UniTrunker Feature Requests

[CompKing]

Hey everyone. Great little program here. It took a little to get used to, but it works great once you figure it out.

A couple quick ideas:

1) For my APCO-25 system, some of the transmissions are "Encrtypted". If I recall, these show up on the display as "DIG". The trouble I have is some of our encryptions are not static (i.e. the user turns it on/off at will and some parties in the conversation are not encrypted). I would like the ability to not "listen" for these and be able to ignore them. I realize I could use the prioirty feature and lock out users which are "typically" encrypted, though I would miss out any conversations where the user turned off encryption. Can this be added as an option?

2) Typical scanner functionality would allow you to lock-on to a channel when conversation gets interesting. In essence, one would like to temporarily boost the priority of the conversation. I did read someting about "F8" locking, but have not played with it yet. Another idea would be able to lock-on to a "user" instead of the channel, and follow that user's affiliations to keep up on the conversation. Is this possible now or in the future?

3) I see that channels and users are able to be given a priority. From what I can tell thusfar, only group prioirities are truly adhered to when determining which conversations to listen to. What is the purpose of putting a priority on a user or channel then? Is this for future functionality, or am I missing something in the criteria for whether a channel should be "listened" to or not. Ideally, one would like the capability to still hear conversations for a user which has a higher priority than your current threshold, even if they key up on a group which has a lower priority.

Cheers. Great work.

 

[CompKing]

Hmm. I was really thinking I was going to see a whole bunch of "that's a great idea" posts. Guess I am very unique in how I use Unitrinker??

 

[Forts]

Myself, I would like to see more space for alpha tagging.... ala DOS Trunker. I find the 'Calling Party' field especially to be a little too confined.

 

[SCPD]

1) I would like the ability to not "listen" for these and be able to ignore them. Can this be added as an option?

Other than urgent bug fixes, I don't expect to make any improvements to the program you have. The voice following logic is being re-written for the new program. In fact, the initial release likely won't have voice following enabled.

2) Typical scanner functionality would allow you to lock-on to a channel when conversation gets interesting. In essence, one would like to temporarily boost the priority of the conversation. I did read someting about "F8" locking, but have not played with it yet. Another idea would be able to lock-on to a "user" instead of the channel, and follow that user's affiliations to keep up on the conversation. Is this possible now or in the future?

See #1 above.

3) I see that channels and users are able to be given a priority. From what I can tell thusfar, only group prioirities are truly adhered to when determining which conversations to listen to. What is the purpose of putting a priority on a user or channel then? Is this for future functionality, or am I missing something in the criteria for whether a channel should be "listened" to or not.

It has no bearing on listening criteria. I had some ideas where a channel priority would be useful (scanning home channels on LTR) that I've never had time to pursue.

4) Ideally, one would like the capability to still hear conversations for a user which has a higher priority than your current threshold, even if they key up on a group which has a lower priority.

See #1 above.

Hmm. I was really thinking I was going to see a whole bunch of "that's a great idea" posts.

These ideas have been hashed over since the T4Win days.

I find the 'Calling Party' field especially to be a little too confined.

The windows and columns are resizeable - just drag and stretch.

 

[DaveNF2G]

Hmm. I was really thinking I was going to see a whole bunch of "that's a great idea" posts. Guess I am very unique in how I use Unitrinker??

Maybe we just don't want to waste the bandwidth. Nobody really wants to scroll through a bunch of "me too" posts to get at the ones that are actually informative.

 

[DaveNF2G]

The windows and columns are resizeable - just drag and stretch.

I don't think that solves the underlying problem for the user. Stretching the window doesn't change the number of characters permitted in each field, does it?

 

[Pyr8]

Back about 6 months ago I asked if there would be a "pause" or hold feature added....I remember that you "Unitrunker" said it would be added.

What is the method to holding/pausing?

 

[SCPD]

What is the method to holding/pausing?

See the announcement for the 14th public beta. You can hold on the active call by pressing F8.

 

[Muxlow]

Have a ETA for this yet?

 

[SCPD]

Stretching the window doesn't change the number of characters permitted in each field, does it?

Open Notepad. Turn off word-wrap. Type a very long line of text. Resize the window width.

 

[SCPD]

Have a ETA for this yet?

Well, since January is gone ... sometime in February.

 

[Pyr8]

See the announcement for the 14th public beta. You can hold on the active call by pressing F8.

F8 does not seem to render anything! Am i missing something....as well, im hoping we are talking about the same thing here. I would like to be able to pause the scrolling of the "destination party/ID/Calling party"..etc.

As for more ideas, it would be great if you could add sound notification that is user defined...ie, if there is a "Emergency Analog Voice Call"/"Emergency Digital Voice Call"..etc, it would notify you via flashing screen as well as a user defined tone/sound.

 

[SCPD]

im hoping we are talking about the same thing here. I would like to be able to pause the scrolling of the "destination party/ID/Calling party"..etc.

Probably not. This pertains to voice following (what you hear, not see). The "hold" is for pausing on a active voice call. It suspends the priority logic to listen only to the held group ID. Some folks have asked for this to be amended to preempt but not suspend the priority logic, but that's another story.

For what you want, call activity is separate from call/event history in the new program. You can pause the scrolling History table but the Call table always reports what's currently active.

great if you could add sound notification that is user defined...ie, if there is a "Emergency Analog Voice Call"/"Emergency Digital Voice Call"..etc, it would notify you via flashing screen as well as a user defined tone/sound.

Annunciation was discussed a while back. You won't see this in the initial release. We'll worry about that later, but yeah, pick your criteria and how you want to be alerted - flashy text, obnoxious noise, electric shock, e-mail send to Pentagon, and so on.

 

[Pyr8]

cool........so i guess we will never see a "pause" option for text?!

 

[FlashSWT]

Annunciation was discussed a while back. You won't see this in the initial release. We'll worry about that later, but yeah, pick your criteria and how you want to be alerted - flashy text, obnoxious noise, electric shock, e-mail send to Pentagon, and so on.

I'm glad to see there are already plans in the works for this feature, looking forward to it! Thanks again for all your hard work Rick.

.

 

[SCPD]

Here is a suggestion for way down the track Rick. How about unattended recording of selected TG's or even IDs. Bit like the way ID Tracker/ID Tracker II does it? This would mean you could not only log those rare Tgs and user IDs but record and play hem back at a later time so it can help you identify them. Maybe recording in MP3 format and time stamping.

Like I said, something to think about way down the track..........

 

[Dewey]

Here is a suggestion for way down the track Rick. How about unattended recording of selected TG's or even IDs. Bit like the way ID Tracker/ID Tracker II does it? This would mean you could not only log those rare Tgs and user IDs but record and play hem back at a later time so it can help you identify them. Maybe recording in MP3 format and time stamping.

Like I said, something to think about way down the track..........

If Rick and crew eventually port all of the features from the original Trunker, your wish will be granted. I've done this using the original Trunker, the priority designators and the track environment variable in the environment file to voice track AND record a single radio. Can't remember exactly how I did it right now since I use Unitrunker now, but only commenting that the ability was there.

Dewey

 

[DualC]

I want to see support, for Commersial Amateur radios, like Yaesu Cat interface and so on...

 

[inigo88]

Here's one for Rick that falls under the porting original trunker features...

On Motorola Type II Smartzone systems, mTrunker would show any page messages (from one RID to another... NOT I-Call) in the affiliation log in real time. On my local system, paramedics requiring hospital consults ring the telephone-like base station in the hospital ERs by keying in a numeric code on their radio to page the appropriate hospital, and getting to see this extra behind the scenes feature was always cool. For example:

Medic 40 Mobile 2 (RID) Join -> Kaiser Hospital 1 (GROUP)
Medic 40 Mobile 2 (RID) PAGE-> Kaiser Hospital Nurse Station 1 (RID) (Rings their handset)

RID Kaiser Nurse 1: "This is Kaiser go ahead."
RID Medic 40 Mobile 2: "Good evening Kaiser this is Medic 40 coming your way with a..."

Just a cool feature. I remember mTrunker would also show an emergency button activation every time there was one in the affiliation log, and say which RID it was. I've noticed Unitrunker shows the Emerg status bit in the CT column of active calls, but I'm not sure if it shows up in the running affiliations log. Basically, the more real time information that can be displayed coming out of the control channel about the system (within reason), the happier I am.

One other thing that I brought up a while back - When you do [F]ind -> ser, the Users page is displayed automatically on the bottom half of the screen. If you choose to type the decimal or hexidecimal ID address in manually (rather than highlighting it as it happens), I always thought a great feature would be to have the green horizontal scroll bar in the Users list automatically scroll to that line that the ID is located on. This would be particularly helpful when tagging radio IDs for things like law enforcement or fire, where portables and mobiles are both used for the same unit. At least on the law enforcement systems I've seen, portables and mobiles tend to be categorized together (often portables are clumped with the mobile for fire and categorized by unit since the portables stay with the rig). In either of these situations, when you get a new ID and want to make a quick decision about what kind of radio you have, it can be extremely advantageous to be able to see which known radio IDs are near it to make a more informed decision as to its use.

Just to illustrate the idea, you see a new RID "C2F8" in hex. If you highlight it while the call is active then the Users page on the lower half of the screen (which already automatically opens) centers on this ID (rather than the first known RID like it does now). If you type it in manually, when you type C, the list scrolls to start with the first RID starting with Cxxx, when you type 2, the list scrolls to show you the first RID starting with C2xx, with F, it scrolls to show you RIDs containing C2Fx, and finally with 8 it centers you on the appropriate RID.

This would be extremely advantageous because, taking a real world example, this RID is unknown but the RIDs on either side of it (above it C2F7 and below it C2F9) are known to be used by dispatch consoles for a given police or fire department. Therefore, logic dictates that the ID between these two will ALSO belong to this department! The idea has the potential to speed up situational awareness and be extremely helpful.

I don't know how useful it would be in Unitrunker's new windows application, or if it's already been taken care of... but I thought it was worth mentioning again. Back me up anybody if you agree.

 

[SCPD]

Here is a suggestion for way down the track Rick. How about unattended recording of selected TG's or even IDs. Bit like the way ID Tracker/ID Tracker II does it?

Not any time soon - I'm not sure what the current legal situation is with MP3 ... maybe Ogg.

I've done this using the original Trunker, the priority designators and the track environment variable in the environment file to voice track AND record a single radio.

You likely used a separate program for the audio recording - which could do timestamping of the audio (davee's ScannerRecorder maybe?) but had no way to associate the "caller ID" of the current speaker which is the point behind IDTracker II.

I want to see support, for Commersial Amateur radios, like Yaesu Cat interface and so on...

Ya got VR5000 support now (though honestly I have no idea how well it works). What model did you want to see supported?

mTrunker would show any page messages (from one RID to another... NOT I-Call) in the affiliation log in real time.

There is code to do this in Unitrunker but I have no idea how well it works. No one uses this feature in my scannable area. The number of 3600 baud systems is slowly shrinking in the migration towards P25. If these don't show up - send me a log with the relevant details.

This would be extremely advantageous because, taking a real world example, this RID is unknown but the RIDs on either side of it (above it C2F7 and below it C2F9) are known to be used by dispatch consoles for a given police or fire department. Therefore, logic dictates that the ID between these two will ALSO belong to this department! The idea has the potential to speed up situational awareness and be extremely helpful.

Except for possibly one small bug-fixing update, that user interface is history, BTW. Assuming two IDs are related because they happen to be numerically close is dicey. Folks want to draw inferences on the type of user(s) and their talkgroups based on actual behavior - which is what the new interface tries to do.