{"id":63010,"date":"2012-11-04T01:32:39","date_gmt":"2012-11-03T23:32:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=63010"},"modified":"2012-11-04T01:34:09","modified_gmt":"2012-11-03T23:34:09","slug":"gr8signal-measuring-sas-mobile-networks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/software\/63010-gr8signal-measuring-sas-mobile-networks.html","title":{"rendered":"gr8signal: measuring SA\u2019s mobile networks"},"content":{"rendered":"

LucidView, a company that specialises in network data analysis<\/a>, and MyBroadband, a company that specialises in awesome, have launched gr8signal – a service to independently measure mobile network coverage in South Africa.<\/p>\n

Gr8signal\u2019s initial release is for Android only, and lets users anonymously report whether they are receiving good signal quality from their cellular provider.<\/p>\n

Developed with the help of Toby Kurien, the gr8signal app<\/a> gathers data such as the cellular signal strength and GPS co-ordinates reported by an Android smartphone and sends them to LucidView\u2019s servers.<\/p>\n

The data is processed and displayed on a map on the gr8signal website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Tim Haak, lead developer at LucidView, explained that new data is pulled to the map every few hours, so users won\u2019t see the map updating in real-time.<\/p>\n

\"gr8signal

gr8signal Android screenshot<\/p><\/div>\n

He also emphasised that the only moderately personally identifying piece of data collected are device identifiers, which are needed mainly to be able to clean up data from a misbehaving device, Haak said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe take privacy very seriously,\u201d Haak said. \u201cWe collect as little as possible personal information and anonymise everything as best we can before displaying it on the site,\u201d Haak said.<\/p>\n

Other things the app handles conservatively are cellular data and the device\u2019s battery.<\/p>\n

Haak explained that by default the app only uploads the data it has gathered when connected to a Wi-Fi network. It also only logs data points when the signal strength has changed significantly, Haak said.<\/p>\n

Both these options can be changed in the app\u2019s settings by unchecking \u201cWi-Fi only\u201d and switching on \u201cTurbo Mode\u201d.<\/p>\n

LucidView also plans to add more features to the app and site, Haak said, such as letting users view and download their own data and showing which networks have the best coverage in a particular area.<\/p>\n

Another piece of data that \u2019s collected which LucidView plans to use in future is whether a device is connected via GPRS, EDGE, 3G, or HSPA.<\/p>\n

This would ideally offer additional insights into the quality of operators\u2019 radio networks across South Africa.<\/p>\n

The app is available for download<\/a> from the Google Play store immediately and some coverage data is already displayed on the gr8signal website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Gr8signal

Gr8signal coverage map – the beginnings<\/p><\/div>\n

Related articles<\/h3>\n

MTN 3G coverage update<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Cell C improving network performance and coverage<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

SA mobile subscriber numbers compared<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Behind Vodacom\u2019s coverage battle<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An independent, crowdsourced measure of South Africa\u2019s mobile network coverage<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":63016,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[16404,35,16406,521,6623],"class_list":["post-63010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-software","tag-gr8signal","tag-headline","tag-lucidview","tag-mybroadband","tag-network-coverage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63010"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63010"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63010\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":63280,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63010\/revisions\/63280"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}