WM App that measures/logs gsm signal strength - Windows Mobile Apps and Games

Is there such a beast for Windows Mobile? I found MobileGX P3Kit but it only runs once in demo mode and didn't log its readings, and the company appears to have gone out of business. Site link doesn't work.
Wasn't sure if this post belonged in the General or Networking forum. Sorry if I guessed wrong.

---

Check this out.......
I wrote it a few months back whilst digging around in part of the RIL.
Written in Win32 C++ it's lean, mean, rather basic, but it does the job. It requires a phone with GPS, as it calls the Microsoft intermediate GPS driver.
Once it is running, it checks the GPS and phone status every 5 seconds. If the signal strength has changed since the last reading, it writes a record out to \SIGLOG.TXT in the root directory of your device, in the format:-
Latitude,Longitude,Signal Strength,Mobile Country Code, Mobile Network Code,Location Area Code, CellID eg.
0.000000,0.000000,090,0EA,0F,00CF,0000E66C
In this case the 090 is the signal strength, 0 to 100
Latitude and longitude appear as zeros, because I have just run it here in the office, where there is no GPS signal. Zero values also appear in the emulator image. With a proper GPS signal they are filled in with the correct values.
Each time the program is run the log file is overwritten. Rename it , or copy it somewhere else, if you want to keep it.
Notice also, that this file will have a file size of zero bytes whilst the program is running. WinMo caches the output in memory until the output buffer gets full, or the program is closed. You will have to kill it with Task Manager or Settings->System->Memory->Running Programs, unless you have set up your device so that [X] terminates the program.
While it is running, it has the GPS Com port open which starts the GPS circuitry. This will run your battery down faster than usual.
UPDATED Version 1.1.................. 5th August 2010
It has taken a while, but here it is, version 1.1, a much needed improvement on the previous version. Following on from the requests posted below I have managed to include nearly all of them. Here are the differences.
1. Mobile Country Code,Mobile Network Code,Location Area Code, and CellID are now displayed on the main screen, under the CellData heading.
2. When the program starts, the default is to only display the values on the screen, if you want it to log the data to a file, then you have to start it running with StartLog from the menu, and end it with EndLog. Seems logical captain!
3. The default is to write the data to \SIGLOG.TXT in the root directory of your device but this time the data is appended to the end of any existing file, it is no longer overwritten.
4. Use Logfile to open a save dialog box if you want to put it somewhere else. Don't forget to click the 'Save' button in the dialog to accept the new filename. The program will use this location until it is killed, it then reverts back to \SIGLOG.TXT when it is restarted. It is disabled while the log is running.
5. LogOnChange can be checked on and off. When checked it will only write a logfile record when the percentage signal level in the registry changes. When 'Off' it will write a record each time the timer routine is triggered.
6. Also, you can set the timer poll interval to a selection of discreet values from 5 seconds to 10 minutes.
7. It gets a more meaningful icon than the bog standard Windows Application effort. If you just copy the program over the previous version, the program icon will not appear until your device is soft reset. WinMo caches the icons within File Explorer. Whatever the hell for?
Updated: Version 1.2 :
Now reports signal strength values from RIL_GetSignalQuality() under the dB heading, they are the values for SignalStrength, MinSignalStrength and MaxSignalStrength, in that order. These values appear negative because they are in dB. They are also written to the logfile as the three values after the signal strength value from the registry.
The logfile is now:-
Latitude, Longitude, ISO Date, Time, Signal,SigRIL,MinSigRIL,MaxSigRIL, Country, Network, Location, CellID
Code:
53.478121,-2.277437,2010-08-11,07:08:37,090,-77,-113,-51,0EA,0F,00CF,0000BE86
53.477617,-2.274503,2010-08-11,07:08:52,100,-69,-113,-51,0EA,0F,00CF,0000BE87
53.470325,-2.243849,2010-08-11,07:25:52,090,-65,-113,-51,0EA,0F,00CF,0000E612
And finally we now have version 1.3......
Decide whether or not to use GPS, it's now your call. Start it and stop it from the menu. The default on program start is that GPS is OFF, you will have to turn it on yourself. With GPS OFF, the date/time displayed/logged is the local system time. When ON the value is the UTC time supplied by the GPS interface.

---

@stephj: Thanks for this!

---

oooooo this looks like a great app, thanks for it.
Does the signal also show 3G signal or just GSM?
Oh and I'd love to see this on the new iPhone
Thanks,
Luke.

---

Log File
Hi. Where is the log file being saved?
Edit:
Oh, found it. sorry not reading the whole post. hope the details (LAC, CellID) could be seen also on the app while it is running.

---

thanks, it's great!
if the user could change the time interval and the output location it would be awesome

---

amazing app!!!!, long time was looking for something like that, I work in network engineering and needed something like this to make a test drive. is there any way to log in neighboring cells appear with ARFCN / CELLID and signal level?
thanks

---

Looks like it's time to reply to the above posts, as the interest in this thing has taken me by surprise, somewhat.
It was originally written just as a proof of concept program, which explains why it is so damned crude. It went through three stages.
1. Find out how the Microsoft Intermediate GPS device driver (gpsapi.h / .LIB/ .DLL) works and print the location results to the screen.
2. Get the signal strength from the registry key HKLM\System\State\Phone\Signal Strength
This value is the percentage signal strength 0 to 100, but it is not continuous, it only ever has a series of discreet values within this range. 0,10,30,60,90,100 etc. In reply to Luke's post above (#4) it is this value that it prints out, I assume it is the GSM value. I may have a look at trying to to use RIL_GetSignalQuality() instead.
3. Open a session to the RIL (Radio Interface Layer) and use the values returned by RIL_GetCellTowerInfo();
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa923065.aspx
This returns a pointer to a populated RILCELLTOWERINFO structure
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa921533.aspx
In theory this should have a load of useful information in it, but unfortunately there's a catch.
It all depends on:-
1. Which parts of all this your phone manufacturer has decided to implement in the Radio part of the phone's ROM, and
2. What your telco is prepared to reveal to the device.
The value dwParams in the RILCELLTOWERINFO structure contains which of the following fields in the structure contain valid data. Here in the UK on a Kaiser running the latest stock Vodafone ROM, connected to Vodafone's network, this value is hex 0F, binary 1111, which corresponds to the first four fields that follow dwParams. i.e.
DWORD dwMobileCountryCode;
DWORD dwMobileNetworkCode;
DWORD dwLocationAreaCode;
DWORD dwCellID;
All other fields in this structure are empty, hence that is all the program dumps out to the log file. Maraca, unfortunately this also includes the ARCFN and surrounding cells.
In future I'll add a dialog box to allow selection of the output file, and some form of selection of the time interval, as per reddevilx's suggestion. I will also add a Startlog/Stoplog menu option with the file opened in 'Append Data' mode.
I'll also put the LAC/CellID details on the main screen too, as per 4trackmind's suggestion

---

Version 1.1 now released.
This is a shameless bump.
Version 1.1 is far better than the original.
It is in post #2 above. I hope you enjoy it, stephj.

---

thanks a lot, it works perfect on a p3300 with wm6.5

---

The program works as advertised, except: won't save log file to memory card and it won't save with a file name other than "siglog" to Main Memory.
Otherwise, works great!

---

You need version 1.1 in post #2 above before you can change the filename. Version 1.0 had the filename hard coded in it.
You change the logfile name by using the LogFile menu selection from the left menu before you start the log running.
From the Save Dialog box, you have to click the 'Save' button, otherwise the dialog will lose the new filename.
Just got my Kaiser to write to \Storage Card\MISC\Logfile.txt without a problem.

---

Thanks. Just tried it with the above method and it works OK>

---

stephj said:
2. Get the signal strength from the registry key HKLM\System\State\Phone\Signal Strength
This value is the percentage signal strength 0 to 100, but it is not continuous, it only ever has a series of discreet values within this range. 0,10,30,60,90,100 etc. In reply to Luke's post above (#4) it is this value that it prints out, I assume it is the GSM value. I may have a look at trying to to use RIL_GetSignalQuality() instead.
3. Open a session to the RIL (Radio Interface Layer) and use the values returned by RIL_GetCellTowerInfo();
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa923065.aspx
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Very nice!
About Signal Strength, is it still from registry?
In RIL_GetCellTowerInfo() from your link is also some dwRxxxxxx, e.g.:
dwRxLevel - Specifies the received signal level.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe the right one for signal strenght?
Nummer5

---

Unfortunately as mentioned in post #8 above, only the first four values are filled in. Here's a dump from the debug watch window. cbSize is the size of the structure. dwParams is 15 or binary 1111, which corresponds to only the next four fields being valid. dwRxLevel is zero.
Code:
cbSize 140 unsigned long int
dwParams 15 unsigned long int
dwMobileCountryCode 234 unsigned long int
dwMobileNetworkCode 15 unsigned long int
dwLocationAreaCode 207 unsigned long int
dwCellID 58988 unsigned long int
dwBaseStationID 0 unsigned long int
dwBroadcastControlChannel 0 unsigned long int
dwRxLevel 0 unsigned long int
dwRxLevelFull 0 unsigned long int
dwRxLevelSub 0 unsigned long int
dwRxQuality 0 unsigned long int
dwRxQualityFull 0 unsigned long int
dwRxQualitySub 0 unsigned long int
dwIdleTimeSlot 0 unsigned long int
dwTimingAdvance 0 unsigned long int
dwGPRSCellID 0 unsigned long int
dwGPRSBaseStationID 0 unsigned long int
dwNumBCCH 0 unsigned long int
+ rgbBCCH 0x27a4fd8c "" unsigned char[48]
+ rgbNMR 0x27a4fdbc "" unsigned char[16]

---

stephj thanks , i am using your program to check the quality of external GPS antennas .
Just fews question:
1) the signals is in % ?
2) I read 3 Db values : is one for celldata ?
3) the range of Db is from ..... to .... (i mean MIN MAX
4) i have signal 100 and db -83 -113 -51 (minus) what is the highest value for good signal ?
thank you

---

Code:
53.470325,-2.243849,2010-08-11,07:25:52,090,-65,-113,-51,0EA,0F,00CF,0000E612
In this case the 090 is the % value from the registry.
-65 is nSignalStrength, -113 is nMinSignalStrength and -51 is nMaxSignalStrength as returned by RIL_GetSignalQuality() the structure is defined as:
Code:
typedef struct {
DWORD cbSize;
DWORD dwParams;
int nSignalStrength;
int nMinSignalStrength;
int nMaxSignalStrength;
DWORD dwBitErrorRate;
int nLowSignalStrength;
int nHighSignalStrength;
} RILSIGNALQUALITY;
This from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa922384.aspx
It is the first of the three values that is the current signal strength.The values are in db as they can vary a lot, from being right next to the tower to being miles away from it. In this case -51 is over a million times stronger than -113.
Maybe some radio engineer might be able to shed some light on the values as regards a 'good' signal. I assume there is some correlation between the % strength and the actual db level.

---

Very useful app thanks. Works fine on HTC HD2 .Does anyone know how to find the location of a cell from the cell data. ? Also any way to choose the cell to use. I have a weak signal for 3g that appears sometimes and a stronger one with GPRS only. I would like to be able to hold it on the 3g and also tell the carrier to hold the full signal power if possible. I believe there is some datacard software that can do some of these things ( E620)

---

Cell-ID to actual location.
This is where the data starts to have some real commercial worth, and it also sees the appearance of methods used to protect the same.
I believe that Google Maps for mobile uses some internal web service API.
Ericsson Labs also provides a limited service but you have to sign up as a developer, and you are limited to the number of submissions per day you make to the webservice. You have to supply your userkey provided on signup, as part of the URL, to get the location data returned.
For more info have look at
https://labs.ericsson.com/apis/mobile-location/
The API itself, is described here.
https://labs.ericsson.com/apis/mobile-location/documentation/cell-id-look-up-api
It does work. You supply the Hex values for Mobile Country Code, Mobile Network Code,Location Area Code, and CellID and it returns the Latitude and Longitude of the cell, as well as the maximum distance you are likely to be from it. An example of what it returns is below :
Code:
{"position":{"accuracy":"481.0","latitude":"53.477208009524","longitude":"-2.2329582857143"}}
Anyone recognise central Manchester?
As regards holding on to a particular Cell, I am not certain whether it can be done, as most of this is done by the Radio ROM and is outside the user's control. There is nothing in the standard RIL library to deal with this.

---

Thanks for this app, I can see it coming in very handy in future when I'm onsite setting up GSM kit, especially if the client is complaining about our kit having a low signal strength when their mobile phone is showing full bars... much easier to point at absolute numbers on a screen than to try persuading them that comparing bar graphs between different devices is about as reliable as sticking a wet finger in the air and trying to deduce signal strength from how much it tingles!