On board lap timer sheets/records? [CCS Lap Times App]

[Russell2566]

I'm currently building a new Lap Time tracker application that will be used by CCS in the near future. The app is coming along quite well but I'd like some help on a feature...

A planned feature already was to allow a user to insert their own custom times (which would be noted as unofficial). Last week when I asked for any tips or ideas on feature sets someone expanded on this an suggested that I allow uploading of output from lap timers.

I do not currently have a personal lap timer or any experience with them. I know there are probably a few popular models that I would only support at first at least. My question is, can anyone send me lap time sheets/exports from their PC linked lap timers?

email: russ AT EmpireGP dot com

I want to start looking at writing the import tools for these. If you do send me output from your timer, could you please include the make/model of the timer, otherwise the data is worthless.

Also: Comments such as "this is a not worth wasting time on" are acceptable. if this is a feature no one would care to use, or only a few people will use, it's something that I will put off for a much later future..

[erock768]

I do like the idea, but could you expand on the

"A planned feature already was to allow a user to insert their own custom times (which would be noted as unofficial)."   part?

Would they be for comparison or to use a goals/milestones/track progress?

Like I said I like the idea, but my data acquisition system works just fine for most purposes, and some others. I'd let you borrow it to read the out put files but I fear shipping would be cost prohibitive and she'd probably charge you by the hour, not to mention the requisite "maintenance" costs.

[Russell2566]

My plan for "Custom Times" or what ever I end up calling it is just for the rider to add more points on the map to track their progress.

Some riders do track days or practice days that are not linked with CCS, so they [CCS] won't be uploading those times. This will give a rider the opportunity to fill in those blank spots in between races to track progress (hopefully it's progress). The times can be private or public depending on the user's preference. Although it will most likely be an all or nothing, so no hiding that one bad group of custom uploaded times.

[erock768]

I think I'm beginning to understand. Kind of like splits?

[Russell2566]

Example:

2 race weekends ago at Summit Point I was hitting upper 1:21's
last race weekend I was hitting lower 1:19's

There is now a long break (for me) between races. If I go do an upcoming NESBA track day at Summit before July 6/7 and I have the laptimes downloaded off my timer, I would like to upload them so I can see those numbers in my lap time graph for that track. Maybe I start turning crappy times for instance. Now I will have a solid record of when I started to turn for the worse.

[kl3640]

I think that it would be a great feature to have, if you are trying to make a generic laptimes database website for riders to use for all of their progress tracking.

On the other hand, if the new laptimes site allows a download of the laptimes in a generic format, e.g. CSV, then people could keep their own personal databases in Excel or whatever they choose, and the website could be just for official timing results from practices or races.

My vote would be for the latter, because that would allow me to do more ad hoc reporting (unless you were planning to add ah hoc reporting functionality also), but other people might prefer to have it work in the opposite direction.  My intuition is that anyone who is computer saavy enough and willing enough to upload lap times from their personal timer to the website would be capable enough of downloading the times from website and managing their own log of times.

Managing uploaded data would also add a tremendous layer of complexity to your site, as you would then require authentication for each user (or were you thinking of basing it on trust?).  You would also run up against the issue of the lack of a unique key for riders, and for venues.  Then there is the issue of reporting capabilities.  Lastly, it would increase the maintenance requirements and machine overhead (processing, network, and, perhaps most, storage).

Of course, you could always do both, i.e., allow uploads AND make available the raw official data for download.

If you do make uploads possible, then I believe that most lap timers that have a feature to download their data to a PC use a CSV format.  I know that one of the more popular units, the XT Ultra-Lap, does something like that.  There are some details here:

http://www.cc-2000.com/xtracing/en/ultra-lap/download.html

Good luck, and thanks for doing something from which we can all benefit!