Emit

[Godders]

As a planner / club computer "expert" I have to say that SI adds a massive amount of work and stress onto a limited number of people.
Many thanks to SIman for all his work in Scotland

At the first event I did none of the SI units worked Since then I've survived BUSA, the Scottish Champs, a badge event and a colour coded event.

The main attraction of emit is the ability to throw the controls out in the forest some time before the event and not have to worry about them or go round on the morning of the event putting out the SI units.

As a competitor SI is fine apart from having to wait for the beep and units not working. Having used emit a lot I find it quite easy to use - and with the advantage that if you use it correctly (put the emit card in the unit) it will definitely have recorded the punch as opposed to SI where you can punch too quickly.

Emit do need to sort out their splits software quickly as the standard output is next to useless.

[Patrick]

At the first event I did none of the SI units worked

To be fair, on that occasion the units did exactly as they were told...

But I agree, SI can be a lot of work. I've never used Emit as an organiser so I can't compare the two. However, as a competitor I've found that things seem to go wrong at least as often at events using Emit as at those using SI, despite the former's supposed foolproof nature. I suspect this is because people (in Scotland, at least) understand SI fairly well by now.

Patrick

[Guest]

As someone who has planned with pin punches, SI and Emit, I can say that with a planner's hat on there is only one winner - Emit. In fact I would go as far as saying that if the only choice was SI, I would probably think very, very hard before saying yes if asked if I wanted to plan again. Emit means that the planner can concentrate on the important things i.e. getting the course right and the right control in the right place in the forest, rather than programming, changing batteries, worrying about failed controls, etc. etc.

I don't know about other clubs, but in our (quite large) club there is a limited supply of people willing to be event officials. Anything that adds lots of totally unneccessary extra work and thus puts them off volunteering will potentially result in no events. When that happens it doesn't really matter which system is preferred by competitors, as there won't be any events to compete at....

As a competitor with lots of experience of both systems I don't really have any view either way. The Emit card was a bit unwieldy to carry at first, and the planner always seems to be left handed, but so long as you look at which way round the control is placed as you run up to it, this isn't a problem. At least it's no more of a problem than trying to hit the tiny hole in an SI control unit at speed. Either of them are miles easier than the good old days of pin punches dangling on the end of a bit of string...

The Emit results presentation does leave a lot to be desired. That is one place where SI wins hands down.

Mind you, I'm sure both systems will be superceded as soon as someone manages to combine a GPS receiver, data logger, and clock into something no bigger than an Emit card, and can sell it for £20. The planner would then only need to hang a kite in the forest, the GPS trace would show if you had been to the controls. You'll not only be able to look at split times, but actually be able to see your (and everyone elses) routes, preferably overlaid on the OCAD map of the area. Animated as well to give a real feel of how the race went?

[redkite]

I like the idea of GPS, unfortunately current low power GPS systems do not seem to work in under tree cover.

[pyrat]

ok, lets look at post-event element of the systems.

- emit results and splits are a complete joke. Tiny font in the splits and hard to read. Is emit compatible with winsplits?

-si Polished results and splits with direct export to winsplits. (great post event analysis program)

- punching splits : no chance. results - very very time consuming if a big event, not a standard format.

-p

[fell]

I like the idea of GPS, unfortunately current low power GPS systems do not seem to work in under tree cover.

I reckon RFID is looking to be a better solution in the near future- tags can be sewn into uniforms, and can be read even when there's a concrete wall between it and the transmitter.
And All tags can be read simultaneously on a 'radar' screen, -could be good spectating.

Only problems is, filling a forest with transmitters.
cripes

[Ed]

I like the idea of GPS, unfortunately current low power GPS systems do not seem to work in under tree cover.

doesn't matter how much power there is - it'll still never work as it needs a clear view of the sky to see the satellites. Quite apart from the problems with multipathing and signal delay that tree canopies would cause even if you could persuade a receiver to pick up the signals.

Is emit compatible with winsplits?

I think only if someone's done a csv/xml export of the results, and/or uploaded to winsplits online.

[andy]

Is emit compatible with winsplits?

I think only if someone's done a csv/xml export of the results, and/or uploaded to winsplits online.

Apparently so, as SIman got some BEOC/SOL5 results from winsplits, it was an emit event. But I have received two files from the Emit system in the last week and they have both been very very different, the times were even in different formats, so from this I find it hard to believe it's compatible with winsplits without some editing.
In the software department, as pyrat said, SI is streets ahead of Emit. And for this sole fact I will always push for using SI when involved with the organisation of an event, the little bit of extra work is worth it (and it's not any more difficult to put out the controls is it?? i've not had any problems and usually carry about 15-20 with units)

[FatBoy]

In the software department, as pyrat said, SI is streets ahead of Emit.

...and the SI software is lousy.

[David May]

redkite wrote:

I like the idea of GPS, unfortunately current low power GPS systems do not seem to work in under tree cover.

doesn't matter how much power there is - it'll still never work as it needs a clear view of the sky to see the satellites. Quite apart from the problems with multipathing and signal delay that tree canopies would cause even if you could persuade a receiver to pick up the signals.

Perhaps mobile phone technology is the way to go.

I saw a presentation from the Danish elite runner Chris Terkelson at Västerås during the WOC week where he showed a system, based on cellphone transmission and GPS receiver, which he’s developed along with others and which is called TracTrac. You can see the results of the trials at http://www.copenhagencitycup.dk/ok-oest/ccc/index.asp?page=2004/trackingonline.asp. Just click on one of the two large buttons on this page to bring up a Sprint map; then click the Løbs Simulator tab and play with the settings.

It’s a bit hit or miss (probably because of my poor Danish) but you can get speeded up versions of the GPS-determined position-time data for the runners listed down the side of the page. Each runner drags a “tail” behind which represents the previous minute’s position data

[RJ]

The SI system is really very robust. We have done in excess of 250 events in WCOC since we got the gear back in 2000. There have been very few failed units when you consider the number used. Usually it is due to condensation in the units when they are left overnight in the terrain, and battery failure due to cold.

We have never lost an event, there is quite a lot of backup inherent in the system if one part fails. We now try to run all our events in Training mode, which means you just turn them on with a magnet and then synchronise the time with TimeMaster. For most of our events we use a very lightweight stake with red and white plastic squares attached and just put the unit on the ground. The whole system really is very user friendly.

We try to get the results on the web within hours and our club website uses splits browser to graph the results. The whole thing is such a change from what we had years ago. It makes the sport buzz, and is the best thing that has ever happened. If you can't attract folk to a sport that is this good then we have no chance!

Roger Jackson

[fish]

doesn't matter how much power there is - it'll still never work as it needs a clear view of the sky to see the satellites. Quite apart from the problems with multipathing and signal delay that tree canopies would cause even if you could persuade a receiver to pick up the signals.

The gps system (spi10???) I've used out here in Aus has worked pretty well in thick forest - reasonable track of position - which we've seen overlaid on maps. The next thing is to work out how to use it as a better training tool - there's people looking at trying to estimate physiological demands of the sport - as you can look at velocities and HR, plus climb etc.. I thing Gareth Candy might be doing a uni project along these lines - at least he's got us running a short test course next week with something in mind...

Fish

[PeterG]

On a technical note, Emit has a very nice description of how to interface with the units. Does anyone know if SI has anything similar?

[Mrs H.]

Why have there been problems at a number of big SI events lately - the White Rose, I think someone said there was a problem at the Twin Peaks and now the Boktrot - I've heard people muttering about databases etc - were the problems connected to each other - whats going on?

[Simon]

On a technical note, Emit has a very nice description of how to interface with the units. Does anyone know if SI has anything similar?

On of the SI websites there is an e-mail address to contact them to get a technical guide to interfacing with the master boxes. I have found it to be incomplete (or not particularly detailed) and instead reverse engineered the existing programs to work out how to interface with the units.

Why have there been problems at a number of big SI events lately - the White Rose, I think someone said there was a problem at the Twin Peaks and now the Boktrot - I've heard people muttering about databases etc - were the problems connected to each other - whats going on?

My understanding was that the White Rose had problems sorting out the results in both the existing age classes and the experimental event format at the same time. I have not heard of any other problem there, but was not at the event and have only heard a few comments about it.

At the BokTrot I heard mention of using the latest update to the software. If this is the case then a bug in that could be a contributing factor to the problem, as the latest release was only a few days before the event (software released on 22nd Sep).
From standing in the queue to download the comment was that the event database had become corrupted and that they were unable to restore from any of the old backups due to other technical reasons. I am fairly sure I have had this happen at an event and seem to recall that we ended up having to read in all the various log files to recreate the event data.