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So we are now weeks into the North American ski season.

One big circumstance keeps popping up.

How do I make my ALGE displays work with VOLA?

The answer regrettably is that you have to reprogram them to accept the data that VOLA chooses to send.

The ALGE format for BIB RANK TIME has existed since the 70s. Every major ski race software except VOLA ( Soft Control/ MSports) has adopted this simple data string.

Address 0 and the use of a "toggle switch" to determine the personality of Hr Min Sec , Min Sec 100th, or Bib Rank.

SIMPLE

So now we have people climbing on ladders in the dark switching the personality of their well used and loved display to accommodate some new comers idea.

WHY?

And of course there are various ages of ALGE displays

GA 82 - never tried with VOLA

GAZ c > GAZ 5 = works on address 6 toggle in HH MM SS

Dline 2006> 2011 = Works as GAZ4 in Address 6 but won't work as DLINE in VOLA

Dline 2011 > present = appears to allow Vola to program if started in Address 1

Microtab ALGE Emulation > appears to only work as GAZ4

Get the drift?

So be prepared to spend extra time dealing with programming, scripting, saving, loading.

And be prepared for dealing with issues if you use USB<>Serial adapters with Windows 10 and VOLA to send data to the displays.

A perfect circle of Windows<>ALGE<>VOLA variables.

But the ALGE protocol is not a variable. It has been out there for so long that it is the standard.

A handy utility does exist to help try to make some sense out of this.

http://alge-timing.com/alge/do...oftware/gaz4test.exe

Make sure you try either legacy software or this before modifying. Handy to get back to home base if you know where it is before leaving.
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Programming of displays in Vola software is pretty straight forward. You have full control over what to display on which display. But you have to leave the comfort zone for a few minutes.

Very useful whan you have a range of displays. A Vola line is 8 digits, up to 40 lines allowed on one Display output. One line can be programmed in several programming-lines to a combination of digits and info like BIB & RNK.

Alge displays have to be set with adress as line 1, 2, 3... Connection between displays with ordinary cable, and connect the first display using USB-RS232 @ Tx (pin 3) & GND (pin 5). Be aware of correct baud rate of the display (Alge@2400-USB@9600)

Using two displays you can eg. choose beween :
- running time, gap at inter 1, 2, 3, time at finish, gap at finish, ranking
for two competitors on course - see example below,

or:
- line 1: running time, time at inter and finish
- line 2: BIB, RNK (gap)


You can apply filters for categories at software parameters in the timing window. Remember to Save the different setups for later use.

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