Introduction

Anticyclone Systems Ltd, founded in 1998, is a established design house combining a unique blend of skills to bring innovative, tightly coupled hardware and software solutions to the marketplace. We are proud of our proven ability to deliver highly competitive products world-wide and have built a reputation for delivering our products within tight time scales.

We are also proud of the direct relationship we have with our customers, and despite other organisations claiming they do this, we are one of the few who really do centre our designs on real customer feedback based on active products in the marketplace.

The unique combination of hardware and software expertise available to us is our key to success. Anticyclone Systems Ltd is currently focused in the RS232 data logging market and our AntiLog product is a good example of a tightly coupled design which gives world class performance.

We have historically provided software only solutions and microcontroller based solutions to meet individual customer needs. Examples include our WxWatch real time weather satellite image reception system for the Royal Navy in the UK, a completely digital radiosonde meteorological measurement system and a unique antenna ground station control system for Azimuth/Elevation and X-Y tracking controllers.

There are a vast range of electronic devices in the world that can output data in RS232 format. Examples include Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers, test and measurement equipment, process control systems and communication systems. There is also a sizeable requirement to log this data reliably. For example, for performing system analysis, field trials data recording, or equipment verification and validation.

With the advent of the personal computer (PC), RS232 data logging was simplified because most PCs came as standard with an RS232 serial port, could run application software to log data from this port and had sufficient disk storage to record the results. Since then, laptops, palm tops and PDAS have been developed which can now offer a portable data logging capability.

However, although the technology has improved, RS232 data logging has not improved much with it. Laptops, PDAs and the like were not designed to be dedicated data logging devices and so compromises in terms of speed and ease of use have had to be made to allow these devices to be as general purpose as possible. To log RS232 data effectively requires a reliable, dedicated data logging solution.

Our AntiLog product was designed from the ground up to be this dedicated, reliable data logging solution. We have combined a powerful stand alone microcontroller solution with some tightly coupled software to realise a highly portable RS232 data logging system which can write to extremely small, lightweight, solid state FLASH media.

AntiLog is now in use throughout the world in a very diverse range of applications including transport development, civil and military GPS receiver data logging, medical equipment monitoring, wildlife monitoring, Unmanned Aircraft flight data recording, sea trials, crop yield control, crane safety and a whole host of process control applications.

So next time you need to log RS232 data, why not look at our AntiLog product and see for yourself the benefits of a dedicated data recording device.

There is no doubt that meteorological imagery from weather satellite systems has greatly enhanced our ability to predict weather conditions around the world. Visual and infra-red imagery from weather satellites can see everything from small localised changes in temperature to large tropical storms.

Processed weather satellite images are commonly used by television stations to give viewers a more visual impression of weather conditions. The weather is important to those who travel and those who supply services that can be affected by the weather.

There are two main types of satellite which can provide unencrypted services to users almost anywhere in the world. The first are polar orbiting satellites whose low earth orbits are designed to give sun synchronous coverage of the earth. The orbits extend up toward the polar regions of the earth. Geostationary satellites are placed in orbits which maintain their relative position to the earth's surface and can provide continuous coverage over the same earth region from high altitude.

What is not commonly known is that live images from these weather satellites can easily be decoded by anyone using low cost equipment. There are several commercial and public domain programs and hardware solutions available and very satisfactory images can be obtained. However, not all systems are the same. What most systems lack is very easy to use features with truly powerful automated facilities for image reception requiring no user interaction (despite the claims on their packaging!). It is also important to be able to process images without any noticeable speed reduction whilst decoding live images.

The first major product developed by Anticyclone Systems Ltd was a professional weather satellite reception solution that was packed with advanced features for the time (WxWatch). The system was supplied into the Royal Navy in the United Kingdom and had image projection onto mapped surfaces, GPS position and time augmentation, full overlay gridding with high resolution map overlays, automated image reception, automated image administration. The system also contained a full suite of image processing options including contrast stretches, false colour, image combinations, unique weighted digital filtering system and comprehensive meteorological symbol editing including placement and editing of meteorological symbols, text and weather fronts.

Although the software is an important part of the system, it is also important to use the right hardware. A dedicated weather satellite receiver must be used for good signal reception. Several sources of radio signal exist close to the polar orbiting weather satellite band (e.g. telephone paging systems in the United Kingdom) which can cause reception interference to weather satellite signals. It is also important to decode these incoming signals correctly. Most systems use an 'interface card' which consists of an analogue to digital converter in some kind of phased locked loop. Some cards don't even do this, they just sample the incoming signal asynchronously to keep the costs down. After extensive development, Anticyclone Systems Ltd was able to offer a unique advanced microprocessor controlled synchronous decoder (which also performed simple asynchronous reception for Facsimile transmissions). The decoder unit was also responsible for direct control of the weather satellite radio receiver.