SoftWright LLC, developer of the Terrain Analysis Package (TAP) Software for radio path analysis, has introduced the ability to visually see the details of a path analysis or RF coverage map using Google Earth. The application allows users to visualize virtually all types of radio system paths, according to the company.

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In the past, designers relied heavily upon a predictive technique developed by French physicist Augustine-Jean Fresnel. His modeling predicted an invisible envelope of transmitted energy that surrounds the line-of-sight on the entire path between a transmitter and a repeater. An obstruction that penetrates this envelope reduces the received signal level, sometimes causing degradation so severe that the path is unusable.

Up to now, this modeling was a simplified, two-dimensional graphic of the path’s terrain. If the entire portion of the Fresnel zone to be protected was above the elevation of the ground and obstructions along the path, then the receiver showed the maximum possible signal.

SoftWright’s application graphically models not only the portion of the Fresnel zone that lies below the actual path line-of-sight, but also on both sides of the exact path, where additional path losses are created. Before now, this degradation would have been undetected.

Integrated with Google Earth, the new tool allows engineers to fly down an entire path and look at the areas that would cause signal deterioration down the entire path including the side lobes of the protected Fresnel zone. This is the only way designers can precisely locate these obstructed locations and create strategic solutions to eliminate them.

• SoftWright LLC

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