Importing station and receiver data into the system

Trimble 4D Control Server is designed to internally store data it needs for its system set-up definition. Most of the data is generated once when you set up the system, but some of them might be tiresome to be edited. Therefore, Trimble 4D Control Server offers some options to import data from files into the system. These data include:

• Station data
• GNSS Receiver module definitions
• System setup definitions

Importing station data

Station data, such as coordinates, coordinate systems, agency, observer, receiver and antenna type, are collected in a global station list. The global station list stores the information internally and makes it available to all Trimble 4D Control Server modules and other modern Trimble Infrastructure Solutions software. Within the Trimble 4D Control Server system, the global station list is available for viewing and editing at various locations in the system. Among them are the System Properties and all modules that require the specification of a station.

• Besides manually entering the settings, you can also import most of the station data from data files in the IGS site log format. The IGS site logs are ASCII text files conforming to the format specified by the IGS Central Bureau.Trimble 4D Control Server supports the import of multiple site logs in one step. For more information see Importing station data from IGS site logs.
• Another option is to import station data available from a Microsoft Excel worksheet. This feature allows you importing data that is organized in your specific way. The Import > Excel Worksheet feature lets you select a worksheet in the Excel file; then it lets you assign worksheet column headers to Station data properties. For more information see Excel Worksheet Import Configuration dialog for importing station data.

Note - For running the data import from an Excel file you must have started the Trimble 4D Control Server UI (user interface) with Windows administrator rights (for example, using the Run as administrator command when starting the Trimble 4D Control Server UI).

GNSS Receiver definitions:

A GNSS Receiver module controls the data received by the respective connected receiver. Each GNSS Receiver module configuration holds the decoder settings, the connection to the reference station receiver, receiver data, such as the station information and receiver control, and a lot more information. For large GNSS Receiver networks, a feature that allows you the automatic creation of GNSS Receiver modules and the import of receiver information if already available in Microsoft Excel format will save you a lot of time during network setup.

Such a GNSS Receiver data import feature is available from the Trimble 4D Control Server File menu:

1. For running the data import from an Excel file you must have started the Trimble 4D Control Server UI (user interface) with Windows administrator rights (for example, using the Run as administrator command when starting the Trimble 4D Control Server UI).
2. Make sure to first have set up the following:
   • Reference station definitions used for identifying the reference station receiver. For importing station data you may use one of the options listed above in the Importing station data section.
   • At least one Device Manager module as parent module.
3. Select File > Excel Import. A standard Windows file import dialog appears with the Excel file type pre-selected.
4. Select an *.xls* data file that contains the receiver information you want to import. The Excel Worksheet Import Configuration dialog appears.
5. Use the Excel Worksheet Import Configuration dialog for assigning Excel worksheet column headers to GNSS Receiver properties by an easy-to-use drag-and-drop action. For more information see Excel Worksheet Import Configuration dialog for importing GNSS Receiver data.
6. Click OK to accept the data import. A progress window appears and a bulk import log file is created in the <User Name>/AppData/Roaming folder. After the last receiver configuration has been imported, the log file opens automatically in the default text editor.
7. Read the log file carefully for detecting if any errors have occurred during the data import.

Backup and import of the master system setup

On demand, Trimble 4D Control Server saves a default configuration setup file which includes system properties as well as system and module configurations. For restoring the default setup, one imports it. For more information see Backup and import of the master system setup.