A graphical tracking of my progress has been requested a few times, and I do want to do it, I just don’t know how.
There are a million and one options available to me, and I know about these, but the trouble is, they all required GPS tracking data, and that’s locked up on my Standard Horizon CP180i chart plotter. Without spending a load of money on the special SH data transfer card, I don’t know how it can be done.
Suggestions are more than welcome.
Good luck with getting your bottom wet tomorrow. I hope all goes well.
Regards
Terry
A copy of Notepad/QuickEdit and enter the data by hand once a day into a KML file for viewing in Google Earth or Maps:
http://code.google.com/apis/kml/documentation/kml_tut.html
Email me if you would like a template.
Or you can use Google Latitude and attach it to your mobile phone, internet dongle or a cheap second hand eBay or freecycle phone with a PAYG card wired into the boat power supply:
http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/latitude/intro.html
Or you can use Latitude and attach it to your mobile phone, internet dongle or a cheap second hand eBay or freecycle phone with a PAYG card wired into the boat power supply:
http://www.google.com/intl/en_us/latitude/intro.html
There’s the spot GPS, which has automatic tracking, emails/twitter integration etc for progress updates.
http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/07/spot-personal-gps-tracker-the-argonauts-lifeline/
I don’t think its that expensive anymore (the monthly fee). Good for emergencies too..
SPOT system looks interesting but is going to eat batteries – according to their site it needs 2 Lithium (and only Lithium) batteries every 14 days in tracking mode and doesn’t appear to have an external power port.
There are NMEA compatible ports on the Standard Horizon CP180i. This would give you the required data which you could log in real time on your laptop. NMEA standard is just serial data with the following setup: Baud rate 4800
Data bits 8. Parity None, Stop bits 1Handshake None. A simple terminal program would probably get you what you want. I would hazard a guess that it would not take you too-long to code a simpe logging program…After a cursory search there is also appears to be free logging software available to do this. You may need serial-to-USB dongle if your laptop only has USB ports however.
Good luck,
Niall
…In fact I have just been browsing the user manual for you plotter and there is a whole s/section about connecting to a computer serial port ( 2.10 PERSONAL COMPUTER CONNECTIONS). This should help to get you setup.
Niall
I have a serial port to USB port convertor which I used to get data from my old serial-port afflicted GPS. Then use MacGPS or similar free app to get the raw track data via NMEA.
Happy to post it your way if wanted.
As a possible answer have a look at http://wimobi.com/gpsdash/overview.ppc2.php
It stores tracks (unlimited if registered) in a format that can be transferred. Registration is not very expensive, somewhere in the 30 – 40 euro range
It works on a PDA. You do not need the latest model. some, including the GPS arial, come cheaply on ebay, see
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Dell-Axim-hand-help-P-C-lots-of-extras-no-reserve_W0QQitemZ180387259834QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_AudioTVElectronics_PDAsAccessories_PDAs_JN?hash=item29ffeb25ba&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=65%3A12%7C66%3A2%7C39%3A1%7C72%3A1690%7C293%3A1%7C294%3A50
This is an earlier model Axim and they do not go for big money
Downloads to a PC and from there installs onto the PDA. Dunno about a Mac though. It is a very versatile application. You can install map/chart images and calibrate them easily. Useful backup