[Xastir] Saving serial snapshots

[Jim Tolbert]

Curt, WE7U wrote:
> On Wed, 15 Apr 2009, Jim Tolbert wrote:
>
>>> On Sun, 12 Apr 2009, Jim Tolbert wrote:
>>>
>>>> I think I remember someone describing a method of saving serial png 
>>>> snapshots.  I have searched all the saved posting that I have, but 
>>>> have not come up with it.  Could someone repost or redirect  me to it?
>>>
>>> If you mean saving snapshots so that you could play them back as a
>>> movie later or something, you'd have to write a script that would
>>> rename them in sequence after they were written by Xastir.  Each one
>>> gets written to the same name as-is.
>>>
>>> Or you could modify Xastir source code to name them based on the
>>> date/time so that each was different.
>>>
>>>
>> What would be the best way?  Would it be difficult?  How should I 
>> attack it? I have my openSUSE 11.0 Bible manual out and getting ready 
>> to go. I should have it done by morning......  Ignorance is bliss! 
>> <grin> Seriously, though.... any suggestions would be greatly 
>> appreciated.
>
> Tell us what you want to do.
>
> Is saving/playing back the log files good enough?  You can then
> bring them back in and see the tracks quickly at any time.  No code
> changes needed.
>
> It wouldn't be hard to slow the reading in of the log files down to
> more easily see the movement of the objects.  This would take a
> relatively small code change.
>
> Someday we could perhaps implement reading in of the timestamps in
> the log files so that we could more accurately do a *10 or a *2 type
> of facility, speeding up real-time by a multiplier but keeping the
> pauses between updates accurate relative to each other.  It'd be
> great to be able to go forward or backward at any speed, like a
> professional VCR can do for video.  I can think of a very special
> use for that which would be cool.  These ideas would require much
> more code.
>
> If you want to save screen images we can help you do that as well,
> but it'll be more error-prone and take up a bunch of disk for the
> images.  It would require a Perl script (or similar) to copy/rename
> the snapshot files as they appeared, and you would have to make sure
> that Perl script kept running during the length of your exercise.
> Or:  This could be accomplished with code changes in Xastir as well
> but would require developer time for implementation and testing.
> I'd rather not do this inside Xastir as it would have relatively few
> uses.
>
What I (think I) want is to be able to replay a search at high speed (2 
sec = 5 minutes or something like that).  I currently have 4 GPS 
trackers for SAR and want to eventually have about 20. 

I think I want a slide show.  Then I could adjust the timing for the 
slideshow to show the progression of the tracks.  When I use the play 
back of the log files.  I get all the points showing up sequentially but 
quite rapid and then the point labels going away being replaced by a 
colored track.

The VCR mode sounds great, but I suppose the easier way to do it will be 
to use a script.   So....  ( and here is a stupid question ) a quick 
look in my openSUSE book doesn't have much about scripts....  do I want 
a PERL book?

Thanks............. jt           KC9MXT