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TOB1

Recommended Format

TOB1 is a binary format with a CSV-style header.¹

If you will only be reading this file with LoggerNet and Toxx, and have no need to read the file in plaintext, this is by far the fastest and most efficient format.

LoggerNet Configuration

Output File Options

Include Timestamp
Include Record Number

Structure

TOB1 Format
"TOB1"	Station Name	Datalogger Model	Serial Number	OS Version	DLD Name	DLD Sig	Table Name
Field Names
Units
Processing Method ²
Field Type ³
[Binary Record Data]

Binary Field Formats

Name	Size	Description
UINT1	1-byte	unsigned int
UINT2	2-byte	unsigned int
UINT4	4-byte	unsigned int
INT1	1-byte	signed int
INT2	2-byte	signed int
INT4	4-byte	signed int
INT8	8-byte	signed int
FP2	2-byte	non-standard floating point
FP4	4-byte	non-standard floating point
IEEE4	4-byte	IEEE floating point
IEEE8	8-byte	IEEE floating point
ASCII(n)	n-byte	fixed length null-terminated string
SEC	4-byte	unsigned int as seconds since 1990-01-01
USEC	6-byte	unsigned int as 10s of microseconds since 1990-01-01
NSEC	8-byte	4-bytes for sec since 1990 + 4-bytes nanoseconds
BOOL	1-byte	boolean
BOOL2	2-byte	boolean
BOOL4	4-byte	boolean
BOOL8	1-byte	bit field

FP2

FP2 is widely used as a storage format in Campbell Scientific dataloggers, it is a non-standard two-byte floating point number with a single sign bit, a two-bit negative decimal exponent, and a 13-bit mantissa.

Decoding FP2

sign     = ( 0x8000 & FP2 ) >> 15
exponent = ( 0x6000 & FP2 ) >> 13
mantissa = ( 0x1FFF & FP2 )

value = mantissa * pow( 10, -exponent ) * ( sign == 0 ? 1 : -1 )

FP4

Untested

FP4 is a storage format used in Campbell Scientific dataloggers. It is a non-standard four-byte floating point number with a single sign bit,
a seven-bit base-two exponent, and a 24-bit mantissa.

Decoding FP4

sign     = ( 0x80000000 & FP4 ) >> 31;
exponent = ( 0x7F000000 & FP4 ) >> 24;
mantissa = ( 0x00FFFFFF & FP4 );

value = mantissa * pow( 2, exponent ) * ( sign == 0 ? 1 : -1 );

Example File

"TOB1","Ridge Station","CR1000X","12345","CR1000X.Std.03.02","CPU:ridge_station.CR1X","12345","Ridge_Table"
"SECONDS","NANOSECONDS","RECORD","panel_temp","battery_voltage","battery_voltage_Min"
"SECONDS","NANOSECONDS","RN","°C","volts","volts"
"","","","Smp","Smp","Min"
"ULONG","ULONG","ULONG","FP2","FP2","FP2"
[binary record data...]

Usage

<?php

use Hyyppa\Toxx\Toxx;

$dat = Toxx::load('toa5_file.dat');

$json = $dat->first()->json();

$json =

{
    "TIMESTAMP": "2020-03-08 19:35:00",
    "RECORD": 0,
    "panel_temp": 26.86,
    "battery_voltage": 12.94,
    "battery_voltage_Min": 12.94,
    "SECONDS": 952544100
}

References

LoggerNet Product Manual 4.6 - Appendix B.1.4

Though comma separated, the file is not valid rfc4180 compliant csv as the first line of header does not contain the same number of columns as the rest of the csv file. ↩
See available processing methods here: LoggerNet Product Manual - B.1.3.1 Field Name Suffixes ↩
See Binary Field Formats Table ↩

Last update: January 6, 2021