13.3. Importing Range Data
This page gives an overview of the import of Range Data. Range data import is started by pressing the "Import Range Data" button:
This button causes the Import Range Data form to open:
The form contains instructions at the top, followed by the following elements:
Filename: set this to the file to be imported. It is important that PC Argos files from AUTEC end in the suffix RAO, and PMRF/AFWTF (or similar) files end in the suffix PRN.
Frequency: datafiles recorded at very high frequency may cause Debrief performance to suffer greatly. Selecting a datapoint frequency allows the user to select the frequency at which data points are imported from the file.
Origin: this records the origin of the range data.
DTG: where the datafile does not contain date (eg PC Argos), a starting date can be provided. Where the datafile does contain a useable date (eg PMRF) this value is ignored.
See Importing PC Argos data for details relating the import of PC Argos data, and Importing PMRF data for further details regarding the import of PMRF files.
 | As detailed above, for both AUTEC and PFWTF data the start date is either read form the text-box or from the data-file itself. The track points all contain an offset from this start time (in seconds). Unfortunately the file formats do not indicate that the data being recorded has passed into the next day. The only indication that the time in seconds has moved to the next day is that the time effectively "restarts". Unfortunately it has not proved sufficient to merely wait for a time which is less than the previous time (since on occasion files containing more than one track contain points which are not in chronological order, sometimes successive times are 1 or 2 seconds before the previous time). This is overcome by Debrief adopting the following policy for day/night decisions: if a successive data point is more than 1 hour earlier than the previous one, then Debrief decides that the data point is from the next day. |