How to open
This dialog box is opened from the Setup menu.
Description
Many third-party sensors or ROV systems export sensor strings through a UDP or serial connection. These sensor strings include various data types such as position, heading, depth, pressure, altitude, pitch, roll, and water
temperature. The third-party sensor string may not conform to the universal NMEA standard and will change depending on the sensor or ROV
manufacturer.
You will find many supported sensor formats in the Protocol drop-down list found on the Sensors Setup page in the System Configuration dialog box. However, if a particular third-party sensor format is not listed there, you can create it (using the third-party sensor specification
as your guide).
NoteAfter you are done creating the custom sensor format, it will appear in the Protocol drop-down list on the Sensors Setup page.
The sensor string is comprised of a sentence with defined parts: Message ID + Sensor Format and Delimiters + Termination.
Details
Message ID
The start (prefix) of the sensor sentence. Refer to the manufacturer's sensor specification to determine what to use. For example, “:” or “$GPRMC”.
Delimiter(s)
The character used to separate each string in the sentence. You can select more than one if necessary - each character will be treated as one delimiter. Refer to the manufacturer's sensor specification to determine what to use.
Termination
The ASCII character that tells the software where the sensor string ends. Options include a carriage return (CR), line feed (LF), or both. Refer to the manufacturer's sensor specification to determine what to use.
Sensor Format
Define the entire sensor string in this field.
Enter the Message ID, followed by the chosen delimiter. Enter in one or more of the three-letter definition strings from the list on the right side of the dialog box. Match each three-letter string with the data type in the sensor specification. For example, enter "ALT" for the part of the sensor sentence corresponding to Altitude, and so on. Separate each string with the chosen delimiters. If you can't find any part of the sensor sentence on the right-side list, then enter the "Ignored field" string (III). This will tell the software to skip over this part of the sensor sentence when parsing the string.
For example: “: ALT DEP HDG ROL PIT” defines a sensor sentence with the Message ID “:” and five fields for Altitude, Depth,
Heading, Roll, and Pitch separated by space delimiters.
Data Type
If the data type in the sensor sentence is an integer (for example, 1002), then select Whole number. If the data type in the sensor sentence is a float (for example, 10.02), then select Decimal number. Refer to the manufacturer's sensor specification to determine what to use.
Latitude / Longitude Format
Choose whether to display the latitude/longitude format in degrees, degrees and minutes, or degrees, minutes, and seconds.
Unit Scale Factor
The dialog box will tell you what unit scale the software expects (meters, degrees, meters per second, and so on). If the data type in the specification does not match the required unit scale, you must enter an appropriate scaling factor. For example, if the Depth data type is in feet, then you must enter 0.3048 to scale the depth value to meters.
Sensor Name
This name will appear in the Protocol drop-down list found on the Sensors Setup page in the System Configuration dialog box.