Some interesting Uses for SnapTimePro
Timing Satellites.
SnapTimePro is being used to time satellite 'flashes'. The 'flash' times are
captured with a single key or mouse click and a comment added simply by typing it
in before the next timing. The individual who brought this use to my attention stated
'It is pretty easy to add text to an older timing also with SnapTimePro. The best thing is that instead of storing just 10 or 50 times it can store thousands. You don't need to have your eyes leave the satellite - just one finger on the mouse-clicker or the assigned time capture
key'. There is a large number of orbiting satellites to be seen in the hour or two after sunset and before sunrise.
Hundreds of such objects are visible to the naked eye out of the many thousands currently in orbit. Many of these objects rotate and produce momentary increases in brightness (or 'flashes') when the sun reflects off solar panels or sensor covers
(just one square meter of a mirrored surface at range 1000 kilometers would
appear as a magnitude -7 star). Amateur satellite enthusiasts through observation of the satellite path and recording of the 'flashes', can identify the satellite or at least gauge its
geometry and behaviour. This type of timing data is also useful in constructing satellite tracking programs that make 'flash'
predictions from different terrestrial observation locations.
Backing
up LP Records. Ahh...LPs. Many people have amassed large collections of
these beloved but fragile plastic discs over the years, and considering they now cannot be replaced and even with the most meticulous care, they deteriorate with plays,
digitally recording and 'transferring' them to CD makes perfect sense. However, as the LP plays and
the audio is recorded as a Wav file on the PC, clicks, pops and other extraneous
sounds also get recorded. An individual who used an application called Wave Corrector to transfer 10s of LPs to CD, found that a good technique for identifying the corrections which needed to be made was to listen
through the recording process and note (using pen and paper), the times at which the most audible artefacts
occurred. He also jotted down the times of 'track breaks' when recording material which Wave Corrector was unlikely to separate automatically - such as live
performances with applause between tracks. He thought however that this approach
could be made much simpler if he were able to just tap a key during the recording and create a log file containing the times of the keystrokes and comments about each time.
Wish granted - this is where SnapTimePro has found another use!
Finding Probability Distribution of Students in a College Dining Hall. SnapTimePro
is being used in Academia for a wide variety of research projects and
experiments. One example is this
project, the data for which was collected by sitting at the entrance of
Dartmouth College Food Court, and recording the waiting times for groups of
students (measured from the moment they arrived). For those of you of a
statistical persuasion, the objective of the project was to determine if
the student waiting times follow a 'gamma distribution'.