SiliconFiend

Barry, As I understand the issues, Garmin does not own any of the "road warrior" maps. These are purchased from Naviteq and TeleAtlas. These companies impose very restrictive licensing terms on their users. As a measure of the value of the intellectual property involved, Naviteq was just sold to Nokia for $5B and Garmin dropped out of the bidding for TeleAtlas at $3B. Basically, you're blaming Garmin for a problem they have no control over. This is one of the big reasons that OpenStreetMap was started. Free maps, for everyone, to use however you like. There is an application called mkgmap that can convert OSM data to (non-routable) Garmin IMG format. Plus, with OSM, you have the ability to fix any map problems you encounter.

What is the essence of routing? Is it taking every road segment, intersection to intersection, and assigning a road type "value"? Then the routing algorithm picks a route based on the rules you've selected? Or different? Thanks Well, you have to add routing nodes, which indicate what roads connect to which other roads, and at which point. Then you also need a routing class (0 to 4) to indicate the relative importance. You'll also need to indicate the speed, whether it's one-way, if certain vehicle types are restricted, etc. Then there's house numbers and turn restrictions. In theory OSM has all this (except house numbers and turn restrictions still are up in the air), and I have had some success in the past transforming into a routable Polish format file for input into cGPSMapper. I used XSLT, though, and it choked on even 10 MB of data.

I'm not familiar with quakemap, but you may need to use an external program to correlate the photo timestamps with a location using your tracklog. It will then write the coordinates into the file header of each photo. I've heard good things about gPicSync. There are others, too.

What version of the Tiger data has it been seeded with? It sounds like much of this data has been significantly updated in the lastest version. How do they compare? Is there a way to take the data 'in bulk' and transfer it? (i.e. would it be possible to download the entire country? Load in to Mapsource? etc? I'm pretty sure it was TIGER 2005 (not sure if it was the first or second 2005). The Tiger Line IDs were preserved, so it may be possible to update them later if there's better data. It's possible to download the entire country--you can download the entire OSM planet if you want. However, you'll have to chop up the file to feed manageable chunks into mkgmap. A Java utility named Osmosis is handy for that. I don't know about getting the resulting maps into Mapsource; it's probably just a matter of setting up the infrastructure to create a nice packaged version such as you have created. I'm not the author of mkgmap, nor am I involved with its development. It is skipping cGPSMapper, though, and writing the IMG directly. The Wiki page is here. My routable map project will have to use cGPSMapper for now, though, until someone else decodes the routing IMG format and makes it open source. You can check out the source of mkgmap if you'd like. It's referenced on the Wiki page I linked above.

Yes, absolutely, but it uses UK conventions such as "motorway", "trunk", "primary", "secondary", "tertiary", "unclassified". There's some discussion on the OSM Wiki as to how those should map to US highways, but in general it's done how you would expect. There's this page on the Wiki, but I think not all of those tags were implemented.

I would say you need a new dog, but you've already got one of those. What you really need is an old(er) dog. Don't worry. After another year or so (!) he won't chew much stuff anymore.

You guys should know that OpenStreetMap (www.openstreetmap.org) has been seeded with TIGER data and is actively being improved (and you can help!). There is a utility (mkgmap) which can take an OSM data file and convert it directly to a Garmin IMG file (skipping cGPSMapper). Not routable, but that's my project, in the works.

You mean like www.openstreetmap.org? No need for restrictive standards--just get out there, collect the tracks and make the maps.

I agree. I was caching in an unfamiliar place this week, with a lot of weird rural roads, and without autorouting, I couldn't have gotten to a bunch of them. By the way, I think you mean "off road" vs. "follow road". You should use "off road" to find a cache once you're on foot. However, if you really meant "lock to road", that's just a nicety to correct for position imprecision to make it look like you're exactly on the road. It will hinder your caching, too, though, because it will show you on the road instead of where you truly are in relation to a cache. So, "lock to road" should generally be off at all times for a geocacher. Autorouting will work just fine either way. I suppose if you have it set up in your Colorado profile, then you can have it both ways!

I concur. I did my research before I bought (a lot of which was reading forum posts here), and the popularity of Garmin, their excellent customer service reputation and the ability to create custom maps made it a no-brainer to go with Garmin.

It would be really cool if you could contribute this data to OpenStreetMap. I've been wanting routable trails (not available commercially except the National Parks 24K Topo with limited coverage), and I think OpenStreetMap is going to be the key. I have a project in the works to create routable Garmin maps from OpenStreetMap data.

I know I've said it before, but I'll beat the drum again. Anyone that has track log data, consider contributing it to OpenStreetMap. Then we can all have routable trails (hopefully soon, when my project is done).

the unit software is 2.3 this is specific to the unit and can not be updated. the software version is 2.6 and is as current as I can make it. Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but I doubt it's "specific to the unit". I have a Vista HCx (a relatively early serial number), and I have GPS software version 2.6 and system software version 2.6. I had to run WebUpdater to get the GPS software updated.

That has bugged me, too (although I've been looking for CA). That's why I got involved in the OpenStreetMap project--to have the potential for a complete road, trail, etc. map database which could be turned into routable maps (not yet, but hopefully soon). The data is not all there yet, either, but as more and more users join and contribute their tracklogs and create the map data it gets better all the time. I'm actually working on a routable Garmin GPS map project right now, but progress is slow.

If your GPS software version is really 2.3, then you should update. The current versions are 2.6 and 2.6. You'll probably need to use the WebUpdater to get it.

I didn't know this! I just assumed I couldn't get tide data on my Legend HCx. I have Topo 2008 installed, so I'll have to check that out tonight. Thanks! --Bill I'm not sure about that for the HCx. Anyway, if you still want tide stations, you can download the US points from Garmin via an update for the GPSMAP Sounder 168 here. It installs into MapSource and can be selected as a map set for download to your GPS. I have it working with my Vista HCx.

Umm... You might add "...yet" because the 400i and 400c use satellite imagery as their basemap, so there is strong speculation that the Colorados will eventually support raster maps.

There may also be HTML markup in the description text that is "invisible" but adds to the character count. You'd have to look at the raw XML, but I wouldn't be surprised if the limit is 5000 characters. Nice, round number.

If you're concerned about the InvisibleShield sticking to a vinyl case window, you could get a case without a window, designed to be used with this type of screen protector. Check out my review of the Foarm eTrex case.

Despite being a neighbor of Missouri, I'm pretty sure they speak English in Kansas (as a first language, even).

I don't think that's quite true... Garmin certainly makes a profit on map sales, too. If they only wanted to sell hardware, they could just publish the IMG file format and let us do-it-yourself mappers go to town. (I wish they would...)

A useful tool for general GIS manipulation/transformation is ogr2ogr. It's open source, it has great support for shapefiles, and it has a mode that allows you to execute sql-type statements that I think may allow you to do an update operation such as adding the mp_type (maybe, haven't confirmed). The web page is www.gdal.org.

Seems like an odd response, seeing as how Magellan has had 3-axis compasses for several years - apparently successful, although I don't have any direct experience with them. Just offhand, I can't think of why adding a third axis would dramatically increase calibration needs and temperature/pressure sensitivities over the 2-axis versions. I don't particularly want one that would work in any position - upside down for instance, or even vertically, although I know some would like that; I just want one that would make it less sensitive to being held perfectly level. Perhaps Magellan has patented the technology they use to implement 3-axis compasses, and Garmin simply doesn't want to license a competitor's technology. I doubt it's that expensive. I recently interviewed with a company (PNI in Santa Rosa, CA--www.pnicorp.com) that makes these types of sensors, and at one point they made consumer-level devices, including electronic compasses. I don't know if the consumer devices were triaxial, but I do know that they make three-axis devices, so it can be done and probably with low enough price and power.

Loggin the cache as "Did not find" will mark the cache as found on the Colorado If you look at the map, the symbol will change to an "open treasure chest"... Well, they used the "open treasure chest" to indicate that you were there, so don't try to go there again. They didn't have another appropriate icon to use for DNF. I agree, not the best thing, but completely functional for my use. --Marky It might be nice to maintain the cache type icons, but change the background--green for found, red for DNF, yellow for needs repair, and transparent for unattempted.

Hey, IndyJpr, when you're developing these, are you keeping the different "layers" in different .mp files? (i.e., contours in one file, hydrology in another, roads & trails in another) If you did, that would be super-helpful, because I'm working on getting routable maps from OpenStreetMap data. Then I might want just the contours or contours + hydrology to combine with the routable roads & trails from OSM. It's easy enough to create that--just have one "master" file for the mapset which links to the individual layer files. It's a little more work to set up but makes it much easier to separate later.