Caro-COOPS.org Discussion Board

jcothran · Joined: 24 Feb 2025 Posts: 176 Location: Columbia, SC

From Charles White at Conrad Blucher Institute for Surveying and Science regarding a discussion thread where the ADCP Wavesmon windows application was hanging:

This email you saw was about one of our initial deployments where we have a Linux PC104 dataloger on a platform collecting the raw data and moving it to our server on shore via Freewave radio. On the server, we run a perl script that checked a folder for the file and if found executed the Wavesmon program using the command line capability giving the file name to process and a preset sst configuration.

Two problems caused us to lockup;

1) The version of Wavesmon we had was buggy, two versions later we have no problems. We now using version 2.02.

2) If we got a corrupted raw file it would lock up Wavesmon. We solved that just by checking the data file before attempting processing.

Another way we use Wavesmon is to deploy a PC104 with Windows 2000 installed and Wavesmon actually communicating directly with the ADCP. We then transfer back the binary currents files and post process the files using bbbatch controlled by a perl program.

============================
additional discussion thread:

That sounds like a good bet to me too. I'll see if we can work up the type of setup you mention.

Jeremy

Iâ€™d be willing to bet itâ€™s the connection that is causing your problems.

We tried doing this same setup before:

Server with WavesMon and virtual COM (VCOM) -> Internet -> IP to Serial device -> ADCP

Our problem was every time the Internet or our ISP on either end had a hiccup (they happen all the time and these are normally transparent to users but not applications requiring solid TCP connections) it locked up the WavesMon programâ€¦

The reason this happened was in the way Windows and Wavesmon handles the VCOM ports, a brief hiccup could cause the VCOM port to briefly disappear and then reappear. When it comes back, itâ€™s a new port with no connection assigned to it. So itâ€™s now available, there is an ADCP on one end but and there is no memory that Wavesmon occupied this connection. WavesMon may have been waiting for the next time window but when it senses the port is no longer available, it pukes.

Most of the VCOM software and devices are being sold as â€œcontrol serial devices over the internetâ€ and for open connection, send command, close connection they work great but they really are best used in a Local network setup as opposed to the Internet where there isnâ€™t enough Quality Assurance on the connection.

This is why we now have PC104 motherboards with IDE flash drives now on our remote ADCP deployments. We load Windows on it and Wavesmon, put it behind a firewall (software is fine for most) with only one way in. We run Wavesmon on the site and transfer back the files using ftp connections.

Tommy

The ADCP is available via internet to the office setup here. The virtual COM port is a software implementation running with WavesMon on the same PC here at the office. WavesMon is using the virtual COM to communicate with the internet feed.

Jeremy

Quick couple of questionsâ€¦..

The computer with the virtual COM port is local to the ADCP or back at he office?
If back at the office, what kind of link exists from the office to the ADCP?
Is your virtual COM port a Serial to IP hardware solution?

Tommy

We are running a windows virtual COM port utility(don't know if that's where the problem lies), and after WavesMon hangs, the port stays open(blocking further transmissions) until we are manually able to reset it. It usually hangs within about 24 hours.

Jeremy

bgibson · Posted: Tue Nov 02, 2025 3:00 pm Post subject: WavesMon ver 2.02

At present, there is a bug in the WavesMon ver 2.02 regarding the raw data file being remembered in the SST file. The problem comes when the raw data file exceeds the file size set in the SST raw data setup. What happens is that it causes a new raw data file to be created for each new data run. Brandon Strong (RDI) sent me an Alpha version to test and so for, that problem seems to have been fixed. However, with the alpha version, I am experiencing intermitant loss of data runs, usually every other hour or subsequent hours and then it comes back and starts working. I am also experiencing a problem in that the samples/burst cannot be changed once you have gone through the quick set-up. These 2 problems have been sent to RDI for troubleshooting.