trevorh7000

Okay we'll appoint you to log a 'will attend' on our behalf! mmmmmmmmmmm why not have a lottery Doc - seems fairer as there is obviously a lot of interest - i cacher per team - unless as you say there is not enough demand. Or does a case of beer cause enough bending of the rules to get me on. Further I think I will be asleep and unable to log a will attend when the cache comes out or my phone may have a flat battery or I could be lying drunk in the gutter or my hard drive could have crashed or I may just forget so I INCLUDE MYSELF IN THE et al CATEGORY and hereby appoint you to log a will attend on my behalf Otherwise I am going to have to polish up my technology so I get the notification on my phone immediately!!!!! Or i'll have to coerce FTR for his auto script!!!!! Trev

Hmm... now to write a script that monitors for this event notification and immediately logs a "Will Attend"... As long as you you share the script with us all Nice idea Doc - Hope Have the faster finger when the time comes. May android notify is not working up to scratch so I will have to be sharp!!! Trev

Got the same GPS Tom and all you need is a Serial-USB connector which should cost you under R200 - last one I bought I got for R120 ish at HiFi Corp. It should come with a CD with drivers but I think Windows 7 probably has the drivers already - it worked out the box for me in linux and I think for XP had to install drivers from the mini CD and I have hooked one up to W7 so yes its trivial and it works just fine. If you need help getting it going give me a shout or pop around to The Fig. Trev

Dear Cape Cachers Those of you mad enough to have done the Polar Bear Swim last year (event link) do not miss out on the fun this year. Those of you who were sensible - throw caution to the wind and join in the fun! Up country cachers if you happen to be in Cape Town on Saturday 23 July why not attend this event. I have just submitted the event listing and I expect it shall be published with out delay as it is the same as last years event. I will add a link to the listing as soon as it has been published. Looking forward to it Trev Wow! Published in about an hour! Thanks for the record fast service Bruce Ursus maritimus cedit mare II listing

Call me 072 438 6800 - first to get hold of me gets it Kick off 19:10 so we can meet at Newlands at 18:30 for a prematch beer in the castle lawns Trev

Nice link Anton but that is for geeks and techno-freaks - so try thta if it is your cup of tea If you just want plain old OSM/Garmin goodness use this link http://garmin.openstreetmap.nl/ It lets you choose any map in the world and creates a fully routable img file that you can load into Mapsource/Basecamp of directly to your unit using some of the software that is probably mentioned in Antons link. As I said it is fully routeable but may (probably) not have street number detail. So you cab preselct all the addresses you need to visit using the garmin map and save them as faverourites and then switch to the OSM map and you can route to those faveroutes. I fully concur what Anton says about R1500 for a map its a ludicrous rip-off - especially when there are equally good if not better maps available. I think the major issues is mobile data costs - I never use mapsource to find routes - google maps and it is constantly update and free. You will be surprised at how small the incremental changes are in the Garmin maps and as previously mentioned you can send updates till you are blue in the face and you never know if they will inlude them. With OSM you can make the updates yourself and within hours download the updated maps to your unit. I guess I woudl still buy a garmin but I woudl not buy a map!! I am sure I can get offline maps on my android phone and the next time I go on a trip I will compare the garmin to the phone and see which one performs better. Trev

Interesting - that is great to know and I am sure that using this method and the MNT method will be useful for all those who do not have a smart phone and who wish to have that competitive advantage of knowing when a new cache comes in! If any one has other tips on leveraging notifications on non-smart phones keep the tips coming. Sharing is caring! Nice one - I have just registered at vodacom and sent my self a test email and it took about a minute to arrive as an sms on my phone. So there you go vodacom subscribers now all you need to do is set your Groundspeak notifications to be sent to you cellnumber@voda.co.za address and you will be notified by sms - you will not dout not see much detail but at least then you can get to a pc and check your email. So I woudl recommend you use gmail or other webmail account that has filters so you can get the message on your phone and on your email. Just remember the forwarding will not work well with offline clients such as thunderbird and outlook as this will be dependent on your pc being on with the client running and actively polling for new mail. If you have a desktop pc you alwasy leave on no problem. Trev

As with anything software related its always available for free - I notice you never said free and legal. The garmin maps are trivial to copy and unlock - the newer maps have a newer method of protection but are just as trivial to work with. Jetmouse might be your friend here.You can either download the new maps or buy a DVD for a nominal price. You do not mention what version you are using. Since the 200W is likley discontinued you probably bopught yours two or three years ago I woudl guess - depending on when you bought it you may have been entitled to a upgrade. If you wish to purhcase the maps Garmin should have a pricing matrix on their web site - overly complicated in my opinion. Might actually be cheaper and more convenient to buy a new unit - although I susepct that some of the new units are sold without a map which you then have to purchase separately. Also upgrading maps may not solve your problem. I have noticed 3 years of upgrades have not solved some basic issues in the mapping in some areas. Then there is the fact that the local maps have changed completely to a different provider Navteq vs TeleAltlas and there have been some moans about the new maps whichever they are. So you might want to stick with the old style Garmap maps and not bother getting the latest. Or you could install OSM maps which are pretty good and in some areas better than Garmin. These are both free and legal. They route nicely but the embedded address information may be missing - ie it will not find a street address but if you know the coords it will happily route you. You coud of course look thta up on the old Garmin map and select it then save it to a favorite for future use with the OSM maps or just select your destination in the Garmin map and then switch over to the osm map which takes a couple of taps of the screen. Goodluck and MTFBWY! Trev

Cool! trev

As promised a field report of my setup. Was gloriously woken at 4am'ish by the sounds of AC/DC Back in Black belting out of my phones little speaker. New cache alert! I could not even read the email as the phone was too bright and my glasses were not at hand, I just rolled over and went back to sleep - this time - as I was shall we say just a little under the weather getting an getting FTF was a much lesser concern than getting some quality sleep time. But now I am set to never miss another opportunity should I wish to take it! Thanks to all who contributed to the thread. Trev

That is odd. You should have v2.3 "Gingerbread" on that phone, so you should have an option to choose your own mp3 as a ringtone/notification (which plays for as long as the song is until you open the email) for each separate account. If for some reason you don't or you have an older OS without that menu option, then the alternate method is to place your mp3 audio files in "media/audio/notifications/" or "media/audio/ringtones/" folders as necessary. If these do not exist, create them. Now the mp3 files will show up in the default notification and ringtone lists respectively. I'm not a big fan of using apps to do things the system can already do, as they also suck battery besides the data. Also keep in mind, that you are going to be using quite a bit more data, receiving all your emails on your phone in order to get only a few notifications. Polling my notification account every few minutes uses almost no data, so its only the notification headers/emails a few times a month that use any kind of real data. Thanks Mark - after install ringdroid I also read about using those folders - I think ringdroid just automates that although when I went to look for those folders they were not there. dumping files into folders is a bit obscure anyway - there shoudl be a default option to choose your own mp3 as ringtone / notifcation tone. As far as getting all my emails - I did not think that gmail app uses large amounts of data - surely it just shws you the email headers and onlyuses much data if you look at the email. In any event at home and at work I am connected to wifi so don;t care about data usage. I have a data usage monitor app so I will be able to see exactly what apps are using bandwidth - living and learning - the other thing is to set the inbox not to sync - I had to special specify the label that I use for notifications to sync Anyway I will be buying a second USB cable so I can kepe the thing charged at work and at home - then the 3 hours usage before battery dies should be enough to do most of the caching and what not - and then a third and 4th cable for the car and bike will charge the phone between destinations. Final reult is I now have a funcitoning alert system that plays AC/DC Back in Black (about 20second clip) and repeats it till I dismiss it when a cache notification comes in. SO unless my phone is off or I left it at home - I should never miss another cache notification. Now just to wait for the next published cache to make sure it all works live!! Next time we meet - next event? - I will pick yours and Andyt1s brains about these devices Thanks Trev

You can set up a custom ringtone/notification using an MP3. Account Settings > Select Ringtone > Goto My Files Thanks Mark - I must say I could not find that exact menu option but I did download a app called ringdroid which allows you to make custom ringtones and more importantly custom notification tones. So I made a longer one and added it and then I could select it but it did not play the whole file - but that may be because it was interrupted by the general gmail notification - I will keep trying and will report back on my successes or lack of thereof. Ok it was interrupted and because I have it set to repeat at 1 min intervals until i acknowledge it - it played the whole file on the second go - just very softly - so I need to boost the audio file or just use a loud mp3 - i recorded my own voice message using ringdroid - see here - https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ringdroid&hl=en So I think my solution is complete - unique long notification tome for only messages I select and filter in gmail using only my primary gmail account. Far more elegeant I think than multiple accounts and forwarding!!! You will know I have had success at this when my rate of FTF's for Urban Drive By Low difficulty caches climb - yay for Android. Only thing is all these apps are mothing but data suckers and I am the sucker for using them. Why woudl a ring tone editor need or want access to my contact details - data collection for greedy evil doers is the only reason I can think of which is a great pity - I would rather even pay a small amount for an app that respects my privacy - but my info is worth more to their little evil plans than a few rand is. Trev

Ok Android Gmail User Fans I have just found an app R6.20 that sets different notifications on different lables - so you have to set up your gmail app to sync the labels you want then you set up those same labels in the Gmail Label Notifier App and select a unique notification sound. Then there are lots of options about repeating the notification till you acknowledge it and times where you do not want the notificatiosn to be audible. So this is a much more elegant way of doing things than setting up mulitple gmail accounts - if you do not already use gmail that advantage is lost! At the moment my phone is tweeting away as I set it to keep notifying each minute till I acknowledge - just have to work out how to acknowledge as I have read the test email. I will just now have to tweak my filters and labels as I have all the other GS notifications goinf to the same label and I only want to be buzzed on NOTIFY messages. I will report back in a week if the app was worth it. The app can be found here - https://play.google....mailnotifierpro While this repeating alarm is better than a single one that can be easily missed I woudl still prefer some more violent and loud ringing - anyway to choose your own tones for the notifications - all the stock ones are too soft and too short Trev

Thanks for all the help guys I kind of thought it would have to be a solution like this So I have done a little bit of a reverse to MnCo - I did create another gmail account for notifications and I did load it to my GC account but then decided not to use it - I now use filters in my primary gmail to forward cache notifications to my notification account which as per MnCos suggestion I set up using the email app rather than the gmail app. I then made sure it was set for notifications and changed the tone to something different from my primary gmail. This works with a test email I send to my notification account. Just waiting for the first new cache notification to see if I am alerted in real time. I also set the polling time to 5 minutes - will chow battery no doubt but there is no point setting it to any less as then the advantage of knowing immediately is lost! However here's the rub - a millisecond chirp is not going to be very audible or effective especially if the phone is in my pocket or if I am asleep - that will never wake me up. Can I make the phone full on ring when a new message comes in or am I limited to just a fleeting beep! Or is there some other action the phone could take when a message to the notification email account is received? Thanks - I now feel I have the same competitive advantage as the other serious FTF hounds! Trev

Just got Samsung Galaxy Ace Am trying out c:geo More importantly how do I make the phone notify me in a memorable and unique way so that I know its a new cache by the sound of the unique ringtone. Currently my cache notification go to my gmail address (gmail is setup on my phone) but by using filters they by pass the inbox and go to a label called GS - this is bad anyway as I always miss new notifications as they do not come in my inbox and I have to scroll down to see the GS label. So to recap I want the phone to buzz in a special way when a new cache is published - do any of the caching apps take care of notifications or is email the only early warning system. I might add that i don't care to know when other emails come in or they will be special cases where I want to be notified of very specific emails - I can't help think filtering in gmail will be the key - even if the mail I want to know about is forwarded to another gmail account which the phone can pick up and notify me of! Had an unacceptable situation tonight - 6 caches published at 9pm in my FTF zone and Henzz (well done) from out of town and cism/yelena (well done but you wimped out of doing them all! ) previously engaged in music find these things before I am even aware of their presence Help desperately needed! Also any other Android caching tips appreciated - will soon be attempting AVATAR no that I have a Wherigo player installed. thanks trev

This was posted to the OSM list. Please track these users down - their is a link for the whole list - check if your name is on it? I see besem is on the most wanted list - I am guessing it is the same besem we know from geocaching. I have already sent him a pm but if you are in contact with him ask him to check out his OSM profile (if it is the same besem!) Thanks trev Talk-ZA, It hasn't been discussed here, but as some of you know OpenStreetMap is changing from the CC BY-SA license to the Open Database License (ODbL) starting on Sunday. Contributors who signed up before 12th May 2010 need to agree otherwise the project will be unable to use their contributors and their contributions will be removed from the map next week. Contributors who signed after 12th May 2010 have already agreed while signing up. ;-) South Africa has very good acceptance rates of over 98% for the map data. BUT! We need to track down the last few users and ask them to Agree to the new license by logging-in and clicking agree (or decline if they wish). Please help track down: http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Jan%20de%20Jager - Jan de Jager - Johannesburg http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/EDWARD%20J - Northern Suburbs in Cape Town http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Carel%20Olivier - Port Elizabeth http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Gawie - Small bits all over SA http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/bhonermann - JHB http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/kevnewman - JHB http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/PhilipK (Case Sensitive username) - JHB http://www.openstreetmap.org/user/besem - Pretoria The full list: http://odbl.poole.ch/south_africa_and_lesotho-20120213-20120328-poly.html ** Please check the list if you have multiple accounts ** If the user's email address has changed and they are unable to login/reset password please ask them to email webmaster@openstreetmap.org with details and we'll get it fixed up ASAP. At the moment we'd lose a few areas in north Cape Town and south Johannesburg / Soweto. See: http://tools.geofabrik.de/osmi/?view=wtfe&lon=25.06787&lat=-28.39720&zoom=6 Regards Grant _______________________________________________ Talk-ZA mailing list Talk-ZA@openstreetmap.org http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/talk-za

Quite Right! For Monty Python neophytes check here for the wikipedia article and here for the yoputube clip Enjoy! Trev

ok this i going no where the answer was The Ice Truck Killer And now for something completely different From whence did The Holy Hand Grenade that was used to kill the Rabbit of Caerbannog - who was blocking the progress of King Arthur and the Knights Errant - originate? And for your gratification some more info on the Holy Hand Grenade ...And Saint Attila raised the hand grenade up on high, saying, "O LORD, bless this Thy hand grenade that with it Thou mayest blow Thine enemies to tiny bits, in Thy mercy." And the LORD did grin and the people did feast upon the lambs and sloths and carp and anchovies and orangutans and breakfast cereals, and fruit bats and large chu... [At this point, the friar is urged by Brother Maynard to "skip a bit, brother"]... And the LORD spake, saying, "First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin, then shalt thou count to three, no more, no less. Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then lobbest thou thy Holy Hand Grenade of ******* towards thy foe, who being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it."[1] Trev

nope anagram - 4 words Cruel Thicket Liker {edited to remove reference to cheating using google!!!} I meant to say use an online anagram service - so here is the url of the one I used. http://wordsmith.org/anagram/ trev

mmm no takers - i'll set a new question tomorrow if no one has the answer Dexter was a good an popular series - I am surprised no one has come up with the answer considering some of the esoteric questions that have been answered in the past. Perhaps the brainiacs of the group have no time to spend watching TV and are burying themselves in books and academia! Trev Oh and here is a clue his name was Brian and he was a Cruel Thicket Liker

none close yet - has no one watched Dexter? Its a great show. trev We watched it a while ago. I think the nick name was something like "The Butcher" or "The butcher of (something I can't remember)" Now we are getting somewhere - but that was Dexter himself who was referred to by press and police as the Bayharbour Butcher! Dexters's brother was also a serial killer and was engaged to Dexters step-sister Deborah. Trev

none close yet - has no one watched Dexter? Its a great show. trev

Ok a bit of TV trivia - What was the nick name of Dexter Morgan's brother in the TV show Dexter? Trev

Coca Cola Trev

Sorry guys - one chilli too many - when I had to ask a question I had chiilies on my mind - obviously from havinf read about them on the same page as the question I answered - I must admint to feeling more than a little foolish! Since the question was aksed and annswered and CHl answered my question first go for it Carbon Hunter I'll make sure I ask a more original question next time! Trev .