Highway Radar v2.4.3: New aircraft server and map lock

[ferius]

Hi everyone,

I'm happy to announce that I've published v2.4.3 to the beta channel. I'm planning to keep this update in beta mode for a couple of weeks while observing stability and tuning the performance; later, I'll make it public. To become a beta tester, you need to enroll in Play Market on the app's page.

v2.4.3 is quite a minor update in terms of features, but quite a big update in terms of the underlying technology. Due to this, please expect some issues that may be happening from time to time, especially with aircraft alerts.

I created quite a nice instant data distribution server left for the SEAL project, and I decided to re-use it for aircraft alerts. This allows pushing aircraft alerts to devices in real-time, and significantly reduces data usage.

Here are the key benefits of the new server:

• It delivers data instantly (the previous server had 10-40 seconds delay).
• It doesn't require you to specify a secondary server anymore, as everything is built-in.
• It uses less data as it sends only the updates, not the entire bundles every several seconds. Also, the secondary server isn't queried by the mobile device anymore.
• It survives failures of underlying data providers better (in the previous version, aircraft could disappear from the map in case of data provider failure).
• It provides better privacy. Instead of sending the exact driver's position to my server and then data-sources, it queries data for one of 262144 predefined sectors of the world map; no exact location is transmitted.
• It has better aircraft un-censoring based on data feeds matching (about 80% are successfully un-censored).

All those benefits come at a cost, and the cost is the increased load on my server. Synthetic tests show that it should be able to handle ~1000 simultaneous connections before showing degradation. However, I can only get exact numbers by rolling the service out and watch how it works in real-world scenarios.

Another important update is that starting from this version the minimum supported Android version is Android 5.0. More details in https://www.rdforum.org/threads/104786/.

Besides the new aircraft server, there are a couple more improvements:

• Added a map lock button. If it is pressed, the map won't reset its state to tracking the current position.
• Added altitude indicator for aircraft map labels
• Added a splash screen while the app is loading
• Improved profile names buttons display

This is a beta release, so please expect some bugs or issues may happen. Please report them here or using the bug report feature (triple tap on the speed or "Submit bug report" using the voice control).

Have fun! And special thanks to those 138 people switched to the beta update channel!

 

[WJS]

Awesome work. New donation made toward your electricity bill ; )

 

[ICULookin]

Awesome work. New donation made toward your electricity bill ; )

How do we donate to the electricity bill?

 

[WJS]

How do we donate to the electricity bill?

Credits - Highway Radar

highwayradar.com

At the bottom of the page.

 

[jestric]

Even easier: Donate to @ferius

 

[Jesse]

When the app is in PIP, and I press the little maximize arrows, the app just goes to the background after about 5 seconds. At that point I use the drop-down and select the app and it comes back on the screen. Happens in Landscape & Portrait mode consistently every time. Doesn't seem to matter if I'm running Waze or not. I'm using the SABRE plug-in.

Samsung Galaxy S8, Android Version 9

I noticed this in the last version, and this one as well.

 

[ChrisTDI]

Love this app, find myself looking to load it before waze and maps. I would like to join the beta channel but for some reason cant follow your instructions on where the beta channel exists in the play store. Thank you!

Post automatically merged: Oct 6, 2020

I found the "join beta program" option in google play about midway down the page. this link helped as well https://www.rdforum.org/threads/98730/

 

[nomore55]

I'm seeing aircraft traces for the very first time today !!

 

[ferius]

I'm seeing aircraft traces for the very first time today !!

The traces used to rely on a very unstable external service before. Now I compute the traces myself, on my server, so I'm in charge of stability.

 

[G37X Jockey]

The traces used to rely on a very unstable external service before. Now I compute the traces myself, on my server, so I'm in charge of stability.

Noticed a small issue with this version. When changing from a profile with aircraft detection activated to a profile without aircraft, the plane icon goes red, instead of grey and the Detection Problem banner appears. Backgrounding and reactivating HWY Radar corrects things.
Also only the first 3 alert tones work. Those from Wheeu.. wheeu and below don't activate.
Thanks @ferrius.

 

[ferius]

Noticed a small issue with this version. When changing from a profile with aircraft detection activated to a profile without aircraft, the plane icon goes red, instead of grey and the Detection Problem banner appears. Backgrounding and reactivating HWY Radar corrects things.
Also only the first 3 alert tones work. Those from Wheeu.. wheeu and below don't activate.
Thanks @ferrius.

Got it, will take a look tonight. Thanks!

 

[ferius]

Noticed a small issue with this version. When changing from a profile with aircraft detection activated to a profile without aircraft, the plane icon goes red, instead of grey and the Detection Problem banner appears. Backgrounding and reactivating HWY Radar corrects things.
Also only the first 3 alert tones work. Those from Wheeu.. wheeu and below don't activate.
Thanks @ferrius.

I did fix the aircraft icon going red, and will push a fix tonight. However, I had no luck reproducing the alert tones. Could you record a short demo video for me, please? Possibly, the issue could be somewhere else.

 

[plm]

The auto-start doesn't seem to be working for me, despite having it set in my preferences for each of the profiles. I get the splash screen and then the status of the plugins, rather than jumping directly from the splash screen to the running application.

 

[ferius]

The auto-start doesn't seem to be working for me, despite having it set in my preferences for each of the profiles. I get the splash screen and then the status of the plugins, rather than jumping directly from the splash screen to the running application.

Could you take a screenshot of your configuration status screen? Or just tell me the status of each item there.

 

[plm]

Could you take a screenshot of your configuration status screen? Or just tell me the status of each item there.

General Settings:
Units: U.S.
Start service automatically: yes
Shutdown when stationary: no
Show notification on alert: yes
Activate PIP on home / tasks button press: no
Back button action: Go to background and keep running
Use Google location services: yes
Enable bug reporting: yes
Action on service start: No action

I presume you don't need configuration from any of the other screens, but let me know if you do.

 

[ferius]

General Settings:
Units: U.S.
Start service automatically: yes
Shutdown when stationary: no
Show notification on alert: yes
Activate PIP on home / tasks button press: no
Back button action: Go to background and keep running
Use Google location services: yes
Enable bug reporting: yes
Action on service start: No action

I presume you don't need configuration from any of the other screens, but let me know if you do.

I meant the start screen - the one with a bunch of green checkmarks. Is everything green there?

 

[plm]

I meant the start screen - the one with a bunch of green checkmarks. Is everything green there?

Location permission: Granted
Microphone access permission: Granted
SABRE plugin: Not required
Accessibility service: Enabled

 

[ferius]

Location permission: Granted
Microphone access permission: Granted
SABRE plugin: Not required
Accessibility service: Enabled

Thanks, I'll investigate tonight and reach back afterwards.

 

[ferius]

The auto-start doesn't seem to be working for me, despite having it set in my preferences for each of the profiles. I get the splash screen and then the status of the plugins, rather than jumping directly from the splash screen to the running application.

Just checked and confirmed that auto-start is broken when there is no SABRE plugin used (btw, I highly recommend installing one to be able to submit and confirm alerts).
I'll submit an update fixing that tonight.

 

[plm]

All looks good now, and I subsequently went and installed a SABRE plugin so I can submit alerts as well.

Can I get an old request back on the list, which is the option to disable the announcements of the models for helicopters/planes independently? I get so many helicopter alerts that I don't care what models they are, as they are all a risk here, but in the rare instance that I get an alert for a plane I'm interested to know if it's a Cessna as that could be problematic.

I'm not sure if there would be benefit to anybody in being able to disable the announcement of the operator or not, but at least for me it's the model that's largely superfluous and results in announcements being longer than necessary.