NESDIS RF QUALITY Parameters
DOMSAT Values
----------------------------
The pam_ascii data files include RF quality parameters with
each message.
To make it easier to examine use:
cut -c10-60 /pam/pam_ascii/970408.pam > rf.text.file
That removes the bulk of the data, and the superflous year/day
from the header.
You'll then have something like this (without the title)
time sta source RF-Qualities data.....
-------- -------- ------ ------------------ --------
00:01:27 364184A0 DOMSAT:G47-2NN117EFF00239 e@@B
00:03:27 3641C7AA DOMSAT:G46-2NN117EFF00240 n@@B
00:06:27 364184A0 DOMSAT:G47-2NN117EFF00239 e@@B
00:08:27 3641C7AA DOMSAT:G46-2NN117EFF00240 n@@B
00:11:27 364184A0 DOMSAT:G47-2NN117EFF00239 e@@B
You can fgrep that file for the specific platform(s)
of interest.
The RF quality stuff for DOMSAT is actually what's monitored
by the main NESDIS receive site at Wallops. It includes:
'G' Good message
Alternatives =
? message with parity error
W message received on wrong channel
D previous msg was duplicated (ie rcvd on multiple
channels)
Q bad signal quality measurements
A correctable address error
B bad address
I invalid address
T outside it's assigned time (N/A for NCAR)
U unexpected (N/A for NCAR)
M missing (N/A for NCAR)
N incomplete platform description table at NESDIS
'46' Signal Strength in dbm EIRP (this is a good value, expect
between 44-49. more than that is naughty but ok, much less
and you won't get it. resolution is 1dbm
'-2' Frequency Offset * 50Hz: ie -2 = -100Hz from assigned center
frequency. Range = +/- 0-A (beyond 500 Hz and you probably
won't get it. expect between +/- 0-5.
'N' Normal modulation index (or Low, High)
'N' Normal data quality bit-error-rate <= 1x10**(-6)
or Fair 10**(-4) to 10**(-6)
or Poor < 10**(-4)
'117E' Channel 117 GOES-east
'FF' Uplink carrier status of DOMSAT, ignore this.
'00239' Decimal Length of data in bytes