BoxCar Pro 4.3 Release Notes

 

Contents

 

A. BoxCar Pro 4.3 Upgrade Software License Agreement Note

B. Installation Instructions

C. New Features

D. Known Issues

E. Humidity Sensor Note

F. Additional Files on the CD

 

A. BoxCar Pro 4.3 Upgrade Software License Agreement Note

If you are upgrading to BoxCar Pro 4.3 from BoxCar Pro 4.0 or higher, the following paragraph replaces Paragraph 2 in the Software License Agreement distributed with BoxCar Pro and printed in the User's Guide.

 

2. Grant of license. You are granted the right to use the Software Patch to upgrade every legally licensed copy of BoxCar Pro 4.0 or higher that you own. After upgrading your software to BoxCar Pro 4.2, all other applicable statements of this license agreement shall apply to the upgraded version, for example: the statements of ownership, of support, of liability, and the restrictions in section 3 shall apply.

 

B. Installation Instructions

To install BoxCar Pro 4.3, insert the CD in the drive. The installation program will automatically start. Follow the instructions on the screen.

 

If the installation does not automatically start:

1. Navigate to the CD drive from My Computer or Explorer.

2. Right-click the CD drive and select open.

3. Double-click the BoxCar Pro 4.3 setup.exe and follow the instructions on the screen.

 

****IMPORTANT NOTE****

The installation program requires that your version of Windows is running the correct, compatible version of certain system files. If you encounter the following error when you install BoxCar Pro, you will need to update your operating system with a patch available from Microsoft:

 

  Error Number: 0x80070725

  Description: Incompatible Version of the RPC Stub

  Setup will now terminate.

 

This error is caused by a system file (a DLL file) that is incompatible with the version of Windows installed on your computer. For example, if you have Windows XP installed, then the computer should have DLL files designed for Windows XP installed instead of DLL files designed for Windows 98.

 

If the above error occurs during installation, download the mcrepair.exe patch from this address:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/msninvestor/Patch/1.0/WIN98/EN-US/mcrepair.EXE

 

Internet Explorer 4.0 or higher must be installed on your computer to run this patch. When you run the patch, it will ask you whether you want to overwrite newer files. Make sure you click YES for each file (do not select NO or NO TO ALL).

 

C. New Features

BoxCar Pro 4.3 introduces support for the HOBO LCD Temp/RH, HOBO Water Temp Pro, and HOBO Weather Station data loggers, which allows you to:

* Launch and readout these new loggers, including the option to continue logging while offloading data

* Check the status on the loggers while the loggers are recording data

* View offloaded data in plots

 

Use the general Launch, Get Status, and Readout commands available from the toolbar or Logger menu to work with the HOBO Weather Station. To launch, read out, and check the status on the HOBO LCD Temp/RH and HOBO Water Temp Pro loggers, click the Logger menu and then select the logger name to access a submenu with the commands for that logger. See the BoxCar Pro User's Guide or the online help for details on using these loggers.

 

D. Known Issues

1. The high and low temperature alert lines displayed in plots for the HOBO LCD logger are slightly higher than the actual alerts entered at launch. The alert temperature in the plot is typically 0.7 to 0.9 degrees higher than the actual high and low alert values used during the launch. To adjust the lines on the plot to match the original values that you entered, double-click the temperature series on the plot. In the Series Properties dialog under Alarm Lines, enter the correct alert values in the Min Line and Max Line fields.

 

 

2. When using the Export to Microsoft Excel Spreadsheet command, numbers may be exported as text. To change the format, right-click the cells you wish to change, select Format Cell(s), and then select a new format for the numbers.

 

In addition, the date/time format is not recognized when using the Chart Wizard. To adjust the date/time so that you can automatically generate a chart, delete the ".0" at the end of the time. Assuming the date/time column is column A, select the J2 cell, type "=LEFT(A:A, LEN(A:A)-2)" and press Enter. This drops the last two characters from the date/time string. Select the entire J column from J2 down to the last data point and select "Fill Down" from the "Edit" menu. This creates a column of date/times without the decimals. Select this column again and choose "Cells" from the "Format" menu. From the Custom menu, select "m/d/yyyy h:mm." Copy the columns with data points and paste them starting in the L column. Select columns J through the last column with data and use the Chart Wizard to create the plot.

 

An alternative approach is to use the Export to Microsoft Excel Text command. Open the text file in Excel, choose "Fixed width" and click "Next." Place column breaks right before the decimal points and right after the squares. In the last window, leave the first and third columns in General format and do not import the middle column. To replace the # signs with the date/times, format the cells to "m/d/yyyy h:mm."

 

 

3. If you insert a series from one plot onto another and use the crosshair tool, the plot legend for the inserted series sometimes displays an incorrect value. This happens when the data points on the time axes do not line up for the series. Normally, the legend displays an ellipses (...) on the legend for the data points that aren't lining up. But the first time you click the crosshair on a plot where the time axes do not line up, the legend displays the first data point value rather than the ellipses. All subsequent clicks of the crosshair show accurate values or ellipses as appropriate.

 

 

4. The HOBO Weather Station will not log data when more than 15 sensors/data channels are in use or the total length of the smart sensor portion of the sensor cables is more than 100 meters (325 ft) (see the HOBO Weather Station User's Guide and Smart Sensor manuals for more details). BoxCar Pro cannot communicate with a logger that has exceeded these limitations, and may crash during an attempt to read out the logger. Remove the excess sensors, and remove and reinsert the batteries to re-establish communication.

 

 

5. View Details does not report the delayed start date selected for HOBO LCD Temp/RH, HOBO Water Temp Pro, and HOBO Weather Station datafiles. View Details also reports logging intervals for these three loggers in total seconds rather than HH:MM:SS format.

 

 

6. The Save Settings in Logger for Later Launch feature available in the HOBO Weather Station Launch screen does not save delayed start dates.

 

 

7. Generally, if a period of daylight savings time begins or ends between the current date and time and the date and time you specify for a delayed start, enter the time you want the logger to start as if there were no change in daylight savings time. For example, if you are setting up the logger on the Friday before daylight savings time ends and you want the logger to begin recording at 3:00 PM on the next Monday (after daylight savings time has ended), enter Monday’s date and 4:00 PM, which would be the desired time if daylight savings time were still in effect. However, the HOBO Weather Station will start one hour later than expected when daylight savings time ends (before the delayed start date and time is reached). For example, if you configure the HOBO Weather Station on Oct 26, 2002 (DST) for a delayed start at 5:00 am on October 27, 2002 (Standard time), the launch won't start until 6:00 am.

 

 

E. Humidity Sensor Note

The BoxCar Pro absolute humidity calculation for the temperature/RH smart sensor is only valid at one atmosphere. The temperature/RH smart sensor can be used with the HOBO Weather Station and the external probe model of the HOBO LCD Temp/RH logger.

 

 

F. Additional Files on the CD

 

USER GUIDE IN PDF FORMAT

The BoxCar Pro 4.3 User's Guide is also available on the CD in an Adobe Acrobat PDF format (the file is called BCP 4.3 user guide.pdf). To view this file, Adobe Acrobat Reader must be installed on your computer. The latest version of Acrobat Reader as of August 2002 is also included on the CD. To install Acrobat Reader:

 

1. Navigate to the CD drive from My Computer or Explorer.

2. Right-click the CD drive and select open.

3. Double-click ar505enu.exe and follow any instructions on the screen.

 

Note: Some versions of the Windows operating system are designed to automatically start the installation program on software CDs any time you double-click the CD drive from My Computer or Windows Explorer when the CD is in the drive. If you find that the BoxCar Pro installation is automatically starting when you want to view the contents of the CD only, RIGHT-click the CD drive and select Open instead of double-clicking it.

 

 

UNSUPPORTED UTILITIES

The following two datafile manipulation utilities are included on the BoxCar Pro 4.3 CD as unsupported utilities. These utilities correct two specific types of errors occasionally generated by H07 and H08 loggers, and save data that would otherwise be lost. To install these utilities, start the BoxCar Pro installation, and choose the Custom installation instead of Typical when prompted to select the Setup Type. You'll then have the option to install several specific files, including H07FileCvt.exe and H08FileCvt.exe.

 

H07ValCvt Utility

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The H07ValCvt utility is used to change the "Event Value" parameter in a HOBO Event H07) datafile.

 

Example: A researcher has two rain buckets and wants to measure inches of rainfall in each bucket with two event loggers. One rain bucket tips at one inch, and the other tips at two inches. He launches one event logger with an event value of "1" and the other with an event value of "2", but then mixes the loggers up and puts them on the wrong buckets. The logger with the event value of "1" was triggered every two inches (making the graph show HALF the actual rainfall) and the other with the event value of "2" was triggered every one inch (making the graph show TWICE the actual rainfall).

 

This utility can be used to swap the "event" values in the datafiles to make each datafile display the proper amount of rainfall.

 

Utility H08FileCvt

------------------

The H08FileCvt utility is used to change the "Selected Sensor" in H08 datafiles from loggers with external sensor ports.

 

Example: A scientist launches an H08 with a temperature sensor attached, but mistakenly had "Voltage" selected as the sensor type. This utility opens the saved datafile, and changes the "Selected Sensor" from "Voltage" to "Temperature" so that her data can be interpreted properly.

 

This utility prevents collected data from being lost because of incorrect sensor selection on launch.

 

 

Copyright 2002, Onset Computer Corporation.