Free Topo Maps for Garmin GPS

[+Red90]

here are a couple of building polygons nearby, but nothing blue.

 

I agree, I don't see anything at those coordinates other than the railroad.

[+Westacular]

I just checked on my Oregon 300, and I'm seeing that weird blue thing, too:

 

 

I haven't checked this spot in MapSource yet.

 

What I have occasionally noticed in MapSource are few stray vertical or horizontal lines of land sticking out across water -- or water through land -- that seem like rounding errors on the boundary of segment. Some of them disappear when you zoom in closer, while others only appear when you zoom in close. It's not a huge problem and I think it was mentioned a few pages back.

[+Viajero Perdido]

Argh... too late.

 

No worries then. It's minor minor minor...

[sagc]

I also can't seem to replicate the problem here, so I'm not sure what's going on. That particular spot looks like an open area to me (i.e. nothing there). There are a couple of building polygons nearby, but nothing blue.

It doesn't show up in MapSource 6.13.7 but it does on my Venture Cx:

Blue Area on Venture Cx

[+Red90]

One little categorization glitch: A few times I've seen something marked as "Area" shown in blue, so it looks like a lake. But from the looks of it on-site, these "areas" are cuts, not lakes. For example, at N45 22.688, W75 41.271, where there's railroad track going through it. That's in Ottawa (where I am right now), but I've noticed this a few times in Alberta too.

 

Simplest thing would be to just change the color for that type of "area" to yellow, like other types of land.

 

Other than that, the maps are working flawlessly. Rock on!

 

OK, I looked into the map and it is an object "Blue-Unknown (0x29, polygon)". Maybe not a good choice of polygon.

[+ibycus]

One little categorization glitch: A few times I've seen something marked as "Area" shown in blue, so it looks like a lake. But from the looks of it on-site, these "areas" are cuts, not lakes. For example, at N45 22.688, W75 41.271, where there's railroad track going through it. That's in Ottawa (where I am right now), but I've noticed this a few times in Alberta too.

 

Simplest thing would be to just change the color for that type of "area" to yellow, like other types of land.

 

Other than that, the maps are working flawlessly. Rock on!

 

OK, I looked into the map and it is an object "Blue-Unknown (0x29, polygon)". Maybe not a good choice of polygon.

 

I'll try to get that cleared up for the next version (the one after this one)... don't let me forget!

 

I'm currently adding the roads in. This version for some reason only has 1786 tiles, rather than the 2724 of the previous one.

 

Dale

[+ibycus]

My hosting provider decided to move my website to a new server with no warning to me. As a result, the site will be down for a couple of days while the DNS updates.

[+Viajero Perdido]

Here's a suggestion for the next version. (Or the version after that, if the next one is already in the pipeline.)

 

I see that Alberta now has street names, which is great. However, they can be verbose. As I was out cycling with the GPS on the handlebars, I saw a lot of stuff like

ENUE NORTH-WEST

where the useful part of the street name was off-screen.

 

So my suggestion is to do some search-and-replace:

double space --> single space

AVENUE --> AV

STREET --> ST

RANGE ROAD --> RR

TOWNSHIP ROAD --> TWP

NORTH-WEST --> NW

etc.

 

That would make the best even better.

 

TFTMaps!

[+ibycus]

Here's a suggestion for the next version. (Or the version after that, if the next one is already in the pipeline.)

 

You may get your wish for the next version... Or something similar if I can work out the details (there is a way to have the whole name in there, so that eventually it could be searchable on the whole name, but only display the 'short' name... this incidentally is the reason the text to speach engine on the Nuvis talk about Doctor instead of drive...). It turns out I goofed my label coding, and none of the street signs are showing up correctly, so I'm going to have to do some post processing of the .mp files, which will involve a complete recompilation of all the files. Drat!

 

Dale

[+Viajero Perdido]

Would anybody actually search for long versions of "AVENUE", "RANGE ROAD", etc? Given the clunky user interface, I can't imagine.

 

"At Saskatchewan Doctor, turn right". That's funny!

[Mag Magician]

This may have been covered already in this thread, but I couldn't find it.

 

Since either my server or my router will not allow me to use Mapupdate.exe (It locks up), is it possible to have a friend download the entire program for me? If I copy all the files to the appropriate directory on my hard drive, will Mapsource pick it up without some sort of install? Thanks, Roger

[+ibycus]

This may have been covered already in this thread, but I couldn't find it.

 

Since either my server or my router will not allow me to use Mapupdate.exe (It locks up), is it possible to have a friend download the entire program for me? If I copy all the files to the appropriate directory on my hard drive, will Mapsource pick it up without some sort of install? Thanks, Roger

 

You'll need to make some tweaks to get it to work, but yes its possible. The next version (currently being worked on), isn't going to use MapUpdate, its going to be a single file (ISO) download.

 

Dale

[+DanOCan]

You'll need to make some tweaks to get it to work, but yes its possible. The next version (currently being worked on), isn't going to use MapUpdate, its going to be a single file (ISO) download.

 

That is really great news. I recently reloaded my laptop and had to reinstall Ibycus Topo and Mapupdate.exe stopped repsonding for me numerous times -- not sure why, as I never had that problem before.

 

I love the ISO format -- I keep all of my software in ISO format on my server at home so I can sit in the living room and just mount the ISO images over the network and install everything without messing around with physical media.

[+Red90]

Except that 3+ GB single downloads can be a PITB sometimes. It will be interesting to see if we can drag down the Host Monster server.....

[+ibycus]

Except that 3+ GB single downloads can be a PITB sometimes. It will be interesting to see if we can drag down the Host Monster server.....

 

I think they've already moved me to a less 'busy' server because I was impacting everyone else on the same system.

[Mag Magician]

I will be e-mailing you shortly for the tweaks you are suggesting. The DVD should be in my hands this weekend from my friend.

 

Just to refresh, he has gotten the mapupdate.exe installed on his, and has gone to the folder, copied that to a dvd, and that is what he is giving me.

[+ibycus]

I will be e-mailing you shortly for the tweaks you are suggesting. The DVD should be in my hands this weekend from my friend.

 

Just to refresh, he has gotten the mapupdate.exe installed on his, and has gone to the folder, copied that to a dvd, and that is what he is giving me.

 

When you get the DVD, copy the contents to \Program Files\TopoMaps. Then you'll have to register the maps with Mapsource. The easiest way to do this would be to run "MapUpdate". It shouldn't find any updates, but it will register the maps. If that fails (due to firewall or whatever), there are a few other options:

 

1. Register it using "MapSetToolKit" (google it for URL)

2. Manually register it (I can send you the reg file, but you'll have to tweak it for your set up, so the paths are right).

3. Wait until I have the installer ready for the ISO version, and I can send that to you, and it will add the registry keys required.

 

Dale

[+ibycus]

After a couple of false starts, version 2.1 is finally fully compiled. Now I just need to zip it and upload it (stay tuned).

 

I've decided to make this version available in two formats.

 

1. As promised, an ISO version. This version you'll likely want to burn to a DVD before using.

2. A straight zip file of the same thing. Unzip and run "setup.exe" to install it.

 

Mac version not yet available (if anyone cares to make one, I can provide you with an FTP account on my site to put it on...)

 

Major improvements in this version:

1. Fixed problems in Quebec with accented characters not showing up (they were showing as '-' before)

2. Updated Roads in Ontario and Yukon (just for Red90, I'm not calling it "the Yukon" . )

3. Brand new installer

4. Dropping "MapUpdate" as a download method (may reinstate if people *really* want to me to).

 

Please note, this version *won't* overwrite the old version, and I haven't written an 'uninstaller' for the old version (yet). At the moment, if you want to remove the old one, download "MapsetToolkit" to unregister it, and then just delete the directory.

 

URL will be provided as soon as its available. (you can probably guess it if you really try). Both versions are ~3.03GB.

 

Dale

 

** edit 9% uploaded in 1h 20 minutes, so another 12-13 hours before the upload of the ISO is finished. I may have to kill it and try it from the university on Wednesday (only have high bandwidth access on MWF, otherwise I'm on a DSL at the university, so no benefit.)

Edited October 13, 2008 by ibycus

[+ibycus]

First upload finished today.

 

The URL for the ISO version is http://www.ibycus.com/ibycustopo/IbycusTopo21iso.zip

 

I'll try to get the non-ISO version uploaded tomorrow.

 

Dale

[+Red90]

Except that 3+ GB single downloads can be a PITB sometimes.

 

Well, two unsuccessful downloads so far.......

[+ibycus]

Except that 3+ GB single downloads can be a PITB sometimes.

 

Well, two unsuccessful downloads so far.......

 

Hmmm.... I wonder if torrenting it would be more reliable....except I've never torrented anything before, so I'm not sure of exactly how to do it (and most of the torrent stuff I've looked at it pretty inappropriate to post something like this to...)

 

Has anyone managed to successfully download it?

 

Dale

[+Red90]

Torrenting helps because the file is split and each part checked.

 

But.....you need a few people with large upload bandwidths (>2 MB/s) for it to not take two weeks to download. Not many "normal" people have high upload bandwidths.

[+Diemanca]

Well, two unsuccessful downloads so far.......

 

Hmmm.... I wonder if torrenting it would be more reliable....except I've never torrented anything before, so I'm not sure of exactly how to do it (and most of the torrent stuff I've looked at it pretty inappropriate to post something like this to...)

 

Has anyone managed to successfully download it?

 

Dale

 

It's coming through the pipe right now at 450KB/Sec, just over an hour to go.

 

Ray

[Mag Magician]

 

It's coming through the pipe right now at 450KB/Sec, just over an hour to go.

 

Ray

 

On my radio (RF) high speed, it shows 25 hours to go at 40Kbs/sec. Talk about less than high speed.

[+Luc & Sweety]

Any word on the installer for the ISO?

[+KFBradley]

I recommend using Firefox to download the file, as it's built-in download manager can be a life saver. That being said, it still took me two tries, as the first one "completed" at 710MB. I also found that for some reason, using any of my bandwidth for anything else (ie. browing the internet) caused the file to download at between 60 - 80 KB/s, but as soon as I stopped browsing, my speeds jumped to like 300 - 500 KB/s. You're best bet would probably be to close all other programs, download with Firefox, and let it do it's thing overnight.

[+ibycus]

Any word on the installer for the ISO?

 

As in if it works or not, or if there is one? There is one, and it works on my machine after removing any previous instance of the program...

 

The ZIP version is currently uploading, and should be finished in about an hour.

[+ElectroQTed]

I recommend using Firefox to download the file, as it's built-in download manager can be a life saver. That being said, it still took me two tries, as the first one "completed" at 710MB. I also found that for some reason, using any of my bandwidth for anything else (ie. browing the internet) caused the file to download at between 60 - 80 KB/s, but as soon as I stopped browsing, my speeds jumped to like 300 - 500 KB/s. You're best bet would probably be to close all other programs, download with Firefox, and let it do it's thing overnight.

 

Using IE, one try, no problems, got all 3.03GB in about 3 hours while browsing and streaming CFNY as well. I have yet to install it, but the download went fine.

[+Red90]

Got it on the third try. Installed fine.

[+ibycus]

Got it on the third try. Installed fine.

 

Good. The big advantage I see to distributing it as a single file, as that its an 'all or nothing' play. So if it doesn't work, you know its something with the download. I've had quite a few people lately come to me with problems that turned out to be download related (because MapUpdate isn't well tolerant of faults).

 

The disadvantage is also that its all or nothing. You can't try a few times to get everything and get a bit right at a time, which means that it may take longer to get the file.

 

We'll see how it goes in general.

 

Dale

[+ibycus]

The non-ISO version is now uploaded. http://www.ibycus.com/ibycustopo/IbycusTopo21.zip . Use this version if you don't know what an ISO is.

 

Dale

[+DanOCan]

Alrighty, I "uninstalled" my Beta version and have started the ISO download. Right now it's clicking along at anywhere from 250KB - 350KB / second.

 

EDIT: I checked this morning and showed completed but it only pulled down 242MB. Trying again....

Edited October 16, 2008 by DanOCan

[+ibycus]

Alrighty, I "uninstalled" my Beta version and have started the ISO download. Right now it's clicking along at anywhere from 250KB - 350KB / second.

 

EDIT: I checked this morning and showed completed but it only pulled down 242MB. Trying again....

 

What are you downloading with? I find Firefox is much better at handling large files than IE.

[+DyverDown]

Are the files online right now?

 

I can't seem to get th eDL to start at all..... just a blank zip file

 

 

Alrighty, I "uninstalled" my Beta version and have started the ISO download. Right now it's clicking along at anywhere from 250KB - 350KB / second.

 

EDIT: I checked this morning and showed completed but it only pulled down 242MB. Trying again....

[+ziploc n baggie]

Got it on the third try. Installed fine.

 

Good. The big advantage I see to distributing it as a single file, as that its an 'all or nothing' play. So if it doesn't work, you know its something with the download. I've had quite a few people lately come to me with problems that turned out to be download related (because MapUpdate isn't well tolerant of faults).

 

The disadvantage is also that its all or nothing. You can't try a few times to get everything and get a bit right at a time, which means that it may take longer to get the file.

 

We'll see how it goes in general.

 

Dale

 

Got it on my fourth try with no problems last night and installed it this morning.

Works great.

Many thanks

[+rovers3]

Downloaded iso this morning first try using Safari on my Mac. Took 1 3/4 hrs at 500+kbs I am currently burning it to DVD which I hope works on my laptop with XP. Never tried this before.

[Tzetzo]

Are the files online right now?

 

I can't seem to get th eDL to start at all..... just a blank zip file

 

 

Alrighty, I "uninstalled" my Beta version and have started the ISO download. Right now it's clicking along at anywhere from 250KB - 350KB / second.

 

EDIT: I checked this morning and showed completed but it only pulled down 242MB. Trying again....

I am having the same problem.

Just tried to download, and all I get is a zip file that is empty.

Tried Firefox and IE, both failed.

[DarkAngel88]

Hi there, first time poster here !!

 

First of all, I'd like to say a big thank you to ibycus for the great map you came up with. It's trully a master piece and I encourage you to continue your good work.

 

Second of all, I've downloaded the ISO version you put available yesterday and it works flawlessly !! Quite a big download but with firefox, no issue at all, got it within 45 min.

 

Thirdly, I have a easy yet important question for me. Would it be too difficule for you ibycus to set the topo map as a transparent layer ?? For example, I'm using the America 2009 NT map pack from Garmin for my everyday use and when I want to use the topo card, I have to unselect the right maps on my GPS so the ones you created gets visible. Wouldn't it be easier to set the topo maps you created as transparent so people won't have to disable other maps to see it ?

 

Also, I know that it might sound complicated but the format you use right now under MapSource got me to select all the little squares to select the space I want. Wouldn't it be simplier to select the province you need, no other options offered ? Might be something I don't understand on the way to use MapSource but it's kind of hard to select all the needed territory square by square.

 

Anyway that was my .02 cents. If you need any help on this, let me know !

 

Thanks

 

DA

[+Red90]

I can probably answer for Dale (he is a busy guy [] )

 

He could make the topographic lines transparent. I think he disucssed this way back in the thread. But this would be a completely new mapset and would depend if he wanted to expend the effort. Other data in the maps would not work well transparently.

 

He has sized the map tiles to not exceed 8 MB. This is because some units (i.e. Legend) only have 8 MB of storage.

 

You can just grab all the squares by making a box while holding down the cursor.

[DarkAngel88]

You can just grab all the squares by making a box while holding down the cursor.

 

Oh.. I didn't know that... I'll try that tonight, thanks !

 

About the transparent topographic lines, I don't see any other "data" required other than the topo lines. Streets and other indications should be provided by the other map pack, in my case the America 2009 NT one. This would reduce the total size of the maps provided by Dale and would be a nice addition to the other packs.

 

What would be needed (effort wise) to set only the topo lines transparent and discard all the other infos ?

[+Red90]

...I don't see any other "data" required other than the topo lines. Streets and other indications should be provided by the other map pack, in my case the America 2009 NT one.

 

Actually, there is LOTS of other data that is missing in CNNA.

 

- Detailed water features.

- Forest coverage.

- Roads in rural areas.

- Road data is more up to date.

- Cutlines.

- Railways.

- Powerlines.

-.......

 

CNNA2009 is pretty good in major cities and on highways, but in the rest of the country does not provide much information. Things like forest cover and water features are extremely important outside of the cities when caching or hiking or the like.

[Mag Magician]

I'm working on the second download attempt right now. The first one failed with an empty zip file. An, yes, I'm using the latest Firefox. Problem is, the download manager thought it finished, so I have to start all over.

[+Red90]

Example:

 

Canmore with Ibycus Topo 2.1

 

With City Navigator North America NT 2009

[+Luc & Sweety]

Argh..Gave up on the ISO..Apparently NERO doesn't like Vista. So downloaded the ZIP instead. Oh and BTW, got both downloads in one shot.

 

Anyhow, unzipped the ZIP and started the install. I dunno if its a Vista issue or what but it only gets about 5% into the install and then Windows Explorer stops responding and Vista takes over and re-starts it effectively killing the install process. Tried turning all the scanners and everything off but doesn't seem to help.

 

Anyone have any suggestions? And before someone else says it, no switching to XP is not an option.

[DarkAngel88]

Hmmm.. interresting point Red90. I'm gonna have to check it twice. Not that I don't believe you but I haven't saw those details... must be because the region that I'm interrested in is pretty complete OR I haven't seen anything that I need that isn't there.

 

Anyone knows a good way to remove a complete mapset from the gps menu ?

[+KFBradley]

Argh..Gave up on the ISO..Apparently NERO doesn't like Vista. So downloaded the ZIP instead. Oh and BTW, got both downloads in one shot.

 

Anyhow, unzipped the ZIP and started the install. I dunno if its a Vista issue or what but it only gets about 5% into the install and then Windows Explorer stops responding and Vista takes over and re-starts it effectively killing the install process. Tried turning all the scanners and everything off but doesn't seem to help.

 

Anyone have any suggestions? And before someone else says it, no switching to XP is not an option.

 

Hmm, I use Vista and the install worked just fine for me. I also used the ISO file, but try mounting it using Daemon Tools (google it), I don't really trust Nero. Let us know if that works.

[+KFBradley]

Hmmm.. interresting point Red90. I'm gonna have to check it twice. Not that I don't believe you but I haven't saw those details... must be because the region that I'm interrested in is pretty complete OR I haven't seen anything that I need that isn't there.

 

Anyone knows a good way to remove a complete mapset from the gps menu ?

 

From the Maps menu on your GPS where you select and deselect map tiles, hit the menu button and you should see another menu where you can enable or disable an entire mapset at a time.

[+Luc & Sweety]

 

 

Hmm, I use Vista and the install worked just fine for me. I also used the ISO file, but try mounting it using Daemon Tools (google it), I don't really trust Nero. Let us know if that works.

 

Found another program to burn the ISO. Burnt it fine and verified it. Went to install it and zilch. Program starts but then Vista comes up with the "This Program might not of Installed Correctly" window and then the program terminates abnormally.

 

I see it did manage to register Ibycus Topo in Mapsource cause I see the listing for it now but when I select it, the maps are blank.

 

Back to square one for me.

[+ibycus]

 

 

Hmm, I use Vista and the install worked just fine for me. I also used the ISO file, but try mounting it using Daemon Tools (google it), I don't really trust Nero. Let us know if that works.

 

Found another program to burn the ISO. Burnt it fine and verified it. Went to install it and zilch. Program starts but then Vista comes up with the "This Program might not of Installed Correctly" window and then the program terminates abnormally.

 

I see it did manage to register Ibycus Topo in Mapsource cause I see the listing for it now but when I select it, the maps are blank.

 

Back to square one for me.

 

If you've got it registered in mapsource (Ibycus Topo 2.1), just copy all the files from the DVD to the install path (Default is \Program Files\Ibycus Topo\)

 

Any of the numbered IMGs should be in \imgs\, all other files should be in the parent directory (same setup as on the DVD).

 

Very strange problem though... Pretty sure the registering with mapsource is the last thing it does, so if it managed to do that... well it should have done everything else already. When I have a chance I'll try it out on my vista machine.

 

Make sure you have "Show GPS Map Detail" turned on (hit Control-G) and make sure you are zoomed in far enough.

 

To answer why I don't group tiles by province, the individual tiles get *way* too big. Saskatchewan is nearly 200MB. I doubt I could even *compile* an IMG file that big, let alone use it.

 

In theory I could create a transparent topo-only layer, and if I get enough demand for it, or if I feel like its something I might use, one day I will (so if this is something you're interested in let me know)

 

Dale

[DarkAngel88]

Hi Dale,

 

Thanks for the clarifications. I see why you don't create full province tiles.. makes sense !

 

As for the transparent layer, after looking at another one for the US (I'm from Quebec so I'm not really interrested in the whole US map) I'd really appreciate to try it with the transparent layer. It's going to be more than useful for me and others too, I'm pretty sure.

 

So yes, I'm interrested in a transparent layer for Canada. If I can be of any help to you, I'll be pleased to give you a hand.

 

PS : Thanks KFBradley for the hint.