Friday, October 23, 2009

PRL Text

You may have wondered what happened to our most recent Preferred Roaming List (PRL) “Interpretations” that appear on our PRL pages of the Roamingzone. It seems our interpreters have "retired." To create an accurate text of these lists takes quite a bit of work, and so far, that work has been entirely voluntary.

When those who interpret the PRL as a hobby find something else to do, the rest of us go scrambling for another source…but there isn’t any. We have offered these PRL volunteers the full control of one of our web sites, only to watch them create their own. The sad result is that once that happens, they lose interest…and we lose our source.

There are a handful of users who take the time to save and even post the actual .prl file, but for most of us, they’re just a list of meaningless numbers. We even offered to pay to have PRL’s decoded, but once the fun is over, it becomes too much like a job. And we understand that. We have considered at least posting the raw lists so that serious PRL fans can at least look at the order of things and look for their favorite System ID (SID). We hate to just leave you with so little detail, but I guess you can always decide whether it’s useful.

Let’s just hope the process hasn’t been interrupted by the carriers who don’t want the data made public. No conspiracy theorists, here.

7 comments:

Adam said...

I hope the Corolada PRL Page is not the target of the comment "We have offered these PRL volunteers the full control of one of our web sites, only to watch them create their own", as I have been the only person to run that site (and while I've contributed here and there to your site, have never been on staff like those referred to in the comment).

However, the reason that page hasn't been updated lately has nothing to do with carrier influence. People won't submit PRLs anymore. I used to have time to scour message boards, looking for PRLs, but I don't have the time to do that anymore. Without submissions, not much gets updated.

Another (main) issue is that the tool that converted the RAW decoded PRL to HTML was never released to the public. It was held by a select few and when those few moved on, it disappeared. If it would have been released, it could have very easily been updated for new formats (EvDO as far as I know has always been added manually, not through the use of that decoder), and likely there wouldn't be a problem of having people to run it. However, now the only way to create the same readable format is to go through, line by line. If anyone that ever had access to that tool would be willing to release the tool, I for one would be happy to modify the code and use it no regular basis. Plugging and chugging is not much of a time-consumer. Line by line HTML is.

Scott W said...

Adam,
Thanks for your comment. No, your site is one of the few we can still use, and it provides lots of valuable prl information. You're right, some of the tools are being hoarded. Let's hope we can free them up.

Benjamin A said...

To Adam Scott and everyone else who does what they can to help with the PRL situation. Thank you all for the hard work you are doing especially now considering the most recent circumstances. I have been using mountain for about 5 years and hope its around for many years to come. To Adam thanks for posting your PRLs to corolada.com. I discovered your site when I was updated in September just to find that a town in AL I was going to be spending a few days in only has a Sprint tower on CDMA SID 4103 and that had just been removed. Thanks to your site I was able to revert back to a previous PRL so I could have service while I was there. Once again to all keep up the good work.

Anonymous said...

The PRL interpretations were done by mathwhiz, TProphet, and myself. I'm fully unaware of anyone ever offering either one of us any money, not that that's the deciding factor, but I'm curious what you're referring to.

Oz Andrews said...

I will assume I know who you are but will maintain your anonymity. I will limit comments in a public forum, but the offers weren't for any substantial amount, just something to 'cover expenses.' I can fill in the rest privately.

Anonymous said...

FYI:
US Cellular has updated their PRL version to 15102

Anonymous said...

look here what can i do to help
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1142401