Santa Pod Live Timing
Santa Pod Live Timing
Author
Discussion

hairyjester

Original Poster:

60 posts

186 months

Saturday 14th April 2012
quotequote all
Just to let everyone out there know Santa Pod is now streaming live timing data to the 1320go.com website.
For those of you unfamiliar with 1320go it displays every run the moment it happens, giving full incremental times and also current weather conditions.
The service is free to watch the live timing page but the paid membership offers you access to all previous timing data from Easter Thunderball onwards. Android and iPhone apps are also available which gives you mobile access to live timing and previous timing data. 1320go also provide a range of run analysis software for race teams.
We'll be running the service at every event from now on (except for private test days) and any feedback would be much appreciated.

The Santa Pod live timing page can be found at http://www.1320go.com/santapod/timeslipsonline.php

Tet

1,196 posts

225 months

Saturday 14th April 2012
quotequote all
My first reaction is "why does it have to be in flash?". There's no mobile app for my phone and although my phone supports flash, it's slow, and the site in general is extremely heavyweight, probably to the point of being unusable on a mobile device at the track, given the Pod's poor signal quality and limited data connectivity, which is where it's needed most. I'd also really like a sensible means of getting at the data in a machine readable format. 20 bucks for a year's live data doesn't sound too bad. My concern is that the implementation means it won't be useful at the track.

redvictor

3,152 posts

258 months

Saturday 14th April 2012
quotequote all
hairyjester said:
Just to let everyone out there know Santa Pod is now streaming live timing data to the 1320go.com website.
For those of you unfamiliar with 1320go it displays every run the moment it happens, giving full incremental times and also current weather conditions.
The service is free to watch the live timing page but the paid membership offers you access to all previous timing data from Easter Thunderball onwards. Android and iPhone apps are also available which gives you mobile access to live timing and previous timing data. 1320go also provide a range of run analysis software for race teams.
We'll be running the service at every event from now on (except for private test days) and any feedback would be much appreciated.

The Santa Pod live timing page can be found at http://www.1320go.com/santapod/timeslipsonline.php
Woo hoo... We can see what all our competitors are up to..biggrin

leffehoegaarden

199 posts

172 months

Saturday 14th April 2012
quotequote all

There was a guy in the cafe at the Pod last weekend, he had it up and running on his phone, seemed to be working really well.

Is this going to help racers or will it be aimed at spectators?

redvictor said:
Woo hoo... We can see what all our competitors are up to..biggrin
LOL. Guess that answers that one then.

Edited by leffehoegaarden on Saturday 14th April 23:45

hairyjester

Original Poster:

60 posts

186 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Always good to get a techie's perspective Tet. The Flash is a bit heavy to load on a PC but once it's loaded it does run quick, runs are on the screen within 5 seconds of the pair going over the line. I haven't attempted to load the website on my own Android phone with Flash but I imagine I'll get the same problems.
I think it's the usual story with a lot of apps only being available on iOS or Android, that may change in the future with HTML5 standards starting to be adopted for mobile apps but I think that's some way off. And yes, the coverage of mobile networks at the track is pretty bad and we're not sure how it's going to stand up to a couple of hundred people using the app simultaneously, Main Event/Euro Finals might be interesting.

The guy in the cafe was DJ who designs all of the Santa Pod websites and made all the arrangements for 1320go. He was pretty impressed with the Android version on his phone and it got a bit of attention. We tried it out on an iPhone and that was pretty good too.
It's aimed at both racers (internet connectivity dependent) in terms of keeping up with competition (as Andy said) and run analysis and spectators in terms of getting instant incremental times, reaction times and margin of victory, basically anything the scoreboards don't show.

Miss Information

86 posts

250 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Excellent! I knew I was right to upgrade to the latest version of Crew Chief clap

slinky

15,704 posts

270 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Looking good..



It doesn't to be quite "as live" at the moment though..

Cars seem to enter pre-stage, skip full stage, the tree runs, a win light is awarded and the timing data is displayed immediately. Is that the intention?

anonymous-user

75 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Knowing your competitors incrementals doesn't mean you're going to know how to replicate it yourself, so it's not going to be some magic wand.

JakesterUK

869 posts

220 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Will the app work through a blackberry or does it have to be an i-phone

hairyjester

Original Poster:

60 posts

186 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
All of the timing data for a run is uploaded the moment the pair crosses the line so it won't be live in terms of giving incremental times as they happen. As for the tree it's really just a bit of eye candy but it seems odd it doesn't light up the stage "lamps". Also, the 330' times appear to be missing today so we'll get in touch with 1320go.

Currently the app is only available for iPhones (inc. iPod Touch & iPads) and Android devices. I should think if there's enough demand from Blackberry users they'll look into getting a Blackberry app developed.

Tet

1,196 posts

225 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Hmmm... I'm watching cars going down the track on the webcam, but the live timing page is still saying "Oil down. Clean up in progress." :-(

hairyjester

Original Poster:

60 posts

186 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Webcam?

Tet

1,196 posts

225 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
I thought I'd try it just in case, and it seems to be working. Or at least it's displaying what look like RWYB vehicles going down the track and they seemed to be coinciding with the live timing data earlier.

hairyjester

Original Poster:

60 posts

186 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Just had a look at the Eurodragster webcam page, no idea what day that's from but there's no Tog or webcam today. I guess there's some sort of testing going on with the webcam but it confused the hell out of me.

VRSLoz

1 posts

173 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
I had this app running on my Samsung Galaxy S2 while taking part in RWYB yesterday. Seemed to work very well and updated quickly.

Is a great tool for people that go to Santa Pod a lot

Tet

1,196 posts

225 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Tog mentioned they were going to be replaying the footage from the Thunderball. I guess that's including some RWYB footage too. Anyway, I've now written the basics of an app for my phone, so we'll see how it goes at Big Bang.

redvictor

3,152 posts

258 months

Sunday 15th April 2012
quotequote all
Rat_Fink_67 said:
Knowing your competitors incrementals doesn't mean you're going to know how to replicate it yourself, so it's not going to be some magic wand.
No st.... you missed the smiley Lee. yes

dorrisdormouse

127 posts

172 months

Tuesday 17th April 2012
quotequote all
I wouldnt mind looking at the stream data for that :-)

Oooops... Guess thats my web developer side coming out :-)

Would be interesting to work that streaming data in with Eurodragster's webcam feed - would definately be interested in giving that a go. In fact I will offer my time in working on that sort of integration for free - but im guessing it may not be quite that simple, dunno what sort of link up\contract there is between santa pod and 1320go.

Tet

1,196 posts

225 months

Tuesday 17th April 2012
quotequote all
The stream data is (fortunately) pretty trivial. Like I said, I've already written something for my phone that parses it.

anonymous-user

75 months

Tuesday 17th April 2012
quotequote all
redvictor said:
No st.... you missed the smiley Lee. yes
It wasn't aimed at you Andy wink