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LIGHTNING/2000™
Lightning 2000 is a powerful interface for the Boltek™
lightning detector is now more advanced and flexible than ever before.
Lightning/2000™ is a Windows® application that runs under
Windows95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP/Server 2003 (Boltek
ISA card - Windows 95/98/ME/2000/XP;
Boltek PCI card - Windows 95/98/ME//NT/2000/XP/Server
2003; Boltek LD-250 - Windows 95/98/ME/NT/2000/XP/Server
2003).
FEATURES
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Even an older 486 processor running Windows 95 is completely
adequate to detect real-time lightning.
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Dozens of new storm analysis and display features.
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12 customizable audio warnings that YOU define.
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Real-time lightning strength indicator.
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Background maps include counties, parks, federal lands, lakes,
interstate highways and more. Or you can use any bitmap image
as your map. See a sample.
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Geographic Stroke Plotting: See real-time lightning plot on
the background map of your choice.
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Automation to save lightning maps on a web page automatically is
easy using an external FTP program or a mapped drive to a web server
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Completely user-configurable colors, fonts, alarm levels, and MORE!
ADVANTAGES
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Lightning/2000™ allows you to configure it to your tastes
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12 alarm sounds can be any .WAV files on your computer
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Lightning data is analyzed in real-time and can be displayed both
textually and graphically
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Complete support for the Windows clipboard
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Automatic-save of images and data is built into the program
FEATURES
This list contains only some of the features of this dynamic product.
- 8 movable, resizable windows
- Colors of all screen objects may be easily changed
- window backgrounds
- alarms
- fonts
- lightning strokes
- fresh lightning strokes
- Fonts may be changed easily
- counters
- graph label
- storm analysis information
- Each of 6 different alarms has two alert levels, for a total of 12
different sounds that can alert you to potential danger
- Stroke rate
- Strong stroke rate
- Energy ratio
- Storm proximity
- General status
- Low disk space
- Multiple independent windows allow you to tailor the look to your
needs
- User settings (colors, fonts, etc.) may be saved and restored easily
- Lightning data is automatically saved to disk
- Lightning/2000™ automatically recovers from sudden power failures
with no chance that the archive file can become corrupted
- Saved lightning data can be played back at any time and at any
speed, without interfering with the real-time acquisition of
lightning data
- The raw lightning data display can be configured to your
requirements
- Lightning data is analyzed in real-time to determine where storms
are located
- Storms are evaluated individually for severity
- NOWCast information can be viewed at any time, or it can be saved to
disk for later use
- Daily summaries are saved automatically in a text format
- Old NOWCasts and summaries may be viewed from Lightning/2000™, or
they may be printed
- Complete clipboard support for both graphic and text elements means
you may cut and paste to any Windows program
- Lightning activity rates are displayed in a graph
- The activity graph can be from 15 minutes to 24 hours long
- Recent lightning activity can be played back at any time without
interfering with the real-time acquisition of lightning data
- Each real-time lightning stroke is displayed in two different ways
- All real-time lightning data is evaluated to come up with a general
alert level
- Background maps may be zoomed in and out without loss of resolution
- An optional title can be added to the title bar
- Strokes may be plotted as single pixels, or they may be plotted as
small X's or squares for increased visibility.
Lightning/2000™ v2.0 contains several important features that will
enhance your installation and give you added flexibility:
- You can now use any bitmap image as a background map.
- You're free to use any .BMP file instead of the supplied map.
- You could (for example) take a screen capture from your favorite
mapping program and use it as your map.
- Getting the bitmap aligned and centered is a snap.
- You now have the option of seeing the most critical information
contained in a single window. The real-time
lightning window contains:
- The detector activity (a.k.a. signal strength) meters
- The stroke counter, updated continuously
- Real-time lightning strokes, plotted on the background map
- Improved ranging algorithms were developed for this function.
- An expanded built-in help file.
- More topics.
- More keywords to make searches more productive.
- You can capture an image of the real-time
lightning window periodically.
- Either a compact JPEG or a high-quality BMP image (or both!) may
be saved.
- You specify how often the image is saved to a file.
- The file can then be uploaded to a web site using a third-party
FTP utility.
- The captured image doesn't include the detector activity meters,
and the superimposed stroke rate counter is in the upper-left
corner of the captured image.
- You can capture both the Summary and NOWCast windows to a file.
- A greatly expanded and updated user manual.
- 50% more pages
- A vastly improved index
- A number of minor improvements and corrections.
- More alarm sounds to choose from
- More shapes to choose from for displaying lightning strokes
- Cosmetic and usability enhancements
The latest Lightning/2000™ version contains some features that
could use some explaining.
- The new "Reflection rejection" algorithm is now in place.
- During times of heavy lightning activity, sometimes a stroke can
be identified as coming from a direction as much as 180 degrees
away from where it's actually coming from.
- The reflection rejection logic assumes that the most intense
storm is not a reflection. Any storms at azimuthally
locations where a reflection from the strongest storm could occur
are tagged as possible reflections. Other criteria are then
used to determine if any possible reflections are actually
reflections. Any storms determined to be reflections are
eliminated.
- The new algorithm will hardly ever eliminate a storm that is not
a reflection, however it will sometimes leave reflections in place
if it isn't sure.
- On the whole, the new algorithm is substantially better than the
old one and can be left turned on.
- There are now 5 levels of reflection rejection: Off, Low,
Medium, High, and Extreme. The "High" setting is
the same as having reflection rejection turned on in previous
versions.
- The "Range scaling" option allows you to change the way
that storms are drawn in the Analysis window.
- "Nearby" storms are those that are drawn in the red
alert color; "regional" storms are those yellow alert
storms, and "distant" storms are all the others.
- Changes made to the range of the storms in the Analysis window
eventually cause the strokes in the Real-time lightning window to
be drawn in different locations.
- Changes should show up within 1 minute in the analysis window.
- After you make a change to the range scaling, it could take up
to 30 minutes for the changes to be completely incorporated in the
Real-time lightning window.
- This means that you should take the time to observe what effect
the changes you make have had before making any more changes.
- This option was put in place mainly to allow users with
"unusual" antenna placements to have some control over
their systems.
- No matter what settings you use for range scaling, a
single-detector system will still not be the equal of having your
own radar!
- These settings affect both the Real-time lightning window and
the Analysis window.
- Now there is another option on the range scaling dialog box --
"nearby storms link factor".
- By decreasing this number, you will cause storms that are close
to each other in azimuth to be less strongly linked in range.
- The range of a storm is tied to those storms that are in the
same general direction. This works well if there is an
organized line of storms approaching.
- If the thunderstorm activity is widely scattered however, you
may need to cause storms to be less strongly linked
together. This way a nearby storm will tend not to cause
other storms that are in a similar direction to be "sucked
in" towards the center of the display.
- In general, the less organized (i.e. the more scattered) the
thunderstorm activity, the lower the "link" factor
should be. For typical summer popup thunderstorms, a link
factor of 50% or lower is appropriate.
- For well-organized lines of storms, a link factor of 50%-100%
should be used.
- This "link" factor affects only the strokes drawn in
the Real-time lightning window, NOT the Analysis window.
What do I get when I order?
- The full version of Lightning/2000™ on CD Rom
- 2 background maps for your area
- A full-detail map
- A "sparse" map with only state borders and freeways
- Background maps encompass an area with a radius of 300 miles
from your location
- A printed manual
THIS IS SPECIAL ORDER SOFTWARE AND IS INELIGIBLE FOR RETURN, PLEASE
ALLOW 2 WEEKS FOR DELIVERY
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