My GPS Doesn't Work -- Troubleshooting Guide

[still_questions]

Erin,

I use mozilla firefox 3.1. Since the start of the iditarod, I could see the gps.when I opened it, it focused in on the idit trail. later on it showed checkpoints and even the trail.
Yesterday night I had my computer on, also the gps window open. when I looked at it after some time, the screen had changed:
1. I could see that the gps was never updated, ages were over 2 hrs.
2. then I closed my old window and opened the new one. I got the whole world map, not even any symbols related to idit, etc etc.
3. when I finished checking at 1am, the current status table was more updated then what the gps showed. since then the gps shuffeled all the mushers to specific checkpoints instead of showing us where they were on the trail.

So, since yesterday, my gps does not work. and since my whole working environment has not changed since the beginning of the idit, I like to check with you and find out what is going on?
Right now, for example:
if I open the gps map, all the mushers are in the checking points except: 36, 39, and 27. Buser is still in unakleet, even though he left it some time ago. when I select him, I get the information that he is out and where he is.
HOWEVER: while the gps clearly used to show where a musher is on the trail, we now have to find the checking point where the musher is, select this musher and then READ where he is. what happened?
I read all the other comments you gave to similar e-mails. it looks to me when suddenly so many people have similar problems for more than 24 hours, it would be good to clarify this...

[Erin_IonEarth]

I am confused by what you mean by checking points. Do you mean the three overlapped flags with a '+'?

Read my post about halfway down this page:

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1297&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&start=20#p12670

[still_questions]

checkpoints are the locations where mushers have to stop and often take a rest.
as I said in my last e-mail: when you open gps and get the first map most mushers are clustered in these checkpoint. so the first look appears as if nobody is moving.

is there the possibility that a clustering function was chosen that put mushers into the same cluster even though they are fairly far away? and then we actually see moves of clusters instead of single people - what we had before? this would explain the troubles we have with following the race.

also yesterday: buser was half way between unalaakleet and shaktoolik when I could finally see his symbol. before that, he was still shown beeing in unalaakleet even though he moved.
in other words: when at the beginning the gps was better set up, I did not need much higher resolution before I could get an overview where a musher was on the map. the resolution was in such a way that I actually had a good overview over all mushers. now, I have to choose 2-3 resolutions to track one musher. I then get information about the streets of a checkpoint (who cares?) before a musher's symbol is shown at the correct position; at the same time, the focus is so large that I lost all the other mushers in the race and have to go back to the very low resolution and start again.

if you have a hard time to understand these examples, I would be curious to come to know whether there is a discrepancy between the information that I describe and what you can see on your screen. may be this is a good way to tackle all this.
your comments look as if the gps still runs for you?

for example, (alaska time: 9.46):

checkpoint shaktoolik:
when I click on the green symbol with a cross: I see that jeff king is still in this checkpoint, the current standing list shows that he checked out of shaktoolik at 1.03 pm. still, the gps shows that he is at mile 741.

I remember, that gps shpwed him yesterday already far away, approximately at mile 751.
the information the idit website currently provides does not show that he scratched etc. Thus, I assume that we really have a discrepancy between gps and the current standing list.

[Erin_IonEarth]

If you read some of the other posts, you'll see that Jeff King and someone else (I forget who) turned back from the camping point just before the water and returned to the checkpoint. As I understand it the weather has turned very nasty. It appears that the majority of the mushers who are in checkpoints have decided to stay in the relative safety of a checkpoint, perhaps to wait the weather out? (I really can't say for sure, I'm not terribly familiar with the Iditarod)

If you notice, if you sort the table by MPH, there are a LOT of 0s. I've been browsing the forums, trying to keep an eye out for people in need of assistance, and I've noticed that quite a few of the mushers seem to mention that their last run was one of the harder ones they've had in a while. The dogs are pooped, the mushers are pooped, and in many places the trail is obliterated. At least that seems to be what I am seeing.

If we were to turn off the grouping now you would see stacks of flags at the checkpoints, because that happens to be where everyone is. You'd still have to zoom in rather deep in order to be able to see any of them separate, even some. And you would most likely still have some stacked nearly on top of each other. The end result would be that you would be unable to hover over many of the mushers, and therefor see who all is where and their popups. At least with the stacking you can see everyone who is in the vicinity.

The algorithm that is used to determine whether or not to place an individual musher into a group is the default one that Microsoft supplies. The basic way that the algorithm works, as I have described before somewhere in another thread is that it breaks the current view of the map down into a grid. The width and height of the boxes is determined internally by the plugin. It then goes through the list of people to plot and find out which grid they fall in. A single flag is then used to mark that grid, and we tell it to list all the individuals within that grid in the popup, and to provide a link to access their individual stats.

If the weather were better and people were more uniformly spread out, I think you wouldn't have to zoom in too much to see them separately. It just happens right now that all but a small handful of mushers are staying put where they are -- which just happens to be a checkpoint.

[little dog]

Hi Still questions,
I'm not a techie, but from what I have figured out, you have to zoom in on a cluster util the map distance key (botton right of map) is no more than double the distance between 2 mushers in the cluster. So if they are 5 miles apart, you have to zoom in to around the 10 mile point on the map key.
I have also had issues where a musher isn't released from the cluster to be shown by themselves until I zoom in. If you read my earlier posts, you will see I have voiced this issue before. I'm thinking that implimenting changes like this in the middle of the race is not too good for business (hey, we are paying customers!!!)
little dog

[melodysmom]

My GPS has been working fine, then all of a sudden today when I'm on GPS my computer just turns off!!! Any suggestions, please?

[Erin_IonEarth]

I have no idea why your computer shut down. Your only thing to do is start it up and log back in. Unless that's not working? I'm a little confused.

[melodysmom]

Yes, turning the computer back on does work but is irritating (especially since I'm at work). I realize this could just be a "my computer" issue. I was hoping maybe there's some cache I could clear or something like that. I'm not very technological. Just hoping I could get back on the GPS - especially now that Lance is moving again!

[still_questions]

Hi little dog,

yes, it is clear that we now need to select such a high resolution based on the information how the clustering works.

in general, clustering is not always advantageous and can eliminate differences we actually want to see. sure, I have to go now to every cluster, enlarge, enlarge in order to see what is going on in the race. if this is done, I have to go back to the lowest resolution, select the next cluster and do it all over again. remember, the last year, it was set up much better, why not this year?

Erin, is there a possibility to have the old version set up, even by opening another window?

has anyone seen the posting that king and another musher turned back to shaktoolik?

Erin, thanks for the detailed information.

[Erin_IonEarth]

At this point, if you want to see everyone spread out without clustering, my only recommendation is to take advantage of Microsoft's short sightedness in not implementing clustering in their 3D view.