SignalCheck - Android app to monitor your Wi-Fi/2G/3G/4G LTE/5G-NR signal strengths

[bakedc4]

Hrmmmmm.. if those channel numbers are correct, you are right, that is band 25. The problem is, the last two characters of the GCI (09) do not follow the band 25 pattern; until now, that had been indicative of band 26.

 

This is disappointing.. or a misconfigured site. Or the channel numbers are wrong. Several possibilities, but I tend to trust HTC's engineering screens unless someone is aware of issues with the M8's screens? I can definitively tell you that SignalCheck is assuming that is band 26 because the GCI ends in 09, which in turn is why the (incorrect) 760/805 MHz readings are being displayed -- the B26 formula is being applied to an apparent B25 site.

 

-Mike

 

I'm in a Shentel area, not sure if that has anything to do with it. I've seen the GCI end in 0-4, 6-9, and E-G on both my M7 and M8 if I remember correctly.

 

Sent from my HTC ONE M8

[jesmann]

I received your report, thanks.. are you sure you have seen other GCIs on that version of Android? The error I saw in the log is related to a new HTC security permission that I believe got added with the KitKat update, and isn't in the public version of the app yet (it's in the beta that is in testing now).

 

 

I haven't seen anything like that myself -- can you point me to an app that does that so I can check it out? I don't really think it would be feasible, because of the way that Google Play handles beta updates; it's an entirely separate APK. Just like how Lite and Pro are two completely independent apps that I maintain separate code branches for.

 

While the main focus of my work over the past 3 months has been fixing the crashing and stability issues, the features I added along the way weren't added separately, but as part of the app as a whole. I implemented the site note feature as a way to help track some of the instability problems that were happening, and when it worked better than I thought, I just cleaned it up a bit and added it to the beta. It was never at a point where the app was stable and I just started adding new features. I would have released it had it gotten to that point.

 

 

Great question! Something like Titanium Backup would do the trick (be sure to back up data, not just the app), or you could copy the signalcheck_log.db file out of /data/data/com.blueline.signalcheck/databases but I believe you need to be rooted for either option. That is a standard sqlite database, and there is nothing in it that restricts it to a specific device. In the future, I will be looking into adding more import/backup/restore functions from within the app. Export to .csv is all that is included right now.

 

I plan to publish more information about the database stuff once it's released, because there is a ton of potential with it. If someone took the time to merge a market spreadsheet with the SignalCheck database (which wouldn't be too tricky if you knew what you were doing), you could instantly have a fully "noted" market with very little effort -- and you could share that with anyone you wanted.. like in a market thread on here..

 

-Mike

Now I need to get Access fired up and see what I can do lol

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[S4GRU]

My wireless nerd tower hunting has been changed forever. I am adding each sector cardinal direction too (N), (SW), (SE), etc. Viva le note feature!



Robert via Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

[Jeffrey_J]

Mike,

I think their is a bug in the Show Site Hints I have Sprint 3 selected.

On 1X PCS BID is 511B hex sector 3 but on 1X 800 129B hex sector 2 should be 3. So it thinks 1299, 129A and 129B are different sites for the add a note.

The East Texas market uses both 9, A, B and also 1, 2, 3 on the BID hex.

Only difference is 9, A, B (NID: 311) is offset BSL and 1, 2, 3 (NID: 312) is exact BSL.

 

[Dkoellerwx]

I'm in a Shentel area, not sure if that has anything to do with it. I've seen the GCI end in 0-4, 6-9, and E-G on both my M7 and M8 if I remember correctly.

 

Sent from my HTC ONE M8

 

I'm not sure we've seen GCI screen shots from a Shentel area. Probably why we've never seen the pattern before. At least, I haven't seen one from a Shentel area. 

[milan03]

Love the WiFi info readings, but do have GCI issue on GS5 T-Mobile variant.

 

Thank you for consistently improving the app!

 

[digiblur]

Mike,

 

Questions on the database.  I'm writing some queries to convert some data over and thought of something.  Say for instance I've only attached to the alpha sector on a site.  I hit add note on that sector and put in my note.  Of course the app updates that row in the database, if I pass the alpha sector again it will of course show it.  Now say I pass on the beta or gamma side won't the application make two additional rows in the database?  Will it automatically copy the note from the previous north sector?  or will I end up with two rows for this site with no note?  Depending on how things fall in the database this might show up blank right?  I believe you said you were doing a select query just based on the left 6 of the GCI and MCC/MNC right?

 

I think I'm going to run an update query to automatically make the three rows for each site to cover all the bases but it was just one of those "what if" moments that someone might run into.

[Flompholph]

Very good info, I don't think I was aware of the S4T displaying GCI (does the enginerring screen even show it?), and I had not sought out any S5 information yet -- excellent, thank you both! I will edit my previous posts. Hopefully this will no longer be an issue on future devices. Too bad it took so long to get this far.. I know there are a lot of S3 and S4 users who would love to see GCIs.

 

-Mike

If s4 users want gci they just need to upgrade to kitkat. It's to bad I can't use kitkat yet wifi stops working. https://www.dropbox.com/s/640mkyvyuvimk1p/Screenshot_2014-04-04-08-58-55.png

 

Couple questions the bsl in the dropdown shouldn't it be with 1x now its with data notification box. When I connect to 1x only the bsl wouldn't show because I have hide duplicate 1x enabled.

 

When you log is there a little delay to let things settle before you add to the log? I saw it logged a gmo as having 1x800 everything in the log looked correct but it's a gmo. I have had issues at my house when it will jump between towers with 800 and that gmo site and it will show that gmo tower as having 800. I cleared the log to try to reproduce it I couldn't yet maybe this weekend I will check it out again.

[Galaxyguy]

I'm not sure we've seen GCI screen shots from a Shentel area. Probably why we've never seen the pattern before. At least, I haven't seen one from a Shentel area.

 

I'm in a Shentel area and it's showing as B26 but it should be B25. I double checked this in the LTE engineering screen. I got excited for a second but it's OK. I know it's coming here soon.

 

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

[RCM]

Trying to reproduce it and send a diagnostic report but my first LTE note entry is sticking to other LTE sites.

[Dkoellerwx]

I'm in a Shentel area and it's showing as B26 but it should be B25. I double checked this in the LTE engineering screen. I got excited for a second but it's OK. I know it's coming here soon.

 

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

So it looks like we may have an issue with the Shentel network. They are not following the GCI pattern that the rest of the Sprint network follows. Everywhere else, a GCI ending in 19, 1A, 1B or 0F, 10, 11 are always associated with B26. Because your GCI ends in an A, Signal Check assumes it is Band 26, even though it is not.

[tongboy]

Trying to reproduce it and send a diagnostic report but my first LTE note entry is sticking to other LTE sites.

I have the same thing. It only changes if I exit and load it up again. I need to wait until I drive again tomorrow to capture the issue and send a report if necessary.

 

This is an awesome update! Thank you mikejeep

[PythonFanPA]

Let's so who's the quickest to make a script to import a little CSV file of GCI's and site notes into the Sqlite database

 

...said the Road Runner to the entire clan of Coyotes.

[mikejeep]

I'm in a Shentel area and it's showing as B26 but it should be B25. I double checked this in the LTE engineering screen. I got excited for a second but it's OK. I know it's coming here soon.

So it looks like we may have an issue with the Shentel network. They are not following the GCI pattern that the rest of the Sprint network follows. Everywhere else, a GCI ending in 19, 1A, 1B or 0F, 10, 11 are always associated with B26. Because your GCI ends in an A, Signal Check assumes it is Band 26, even though it is not.

 

I think David is right.. this puts a wrinkle into things, although it does not appear to be completely unusable. As long as the Shentel B25 sites don't cross over into the specific suffixes that we have seen on B26 sites, it can still be handled. I have only seen 09 and 0A display incorrectly so far. Right now, SignalCheck assumes 01/02/03/04 is B25 and everything else is B26, because that was how the pattern had been identified to that point.. I just might have to get a little more specific.

 

I'm in a Shentel area, not sure if that has anything to do with it. I've seen the GCI end in 0-4, 6-9, and E-G on both my M7 and M8 if I remember correctly.

 

Do you recall the last TWO characters? That's what I need. If Shentel folks could provide more examples (I don't need full screenshots, I trust your word) of GCIs they are seeing in the wild, I'd appreciate it! One tool I don't have in my test suite is the ability to connect to a Shentel site from 1000 miles away..

 

-Mike

[StyxPhoenix]

Most pre-Spark Samsung devices do not show the GCI.. so there is no way for the app to know which site you are connected to. I've tried communicating with Samsung, but I don't think my feedback went as far as I would have liked. But the Galaxy S4T and S5 apparently do show this information, so if you have one of these, you should be fine.

-Mike

It appears the SG4 also will show the GCI, I grabbed this screen while I was connected to an LTE tower in the area.

[digiblur]

...said the Road Runner to the entire clan of Coyotes.

 

I have some testing to do myself, then I'll test it on a couple folks with Sprint phones to make sure I got their GCIs right, by that time mikejeep might have written something already though.  We will see..

[tongboy]

I filed a diagnostic report for the issue I am experiencing with the LTE note field not changing when a different site comes up. The only way I have found to bring the correct label up is to exit and reenter the app. Here is an example :

 

 

 

See how the gci changed but the note did not? I do not have note entries for either of those LTE GCIs but it doesn't seem to matter. Let me know if you need me to try anything or if I am doing something wrong. I did clear all the site log data. The 1x notes work as expected although I am not really using them.

[Galaxyguy]

I think David is right.. this puts a wrinkle into things, although it does not appear to be completely unusable. As long as the Shentel B25 sites don't cross over into the specific suffixes that we have seen on B26 sites, it can still be handled. I have only seen 09 and 0A display incorrectly so far. Right now, SignalCheck assumes 01/02/03/04 is B25 and everything else is B26, because that was how the pattern had been identified to that point.. I just might have to get a little more specific.

 

 

Do you recall the last TWO characters? That's what I need. If Shentel folks could provide more examples (I don't need full screenshots, I trust your word) of GCIs they are seeing in the wild, I'd appreciate it! One tool I don't have in my test suite is the ability to connect to a Shentel site from 1000 miles away..

 

-Mike

My home tower has 09, 0A, and 0B. I'll keep hunting and let you know if I come across anything different.

 

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

[mikejeep]

Love the WiFi info readings, but do have GCI issue on GS5 T-Mobile variant.

 

Milan, please go to About > Send Diagnostics when you are connected to LTE without a GCI, and I can take a look to see if there are any errors that I can address on my end. Chances are the radio firmware isn't programmed to report it, in which case it's up to Samsung to fix it.

 

If s4 users want gci they just need to upgrade to kitkat. It's to bad I can't use kitkat yet wifi stops working.

It appears the SG4 also will show the GCI, I grabbed this screen while I was connected to an LTE tower in the area.

 

Oh that's great! Maybe the GCI will appear for Sprint users with KitKat and beyond then, not necessarily Spark devices. I believe the original release of the S4T did not show GCI on Jelly Bean.

 

-Mike

[mikejeep]

I think their is a bug in the Show Site Hints I have Sprint 3 selected.

On 1X PCS BID is 511B hex sector 3 but on 1X 800 129B hex sector 2 should be 3. So it thinks 1299, 129A and 129B are different sites for the add a note.

The East Texas market uses both 9, A, B and also 1, 2, 3 on the BID hex.

Only difference is 9, A, B (NID: 311) is offset BSL and 1, 2, 3 (NID: 312) is exact BSL.

 

I think you are reading more into the Site Hint feature than is really there. The only difference between Sprint 1 and Sprint 3 is what character position the sector is derived from; either position "1" (the last character of the hex BID) or "3" (the 3rd-to-last character of the hex BID). So 1299, 129A, and 129B will all show "Sector 2" if you have Sprint 3 selected, or "Sector 9/A/B" if you have Sprint 1 selected.

 

The site note feature is completely separate from the site hint display. Every unique SID+NID+BID trio has its own note. There is no way for the app to know if BIDs are located at the same site, so you will have to save a note for each sector. This also means you need to duplicate the efforts for 800 SMR, although I'd like to find a solution for that, since I believe the NID+BID are the same for PCS and SMR.

 

Each market assigns BIDs differently; for example, in my area, sectors on the same site have wildly different BIDs, with no identifiable pattern. Unlike the LTE GCI, where the first 6 characters indicate the site, there is no similar identifier for 1X or GSM.

 

Hopefully that clears things up for you.. or if I totally misunderstood your question, let me know.

 

-Mike

[mikejeep]

Trying to reproduce it and send a diagnostic report but my first LTE note entry is sticking to other LTE sites.

I filed a diagnostic report for the issue I am experiencing with the LTE note field not changing when a different site comes up. The only way I have found to bring the correct label up is to exit and reenter the app. Here is an example : ...

 

See how the gci changed but the note did not? I do not have note entries for either of those LTE GCIs but it doesn't seem to matter. Let me know if you need me to try anything or if I am doing something wrong. I did clear all the site log data. The 1x notes work as expected although I am not really using them.

 

Hmm.. I'm guessing this bug is isolated to HTC phones, because the app has more than one method to grab the GCI on those devices, and I think you are both on an HTC based on your profiles. If you could make some site notes on various sites (if it lets you) and then send me the database file or a .CSV export of it, it might help me troubleshoot it a little quicker.

 

-Mike

[Jeffrey_J]

I think you are reading more into the Site Hint feature than is really there. The only difference between Sprint 1 and Sprint 3 is what character position the sector is derived from; either position "1" (the last character of the hex BID) or "3" (the 3rd-to-last character of the hex BID). So 1299, 129A, and 129B will all show "Sector 2" if you have Sprint 3 selected, or "Sector 9/A/B" if you have Sprint 1 selected.

 

The site note feature is completely separate from the site hint display. Every unique SID+NID+BID trio has its own note. There is no way for the app to know if BIDs are located at the same site, so you will have to save a note for each sector. This also means you need to duplicate the efforts for 800 SMR, although I'd like to find a solution for that, since I believe the NID+BID are the same for PCS and SMR.

 

Each market assigns BIDs differently; for example, in my area, sectors on the same site have wildly different BIDs, with no identifiable pattern. Unlike the LTE GCI, where the first 6 characters indicate the site, there is no similar identifier for 1X or GSM.

 

Hopefully that clears things up for you.. or if I totally misunderstood your question, let me know.

 

-Mike

Ok.

The BID is different for PCS and SMR here.

[mikejeep]

Questions on the database.  I'm writing some queries to convert some data over and thought of something.  Say for instance I've only attached to the alpha sector on a site.  I hit add note on that sector and put in my note.  Of course the app updates that row in the database, if I pass the alpha sector again it will of course show it.  Now say I pass on the beta or gamma side won't the application make two additional rows in the database?  Will it automatically copy the note from the previous north sector?  or will I end up with two rows for this site with no note?  Depending on how things fall in the database this might show up blank right?  I believe you said you were doing a select query just based on the left 6 of the GCI and MCC/MNC right?

 

I think I'm going to run an update query to automatically make the three rows for each site to cover all the bases but it was just one of those "what if" moments that someone might run into.

 

This is kind of tricky to explain and will probably make some heads spin, but I will try to be as clear as possible..

 

When you connect to an LTE site, the app queries the database looking for the first entry that matches the first (left) 6 characters of the GCI. As soon as it finds a match, it grabs that note and does not look any further. I believe by "first entry", it would be the entry that appears in the database first without any sorting/filtering applied.

 

Let's say you install the app for the first time and connect to GCI 111222CC. The app searches the database for any GCI that starts with "111222" and comes up empty handed, because you've never used the app so the database is empty. Let's say you save a note "High School" for this GCI. Later in the day, you connect to 111222BB. The app scans the database the same way, and gets a hit on the CC sector entry from before, so it grabs that note and displays "High School" on the screen. However, it does not save an entry for BB at that time *unless* the Site Logger is active. A database entry (row) is only added/updated when either A) the Site Logger is active, or the site note is edited from within the app. [i wrestled with the best way to implement this; I ultimately decided that if someone has the Site Logger disabled, they have explicitly indicated that they do not want to expend the system resources to add a row the database every time a new LTE sector is discovered.]

 

Whenever you edit a site note from within the app, regardless of what sector you are on, it will add/update a row for the exact GCI you are connected to, AND it will update any existing rows that have a GCI that matches the first 6 characters (i.e. all entries that are associated with that site). [The rationale for adding a new entry at this moment is because the user is actively doing something to push data to the database, so the brief use of resources is intentional.]

 

So if you never edit the site note for 111222xx through the app after the first time, a note will only physically appear in the database entry for GCI 111222CC. The user_note field will be blank on the other sectors, but because the app doesn't bother searching beyond the first entry it finds for a particular site, it will always appear in the app. It only becomes problematic/confusing if someone is looking at the database (or an export of it).

 

I have some testing to do myself, then I'll test it on a couple folks with Sprint phones to make sure I got their GCIs right, by that time mikejeep might have written something already though.  We will see..

 

Oh I'll be doing the bugfix dance for awhile, so no new goodies like that will be coming out of me for a bit.

 

Speaking of bugs, I might as well mention what I am already aware of.. anyone experiencing the following problems do not need to provide me with any information, I have identified the causes and fixes are in progress:

• Band 41 identification has become less reliable for some users.
• Enabling the Location Service in locales that use a comma instead of a period as a decimal separator will likely crash the app.
• Using the "Verizon" site hint option causes crashes for some users.

-Mike

[mikejeep]

Ok.

The BID is different for PCS and SMR here.

Aha, thanks for the heads up, I will scrap that idea then! The PCS and SMR BIDs happen to match here. Very interesting to see how the site ID aspect of Sprint's network architecture varies so much across the country. I'm sure they weren't ever concerned with the public actually paying attention to any of this stuff though.

 

-Mike

[bakedc4]

My home tower has 09, 0A, and 0B. I'll keep hunting and let you know if I come across anything different.

 

Sent from my SPH-L720T using Tapatalk

Those are the same that I am seeing so far. The majority of sites follow the normal setup. The sites with more than 3 panels appear to be the problem child.

 

Sent from my HTC ONE M8