I am using a compiled version of piaware on a small linux box. All seems to be working, but I have a massive amount of Internet bandwidth being used up and especially downstream.
I am thinking it may be MLAT that is mainly responsible for the download rise 8gbyts in a day.
I am also uploading to Flightradar24, so I will want to try disabling mlat in that upload client too.
The base program is dump1090 with an E4000 dongle, home made preamp and 8 ele collinear antenna. I can see planes in a 200 mile radius so there may be a lot of traffic on the system.
Thanks for any help in finding a command line to control my installation.
You can use piaware-config to disable mlat (“piaware-config -mlat 0”), or disable it from the FA stats page for your site. Both require a piaware restart to take effect.
However mlat dies not generate very much downstream traffic, maybe 0.5 - 1 kB/s. Upstream can be more, perhaps 5kB/s in a busy area. You can check /tmp/piaware.out for the traffic it generates, look at the ‘to server’ / ‘from server’ rates. Certainly nothing like 8GB/day!
edit: for example, here’s what one of my receivers sees:
Jun 24 10:16:32 piaware piaware[505]: mlat-client(9219): Receiver: 1276.6 msg/s received 253.0 msg/s processed (20%)
Jun 24 10:16:32 piaware piaware[505]: mlat-client(9219): Server: 1.3 kB/s from server 0.0kB/s TCP to server 2.9kB/s UDP to server
Jun 24 10:16:32 piaware piaware[505]: mlat-client(9219): Results: 607.0 positions/minute
which (if sustained - it won’t be, overnight) is about 112MB/day upstream, 250MB/day upstream.
Many thanks for the answer obj. Sorry I did not find it before today and hence my response is rather late.
In fact I found command line ways of stopping MLAT and also discovered that the Flight Aware MY ADS-B page allows it to be done via a tick box.
I switched it off for a time and then back on again. I have found by measurement that my hourly (averaged over the day) data usage on my Internet connection with MLAT enabled is: upload about 10Mbyts an hour, and download about 35 mbyts an hour. Obviously, data usage is dependent on the air traffic density visible to the receiver. I am sure that in some locations it will be more or less than I have stated.
Early on - at the time I first posted I was registered with two organisations - Flight Aware and Flightradar24. I have discontinued uploading to Flightradar24 to save data on my Internet connection.
