific core blast area get progressively activated to aid in warning any subscribers that may be in or near the area around the time of the scheduled blast.

Select this option to use geofences that define an Emergency type.

The

Position Filtering (Advanced)

section provides options to enable or disable various geofence accuracy filters to control how inaccurate positions are filtered out of geofence calculations.

Apply Accuracy

Filter

Accuracy

Threshold

Apply Altitude

Filter

Altitude Floor

Select this option to use the Accuracy Threshold setting to determine whether or not positions are considered accurate.

Distance in metres above which positions are considered to be inaccurate.

Select this option to use the Altitude Floor setting and the

Altitude Ceiling setting to determine whether or not positions are valid.

Minimum value of altitude in metres that altitude must not be below in order for position to be used.

Altitude Ceiling

Maximum value of altitude in metres that altitude must not be above in order for position to be used.

Apply Speed Filter

Select this option to use the Speed Threshold setting to determine whether or not the position should be used.

Speed Threshold

Speed threshold value in km/h that speeds should be less than or equal to in order for the position to be used.

Chapter 3



section is shown in Figure 26. It controls the settings behind the

Blast Event

The

Blast Event

Blast Event geofence type, and includes parameters related to buffers that may be used in conjunction with blast zones.

Figure 26. Configuration of Blast Event events

Use Buffering

Buffer Width

Select this option to use the Buffering Width setting to provide buffering around a blast zone.

Specifies the distance (in metres) around the blast zone.

Subscriber Manager

Using the Subscriber Manager, you can assign individual

field radios

portables

, or

mobiles

, called

subscribers

to a group of subscribers called a

subscriber group

. Details for each subscriber and subscriber group are stored in the ALS database (this is a

SQL Server 2014 Express database installed with ALS Server).

Click the

Subscriber Manager

button on the toolbar, or select

Subscriber

Manager

on the

View

menu, to open the

Subscriber Manager

window similar to

the one shown in Figure 27.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Figure 27. Subscriber Manager

The

Subscriber Manager

has two sections:

Subscribers

and

Subscriber Groups

. The buttons perform the following actions:

Add

button adds a new subscriber in the Subscribers panel or adds a new group in the Subscriber Groups panel.

Add Range

button adds a range of subscribers in the Subscribers panel.

Properties

button shows the properties for the selected subscriber in the

Subscribers panel or the properties for the selected subscriber group in the

Subscriber Groups panel.

Delete

button deletes an individual subscriber in the Subscribers panel or deletes a subscriber group in the Subscriber Groups panel.

The Subscribers panel lists all of the

subscriber identities (SID)

for the system. These appear under the

Omnitronics Subscribers

list. Initially, this list will not have any

SIDs until you add one or more to the list, as described in the next section.

Adding Subscribers

Using

Subscriber

Manager, you can add subscribers to the Subscribers list by clicking the

Add

button to open the

Subscriber Edit

window, as shown in Figure

28.

Figure 28. Adding a new subscriber

Chapter 3



window shown in Figure 29 opposite.

New subscribers are also automatically added to this list when new radios in the field send GPS data to ALS Server.

Subscriber Name

Mobile Type

Subscriber Class

Mobile ID

Order Sequence

Voice Contact No.

License Plate

Maximum Speed

Anchor Mode

Specifies the name of this subscriber to be used when displayed in ALS Viewer.

Specifies the type of mobile (currently, only

“Omnitronics” is supported).

Specifies the class to assign to the range of subscribers about to be added. Classes are used define property limits for subscribers in the class. For instance, one class may have different values for the GPS reporting rate property.

Specifies the identity of the mobile (MID). This must match the subscriber identity (SID) for this subscriber.

Specifies the ordering of subscribers in the Subscriber

Summary. When the list is initially displayed, it is sorted by Order Sequence and then by Name. If you want a few items to always be at the bottom, you might give them an Order Sequence of 10 for instance. All the other items would have the default value of 0, and would appear above the items with Order Sequence of 10.

Specifies the contact number to display in the in the SOS

Alert screen that can be activated in ALS Viewer in the case of emergencies.

Specifies license plate number to display the SOS Alert screen that can be activated in ALS Viewer in the case of emergencies.

Specifies a global speed limit if general speed alerting is enabled in the event configuration.

Allows a subscriber to be set as “anchored”. If the subscriber moves more than a configurable distance from the anchor point, an event is raised. This is useful when monitoring fixed equipment and you want some indication when unauthorised movement is detected.

Note: The new subscriber will not be visible in ALS Viewer, and no geofence events will be generated for that subscriber until it is assigned to a subscriber group. To assign one or more subscribers to a subscriber group, select the subscriber(s) in the Subscribers panel, and then drag them to the subscriber group you want to assign them to in the

Subscriber Groups panel. To select multiple subscribers, Ctrl-click each subscriber you want to include. To select a range of subscribers, click the first subscriber to include in the range and then Shift-click the last subscriber to include in the range.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Adding a Range of Subscribers

Subscriber

Manager allows you to specify a range of subscribers when adding new subscribers. Click the

Add Range

button to open the

Add Subscriber Range

By default, the display name assigned to each subscriber within the range will match its subscriber identity (SID). For instance, a subscriber with an SID of 2001 will have the display name of “2001”.

However, when adding a range of subscribers, you can specify custom names for all the subscribers within the range. The format for a

custom name

is:

<name prefix><subscriber identity><name suffix>

<name prefix>

Specifies the text that will appear before the SID.

<subscriber identity>

Specifies the identity of the subscriber (SID).

<name suffix>

Specifies the text that will appear after the SID.

If you define only a

name prefix

for the subscribers, such as “Bob ”, the display name for the subscribers will be “Bob 2001”, “Bob2002”, and “Bob 2003” etc.

Similarly, if you define only a

name suffix

, such as “ Patrol”, the display name for the subscribers will be “2001 Patrol”, “2002 Patrol”, and “2003 Patrol” etc.

However, if you define both the name prefix and name suffix, the display name for the subscribers will be a combination of all three fields, such as “Bob 2001 Patrol”,

“Bob 2002 Patrol”, and “Bob 2003 Patrol” etc. Note that both the name prefix and the name suffix may include spaces, as shown in these examples.

Figure 29. Add Subscriber Range window

Name Prefix

Name Suffix

Defines the text that will appear before the SID (may include spaces)

Defines the text that will appear after the SID (may include spaces).

Chapter 3



“Deleting a Subscriber Group”

Mobile Type

Vehicle Class

Ident Min

Ident Max

Order Sequence

Zero Pad

Specifies the type of mobile (currently, only “Omnitronics” is supported).

Specifies the class of subscribers about to be added. Classes are used define property limits for subscribers in the class. For instance, one class may have different values for the GPS reporting rate property.

Specifies the starting number for the range of SIDs.

Specifies the ending number for the range of SIDs.

Specifies the ordering of subscribers in the Subscriber

Summary. When the list is initially displayed, it is sorted by

Order Sequence and then by Name. If you want a few items to always be at the bottom, you might give them an Order

Sequence of 10 for instance. All the other items would have the default value of 0, and would appear above the items with

Order Sequence of 10.

Option inserts one or more zeros at the beginning of identities so that all will have the same length. For instance, if a min of 1 and max of 100 is entered, the identity of 1 would become 001.

To manually add a range of subscribers

In the

Subscribers

panel, click the

Add Range

button to open the

Add

Subscriber Range

window.

In the

Name Prefix

text box, type the prefix you want to use for the unit names.

All subscribers in the range will start with this prefix.

In the

Name Suffix

text box, type the suffix you want to use.

All subscribers in the range will end with this suffix.

In the

Ident Min

text box, type the SID of the first subscriber in the range.

In the

Ident Max

text box, type the SID for the last subscriber in the range.

(Optional)

If you want to change the subscriber’s class, select a different one from the

Subscriber Class

dropdown list.

Click

to add the range of units.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Editing a Subscriber’s Details

You can edit an existing subscriber’s details by selecting the subscriber in the

Subscribers list, and then clicking the

Properties

button to open the

Subscriber

Edit

Figure 30. Editing the properties for a subscriber

This shows the details for the selected subscriber. Edit the details as required and then click

. The updated subscriber details will appear in Fleet Manager.

Deleting a Subscriber

You can delete subscribers that you no longer want to monitor in ALS Viewer.

However, if the subscriber is a member of a subscriber group, you will first need to delete the subscriber from the subscriber group before you can delete the subscriber

(see

on page 64).

To delete a subscriber, select the subscriber in the

Subscribers

list in Subscriber

Manager, and then click the

Delete

button . This deletes the subscriber from the

Subscribers list. Be careful when deleting subscribers as once they are deleted, they cannot be “undeleted”!

Adding a Subscriber Group

Once you have entered the details for all the subscribers you want to monitor, you must then associate the subscribers with at least one subscriber group. When a subscriber is associated with a subscriber group, its position will be updated on the tracking map in ALS Viewer.

Depending on the number of subscribers you want to track, you may only need to define one subscriber group. Usually, you would define multiple subscriber groups for a large number of subscribers.

Chapter 3



Figure 31 demonstrates how to associate a subscriber with a subscriber group.

To add a new subscriber group

In the

Subscriber Group

panel, click the

Add

button to open the

Add Group

window.

In the

Subscriber Group Name

text box, type an appropriate name that summarises the type of subscribers that will be grouped (e.g. Sales).

In the

Handle Device Type

dropdown list, choose the appropriate communication method for subscribers in this group (only “Omnitronics” is supported at this time).

In the

Radio Group Number

text box, type the number of the radio group (if applicable).

Click

to save the group.

The new group will show up in the list of Subscriber Groups.

Renaming a Subscriber Group

Once you have created one or more subscriber groups, if you later decide that the name of a subscriber group is not quite appropriate, you can rename the subscriber group accordingly.

To rename a subscriber group

In the

Subscriber Group

list, select the subscriber group you wish to rename (e.g.

Emergency Vehicles).

Click the

Properties

button to open the

Edit Group

window.

You should see the Edit Group window with the selected subscriber group's name already filled in.

In the

Subscriber Group Name

text box, type the new name for the subscriber group.

Click

to save the new subscriber group name.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Adding Subscribers to a Subscriber Group

Subscribers must be associated with a subscriber group in order for them to be visible in ALS Viewer and to generate geofence events. You can accomplish this in a number of ways.

To associate a single subscriber with a subscriber group, select the subscriber in the

Subscribers

list, and then drag and drop that subscriber on the appropriate subscriber group in the

Subscriber Groups

list.

To select multiple subscribers, either

Ctrl-click

each subscriber you want to include, or to select a range of subscribers,

click

the first subscriber, and then

Shift-click

the last subscriber to include in the range. Once you have selected the multiple subscribers, simply drag and drop the subscribers to the subscriber group.

Figure 31. Dragging a subscriber to a subscriber group

In this example, we associate the subscriber “Bob 2001 Patrol” with the subscriber group “Emergency Vehicles”. This is done by simply dragging and dropping the subscriber onto the appropriate subscriber group. When you expand the subscriber group, the subscriber then appears as a member of that subscriber group.

Deleting a Subscriber Group

You can delete subscriber groups that you no longer require. Usually, one or more subscribers are associated with a subscriber group. However, when you delete a group, any associations with subscribers will also be deleted. Be careful when deleting a group as once it’s deleted, it cannot be “undeleted”!

To delete a subscriber group, select the group in the

Subscriber Groups

list in

Subscriber Manager, and then click the

Delete

button . This deletes the group from the list together with any subscriber associations.

As a deleted subscriber group is no longer available, any subscribers associated with the group are now no longer associated with that group. Note that only the associations are deleted, not the actual subscribers. You can, however, associate the subscribers with another group.

Chapter 3



window, as shown in Figure 33.

Summary Displays

ALS Server provides several summary views of information as described in the following sections.

•

Alert Summary

– shows a list of contacts that will receive email or SMS alerts from ALS Server (see

“Alert Summary”

on page 65).

•

Subscriber Summary

– shows a list of current GPS events in real-time from active subscribers (see

“Subscriber Summary”

on page 71).

•

Event Summary

– shows a list of all events that have occurred in ALS Server since the program was started (see

“Event Summary”

on page 72)

•

Connected Users

– shows list of users connected to ALS Server (see

“Connected

Users”

on page 73).

Alert Summary

The

Alert Summary

window allows you to configure the contacts that will receive email or SMS alerts from ALS Server. The functionality outlined in this section is not available for all systems as it ties in closely with different devices status and emergency notifications.

Click the

Alert Summary

button on the toolbar, or select

Alert Summary

on the

View

menu, to open the

Alert Summary

32.

Figure 32. Alert Summary window

The

Alert Summary

window allows you to associate subscribers with “alert” contact numbers. When a subscriber transmits an SOS, or a particular preset status is received at the base, all associated contact numbers will be sent an SMS or email indicating that the subscriber has raised an alarm. It also allows various System Alerts (such as primary ALS Viewer link failures) to be broadcast to relevant network administration personnel. The buttons in the Alert Summary window perform the following actions:

Add Contact Number

button adds a new contact number.

Properties

button shows the properties for the selected contact in the list so you can edit them.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Delete Contact

button deletes the selected contact in the list.

Alert Settings

button edits the alert settings for the select contact in the list.

Test Alert Broadcast

button sends a test alert broadcast to all configured contacts.

Adding a New Contact Number

You can add a new contact number for a user by clicking the

Add Contact Number

button to open the

SOS Alert Number Edit

Figure 33. Alert Number Edit window

Type the details for the new contact number as well as what type of events this contact will respond to, and then click

to save the contact details.

Username

Display Name

Mobile Number

Email Address

Specifies the name of the user defined for this contact.

Specifies the name to display for this contact in ALS Viewer.

Specifies the mobile (cell-phone) number for this contact to use for SMS alerts.

Specifies the email address for this contact to use for sending email alerts.

Send System Alerts

Select this option to send system alerts to this contact; otherwise clear it.

Send Unit Alerts

Select this option to send subscriber alerts to this contact; otherwise clear it.

You can associate one or more subscribers with a contact number. To associate one subscriber with the contact number, drag the subscriber from the

Subscribers

list in

Subscriber Manager

and drop it onto the appropriate contact number. A whole group of subscribers can be associated in a similar manner (drag the Subscriber

Group from the Subscriber Groups list instead).

Chapter 3



section shown in Figure 35 includes options for configur-

Editing a Contact Number

You can edit an existing contact number by selecting the contact in the Alert

Summary window, and then clicking the

Properties

button to open the

SOS

Alert Number Edit

Figure 34. Editing the properties for a contact number

This shows the details for the contact number. Edit the details and then click

. The updated contact number will appear in the Alert Summary window.

Deleting a Contact Number

You can delete a contact number that you no longer want to use by selecting the contact number, and then clicking the

Delete

button . This deletes the contact number from Alert Summary. Be careful when deleting a contact number as once it’s deleted, it cannot be “undeleted”!

Editing the Alert Settings

You can configure the SMS/Email options by editing the Alert Settings. SMS messages can be sent using either a modem capable of sending SMS or via a suitable web service (account required). Emails require an appropriate SMTP server with relevant permissions.

Click on the

Alert Settings

button to open the

Alert Settings

window. This window is partitioned into several configuration pages:

SMS Capable Modem

Web

Service

, and

Email

, as discussed in the following sections.

Once you have enabled one or more alert notifications, you can test the operation of the alert notification from ALS Server by clicking the

Test Alert Broadcast

button

—this sends a test-alert notification broadcast to all configured contacts using the alert options you have enabled.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

SMS Capable Modem

The

SMS Capable Modem

ing alerts using an SMS-capable modem.

Figure 35. Alert settings for SMS capable modem

Use Modem

Port

Baud Rate

Data Bits

Select this option if you use an SMS-capable modem to send alerts.

Specifies the COM port to use for the connected modem.

Specifies the data rate (bps) to use for the connection.

Specifies the number of data bits to use.

Stop Bits

Parity

Specifies the number of stop bits to use.

Specifies the parity to use.

Flow Control

Specifies the type of flow control to use.

Initialization

Specifies the AT command(s) required to initialize the modem.

Log

Log Folder

Time Stamp

Select this option to log communications with the modem.

Specifies the folder to store log files.

Select this option if you want to time stamp logged data.

Note: The SMS Capable Modem feature was originally developed for proprietary hardware and services. Should you wish to provide your own

SMS Modem/Web Service and make use of this feature, it will most likely need additional development and certifiification with Omnitronics. Please contact Omnitronics Support for further information.

Chapter 3



section shown in Figure 36 includes options for configuring alerts

Web Service

The

Web Service

sent to a web service.

Figure 36. Alert settings for web service

Use URL

URL

User name

Password

Select this option to enable alerts via an SMS web service.

Specifies the URL of the SMS web service to receive alerts. You can insert the following placeholders: %U for user name, %P for password, %N for number, and %M for xxx.

Specifies the user name of the SMS account used to send alerts.

Specifies the password of the SMS account used to send alerts.

Note: The Web Service feature was originally developed for proprietary hardware and services. Should you wish to provide your own SMS

Modem/Web Service and make use of this feature, it will most likely need additional development and certifiification with Omnitronics. Please contact Omnitronics Support for further information.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Email

The

Email

section shown in Figure 37 includes options for configuring email alerts.

Sender

Figure 37. Alert Settings window

Use Email

SMTP Server

Select this option to enable email alerts from ALS Server .

Specifies the name of the SMTP server to use for sending email alerts.

Specifies the email address of the sender.

Chapter 3



the one shown in Figure 38.

Subscriber Summary

The

Subscriber Summary

window shows a brief summary of current GPS events in real-time from active subscribers. The layout of this window is dependent on the event settings (see

“Event Configuration”

on page 52).

Click the

Subscriber Summary

button on the toolbar, or select

Subscriber

Summary

on the

View

menu, to open the

Subscriber Summary

window similar to

Subscriber

Hdg

KPH

Elapsed

Stationary

Locality

Geofence

Last Msg

Figure 38. Subscriber Summary window

An explanation of the columns displayed here is as follows:

A sequential number starting from 1 for each unique subscriber identifier (SID).

The name assigned to the subscriber.

If the GPS data received by the radio contains heading information, it will be displayed here. Possible values are North (N), West (W),

East (E), and South (S).

If the GPS data received by the radio contains current speed information, it will be displayed here in kilometres per hour (KPH) or miles per hour (MPH) depending on language locale.

The time elapsed since the last GPS update.

The time indicating how long the subscriber has been stationary. If several GPS updates are received from the same subscriber with the same latitude and longitude, a time value will be displayed indicating how long the subscriber has been stationary, and it will be cleared when the subscriber moves again.

If the GPS data received from the subscriber contains locality information, it will be displayed here.

If the subscriber is detected inside a geofence, this field will display the name of the geofence.

Displays the last GPS event message for this subscriber. Possible values include Position (received position information) and Lost

Contact (GPS data not received in a long time).

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Event Summary

The

Event Summary

window displays a list of all the events that have occurred in

ALS Server since the program was started. Events are timestamped and have an event type. These events are volatile so the list will be cleared each time the program starts up.

Click the

Event Summary

button on the toolbar, or select

Event Summary

on the

View

menu, to open the

Event Summary

window similar to the one shown in

Figure 39.

Figure 39. Event Summary window

The buttons in the Event Summary window perform the following actions:

Delete Events

button clears the event summary list by deleting all the events in the list.

Padlock

button locks or unlocks the event-summary list. When the list is locked, it will automatically scroll when new events appear. When the list is unlocked, you can scroll back to view past events.

The event summary list can display many different types of events; however, it will retain only the first 500 of the most-recent events. Once this limitation is reached, the first fifty events (oldest) are automatically deleted from the list to accommodate new events. When new events appear in the event-summary list, the list automatically scrolls so that the most-recent event is always visible.

You can delete all the events in the list by clicking the

Delete Events

button . Be careful as once the events are deleted, you cannot “undelete” them!

Chapter 3



“Configuring ALS Viewer as Administrator”

If you wish to scroll back and review past events, click the

Padlock

button to unlock the event-summary list and enable scrolling. Once you have finished reviewing the events, click the

Padlock

button again to lock the list and enable automated event tracking.

The following types of events are provided:

STATE

EVENT

ALARM

NOTIFY

ATTN

REQUEST

An event to indicate Program Commenced, Client Connected, and Client

Disconnected.

An event to indicate Lost Contact, Speeding, Proximity, and Stoppage alerts.

Reserved for future use.

A “notification” event generated from the server for subscriber position updates.

An “attention” event (coloured in red) to indicate some kind of violation has occurred that may require immediate attention.

A “request” event is made to the server for job allocation and messaging

(not used).

Connected Users

The

Connected Users

window shows a list of ALS Viewer users currently connected to ALS Server. The details include the IP address and Windows user name of each user. This information is logged to the ALS Server database.

Click the

Connected Users

button on the toolbar, or select

Connected Users

on the

View

menu, to open the

Connected Users

window similar to the one shown in

Figure 40.

Figure 40. Connected Users window

Information about when a user connects or disconnects with ALS Server is displayed as a STATE event in Event Summary (see

“Event Summary”

on page 72).

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

C H A P T E R 4

ALS Viewer

This chapter discusses the configuration options available with ALS Viewer, and includes the following sections:

•

“Starting ALS Viewer”

on page 75

•

on page 76

•

“Database Connection Settings”

on page 77

•

“Understanding the User Interface”

on page 78

•

“Configuring ALS Viewer”

on page 84

•

“Setting Up Workspaces”

on page 94

•

“Map Manager”

on page 137

•

“Subscriber Manager”

on page 139

•

“Summary Displays”

on page 150

Starting ALS Viewer

Program shortcuts for ALS Viewer are installed on the Windows

Startup menu and on the Windows desktop. You can start ALS Viewer by double-clicking the program shortcut on the desktop or clicking the ALS Viewer shortcut on the Windows Start menu.

Note: Before starting ALS Viewer, you should change the program properties to run as administrator (see

“Configuring ALS Viewer as

Administrator”

on the following page). Additionally, you should ensure that ALS Server is already running on the server computer and properly configured otherwise ALS Viewer will not function.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Configuring ALS Viewer as Administrator

ALS Viewer needs to

run as administrator

. Before you do this, however, you must ensure that ALS Viewer is not already running. If you see a program icon for ALS

Viewer in the Windows task bar, switch to ALS Viewer, and then select

Exit

from the

File

menu.

You can then change the properties of ALS Viewer to run as administrator by following the procedure below.

To enable administrator access

Open Windows File Explorer and browse to the ALS Viewer folder:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Omnitronics\ALS Viewer

Right-click

ALS Viewer.exe

, and select

Properties

In the Properties window, select the

Compatibility

tab, and then select

Run this program as an administrator

Click

ALS Viewer should now run as an administrator.



The Main Toolbar shown in Figure 42 is always visible (usually docked to the main

Database Connection Settings

When you run ALS Viewer for the first time, or if it encounters a problem while connecting with SQL Server 2014 Express on the ALS Server computer, you will be asked to configure the connection settings.

To run ALS Viewer

Start ALS Viewer.

The program icon for ALS Viewer appears on the desktop or a shortcut on the

Start menu under Omnitronics.

If you see the Database Connection Settings window similar to the one shown below, you will need to configure the connection settings:

2.1 Select

Use SQL Server

, and then type the name of your SQL Server name in the

SQL Server

text box.

This is COMPUTER-NAME\ALSSERVER where COMPUTER-NAME is the name of the server computer running SQL Server 2014 Express and ALSSERVER is the name of the SQL Server instance.

2.2 Select

Use a specific user name and password

, and in the

User Name

and

Password

text boxes, type

omnitronics

for the user name and type

0mnitronics

for the password (note the password starts with a zero, not the letter O).

2.3 Click

ALS Viewer will now attempt to establish a connection to SQL Server 2014 Express using the settings you configured.

Note: If you cannot connect to SQL Server 2104 Express, refer to the troubleshooting section

“Connection Problems”

on page 157.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Understanding the User Interface

Once ALS Viewer launches, you will be presented with the user interface (initially with

Map Manager

Manages subscribers

Map window

Shows subscribers on the map

Menu

Main toolbar

Map toolbar

Map area

Status bar

Legend panel

Shows the layers in the workspace

Figure 41. ALS Viewer user interface

Geofence

Shows geofence boundary and name

Subscriber marker

Shows the subscriber identifier (SID)

Main Toolbar

window) and contains the following buttons.

Figure 42. Main toolbar

New Workspace

button allows you to create a new workspace for displaying tracking data.

Open Workspace

button allows you to browse for a Workspace (rwk) file to open.



The Map Toolbar shown in Figure 43 becomes visible when you have at least one

Save Workspace

button allows you to save the underlying layer settings for the currently active workspace.

Print

button prints the currently active map. This is only available when you have a map window open.

Refresh

button does an immediate refresh of ALS Viewer to update subscriber position information.

Subscriber Manager

button opens the

Subscriber Manager

window for adding or editing subscriber details.

Message Summary

button opens the

Message

window containing all outstanding message/polling requests for certain types of device.

Vehicle Summary

button opens the

Vehicle Summary

window that gives an overview of each vehicle in the poll list.

Event Summary

button opens the

Event Summary

window that displays a list of events that have occurred since program commencement.

Geofence Summary

button opens the

Geofence Summary

window that displays a list of the geofences stored in the database.

Preset Zoom Summary

button opens the

Preset Zoom Summary

window that displays a list of user-defined map boundaries.

Place Job

button opens the

Edit Job

window so that you can enter and submit information for a new job.

Connection Options

button opens the

Connection Options

window to allow you to change or configure the connection options (see

“Connection

Options”

on page 85).

About

button opens the

About

window that displays version and build information for the currently installed instance of ALS Viewer.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Map Toolbar

mapping workspace open. It contains the following buttons.

Figure 43. Map toolbar

Zoom Box

tool allows you to zoom in to an area of the map by drawing a box from top left to bottom right; and zoom out by drawing a box from the bottom right up to the top left.

Dynamic Zoom

tool zooms into an area of the map by clicking on the map and dragging the mouse in a downwards direction. You can also zoom out by clicking on the map and dragging the mouse in an upwards direction. The further the mouse is moved up or down on the map, the more the map zooms in or out. As the map changes dynamically with the mouse movement, this can be quite an effective way of zooming to just the right level.

Pan

tool is a simple way to reposition the map by dragging the mouse pointer on the map to a new position.

Add Geofence

tool allows you to add a new polygonal region or geofence to the geofence layer (see

“Geofence and

Feature Management

on page

141).

Add Preset Zoom

tool allows the current map extents to be saved in the database with a user-friendly name. You can then revert to this boundary in the future by selecting it from the

Preset Zoom Summary

window.

Add Feature

tool allows symbol objects to be placed on the map at the point clicked. This is useful for inserting features like client locations.

Edit Geofence

tool allows you to edit an existing geofence or feature on the appropriate layer. Once you select a geofence or feature, points can be moved, inserted, or removed (see

“Geofence and

Feature Management

“Displaying Subscribers at

on page 141).

Information

tool allows you to view positional information for a subscriber if a track point is at the selected location or any attribute information for objects is at that geographic location.

Subscribers At Location

tool displays a list of all subscribers within a particular circular region in the Information Window. This is handy in situations where several subscribers are all in close proximity to each other and cannot all be labelled clearly (see

Location

on page 156).

Measure

tool allows distances between map locations to be calculated by clicking on subsequent points on the map.

Upload Geofences

button uploads geofence boundaries from an appropriately formatted file into the geofence database.



“Load Track from Database”

Find Street

button allows you to locate a particular street and suburb combination on the map. Once an exact match is identified, the map will be zoomed to this location.

Fit

button allows you to zoom back out to the entire extent of the current workspace eg Brisbane,

North America, world

Map Manager

button is used to show/hide a list of vehicles that are currently associated with a particular map.

Legend

button is used to activate a map's

Legend

panel which is used to control how mapping information is displayed on screen. Layers can be added and removed or even reordered by selecting the layer from the list and clicking on the appropriate button. Properties for a layer can also be modified.

Replay Control

button displays the

Replay Controller

window, which is used to replay previously stored tracking points (see

“Replay Controller”

on page 147).

Load Track from File

button allows you to retrieve previously logged tracking data from a file (see

“Load Track from File”

on page 148).

Load Track from Database

button allows you to retrieve historical data for one or more subscribers (see

on page 148).

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Status Bar

The status bar is located along the lower edge of the main window, as shown in

Figure 44. It is divided into several panels of information as described below.

Figure 44. ALS Viewer satus bar

Message

Cursor

Scale

Distance

CAP

NUM

SCRL

Shows help text for menus and toolbars and the status of ALS

Viewer as it populates or updates various lists.

Shows the current cursor coordinates on the map. This will change as you move the mouse pointer over the map.

Shows the current scaling factor applied to the map. This will change as you zoom-in or zoom-out on the map.

Shows the distance in kilometres (km).

Connection OK

indicates ALS Viewer has successfully connected to the primary ALS Server and to the ALS Server database

ALSServer (SQL Server instance).

Connection Failed

indicates ALS Viewer could not connect to the primary ALS Server, but has connected to ALS Server database

(SQL Server instance). This may be due to several reasons such as

ALS Server is not running or the properties for the primary connection are not correct.

Connection Failed

indicates ALS Viewer could not connect to the primary ALS Server, nor could it connect to ALS Server database

(SQL Server instance). This may be due to several reasons such as

ALS Server is not running, SQL Server is not running, or the properties for the primary connection are not correct.

Indicates you pressed the

Caps Lock

key on the keyboard to enable the caps-lock function.

Indicates you pressed the

Num Lock

key on the keyboard to enable the num-lock function.

Indicates you pressed the

Scroll Lock

key on the keyboard to enable the scroll-lock function.

The status area also displays tooltips for toolbar buttons and menu items. A

tooltip

is a brief description of the function that a button or menu item performs. When the mouse pointer hovers over a button or menu item, a tooltip appears describing its function.



window, as shown in Figure 47.

Changing the Layout

Windows can be undocked and moved to another position on the screen to change the layout of the main window. You can also change the size of a window or group windows together or dock one window at the side of another window.

Figure 45 shows an example of the main window layout that has been rearranged to move the Geofence Summary window.

Figure 45. Repositioning and docking a window to another window

Ctrl

key while you drag the window to the new position. To undock a window, doubleclick the window’s title bar. To change the size of a window, drag any corner of the window.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Figure 46 shows a close-up of the window repositioning guides that you use to dock windows.

Tab

Docks to the window as a tab

Top side

Docks to the top of window

Left side

Docks to the left side of window

Right side

Docks to the right side of window

Bottom side

Docks to the bottom of window

Figure 46. Selecting the type of docking to perform

Displaying Version Information

Select

About ALS Viewer

on the

Help

menu to display the

About ALS Viewer

Figure 47. Showing the version information

Configuring ALS Viewer

The user interface for ALS Viewer is partitioned into user-configurable panels each representing a different component of the viewer. The viewer also has a top-level menu which enables access to other program options. The following sections outline each of these features and how to configure them.



tab, as shown in Figure 49, displays the connection settings for the

Connection Options

Click the

Connection Options

button on the Main toolbar, or select

Connection

Options

on the

Tools

menu, to display the

Connection Options

window.

The Connection Options are generally only changed when ALS Server is configured in a redundant fashion, which requires a special SQL Server configuration to function.

Please contact Omnitronics Support should you wish to set up redundant ALS Server instances.

General

The

General

tab, as shown in Figure 48, displays the name of the user that is currently logged in and provides connection management information.

Figure 48. General connection options

Primary Monitor

Select this option for ALS Viewer to show a “lostconnection” alert when the connection to the ALS Server is lost.

Number of

Connections

Specifies the number of connections to configure for connecting to ALS Server so that another server can be used when the primary server is down. The default is 1. You can have one secondary connection so that if the primary connection fails, the secondary connection will be used. In this case, you will need to configure the connection settings for the secondary connection on Connection 2 tab.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Primary Connection

Specifies the connection to use for the primary connection.

This defaults to Primary.

Use Secondary

Server facility

Connection

Select this option to allow the secondary server connection to be specified.

Specifies the connection to use for the secondary server.

Use a common SQL

Server logon across connections

Select this option to allow one set of authorisation credentials to be used across all connections.

Primary

The

Primary

primary connection.

Figure 49. Primary connection options

Connection Name

Specifies the name of the connection and is a convenient way to describe the set of connection properties.

Allocate Local Port

Automatically

Select this option to force ALS Viewer to automatically assign a port for the duration of the session (recommended); otherwise, clear this option to manually set Local Port number.

Local Port

Specifies the port to use for connections to the server. This field is disabled when Allocate Local Port Automatically option is selected (recommended).



window, as shown in Figure 50.

General Configuration

Select

General Configuration

on the

Tools

menu to display the

General

Configuration

Subscriber Display

The

Subscriber Display

tab allows you to configure several display settings for subscribers.

Figure 50. Configuration of subscriber display

Show Lost

Contact items

Select this option to allow lost contacts to be displayed on the map. If you only want to display subscribers that are currently active, clear this option.

Select this option to automatically re-centre maps on subscribers that are deemed to have set an SOS state.

Automatically centre on SOS receipt

Use RSSI colouring for live positions

Use RSSI colouring past positions

Playback

Speed

Show trails when replaying

Select this option to allow live positions to be coloured based on their RSSI as opposed to any other default/event colours.

Select this option to allow past positions to be coloured based on their RSSI as opposed to any other default/event colours.

Determines the rate at which points will be displayed when using the automatic playback facility of the Replay Controller.

Select this option to display the trail (breadcrumbs) left behind for the selected subscriber(s) as it moves across the map in

Replay mode; otherwise only the current position of the subscriber(s) will be displayed in Replay mode.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Remove points when backtracking

Select this option to remove the trail points (breadcrumbs) one after the other from the map as the subscriber moves back in time in Replay mode.

Symbols

Figure 51 shows the

Symbols

tab, which allows you to configure the symbols used to display subscriber positions on the map.

Figure 51. Configuration of symbols

Current Moving

symbol indicates subscriber is providing speed information (speed

> 0) and GPS coordinate information. If the unit also provides heading information, the icon will rotate according to the heading (“Rotate symbols with heading” setting must be selected).

Current Stopped

symbol indicates subscriber is providing only GPS coordinate information and no speed information or the speed is 0 (stopped).

Replayed positions

symbol indicates the symbol to display for all historical subscriber track points.

Rotate symbols with heading

option rotates the Current Moving symbol according to the subscriber’s current heading (the subscriber must provide heading information).

Rotation Offset

specifies the number of degrees to initially rotate the Current

Moving symbol to reflect a heading of due north.

Feature Symbol

is used to display user-defined features.



tab shown in Figure 53 allows you to configure settings for the

You can change the symbols used to represent subscribers. To select a different symbol, click on a symbol button to open the

Select Symbol

window similar to the

one shown in Figure 52.

Figure 52. Selecting a symbol

Click on a symbol to select the one you want to use, and then click

. The new symbol will now be used instead of the default symbol. The following icons represent the default icons and colours for subscribers, but you can change these in the ALS

Server event configuration

Default icon for subscribers reporting GPS position. This is configured in ALS

Server by changing the subscriber’s “Default Colour” property (see

“Editing a

Subscriber’s Details”

on page 62).

Default icon for subscribers in close proximity to each another. This is configured in ALS Server event configuration (see

“Event Configuration”

on page 52).

Default icon for subscribers that remain stationary for a prolonged period of time. This is configured in the ALS event configuration (see

“Event

Configuration”

on page 52).

Default icon for subscribers that have not reported position for a short period of time. These subscribers are flagged as “lost”. The default time is 5 minutes since the last GPS update. This is configured in ALS Server event configuration

(see

“Lost Communications”

on page 54).

Default icon for subscribers that have not reported position for a long period of time. These subscribers are flagged as “lost”. The default time is 10 minutes since the last GPS update. This is configured in ALS Server event configuration

(see

“Lost Communications”

on page 54).

Default icon for subscribers with no valid position reported (invalid GPS data).

This is configured in ALS Server event configuration (see

“Lost

Communications”

on page 54).

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Street Searches

The

Street Searches

Find Street functionality. This section needs to be set up in order to use Find Street functionality.

Figure 53. Configuring street searches

Use state-based configuration file

Use simple single area configuration

If you intend to use road and suburb information grouped into multiple areas (e.g. grouped by state), select this option and specify the configuration file to use for the state-based configuration (default is StreetSetup.ini

in the installation folder).

Select this option to allow vector-based road- and suburblayers to be selected and relevant fields in those layers to be entered. This will then be used by the Street Search tool to move to the appropriate area on the map.

Road Table

Name of the street/road layer that will be searched.

Road Name Field

Name of the field in the

Road Table

that contains the street's name

Road Suburb Field

Name of the field in the

Road Table

that contains the appropriate suburb (if present).

Suburb Table

Name of the layer that contains suburbs for use in refining the street search.

Suburb Name Field

Name of the field in the

Suburb Table

that contains the suburb's name.



State-based Configuration File

The state-based configuration file mentioned in the Street Searches section above

(see

“

Use state-based configuration file

option on page 90) is a configuration file used by the Find Street feature (see

“Finding Streets”

on page 136). It is used when searching for street names and is usually located in the installation folder:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Omnitronics\ALS Viewer\StreetSetup.ini

This file is partitioned into three main configuration sections: Fields, Files, and States, as shown in the example below.

[Fields]

LocalityTableLocality=Feature_Name

RoadTableStreet=ROADNAME

RoadTableLocality=LOCALITY_1

[Files]

NumStateFiles=2

State1=NSW

State2=ACT

[State: NSW]

RoadTable=AGL_NSW_ROAD

LocalityTable=AGL_NSW_SUBURB

[State: ACT]

RoadTable=ACT_ROAD

LocalityTable=ACT_SUBURB

Fields Section

The [Fields] section contains three entries corresponding to the field names that will be used for field look up in the various mapping layers.

[Fields]

LocalityTableLocality=<FeatureName>

RoadTableStreet=<RoadName>

RoadTableLocality=<LocalityName>

LocalityTableLocality

Specifies the name of the <FeatureName> field in the

“Locality” table(s) that contains the name of the locality.

RoadTableStreet

Specifies the name of the <RoadName> field in the

“Road” table(s) that contains the name of the street.

RoadTableLocality

Specifies the name of <LocalityName> field in the

“Road” table(s) that contains the name of the locality.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Files Section

The number of entries in the [Files] section depends on the number of “state” files that should be loaded, which is specified by the NumStateFiles entry.

[Files]

NumStateFiles=2

State1=NSW

State2=ACT

NumStateFiles

State: x

Specifies how many separate “state” files should be loaded when performing street/locality searches.

Specifies the value corresponding to the field that is returned for a state from the country layer (as used in the State section below).

State Section

The Street Setup file can include one or more [State] sections depending on the number of “state” files specified. A separate state section should be included for each state in which subscribers will be located.

The format of the state section is shown in the example below where <StateName> corresponds to an entry in the Country table.

[State: <StateName>]

RoadTable=<STATE_ROAD>

LocalityTable=<STATE_SUBURB >

Each state section requires two entries:

RoadTable

LocalityTable

Specifies the location of the “Road” layer <STATE_ROAD> .

Specifies the location of the “Locality” layer <STATE_SUBURB>

Note: The files for the RoadTable and LocalityTable must be in the

MapInfo/ESRI shape vector format.



information appears on the map, as shown in Figure 54.

Map Display

The

Map Display

tab allows you to configure settings to control how GPS positional

Figure 54. Configuring map display

Use Geofences

Select this option to display the Geofence layer on each map.

Use Features

Select this option to display the User Features layer on each map.

Quick Zoom

Scale Factor

Cursor Display

Format

Specifies the scaling factor to apply to the map when selecting

Quick Zoom from the View menu.

Specifies the format to use for displaying the cursor position information in the status bar. The Eastings/Northings option will display metres based information if the underlying coordinate system used by the high level workspace project supports it.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

SOS

Coordinate

System

Coordinate System and coordinate display format for use on the flashing SOS Alert screen. Click the Select button to open the Select Coordinate System window from which you can select the appropriate coordinate system to use.

Setting Up Workspaces

Maps are loaded and displayed in ALS Viewer workspaces. A

workspace

is saved in a workspace file (.rwk) as a structured set of configurable display layers. The workspace file contains information about which layers should be displayed as well as the presentation style of the geographical objects within the individual layers of the workspace.

BITStreets data (for users in Australia) is stored in a BitStreets data file (.bitsts) and can be selected when you create a new workspace. This option also has an accompanying workspace file so that other layers can be used in conjunction with the BITStreets data (e.g. OSM derived POI layers). Each layer defined in a workspace can represent:

•

Current subscriber locations

– Subscriber locations are typically shown in the workspace as coloured points with the configured display name, and are updated in real time. These are usually configured as the topmost layer in live mode.

•

Subscriber tracks

– When in replay mode and historical data is loaded, the historical tracks made by a vehicle are shown in the workspace. This is usually configured as the topmost layer when in replay mode.

•

User Features

– Custom features/sites not found on the current map may be added and removed. These are usually configured on a layer above geofences and the map.

•

Geofences

– Geofences of various types are created and applied as a layer in the workspace. This is usually configured as a middle layer between the units and the map so that units do not disappear from the display when they enter a geofence.

•

Map data

– Custom maps in various formats may be loaded into ALS Viewer by adding them to the workspace as a layer. The map is usually configured as the lowest layer so that unit locations, tracks, user features, and geofences are not hidden by the map itself.



Note: Before proceeding, you should ensure that you already have a supported map file downloaded to the computer on which ALS Viewer is running, and you know what projected or geographic coordinate system it uses. One of the most common formats is the geographic coordinate system of WGS 84 (epsg:4326).

Supported map vector formats are: .dgn, .dxf, .shp, .tab, and .osm.

Supported map raster formats are: .ecw, .jpg, .tif, and .ttkps.

Creating a New Workspace

The following procedure will guide you through the process of how to create a new workspace and load a map layer or one or more other layers into it.

To create a new workspace

Select

New

from the

File

menu or click on the main toolbar to open the New

Workspace window.

Under

Select a starting point for the new workspace

, select one of the following:

•

Existing project file

to load an existing workspace

•

BIT Streets Project

to load a BIT Streets workspace

•

OSM Tile Server

to load OSM tile server workspace

•

Web Tiles Service

to load OpenStreetMap workspace

•

Blank map (with selected coordinate system)

to load a new blank workspace

If you have selected

Blank map (with selected coordinate system)

, select the type of coordinate system to use for the map’s Projected or Geographic coordinate system.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

As a guide, if your data contains coordinates with Eastings and Northings, you should choose one from the Projected list; and your data has latitudes and longitudes, you should choose one from the Geographic list.

Click

Save As

to open the Save As dialog, and then specify a filename and a location to save the new workspace.

You may want to name the workspace after the map zone you are working with.

Usually, workspaces are saved in the following location:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Omnitronics\ALS Viewer\MapData

Click

to create the new workspace.

You should now see a blank map window with its name in the title, an empty Map

Manager window (in Replay mode), and a Legend panel with several default layers.

Right click the

Legend

panel and select

Add Layer

to open the Add Layer window.

In the

Add Layer

window, browse to the layer you want to add, and then click

Open

to add it to the Legend.

After you have selected the layer, an entry with its name will appear in the Legend and the layer will be added to the map. You may need to drag the items in the

Legend to arrange the order of the workspace layers.

Note: You should ensure the map layer is located at the bottom of the legend so that subscribers and geofences are not obstructed.

(Optional)

To add another layer to the Legend, repeat step 7.

The list of currently supported vector formats include: Microstation dgn, AutoCAD dxf, ESRI shp, and MapInfo tab. In addition, the following raster file formats are also supported: ecw, jpg, and tif.

By default, layers are added to the top of the Legend. Typically, you will want the

Vehicle Current layer (that holds the current position of each vehicle) to be at the top. You can reposition it by simply clicking on it and dragging it over the top of

(or even above) the topmost entry in the list.



Once you have finished adding layers, select

Save

from the

File

menu or click on the main toolbar to save the workspace.

Configuring Layer Properties

Each layer in a workspace has a number of properties that you can configure to change the overall appearance of the layer in ALS Viewer. Layer properties are stored in a TatukGIS project file (.TTKGP). If the file does not exist, it will be created in the same folder as the workspace configuration file (.RWK).

The project file contains the file names and paths for each layer composing a project, the layer order, map area coordinate system, and all the visual properties controlling the appearance of each layer, including colors, line widths and styles, marker symbols, polygon fills, label presentation, fonts, scale ranges, symbols, charts, and transparency.

To configure the properties for a particular layer, double-click the layer in the

Legend

panel to open the

Properties

window for that layer. The Properties window contains a wide range of settings to control the visual appearance of a map layer. Each one of the tabs is discussed below.

The layer properties dialog comes in two different types (refer to the topics for detailed information):

•

Raster

dialog – properties dialog box for raster type layers such as images and grids (see

“Raster Properties”

on page 99)

•

Vector

dialog – properties dialog box for vector type layers (see

“Vector

Properties”

on page 104)

All settings apply to the section currently selected in the

Section list

, as shown in

Figure 55. A

section

is a set of visual properties defined for a range of zoom levels.

The Visible section is the default section—visual properties defined for it are valid for any zoom level.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Section list

Figure 55. Visual properties for polygon vector layer named Geofence.

Adding and Deleting Sections

To add a new section to a layer

Select (highlight) the desired layer by clicking on its name in the Legend panel.

To open the Properties dialog for the layer, double-click the layer.

On the layer Properties dialog, select any tab on which the Section list is visible.

Click the Add Section button at the left side of the Section list.

To delete a section from a layer

Select (highlight) the desired layer by clicking on its name in the Legend panel.

To open the Properties dialog for the layer, double-click the layer.

On the layer Properties dialog, select any tab on which the Section list is visible.

In the Section list, select the section to be deleted.

Click the Delete Section button at the left side of the Section list.



on page 103) – appears only when the layer is not

Raster Properties

The

Raster

dialog contains the layer properties for the raster type layers (images and grids). It consists of four tabs:

•

Layer

tab (see

“Layer”

on page 99)

•

Section

tab (see

“Section”

on page 102)

•

Pixel

tab (see

“Pixel”

recognized as a grid layer.

•

Grid

tab – appears only when the layer is recognized as a grid layer.

•

tab (see

“3D”

on page 104)

Layer

The

Layer

tab includes two property pages:

Parameters

and

Info

, as described in the following sections.

Parameters

The

Parameters

property page on the

Layer

tab is shown in Figure 56.

Path

Name

Caption

Coordinate

System

Figure 56. Layer Parameters properties

Path or address of the selected layer (READ ONLY).

Automatically generated name the selected layer (READ ONLY).

Caption of the layer as it appears in the Legend panel.

Coordinate system information for the layer.

Advanced Location Services (ALS) – User Manual

Cached Paint

Select this option to use cached rendering for the layer. This means that all rendering is cached (off screen) first and then the map image is displayed on completion. This helps reduce screen flicker. Clearing this option means rendering is performed directly on the Map area, which helps to improve performance but increases screen flicker for complex vector renderings.

Labels On Top

Select this option to force labels to be displayed on top of all map layers in the workspace.

Incremental

Paint

Select this option to use incremental painting for the layer. The mapping engine currently renders a map in two phases: the first is the “draft” phase, which essentially draws all simple vector geometry; and the second is the “final” phase, which draws the final presentation features like charts, labels, and complex fill styles. With this option selected, only the first phase is performed while you drag the map, and the second phase is performed once movement has stopped long enough for the rendering process to be completed. It is recommended that you select this option for large or complex layers to improve performance.

Transparency

Determines the transparency of the layer, and is a value in the range 0 to 100. A value of 0 corresponds to full transparency

(invisible), and a value of 100 corresponds to no transparency

(opaque). It may be better to think of this value as an Opacity percentage.

Addition

(Applies only to anaglyphs) Factor defining the proportions in which the color of the foreground layer is mixed with the color of the background layer (value in the ranger 0 to 100). Determines the degree to which the background colour of the layer is added to the colour of the objects in it.

100



tab is shown in Figure 57. It provides

Info

The

Info

property page on the

Layer

information about the format of the layer, a field for user comments about the layer, and CodePage options for situations requiring a translation between language character sets (e.g. Greek, Cyrillic, Arabic etc.).

Figure 57. Layer Info properties

Information about the format of the layer (READ ONLY).

File information

User comments

From

Codepage

Additional information provided by the creator of the file.

Codepage used to interpret character strings found in the layer.

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101

Section

Figure 63 shows the

Section

tab. The settings on this tab allow a single layer to be broken into multiple virtual layers defined by query statements and scale ranges

(zoom levels).

Figure 58. Section properties

Visible

Select this option to render the pixels in this section; otherwise clear it to hide the section (not rendered within the map area).

Minimum Scale

Minimum scale level (zoomed out) at which the section will be rendered. Click the Current button to fill it with the scale at the current zoom level.

Maximum Scale

Maximum scale level (zoomed in) at which the section will be rendered. Click the Current button to fill it with the scale at the current zoom level.

102



tab is shown in Figure 61.

Pixel

Figure 59 shows the

Pixel

tab.

Figure 59. Pixel properties

Red

Green

Blue

Brightness

Contrast

Inversion

Defines how much the green color is reduced/amplified with respect to the original value for each pixel; can vary from -100 to

100, where -100 means that the red color is completely reduced and 100 that the red color is fully amplified.

Defines how much the green color is reduced/amplified with respect to the original value for each pixel; can vary from -100 to

100, where -100 means that the green color is completely reduced and 100 that the green color is fully amplified.

Defines how much the blue color is reduced/amplified with respect to the original value for each pixel; can vary from -100 to

100, where -100 means that the blue color is completely reduced and 100 that the blue color is fully amplified.

Defines how much all colors are reduced/amplified with respect to the original value for each pixel; can vary from -100 to 100, where -100 turns the layer black and 100 turns the layer white,

Defines how much each color is reduced or amplified with respect to the original value for each pixel; for values from -100 to 0 the color is reduced if its original intensity is above the average and is amplified if its original intensity is below the average; for values from 0 to 100 the color is reduced if its original intensity is below the average and is amplified if its original intensity is above the average.

Select this option to display the layer as a negative.

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103

Grayscale

Histogram

Select this option to display the layer in grayscale.

Select this option to enhance the image using a histogram.

Reset button

restores the default settings on the Pixel tab.

3D

Figure 60 shows the

tab.

Figure 60. 3D properties

Treat layer as 2D

The Z coordinate is neglected (even if present) and the layer is drawn as a flat texture; in presence of a digital elevation model

(DEM) layer, the texture is spread over the DEM.

Treat layer as

Elevation Model

(DEM)

The layer is presented as a three dimensional terrain model; especially useful to force this representation when a DEM-type layer is not recognized as a DEM.

Vector Properties

The

Vector

dialog contains the layer properties for the vector type layers. It consists of several tabs (depending of the format of the vector layer):

•

Layer

tab (see

“Layer”

on page 105)

•

Section

tab (see

“Section”

on page 107)

•

Renderer

tab (see

“Renderer”

on page 108)

•

Line

tab – appears only if the layer supports line type shapes (see

“Line”

page 110)

•

Area

tab – appears only if the layer supports polygon type shapes (see

104



•

Marker

tab – appears only if the layer supports point or multipoint type shapes

(see

“Marker”

on page 116)

•

Label

tab (see

“Label”

on page 119)

•

Chart

tab (see

“Chart”

on page 131)

•

tab (see

“3D”

on page 134)

Layer

The

Layer

tab includes two property pages:

Parameters

and

Info

, as described in the following sections.

Parameters

The

Parameters

property page on the

Layer

Figure 61. Layer Parameters properties

Path

Name

Caption

Path to the file containing the selected layer (READ ONLY).

Name of the file containing the selected layer (READ ONLY).

Name for the layer as it appears in the Legend panel.

Projection

Geographic coordinate system of the selected layer.

Cached Paint

Select this option to use cached painting for the layer. Cached painting means that all drawing is cached (done off screen) first and then the map image is displayed on completion. This helps improve performance and reduce screen flicker. Clearing this option means rendering is performed directly on the map area.

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105

Incremental

Paint

Select this option to use incremental painting for the layer. The mapping engine currently renders a map in two phases: the first is the “draft” phase, which essentially draws all simple vector geometry; and the second is the “final” phase, which draws the final presentation features like charts, labels, and complex fill styles. With this option selected, only the first phase is performed while you move the map, and the second phase is performed once movement has stopped long enough for the rendering process to be completed. It is recommended that you select this option for large or complex layers.

Labels On Top

Select this option to force labels to be drawn on top of all map layers in the project.

Transparency

Determines the transparency of the layer, and is a value in the range 0 to 100. A value of 0 corresponds to full transparency (i.e. invisible), and a value of 100 corresponds to no transparency (i.e. full visibility). It may be better to think of this value as an Opacity percentage.

Addition

Determines the degree to which the background colour of the layer is added to the colour of the objects in it. A value in the range of 0 to 100 (useful for viewing anaglyphs).

Info

The

Info

property page on the

Layer

tab is shown in Figure 62. It provides

Figure 62. Layer Info properties

106



tab is shown in Figure 64. The settings on

If the layer is a raster image instead of a vector image, the File Information section will display the number of pixels in each row and column as well as the number of colour bits used by the image.

Information about the format of the layer (READ ONLY).

File information

User comments

From

Codepage

Additional information provided by the creator of the file.

Codepage used to interpret character strings found in the layer.

Section

Figure 63 shows the

Section

tab. The settings on this tab allow a single layer to be broken into multiple virtual layers defined by query statements and scale ranges

(zoom levels).

The

Render if match query

setting means that an object from the layer will be rendered (drawn on the map) only if the query logic is satisfied. For instance, if we only wanted to see subscribers that are stationary, we could change the Visible Query to SPEED = 0 .

One rendering strategy is to configure these settings so that the parts of the map layer defined by each section can be rendered in specific ways at specified scale levels or not rendered at all. This is one way to control map clutter, such as turning off certain map features or labels at specific zoom levels.

Figure 63. Section properties

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107

Visible

Minimum

Scale

Maximum

Scale

Render if match query

Legend

Ignore shape parameters

Select this option to render the shapes in this section; otherwise clear it to hide the section (not rendered within the map area). If you clear this option, shape visibility will be turned off in accordance with the parameters specified by the selection in the section list in the lower part of the window.

Minimum scale level (zoomed out) at which the section will be rendered. Click the

Current

button to fill it with the scale at the current zoom level.

Maximum scale level (zoomed in) at which the section will be rendered. Click the

Current

button to fill it with the scale at the current zoom level.

Specifies a query statement based on layer attributes—the current section settings will apply only to the shapes for which the logical value of this statement is true; the default logical value of the query (i.e. the logical value of the empty query) is true. All shapes matching the query will be rendered according to other settings in the properties window.

Specifies the name of the current section that will appear in the

Legend panel when the selected section is rendered.

Select this option to ignore any internal visual parameters that might be stored within the map file itself, as is possible with CAD file formats like DXF, DGN, and TAB.

Renderer

The

Renderer

tab includes two property pages:

First

and

Second

, as described in the following sections.

First and Second

The

First

property page on the

Renderer

this page allow you to render by dividing continuous values contained by a selected attribute into a number of zones. The settings on the

Second

property page are similar.

108



property page is shown in Figure 65.

Figure 64. Renderer properties

Number of

Zones

The number of zones (ranges) into which the attribute values will be divided when rendering the map.

Minimum

Value

Maximum

Value

The lowest value defining the lower bound of the lowest zone: a shape with a

Render Expression

less than this value will be rendered in the colour defined by

Default Color

The highest value defining the upper bound of the highest zone: a shape with the value of the

Render Expression

higher than this value will be rendered in the

Default Color

Color used to render shapes which belong to the lowest zone.

Color used to render shapes which belong to the highest zone.

Start Color

End Color

Default Color

Color used to render shapes with the value of the

Render

Expression

outside of the range defined by

Minimum Value

and

Maximum Value

Start Size

End Size

Size (width) of polygon outline used to render the shapes which belong to the lowest zone (in points).

Size (width) of polygon outline used to render the shapes which belong to the highest zone (in points).

Default Size

Size (width) of polygon outline used to render shapes with the value of the

Render Expression

outside of the range defined by

Minimum Value

and

Maximum Value

Render

Expression

Numerical attribute, or a simple mathematical expression with numerical attributes, used to divide shapes into zones on which the rendering will be based.

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109

Round

A positive value determines the number of places to the right of the decimal point that appear in numerical values when shown in the Legend panel. Negative values determine the number of places to the left of the decimal point that are to be displayed.

The

Wizard

button opens the Rendering Wizard window. This wizard makes it easy to quickly render a vector map layer based on the unique values or value ranges of a selected attribute. The Wizard will automatically determine the minimum and maximum values necessary to include all the shapes in the layer.

Line

The settings on the

Line

tab allow you to set the properties for line segments.

Line

The

Line

Color

Bitmap

Pattern

Symbol

Symbol Gap

Figure 65. Line properties

Style

Width

Style of the line.

Width of the line (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Color of the line (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Image to use for drawing lines instead of color.

Pattern to use for the line.

Character used for drawing line instead of color.

Distance between subsequent symbols (in points).

110



property page is shown in Figure 66.

Symbol Rotate

Relative rotation of each symbol (in degrees).

Include in

Legend

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

Outline

The

Outline

Color

Bitmap

Pattern

Include in

Legend

Figure 66. Line Outline properties

Style

Width

Style of the outline.

Width of the outline (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Color of the outline (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Image to use for drawing outlines instead of color.

Pattern to use for the outline.

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

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111

Smart Size

The

Smart Size

property page shown in Figure 67 provides access to the

smart size

feature. This important property sets a size threshold for rendering shape features in the layer. Shapes smaller than the smart size at any given zoom level (scale level) will not be rendered.

Field

Include in

Legend

Figure 67. Line Smart Size properties

Size

Value defines the minimum width a line must be at a particular scale to be visible (in points).

Numerical attribute defines the minimum width a line must be at a particular scale to be visible. If you want to explicitly set the size in points, clear this property and use the Size property instead.

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

It is recommended that you use the Smart Size feature with very large vector file layers. Smart Size can dramatically decrease the time required to open vector map files and can speed up the rendering at zoomed out extent levels.

This is because the software does not have to waste computational resources to render objects which are too small at a given zoom level to meaningfully affect the map view. In some situations use of the Smart Size feature can enhance the map view by reducing clutter.

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page shown in Figure 68 provides the settings to customise the colours and

Area

The settings on the

Area

tab allow you to set the properties for polygons.

Area

The

Area

textures used for each geofence type.

Figure 68. Area properties

Pattern

Bitmap

Pattern to use for rendering the polygonal area on the map.

Image to use for filling the polygonal area instead of color.

Color

Symbol

Color to use for the polygonal area (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Character used for drawing line instead of color.

Symbol Gap

Distance between subsequent symbols (in points).

Symbol Rotate

Relative rotation of each symbol (in degrees).

Symbol Size

Include in

Legend

Size of each symbol (in points).

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

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Outline

The

Outline

page is shown in Figure 69.

Figure 69. Area Outline properties

Style

Width

Color

Style of the outline.

Width of the outline (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Color of the outline (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Bitmap

Pattern

Symbol

Symbol Gap

Image to use for drawing outlines instead of color.

Pattern to use for the outline.

Character used for drawing line instead of color.

Distance between subsequent symbols (in points).

Symbol Rotate

Relative rotation of each symbol (in degrees).

Include in

Legend

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

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page is shown in Figure 70.

Smart Size

The

Smart Size

Field

Include in

Legend

Figure 70. Area Smart Size properties

Size

Value defines the minimum size a polygon must be at a particular scale to be visible (in points).

Numerical attribute defines the minimum size a polygon must be at a particular scale to be visible. If you want to explicitly set the size in points, clear this property and use the Size property instead.

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

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Marker

The settings on the

Marker

tab allow you to set the properties for marker points on the map.

Marker

If the layer is a point or multi-point layer, the

Marker

property page is displayed, as

shown in Figure 71.

Figure 71. Marker properties

Style

Size

Color

Style of the marker point.

Size of the marker point (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Color of the marker point (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Bitmap

Pattern

Image used for drawing marker point instead of color.

Pattern used for the marker point.

Symbol

Character used for drawing marker point instead of color.

Symbol Rotate

Relative rotation of each symbol (in degrees).

Include in

Legend

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

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page is shown in Figure 72.

Outline

The

Outline

Color

Bitmap

Pattern

Include in

Legend

Figure 72. Marker Outline properties

Style

Width

Style of the outline.

Width of the outline (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Color of the outline (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Image used for drawing outlines instead of color.

Pattern used for the outline.

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

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Smart Size

The

Smart Size

page is shown in Figure 73.

Field

Include in

Legend

Figure 73. Marker Smart Size properties

Size

Value defines the minimum size a marker point must be at a particular scale to be visible (in points).

Numerical attribute defines the minimum size a marker point must be at a particular scale to be visible. If you want to explicitly set the size in points, clear this property and use the Size property instead.

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

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Figure 74 provides a number of settings to control what information is presented and

Label

The

Label

tab includes four property pages:

Label

Outline

Smart Size

, and

Position

, as described in the following sections. The

Label

property page shown in

how each label appears depending on is size, colouring, outline, and font.

Bitmap

Pattern

Font

Field

Value

Include in

Legend

Visible

Figure 74. Label properties

Width

Height

Color

Maximum width of labels.

Maximum height of labels.

Background color of labels (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Image used for background of labels instead of color.

Pattern used for the background of labels instead of color.

Font used for the text of labels.

Attribute that determines which values are displayed as labels.

If not blank, a formatted combination of character strings and attribute values that is displayed as a label instead of the attribute defined in

Field

(see

“Custom Visual Formatting of

Labels

below for detailed information about label formatting)

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

Select this option to display labels (defined for the section) on the map area.

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Custom Visual Formatting of Labels

The Value field provides a simple markup language for custom label formatting. The field editor supports some of the standard HTML markup for visual formatting:

<iI>

<hr>

Text inside is displayed in bold font.

Equivalent of supported for compatibility with other

GIS products.

Text inside is displayed in italic font.

Text inside is underlined.

Horizontal line.

Line break.

Text inside is treated as a complete paragraph.

Text inside is displayed in extra bold font.

Text inside is displayed in the “Arial” font with size of 10pt and the color #cccccc where color can be one of the following:

BLACK, BLUE, FUCHSIA, GRAY, GREEEN, LIME, MAROON,

NAVY, OLIVE, PURPLE, RED, SILVER, TEAL, WHITE, YELLOW; or specified by the RGB representation #RRGGBB, where RR, GG, and BB are two digit hexadecimal number representations of the red, green and blue color intensities.

The ampersand (&) sign.

Forced insertion of non-breaking space.

The greater-than (>) sign.

The less-than (<) sign.

Inserting attributes

The code {FIELD_NAME:FORMAT} inserts the value of an attribute named

FIELD_NAME with formatting defined by the format string FORMAT. The format string is attribute type specific and is described below.

Formatting of number and float type attributes

Automatic formatting:

Format character

C or c

D or d

Format name

Currency

Decimal

Description

Integer next to the character defines the number of most significant digits to be displayed.

Integer next to the character defines the minimum number of digits to be displayed; number will be padded with zeroes if necessary; non integral value will be rounded first.

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E or e

F or f

G or g

N or n

P or p

R or r

X or x

Scientific

(exponential)

Fixed-point

General

Number

Percent

Round-trip

Hexadecimal

Integer next to the character defines the number of digits displayed after the decimal point (default is 2); number formatted as Scientific is always displayed in exponential form.

Integer next to the character defines the number of digits displayed after the decimal point (default is 2).

The Editor tries to display the number in best suited form; Integer next to the character defines the number of significant digits.

Integer next to the character defines the number of digits displayed after the decimal point (default is 2); inserts thousand separators accordingly to the system settings.

The number is multiplied by 100; i defines the number of digits displayed after the decimal point (default is 2).

Equivalent of General (for .NET compatibility only);

Integer next to the character is ignored.

Integer next to the character defines the minimum number of hexadecimal digits to be displayed; number will be padded with zeroes if necessary; non integral value will be rounded first.

Custom formatting:

Format character

Format name

Digit placeholder

Description

Defines optional position of a digit: if corresponding digit does not exist, the digit placeholder is neglected.

Zero placeholder

Defines mandatory position of a digit: if corresponding digit does not exist, the placeholder is replaced by '0'.

Decimal point Defines the position of the decimal point.

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Examples:

Code Attribute value

{FIELD_NAME:#.###}

{FIELD_NAME:#.000}

{FIELD_NAME:#.####0}

{FIELD_NAME:#####.###}

123.59

-123.59

{FIELD_NAME:00000.###}

{FIELD_NAME:0-0-0-0-0}

123.59

{FIELD_NAME:over #;below #;zero #} 123.59

FIELD_NAME:over #;below #;zero #} -123.59

{FIELD_NAME:over #;below #;zero #} 0

{FIELD_NAME:over #;below #;zero 0} 0

{FIELD_NAME:;below #;zero#} 123.59

{FIELD_NAME:over #;;zero#}

{FIELD_NAME:over #;below #;}

-123.59

Formatting of boolean type attributes

Automatic formatting:

Code

{FIELD_NAME}

Custom formatting:

Code

{FIELD_NAME}

{FIELD_NAME:yes}

Attribute value

True

False

Attribute value

True

False

True

Result

'True'

‘False’

Result

'123.59'

'123.590'

'123.59000'

'-123.59'

'00123.59'

'0-0-1-2-4'

'over 124'

'below 124'

'zero '

'zero 0'

Result

‘yes’

‘no’

'yes'

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Formatting of date type attributes

Character in parentheses represents a string consisting of any number of this character. h hh(h)

HH(H) m mm(m)

M f ff fff ffff fffff ffffff fffffff(f)

Format string d dd ddd dddd(d)

FFF

Format name

Day

Description

Day as a number 1..31 (without trailing zero).

Day as a number 01..31 (with trailing zero).

Day

Day as an abbreviated name of the day of the week; depends on system regional settings.

Day as a full name of the day of the week; depends on system regional settings.

Most significant digit of the second fraction.

Two most significant digits of the second fraction.

Three most significant digits of the second fraction.

Second fraction Four most significant digits of the second fraction.

Second fraction Five most significant digits of the second fraction.

Second fraction Six most significant digits of the second fraction.

Second fraction Seven most significant digits of the second fraction.

Second fraction Most significant digit of the second fraction; if zero then nothing will be displayed.

Second fraction Two most significant digits of the second fraction; trailing zeros will be truncated.

Second fraction Three most significant digits of the second fraction; trailing zeros will be truncated.

FFFF

FFFFF

Second fraction Four most significant digits of the second fraction; trailing zeros will be truncated.

Second fraction Five most significant digits of the second fraction; trailing zeros will be truncated.

FFFFFF Second fraction Six most significant digits of the second fraction; trailing zeros will be truncated.

FFFFFF(F) Second fraction Seven most significant digits of the second fraction; trailing zeros will be truncated.

Hour

Minute

Month

Hour as a number 1..12 (without trailing zero).

Hour as a number 01..12 (with trailing zero).

Hour as a number 1..24 (without trailing zero).

Hour as a number 01..24 (with trailing zero).

Minute as a number 0..59 (without trailing zero).

Minute as a number 00..59 (with trailing zero).

Month as a number 1..12 (without trailing zero).

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y yy yyy yyyy yyyy(y)

MMM

Month

MMMM(M) Month s ss(s) t tt(t)

Seconds

AM/PM

Year

Year z(z)

[other]

Examples:

GMT Offset

Code

{FIELD_NAME:d}

{FIELD_NAME:dd}

{FIELD_NAME:ddd}

{FIELD_NAME:dddd}

{FIELD_NAME:M}

{FIELD_NAME:MM}

{FIELD_NAME:MMM}

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Month as a number 01..12 (with trailing zero).

Month as an abbreviated name of the month; depends on system regional settings.

Month as a full name of the month; depends on system regional settings.

Seconds as a number 0..59 (without trailing zero).

Seconds as a number 00..59 (with trailing zero).

First character of the 'AM' or 'PM' string; depends on system regional settings.

'AM' or 'PM' string; depends on system regional settings.

Year as a two digit number; if year has less than two digits then one digit number will be displayed.

Year as a two digit number; if year has less than two digits then result will be padded with zero.

Year as a three digit number; if year has less than three digits then result will be padded with zeros.

Year as a four digit number; if year has less than four digits then result will be padded with zeros.

Year as a five digit number; if year has less than five digits then result will be padded with zeros.

[not supported yet]

Other characters are displayed without any change.

Attribute value

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

Result

‘9’

‘09’

‘Thu’

‘Thursday’

‘7’

‘07’

‘Jul’

{FIELD_NAME:MMMM}

{FIELD_NAME:y}

{FIELD_NAME:yy}

{FIELD_NAME:yyy}

{FIELD_NAME:yyyy}

{FIELD_NAME:yyyyy}

{FIELD_NAME:h}

{FIELD_NAME:hh}

{FIELD_NAME:H}

{FIELD_NAME:HH}

{FIELD_NAME:t}

{FIELD_NAME:tt}

{FIELD_NAME:m}

{FIELD_NAME:mm}

{FIELD_NAME:mmm}

{FIELD_NAME:s}

{FIELD_NAME:ss}

{FIELD_NAME:f}

{FIELD_NAME:ffff}

{FIELD_NAME:FFFF}

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

‘July’

‘09’

‘009’

‘2009’

‘02009’

‘5’

‘05’

‘17’

‘P’

‘PM’

‘9’

‘09’

‘3’

‘03’

‘6’

‘6500’

‘65’

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{FIELD_NAME:yyyy/MM/dd

HH/mm/ss.ffff}

9th of July 2009:

17:09:03.650, US English

'2008/06/03

17:09:03.6500'

Formatting of string type attributes

Character “i” is a placeholder for an integer number.

Format string

S s i (at the beginning) i (at the end)

Examples:

Code

{FIELD_NAME:$}

{FIELD_NAME:S}

{FIELD_NAME:s}

{FIELD_NAME:1$-1}

{FIELD_NAME:1S3}

{FIELD_NAME:1s3}

{FIELD_NAME:1$-3}

{FIELD_NAME:-3$-1}

{FIELD_NAME:4$-4}

{FIELD_NAME:8$-8}

{FIELD_NAME:H}

{FIELD_NAME:H$}

{FIELD_NAME:HS}

{FIELD_NAME:Hs}

{FIELD_NAME:H1s3}

Format name normal text uppercase

Description

Text displayed without any changes.

Text displayed in uppercase. lowercase Text displayed in lowercase. first character i>0 defines from which character (counting from the beginning of the string) should be the string displayed; if i<0 then the characters are counted from the end of the string. last character force HTML i>0 defines up to which character (counting from the beginning of the string) should be the string displayed; if i<0 then the characters are counted from the end of the string. force HTML interpretation of <> symbols

Attribute value

'Abcdefghij'

'Ac'

Result

'Abcdefghij'

'ABCDEFGHIJ'

'abcdefghij'

'Abcdefghij'

'ABC'

'abc'

'Abcdefgh'

'hij'

'defg'

'A<b;>c'

'A<B;>C'

'a<b;>c'

'a<b'

126

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property page shown in Figure 75 provides settings to turn on/off and

Outline

The

Outline

control the appearance of label outlines.

Color

Bitmap

Pattern

Include in

Legend

Visible

Figure 75. Label Outline properties

Style

Width

Style of the outline.

Width of the outline (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Color of the outline (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Image used for drawing the outline instead of color.

Pattern to use for the outline.

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

Select this option to display labels (defined for the section) on the map area.

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Smart Size

The

Smart Size

property page shown in Figure 76 provides a setting to turn off labels

at any given zoom level for any shapes rendered less than a specified size. Use of this feature can result in faster map rendering and reduce map clutter.

Field

Include in

Legend

Visible

Figure 76. Label Smart Size properties

Size

Value defines the minimum size a line must be at a particular scale to be visible (in points).

Numerical attribute defines the minimum size a line must be at a particular scale to be visible. If you want to explicitly set the size in points, clear this property and use the Size property instead.

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

Select this option to display labels (defined for the section) on the map area.

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property page shown in Figure 77 provides settings to control the

Position

The

Position

positioning of labels relative to the location of the associated shape. This includes the

'Follow' feature which positions labels parallel to line features and automatically repositions each label for the best position relative to the line after each map move.

This tab also includes settings to preclude overlapping labels and duplicate labels with line features.

If multiple sections are in use, the label set up must be performed separately for each section. Ensure that the correct section is highlighted in the box at the bottom of the

Label tab when entering the label set up.

Figure 77. Label Position properties

Position

Defines position of a label—order of checking decides about the position priority: when the Editor is the unable to put the label in some position, it tries the position with a lower priority.

Top-left position with respect to reference.

Above reference position.

Top-right position with respect to reference.

On the left hand side of reference.

Reference position: shape centroid, or if the centroid is outside the shape, the most optimal point.

On the right-hand side of reference position.

Bottom-left position with respect to reference position.

Below reference position.

Bottom-right position with respect to reference position.

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Flow

Alignment

Select this option to make the label visible whenever any part of the shape is visible within the map area.

Defines alignment of the label within the label area:

Single line

Only the first line of the label is displayed,

Left justify

Text is aligned to the left border of the label extent.

Centre

Text is centred within the label extent.

Right justify

Text is aligned to the right border of the label extent.

Follow

Only for line type shapes, the label is displayed along the line.

Avoid overlap

Select this option to prevent overlapping of labels.

Avoid duplicates

Select this option to prevent displaying of labels with the same content.

Label Rotate

Rotation of the label (in degrees).

Include in

Legend

Visible

Select this option to display the section in the Legend panel as a subgroup of its layer.

Select this option to display labels (defined for the section) on the map area.

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property page is shown in Figure 78.

Chart

The

Chart

tab includes three property pages:

Chart

Values 1–4

, and

Values 5–8

, as described in the following sections (these are not used in this version).

Chart

The

Chart

Figure 78. Chart properties

Style

Size

Style of the chart (pie or bar chart).

Size of the chart (select the

Use renderer

option underneath to use the global renderer settings on the Renderer tab).

Minimum value for the chart (applies to bar style chart only).

Minimum value

Maximum value

Include in

Legend

Maximum value for the chart (applies to bar style chart only).

Select this option to display the section in the

a subgroup of its layer.

Legend panel

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131

Values 1–4

The

Values 1–4

property page is shown in Figure 79 (not used in this version).

Include in legend

Figure 79. Chart Values 1–4 properties

Values

Legends

Attributes presented on a chart.

Text which is displayed besides the chart symbol in the Legends panel (see

“Legend Panel”

on page 136).

Select this option to display the chart symbol of the section in the Legend panel.

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property page is shown in Figure 80 (not used in this version).

Values 5–8

The

Values 5–8

Include in legend

Figure 80. Chart Values 5–8 properties

Values

Legends

Attributes presented on a chart.

Text which is displayed besides the chart symbol in the Legends panel.

Select this option to display the chart symbol of the section in the Legend panel.

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3D

The

tab page is shown in Figure 81.

Treat layer as

Elevation

Model (DEM)

Treat layer as

3D Objects

Figure 81. 3D properties

Treat layer as

The Z coordinate is neglected (even if present) and the layer is drawn as a flat texture; and in presence of a digital elevation model (DEM) layer, the texture is spread over the DEM.

The layer is presented as a three-dimensional terrain model (this is especially useful to force this representation if a DEM-type layer is not recognized as a DEM).

Scale Z

Scales the Z coordinate of the layer (100 is the actual size).

False Z

An offset (in metres) added to the Z coordinate of the layer.

All shapes from a vector layer are presented as a separate 3D objects; the Z coordinate (if present) plays a role of altitude and the M coordinate (if present) is the object height.

Scale Z

Scale M

Scales the Z coordinate of the layer (100 is the actual size).

Scales the M coordinate of the layer (100 is the actual size).

False Z

False M

An offset (in metres) added to the Z coordinate of the layer.

An offset (in metres) added to the M coordinate of the layer.

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Adjust Z

Adjust basement

Sets the reference value for the Z coordinate (“sea level”); see Adjust Z modes below.

Sets the Z coordinate of the bottom of the walls for the polygon-treated objects; see Adjust basement modes below.

Adjust Z modes

relative to 0

The Z coordinate value of the shape is used as is without any adjustments.

relative to

DEM

In the presence of a digital elevation model (DEM) layer, the Z coordinate value of a shape is added to the Z coordinate value read from the DEM layer.

equal DEM

In the presence of a digital elevation model (DEM) layer, the Z coordinate value of a shape is replaced with the Z coordinate value read from the DEM layer.

Adjust basement modes

off lowest

A polygon is rendered with its original Z coordinate values.

For a polygon, the Z coordinate of all vertices is “pulled” to the lowest value found in the polygon; in this case, the roof of a polygon is guaranteed to be flat.

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Finding Streets

Select the

Find Street

on the

Tools

menu or click the

Find Street

button on the map toolbar to show the Find Street window.

Note: ALS street search functionality is developed and customised on a per-site basis—please contact Omnitronics Support should you have a street search database and wish to use it in Omnitronics ALS.

Legend Panel

Figure 82 shows the

Legend Panel

. This includes the basic information about open layers and their visual properties. The order of layers in the Legend panel determines the order of rendering on the Map area (see

“Map Manager”

on page 137).

Items displayed in the Legend Panel are represented as layers. The item at the top of the Legend Panel is the top-most layer, and the item at the bottom of the Legend

Panel is the lower-most layer. To move a layer up or down in the list, click and drag the desired layer higher or lower in the legend as desired.

Figure 82. Legend panel

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The Map Manager window shown in Figure 83 allows you to select the map mode

Map Manager

(live or replay) and which subscribers will be displayed on the map.

Map Mode

Selects the map mode

Show Subscriber

Selects the subscribers to display on the map

Lost Contact

Shows or hides subscribers that lost contact

Lock Map

Locks/unlocks map

Group

Selects which group to display

Follow Subscriber

Selects the subscribers to follow

Subscriber Colour

Shows default colour of associated subscriber

Figure 83. Map Manager window

Subscribers

Shows the contacts for the selected group

Live Map Mode

indicates map is in “live” mode. In this mode, only the current position of each subscriber is displayed.

Replay Map Mode

indicates map is in “replay” mode. In this mode, you can replay the movement of select subscriber(s). If you want to see the map in replay mode, you need to load the tracking data into

the Replay Controller (see “Replay Controller” on page 147), and

ensure that the subscribers in question are associated with the map you wish to replay on (if you have multiple maps open, each map can be controlled independently).

Show Lost Contacts

shows subscribers that have lost contact

(“ghost” subscribers) and will be displayed on the map at their last known position.

Hide Lost Contacts

hides subscribers that have lost contact (these subscribers will not be shown on the map).

Lock/Unlock Map

locks or unlocks the map with its current extents.

When locked, you cannot zoom in or zoom out or pan around using the standard tools. This is useful when you only want to monitor a site and don't want to accidentally adjust the map by interacting with the wrong window.

Show Subscriber

column controls whether or not the subscribers appear on the map. Select a subscriber to display it on the map. By default, the checkboxes will be selected (meaning the subscriber will be shown) when a subscriber/group is associated with the map.

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Follow subscriber

column controls whether or not subscribers will be followed on the map. When the checkbox for a subscriber is selected, any time a new position is received for that subscriber, the map will reposition to ensure the subscriber remains visible on the map.

Subscriber Colour

column simply shows the default colour of the associated unit. If particular event conditions have been activated for the unit (e.g. Proximity, Stationary, Lost Contact, etc.), the related event colour will be used instead.

Group

selects which group of subscribers to display on the map. All associated subscribers are displayed grouped by Group name.

Note: Each workspace has its own Map Manager window. Whilst it is possible to “float” each Map Manager window, it is recommended that you dock it to the respective map window, as this will make it easier to manage (especially when the map is updating) and also help to prevent confusion when multiple map windows are open. If space is an issue, you can either close or auto-hide the windows.

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the one shown in Figure 84.

Subscriber Manager

Click the

Subscriber Manager

button on the main toolbar, or select

Subscriber

Manager

on the

View

menu, to open the

Subscriber Manager

window similar to

Figure 84. Subscriber Manager window

Subscriber Manager displays all of the portable devices configured in ALS Server.

These devices are called

subscribers

and are usually assigned to a group of subscribers called a

subscriber group

. Details about each group and its associated subscribers are stored in the ALS database (these details can only be modified using

ALS Server).

The Subscriber Manager window can be undocked and repositioned on the screen as required. While ALS Viewer is running, it will fetch, and keep up to date, all the subscriber groups configured in ALS Server. Use Subscriber Manager to display a group of subscribers on the map.

To display a subscriber group

From the

View

menu, select

Subscriber Manager

to open the Subscriber

Manager window.

To view a particular group, click and drag the subscriber group folder onto the map.

If the subscribers in the group are currently providing GPS information to the

Advanced GPS Service, this will load the subscribers into Map Manager and display them on the map. In the following example, we dragged the “Main Fleet” group onto the map. All of the subscribers associated with this group are shown in green:

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Once you have loaded your group(s) into your map, you can use the Map

Manager to filter out or follow individual subscribers within that group, as well as assign unique colours.

To show a subscriber on the map, select its corresponding checkbox underneath the

Show Subscriber

icon in Map Manager.

To follow a subscriber on the map, select the checkbox underneath the

Follow

Subscriber

icon in Map Manager.

Note: If you have selected more than one subscriber to follow, the map will try to keep all followed subscribers displayed by varying the zoom level.

(Optional)

To change the colour of a subscriber, double-click its coloured square

(default is green) underneath the

Subscriber Colour

icon to open the Select

Colour window, and then select the desired colour.

To see a “live” view in real time of the subscribers on the map, click the

Live

button

in Map Manager. This will show the current position of each subscriber on the map as long as they provide GPS information.

If want to review the past movement of a particular subscriber(s), click the

Replay

button subscriber(s).

in Map Manager. If the historical positional information for that subscribers(s) is loaded into the Replay Controller, it will display historical data for the

Subscribers that no longer provide GPS information are classified as “lost”. You can hide these subscribers from the map by clicking the

Hide Lost Contact

button .

The

Lock/Unlock Map

button locks or unlocks the map. This is useful to prevent accidental zooming of the map.

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Geofence and Feature Management

Geofences are polygonal regions that define geographical boundaries on the map. A

geofence

is a virtual barrier that you draw on the map, and set up triggers so that when a subscriber enters or exits the boundaries for example, an alert email or some other notification can be sent.

The Map toolbar contains two tools for creating and editing geofences: the

Add

Geofence

tool and the

Edit Geofence/Feature

tool .

Creating Geofences

Select the

Add Geofence

tool on the Map toolbar to activate this function. To draw a geofence region, click on successive points around the area to be contained by the geofence, and then right-click to close the region. By continuing to click, you create a region made of straight line segments connected by points.

To create a geofence

Select the

Add Geofence

tool on the Map toolbar.

Position the pointer where you want the first line segment to begin, and then click to add the first point (do not drag).

Note that the first segment you draw will not be visible until you add a second point.

Position the pointer where you want to line segment to end and then click the map again.

The last point you add always appears as a solid red circle, indicating that it is selected.

Continue clicking to set additional points for additional line segments.

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To complete the geofence, right-click on the map to open the Geofence

Maintenance window.

Select the geofence

Type

from one of the predefined types, and in the

Name

text box, type a descriptive name for geofence (e.g. “Stay Out”), and then click

to save it.

The new geofence is added to the Geofence layer.

If the shape of the geofence does not quite reflect what you intended when drawing the boundary, don’t worry as you can easily fine tune and edit it later (see

“Editing

Geofences”

below)

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Editing Geofences

Select the

Edit Geofence

tool on the Map toolbar to activate this function. This tool allows you to reshape or edit an existing geofence or change a feature on the appropriate layer.

Before you can edit a geofence or feature, you need to select it on the map. Once you select a geofence, points can be moved, added, or deleted as required.

Geofences can be deleted by clicking on them and pressing the Delete key on your keyboard.

Adding, Deleting, and Moving Points

Adding points to a geofence region can give you more control over the shape of the geofence. However, it’s a good idea not to add more points than necessary as a geofence with fewer points is easier to edit, display, and determine when alerts should be triggered.

To add, delete, or move points

Select the

Edit Geofence

tool on the Map toolbar.

Position the pointer over the geofence you want to edit, and click.

To add a point, position the pointer over the boundary segment where you want to add the point, and then click and drag the new point to the required position.

To move a point, click the point to be moved, and then drag it to the new position.

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To delete a point, click the point to select it, and then click the point again to delete it.

The point you select always appears as a solid red circle, indicating that it is selected.

To complete editing, right-click the map.

This opens the Geofence Maintenance window so that you can change the geofence type and name as required.

Creating Features

User-created points on the map are known as

features

. These are visible to all other

ALS Viewer users; however, they do not generate alerts or events of any kind. Select the

Add Feature

tool on the Map toolbar to activate this function. To add a feature to the map, click on the map where you want to add the feature.

To create a feature

Select the

Add Feature

tool on the Map toolbar.

Position the pointer where you want the feature, and then click.

This opens the Feature Maintenance window.

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In the

Name

text box, type the name of the feature (e.g. “Some Feature”), and then click

The new feature is displayed on the map at the pointer location.

Editing Features

Select the

Edit Feature

tool on the Map toolbar to activate this function. This tool allows you to reposition the feature or change its name on the appropriate layer.

Before you can edit a feature, you need to select it on the map. Once you select a feature, you can move it or rename it as required. Features can be deleted by selecting them and pressing the Delete key on your keyboard.

To move a feature

Select the

Edit Feature

tool on the Map toolbar.

Position the pointer over the centre of the feature you want to edit, and click to select it.

When the pointer is positioned correctly, the central point of the feature will appear as a solid red circle, indicating that it is selected.

To move the feature, click and drag the centre point to the new position.

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To complete editing, right-click the map.

This opens the Feature Maintenance window so you can change the feature’s name as required.

(Optional)

In the

Name

text box, rename the feature, and then click

; otherwise, click

Cancel

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“Load Track from Database”

Replay Controller

Click the

Replay Controller

button on the Map toolbar, or select

Replay

Controller

on the

View

menu, to open the

Replay Controller

window similar to the one shown in Figure 85.

Figure 85. Replay Controller window

Once you have retrieved historical tracking information from either the database (see

below) or log files (see

“Load Track from File”

on page

148), you can review it using the Replay Controller.

The playback controls on the

Replay Controller

perform the following actions:

Jump to Start

button moves the current playback position back to the start of the list.

Play

button automatically plays back location information starting from the current playback position and steps through the list one location at a time.

Pause

button stops the playback of location information at the current playback position.

Jump to End

button moves the current playback position to the end of the list.

Step Backwards

button moves the current playback position back one position to the previous location information.

Step Forwards

button moves the current playback position ahead one position to the next location information.

If you loaded historical tracking information for multiple subscribers into the Replay

Controller, you can use the

Subscriber

dropdown control to filter the list by either selecting one of the subscribers or all subscribers.

You can also export the data in a format suitable for Earth browsers such as Google

Earth or display the current position in Google Maps.

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Export

button exports all loaded geographic positional information to a KML file for use in Google Earth.

Google Map

button displays the current position information in

Google Maps using the default web browser on your computer.

KML is a file format used to display geographic data in a browser such as Google

Earth. KML stands for Keyhole Markup Language and is a form of XML notation for expressing geographic information in internet-based maps, like Google Earth.

The

History slider

control shows the current position in the list and allows you to quickly navigate to another position by simply sliding the marker left or right. Sliding it to the left moves the current position back in time, and sliding it to the right moves the current position ahead in time.

Load Track from Database

Load Track from Database

allows you to retrieve historical data for one or more subscribers. Click the

Load Track from Database

button on the Map toolbar to open the

Track Range

window as shown in Figure 86.

Figure 86. Track Range window

Simply select one or more subscribers from the list and an appropriate date range, and then click

to load the data into the Replay Controller window.

Load Track from File

Load Track from File

allows you to retrieve tracking data from a file stored on your computer. Click the

Load Track from File

button on the Map toolbar to open the

File Open window, and then select the file you want to load. The tracking information will be displayed in the Replay Controller window.

This is a historic feature where position data was saved to a text file instead of the database—ALS Server no longer supports this function. However, loading a track that was user/computer generated is useful for demonstration purposes should you have a database with no historical data and wish to demonstrate historical playback in ALS.

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Historical Track Data File Format

The historical track data file must be a plain text file with the extension .log, such as

GPSPath.log

for instance. Each line inside the file (separated with a carriage return) must follow a particular format. The following is an example of a line (all of this must fit on one line):

$RVL,2001,Omnitronics,2001,29022016,064028,-

31.896809,115.808685,0.0,12.0,0.0,0.0,0,1,L,0

Field

Header

Value

$RVL

Unit Name

Device Type

Mobile Id

2001

Omnitronics

2001

UTC Position Date 29022016

UTC Position Time 064028

Latitude -31.896809

Longitude 115.808685

Altitude

Speed

Heading

0.0

12.0

0.0

Accuracy

Satellite Used

Quality Indicator 1

Position Type L

Status

0.0

Note: The fields shown in bold require the values shown here and must not be changed; however, the other fields can be changed to suit your application.

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Summary Displays

ALS Viewer displays several “summary” windows that provide useful information including events that have occurred, active subscribers, predefined map boundaries, geofence details, and map information, as described in the following sections.

•

Event Summary

– shows a list of all events that have occurred in ALS Viewer since the program was started (see

“Event Summary”

below).

•

Subscriber Summary

– shows a list of current GPS events in real-time from active subscribers (see

“Subscriber Summary”

on page 151).

•

Preset Zoom Summary

– shows a list of all of the “preset zoom” map boundaries or regions defined by you and other ALS Viewer users (see

“Preset

Zoom Summary”

on page 152).

•

Geofence Summary

– shows a list of all the geofences defined along with the parameters for each geofence (see

“Geofence Summary”

on page 153).

•

Map Information

– shows information about subscriber(s) (see

“Map

Information”

on page 155).

Event Summary

Click the

Event Summary

button on the toolbar, or select

Event Summary

on the

View

menu, to open the

Event Summary

window similar to the one shown in

Figure 87.

Figure 87. Event Summary window

The

Event Summary

window displays a list of all the events that have occurred in

ALS Viewer since the program was started. Events are timestamped and have an event type. These events are volatile so the list will be cleared each time the program starts up. The buttons in the Event Summary window perform the following actions:

Delete Events

button clears the event summary list by deleting all the events in the list.

Padlock

button locks or unlocks the event-summary list. When the list is locked, it will automatically scroll when new events appear. When the list is unlocked, you can scroll back to view past events.

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

the one shown in Figure 88.

The event summary list can display many different types of events; however, it will retain only the first 500 of the most-recent events. Once this limit is reached, the first fifty events (oldest) are automatically deleted from the list to accommodate new events. When new events appear in the event-summary list, the list automatically scrolls so that the most-recent event is always visible. You can delete all the events in the list by clicking the

Delete Events

button —be careful as once the events are deleted, you cannot “undelete” them!

If you wish to scroll back and view past events, click the

Padlock

button to unlock the event-summary list so that scrolling is enabled. Once you have finished reviewing the events, simply click the

Padlock

button again to lock the list automated event tracking is enabled.

Subscriber Summary

Click the

Subscriber Summary

button on the toolbar, or select

Subscriber

Summary

on the

View

menu, to open the

Subscriber Summary

window similar to

Figure 88. Subscriber Summary window

The

Subscriber Summary

window shows a brief summary of current GPS events in real-time from active subscribers. The layout of this window is dependent on the event monitoring settings in ALS Server (see

“Event Configuration”

on page 52). The following is a description of the each column displayed in the Subscriber Summary window.

Colour

Name

Group

Heading

Speed

Last Poll

Indicates the colour associated with the subscriber group.

Shows the name assigned to the subscriber.

Shows the name of the subscriber group of which the subscriber is a member.

If the GPS data received by the radio contains heading information, it will be displayed here. Possible values are North

(N), West (W), East (E), and South (S).

If the GPS data received by the radio contains current speed information, it will be displayed here in kilometres per hour.

Shows the time of the most recent position received from the subscriber.

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Stationary

Geofence

Last Msg

The time indicating how long the subscriber has been stationary.

If several GPS updates are received from the same subscriber with the same latitude and longitude, a time value will be displayed indicating how long the subscriber has been stationary, and it will be cleared when the subscriber moves again.

If the subscriber is detected inside a geofence, this field will display the name of the geofence.

Displays the last GPS event message for this subscriber. Possible values include Position (received position information) and Lost

Contact (GPS data not received in a long time).

Preset Zoom Summary

Click the

Preset Zoom Summary

button on the main toolbar, or select

Preset

Zoom Summary

on the

View

menu, to open the

Preset Zoom Summary

window

similar to the one shown in Figure 89.

Figure 89. Preset Zoom Summary window

The

Preset Zoom Summary

window shows all of the “preset zoom” regions (map boundaries) defined by you and other ALS Viewer users. A

preset zoom

region defines an area on the map and the zoom level applied when it is initially viewed. These regions are shared by all ALS Viewer users, which means other users can see and use your preset-zoom regions and vice versa.

Preset-zoom regions are useful when you want to frequently monitor one or more specific regions on the map. If your area of interest is defined by a preset-zoom region, you can simply select it from the list and it will appear on the map. This saves you from manually locating the region and zooming to the desired level.

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the one shown in Figure 90.

Geofence Summary

Click the

Geofence Summary

button on the main toolbar, or select

Geofence

Summary

on the

View

menu, to open the

Geofence Summary

window similar to

Figure 90. Geofence Summary window

The

Geofence Summary

window lists all of the geofences by name and type and any optional parameter(s) required.

Type

Name

Param 1

Param 2

Param 3

Shows the type of geofence.

Defines the name of the geofence.

Specifies the first parameter to use.

Specifies the second parameter to use (e.g. the minimum speed limit for this geofence).

Specifies the third parameter to use (e.g. the maximum speed limit for this geofence).

Geofence Types

Table 1 lists the different types of geofences and the optional parameters associated

with those types.

Table 1. Types of geofences and optional parameters

Type Name

0 Channel

No Go

Param 1

Channel

Param 2

Group SSI

Inside Message Exit Message

Speed Limited Limit 1 Limit 2

Yard

Site

Confinement Entry Message Exit Message

Cable Line

Blast

Param 3

Applies To

Limit 3

Extra ID

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Buffer - No Go

Emergency

RSSI

Buffer - RSSI

Applies To

Geofence Parameters

The various geofence parameters have different meanings depending on the type of geofence and are optional as per your requirements.

Channel

No Go

Speed

Limited

If Channel parameter is prefixed with an N, the Channel Change is performed via the TETRA network and not using Sepura’s Public

Protocol. If Channel contains a comma, it is assumed the SPP

Folder/Talkgroup method is to be used; otherwise, if Channel is a single number, a straight SPP channel request is issued.

Inside

Message

Message to send when a subscriber enters the No

Go zone.

Exit Message

Message to send when a subscriber leaves the No

Go zone.

Applies To

Class of subscriber to which the No Go geofence will apply.

Allows for three separate speed limits to be set with only one being active at a given time based on road/rail conditions. Each parameter supports either a single value or two values separated by a semicolon. In the latter case there are two levels of triggering: the first value is expected to be a lower speed, which will result in only the driver being notified; a speed in excess of the second value will notify others.

Confinement Entry Message

Message to send the subscriber when it enters the Confinement area.

Exit Message

Message to send the subscriber when it leaves the

Confinement area.

Extra ID

ISSI that can be optionally notified of the confinement breach.

RSSI Applies To

Subscribers of this class will have their performance monitored inside the area.

Note: Geofence types of RSSI are currently not implemented in

Omnitronics ALS.

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Subscriber Information”

Map Information

Select

Map Information

on the

View

menu to open the

Map Information

window similar to the one shown in Figure 91. This window shows information about selected subscribers or geographical objects on the map. Initially, you will not see any information displayed until you select a subscriber(s) or geographical object(s).

Figure 91. Map Information window

There are a couple of ways to select subscribers or geographical attributes: you can either select a particular subscriber or attribute on the map (see

“Displaying

on page 155), or you can select several subscribers or attributes located within a circular region on the map (see

“Displaying Subscribers at

Location”

on page 156).

Displaying Subscriber Information

When you select the

Information

tool and click on a subscriber or some geographical attribute such as a geofence, the information for that subscriber or

geofence will be displayed as shown in Figure 92. In this example, we selected the

subscriber identified by Radio 171 inside the Speeding geofence. We also repositioned the window to make it easier to view.

Figure 92. Map Information window

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Displaying Subscribers at Location

If there are several subscribers within close proximity to each other and it’s difficult to see the labels associated with each subscriber, you can define a circular region on the map and display information about all of the subscribers within the region.

Click the

Subscribers at Location

button on the Map toolbar to activate this function. To define the circular region, click on the map to define the centre point, and then drag outwards to define the circular region. All of the subscribers located within this circular region will appear in the

Information

window, as shown in Figure

93.

Figure 93. Displaying subscribers within a circular region

Whilst this function is active, you can define another circular region by following the same steps. The new region will replace the original region. To deactivate this function, click on another toolbar button.

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