Why aren't database names constrained?

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mancow

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Most radios can't make use of the very long names used in many of the database entries so why do they exist? When you do an import you end up with something like Missouri Statewi or Kansas Statewide with groups named something like Army National Gu

Wouldn't it make more sense to truncate or abbreviate? Why not use MOSWIN or KSICS and KANG in place of the Kansas Army National Guard that has no hope of fitting on most displays?

Inside groups why not just use Police or Sheriff for channel names? If you are importing a group for Russell County do you really need Russell County in the name of each channel so you end up with something all shoved together like RuslCoSOSpOp. Just use Special Ops. You already know you have landed on Russell County when the radio stops there by the group name indication on the display.

It's kind of frustrating having to go through and rename almost every single entity after and upload just so it's legible.

A feature I would pay quite a bit for would be a customizable database. Basically, like a parallel database that I could actually edit directly and save through the web interface which would be uploadable to radios via software just as the main database is. That would be extremely handy instead of having to hand edit each radio upload or somehow do a save and export/import from one customized radio to another. It would be similar to a web version of the GRECOM EZ Scan software as far as the database manipulation goes.
 
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mciupa

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The constraints that we follow and some insight as to why things are displayed as they are (from the DB Admin Handbook):


When abbreviations are used, they must be defined. For example, a trunked system shall be named “Southeast Texas Area Radio Network (STARNET)” not simply “STARNET.”
Abbreviations shall be placed in parentheses after the full name as shown in the previous example.
Abbreviations shall be entered in all capital letters and without any punctuation. For example, “STARNET” shall be used, not “S.T.A.R.N.E.T.”
Except for abbreviations, words shall never be spelled in all capital letters anywhere in
the database.
Do not use ampersands anywhere in the database.


6.1.4. NAMING CONVENTIONS


Always name an agency, category, subcategory or trunked system with the clearest, most specific name that is appropriate.
When naming government entities, the official name as determined by the government shall be used. Do not include extra information such as to what department the entity organizationally belongs. Per the previously stated policy, abbreviations shall be avoided.

6.1.4.1. NAMING CONVENTIONS FOR USA FEDERAL ENTITIES

Bureau of Prisons entities shall be named using the official facility name. Please note that the proper name is
“Federal Correctional Institution Cumberland” (not “FCI Cumberland” or “Cumberland FCI” or “Cumberland
Federal Correctional Institution”).
Military facility entities shall be named with the official facility name. Navy facilities have names that cause confusion like the BOP systems, so use “Naval Air Station Alameda” (not “NAS Alameda” or “Alameda NAS” or “Alameda Naval Air Station”).
Use “Johnson Space Center” (not “NASA Johnson Space Center”).
If you are tempted to use a colon or an abbreviation then that should be a red flag to you.
 

mikewazowski

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Inside groups why not just use Police or Sheriff for channel names? If you are importing a group for Russell County do you really need Russell County in the name of each channel so you end up with something all shoved together like RuslCoSOSpOp. Just use Special Ops. You already know you have landed on Russell County when the radio stops there by the group name indication on the display.


The way you describe is exactly how it should be.

Category and sub-category names should not be duplicated within the channel description.

If you've found some, send a note to the DB Admins responsible for the area and if that doesn't get you anywhere, you can post here or notify the Lead DB Admin.
 

mancow

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The constraints that we follow and some insight as to why things are displayed as they are (from the DB Admin Handbook):


When abbreviations are used, they must be defined. For example, a trunked system shall be named “Southeast Texas Area Radio Network (STARNET)” not simply “STARNET.”
Abbreviations shall be placed in parentheses after the full name as shown in the previous example.
Abbreviations shall be entered in all capital letters and without any punctuation. For example, “STARNET” shall be used, not “S.T.A.R.N.E.T.”
Except for abbreviations, words shall never be spelled in all capital letters anywhere in
the database.
Do not use ampersands anywhere in the database.


6.1.4. NAMING CONVENTIONS


Always name an agency, category, subcategory or trunked system with the clearest, most specific name that is appropriate.
When naming government entities, the official name as determined by the government shall be used. Do not include extra information such as to what department the entity organizationally belongs. Per the previously stated policy, abbreviations shall be avoided.

6.1.4.1. NAMING CONVENTIONS FOR USA FEDERAL ENTITIES

Bureau of Prisons entities shall be named using the official facility name. Please note that the proper name is
“Federal Correctional Institution Cumberland” (not “FCI Cumberland” or “Cumberland FCI” or “Cumberland
Federal Correctional Institution”).
Military facility entities shall be named with the official facility name. Navy facilities have names that cause confusion like the BOP systems, so use “Naval Air Station Alameda” (not “NAS Alameda” or “Alameda NAS” or “Alameda Naval Air Station”).
Use “Johnson Space Center” (not “NASA Johnson Space Center”).
If you are tempted to use a colon or an abbreviation then that should be a red flag to you.

I can see the reasoning behind defining abbreviations. It's just frustrating at times how it all converts over.
 
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mciupa

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I can see the reasoning behind defining abbreviations. It's just frustrating at times how it all converts over.

I know and I have one of the most generous displays with the 536, you can display a novel on the screen. :D

I dread using the Full Database on the 536 for that very reason. At least with my favorite lists, I can "clean things up" same as you.
 

AK9R

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I know and I have one of the most generous displays with the 536, you can display a novel on the screen.
At the other end of the display width problem is the PSR-800. It got very frustrating watching system and group names scroll across the screen every time they came up. It was even worse when selecting systems as the field was only about half the screen width, as I recall. That was one of the reasons I sold my PSR-800.
 

wtp

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imo

they tell you who it is and it is up to you if you want to rename something
my radio does 16 characters so "charlotte county sheriffs office" is "ccso"
and the next county down is in between 2 ccso's so your radio your rules.
 

mancow

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they tell you who it is and it is up to you if you want to rename something
my radio does 16 characters so "charlotte county sheriffs office" is "ccso"
and the next county down is in between 2 ccso's so your radio your rules.

Yes, but when software pulls in an import it uses those long names for groups and systems. It seems like there should be a field similar to the channel display field for groups and systems with long full name descriptors elsewhere for viewing purposes that are not imported. Whats the value of 10 groups labled Missouri Highway or Missouri Departm with a system called Missouri Statewi.

For example the group for Troop D ends up being named only Missouri Highway but when you open it all the channels are properly named such as Trp D Admin, Trp D Car 1 E, etc... Why not constrain the group name to Troop D. There is no need for the full Missouri Highway Patrol prefixing it.

It seems it defies the logic of the rest of the database naming rules. I realize most of us are advanced users but for the sake of the grab and go people that may not be into it as much or are travelling and the radio is grabbing the data on the fly it's very inconvenient.

The system I'm referring to while using Proscan to view/import:
http://www.radioreference.com/apps/db/?sid=6847
 
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D

DaveNF2G

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The RRDB is "constrained" to the Uniden Home Patrol series, as far as field length is concerned.

I can't think of a compromise that would make everybody happy. Alpha displays on various supported scanner models range from 8 characters on up. Imagine limiting tags to 8 characters in the database.
 

mancow

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The RRDB is "constrained" to the Uniden Home Patrol series, as far as field length is concerned.

I can't think of a compromise that would make everybody happy. Alpha displays on various supported scanner models range from 8 characters on up. Imagine limiting tags to 8 characters in the database.
Just remove singe of the superfluous info. There is no need for all that extra.
 

mciupa

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Just remove singe of the superfluous info. There is no need for all that extra.

You have a valid point there.

I believe you and everyone should follow Mike Oxlong's advice

MikeOxlong said:
If you've found some, send a note to the DB Admins responsible for the area and if that doesn't get you anywhere, you can post here or notify the Lead DB Admin.
 

mancow

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You have a valid point there.

I believe you and everyone should follow Mike Oxlong's advice

The bold is what I'm referring to. Look at how long that data set is. All you end up with on the display is Missouri Highway. It seems reasonable to constrain it to 16 characters so it reads: Troop A and Troop B or something similar.

How should it be submitted? I mean it's not new info it's just a request to strip it down to something more usable.

System Talkgroups
List All in one table Show New Talkgroups

Missouri Highway Patrol - Troop A (Lee's Summit) Talkgroups

DEC HEX Mode Alpha Tag Description Tag
20001 4e21 D Trp A Admin Troop A: Admin Law Tac


Missouri Highway Patrol - Troop B (Macon) Talkgroups

DEC HEX Mode Alpha Tag Description Tag
20051 4e53 D Trp B Admin Troop B: Admin Law Tac
 

mikewazowski

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Just took a look at the system and you're correct, if it says Troop X in the subcategory, it shouldn't be repeated in the channel description.

The whole system needs work to make it comply with the Admin Handbook.

Send in a submission asking the Admin to remove the duplicate information as per whatever section it is that says don't duplicate. I'm on my phone right now so I can't easily look it up.

Give the Admin an example of what you want done.

If he rejects it then ON the Lead Database Admin, copy the Regional Admin and explain what you are trying to accomplish.
 

mciupa

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The problem is we must identify in the bold subcategory Missouri Highway Patrol on the TRS page. People have to know the entity that the troops belong to.

Conrtacting the sub-cat name for brevity to MHP is not permitted by the rules we must follow.

Submit Info can also be used for suggestions for improvement and not only new information.

May I ask which scanner is causing all this grief?
 
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mikewazowski

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The other minor housekeeping which could be done is to remove Missouri from all the sub-category headings.

I think it's fairly obvious that since this is a Missouri system, the only Highway Patrol on it would be the Missouri Highway Patrol.

The other idea would be to arrange the channel descriptions so the more descriptive words would be at the beginning of the description.

"DNR State Park Rangers: Southwest"

Would be "Southwest - State Park Rangers"
 

kruser

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What would really be cool is if there were a way to tell the database what model radio you are using at the time of download and the database would auto adjust and pull the names based on that model and it field lengths and available fields.

Of course that would be a huge nightmare for the DB Admins if he/she had to enter in different names for all the different field lengths available for all the scanners out there today.

I wish there were an easy option for doing this but I'm afraid we will be editing our names to our liking for many years to come.

I've found the same problem for the same state as in mancow's example but it is not all that hard to look at the actual talkgroup names under the duplicated Group names and edit your groups at that time.
Maybe some day, computers will gain enough human intelligence to do this for us but I think we are stuck with what we have for now.

The same problem exists for the actual talkgroup names when they are abbreviated by a DB Admin that may live 100's of miles from where the actual talkgroup is used. I think they do a pretty darn good job with what they post considering some of the submitted info may not be very clear at all.
I always figure that if you see a TG name with a really poor choice for how it is displayed, you can always ask the DB Admin to change it to something that may make more sense.

At least we do have the option of selecting the Alpha Tag as it is listed or most software packages also let you select the first 16 characters of the Description should you like that over the given Alpha Tag name.
Sometimes, neither are ideal but one choice or the other will at lease give you something you can work with.
It would be great if all scanners had user selectable field lengths for these items but that is not the case.

I never did like the models that slowly scroll the extra info that does not fit in the normal space given. Maybe those would not bug me so much if I could select the scroll rate. I guess being able to display all the info if holding on a channel is not a bad thing but it does get annoying at times.
I think someone pointed out that the PSR800 does that.
I've always made edits to my names so the info fits without scrolling.
Icom receivers had or have one of the worst display lengths. I have some models of both receivers and transceivers that only allow five characters.
Those can be a challenge trying to figure out an abbreviation that makes sense!

At the same time, you must wonder how some people got along with scanners that had not alpha tagging at all!
I still find myself missing simple channel numbers that went away when alpha tagging became an option or when the DMA or OOP type scanner came out.
Of course you can still alpha tag a channel number into each memory slot if you like but most modern radios no longer have a way of going to that channel with a few simple button pushes.
I loved being able to go to say channel 162 but just entering 162 and hitting manual or program on the keypad!

I think a lot of that is what made going from the old type scanners to the OOP or DMA types so hard for us older folks that grew up with crystal and early programmable scanners.
They just seemed much easier than todays complex radios!

Oh well, it's fun thinking about how neat things could be if there were only a way for current computers to accomplish the task of auto adjusting all the various info fields found in all the scanner models. I'm afraid we have quite a long way to go before computers get that human touch and can read minds of how you would like your display to display all the info.
Some day, all the info you want will be visualized in your head and the scanners won't even have or need displays! And no virtual reality headset needed.
 

mancow

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The other minor housekeeping which could be done is to remove Missouri from all the sub-category headings.

I think it's fairly obvious that since this is a Missouri system, the only Highway Patrol on it would be the Missouri Highway Patrol.

The other idea would be to arrange the channel descriptions so the more descriptive words would be at the beginning of the description.

"DNR State Park Rangers: Southwest"

Would be "Southwest - State Park Rangers"

Yes, exactly!
 

wise871

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From looking at the site I would do the following.

Missouri Highway Patrol - Troop A (Lee's Summit) Talkgroups

Sub Cat: Highway Patrol
Channel: Troop-A Dispatch
Channel: Troop-A Admin
Text Section: Lee Summit

Or

Sub Cat: Highway Patrol Troop-A
Channel: Dispatch
Channel: Admin

Either way would be a lot cleaner than the current layout. Some sites look like a scratchpad for info that belongs in note text section or the wiki.
As long as this has been talked about I'm surprised no one has made any updates.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

mancow

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I agree wise871. If I had access I would do it.

The KSICS (Kansas) system needs the same thing as well. I'm not trying to stir up trouble but it has been a pet peeve of mine for years. Every time I download to a radio it's a mess that I have to spend quite a bit of time cleaning up.
 

hkrharry

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Casey,

Email me with your suggestions and I will see what I can accomplish with out trying to break all the hand-book rules. I have never like the way it was done as well, at least I can help mend it to something that make more sense. I have redone my scanner and radio many times as well when programming such.

HH
 
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