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Reading a detection: tracks, signal alerts, and the API

WarDragon publishes two kinds of output: aircraft tracks and signal alerts. They look different in your operating picture and come from different places in the API. This article explains the difference and how to check each one.

Tracks and signal alerts

Aircraft tracks carry an identity and a position: Remote ID aircraft, DJI aircraft, and any aircraft the kit can place. They are published as Cursor on Target messages and appear as drone icons.

Signal alerts report that a signal was seen, such as FPV video, without a drone identity or position of its own. They are not tracks. In TAK they appear as alerts near the kit, and the API lists them separately.

How detections are merged

The detection services publish into one aggregation service, which merges detections from the different receivers, removes duplicates, and limits how often each aircraft is updated so a TAK network is not flooded. By default each drone is updated once every 2 seconds. For large numbers of aircraft or constrained links, raise rate_limit in config.ini and restart dragonsync.

Checking the API

The kit serves a read-only HTTP API on port 8088. Confirm it is responding and see what it currently holds:

curl http://localhost:8088/status
curl http://localhost:8088/drones
curl http://localhost:8088/signals
  • /status reports unit health.
  • /drones lists active tracks.
  • /signals lists current signal alerts.
  • /config returns a sanitized copy of the configuration.

The API is rate limited and cannot change anything on the unit.

When a track you expect is missing

  • Check /drones first. If it is listed there, the problem is downstream, in multicast or your TAK Server connection.
  • Check all three detection services are active: sudo systemctl status zmq-decoder dji-receiver dragonsync
  • For DJI aircraft, confirm the motors are spinning.

Related

WarDragon is manufactured by Millenium Products Inc. Technical support for purchased kits is requested through the support page. Purchasing and quote requests go through the contact form.