Adjust Coords before "send to GPS"

[+Pebbelz]

Hi folks,

 

does anybody know, if there is a way to adjust the coordinates of a cache before downloading to GPS?

 

Reason - I love to solve such "Mystery and Puzzle" Caches. Those kind of caches mostly have a "nearby" coordinate listed, while the real final coordinate have to be researched and calculated.

 

Now, When I load this cache to my Garmin, I load as well the "nearby" coordinate and I have to adjust the real coordinate on my Garmin ... which is quite unconfortable on my device.

 

And as a second dream I'm looking for a way to make some "personal" Notes to a cache which might be loaded to my device as well.

 

Any hint is appreciated

Pebbelz

[+McBack]

I use GSAK. When I solve a Mystery I can add "corrected coordinates" to a cache. Then when transfered from GSAK to the GPS I have the right coordinates to a cache.

 

There is user notes also in the GSAK, but I haven't tried to transfer them.

Edited August 27, 2009 by McBack

[+fegan]

If you use a paperless GPS (like a Garmin Colorado or Oregon) and use GSAK to correct the coordinates and add a note with additional information the note can be included as the first log...very handy feature.

[+FraCaMen]

does anybody know, if there is a way to adjust the coordinates of a cache before downloading to GPS?

 

No not possible. It has been requested before quite often. One of them is here: http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=226211

[+Pebbelz]

Thank you all, for your feedback ...

 

I just tried GSAK and it looks very comfortable for me ... and it seems there are tons of other features which I never thought about - probably it's a chalange to figure out all the features ... but I am a child in the body of an old man ... so keep playing

 

EDIT:

For those which observe HTML trash in the cache description of their Oregon and probably Colordao device, follow this

link

where a GSAK-Macro is offered which makes some housekeeping jobs ... and finally cleans up the html trash

 

Pebbelz

Edited August 27, 2009 by Pebbelz

[+niraD]

Another option is boulter's Geocaching Basecamp, which is what I use. (GSAK runs only on MS Windows.)

[+Corey]

You could create a waypoint with the correct location and info in a desktop program (maybe EasyGPS?) then transfer it to the GPSr.

[+fizzymagic]

The problem with all the third-party app solutions is that they don't work for caching with mobile devices. And they don't work when you are in the field and want to grab a cache.

 

So while the work-arounds are certainly appreciated, they don't solve the problem.

 

BTW, niraD, I have a cool C++ app I wrote to correct coords and adds user notes that works on Macs and *nixes. Uses xerces. Let me know if you want it.

[+niraD]

The problem with all the third-party app solutions is that they don't work for caching with mobile devices. And they don't work when you are in the field and want to grab a cache.

Amen.

 

BTW, niraD, I have a cool C++ app I wrote to correct coords and adds user notes that works on Macs and *nixes. Uses xerces. Let me know if you want it.

Thanks for the offer. I may take you up on it if I ever get a "real" GPSr that I can download waypoints to. Right now, I'm moving towards keeping all this data in the cloud until I download it to GeoBeagle running on Android. Geocaching Basecamp fits nicely into this model (although having the feature built into Geocaching.com would fit even more nicely).

[+pppingme]

The problem with all the third-party app solutions is that they don't work for caching with mobile devices.

Huh, I don't have any problems at all exporting from GSAK to my mobile device, which I run a couple different apps for geocaching. Takes me less than a couple minutes to load a couple thousand caches.

 

And they don't work when you are in the field and want to grab a cache.

And neither does my mobile device. You may only cache in urban areas, but when your out in middle of nowhere between mountains, getting a cell signal isn't exactly easy. This sounds more like a planning issue than a technology or software issue.

[+niraD]

The problem with all the third-party app solutions is that they don't work for caching with mobile devices.

Huh, I don't have any problems at all exporting from GSAK to my mobile device, which I run a couple different apps for geocaching. Takes me less than a couple minutes to load a couple thousand caches.

That doesn't sound like caching with mobile devices to me. That sounds like caching with mobile devices and an MS Windows box. And that was fizzymagic's point: third-party apps require another system to run the app, in addition to one's mobile device.

 

And they don't work when you are in the field and want to grab a cache.

And neither does my mobile device. You may only cache in urban areas, but when your out in middle of nowhere between mountains, getting a cell signal isn't exactly easy. This sounds more like a planning issue than a technology or software issue.

I've had coverage in a lot of areas that weren't urban, or even suburban. On vacation a couple weeks ago, my wife and I drove up a gravel road, continued on the dirt road, parked the minivan when the road got bad enough to require 4x4, and hiked to a secluded waterfall where we had lunch. After I found the nearby cache, I used my mobile device to get online to record my find. In less remote places, I almost always have coverage.

 

I'm not saying you can get coverage "out in middle of nowhere between mountains", but enough of us can get coverage in enough places that this feature would be very useful. Especially for puzzlers who have dozens (or even hundreds) of solved but unfound puzzle caches. In particular, a lot of web-capable devices can use the Geocaching.com search function to find the caches nearest to one's current coordinates. It would be nice if this function could use the corrected coordinates for puzzle caches that one has solved.

Edited August 28, 2009 by niraD

[+fizzymagic]

This sounds more like a planning issue than a technology or software issue.

Ah, the venerable "I don't need this feature so nobody does" argument. Haven't seen it for three or four days. How lucky you are that the way you cache is the way everyone should cache.

 

I've personally experienced several different situations where I would have very much liked this feature that have nothing to do with "planning." I was visiting family this summer, for example, and I was able to update cache pages in my PN-40 using the "send to GPS" feature on their Mac. Too bad I couldn't "plan ahead" and run GSAK on their machine, huh?

[+fegan]

The problem with all the third-party app solutions is that they don't work for caching with mobile devices. And they don't work when you are in the field and want to grab a cache.

 

The Groundspeak app for the iPhone allows you to create your own waypoints (not sure about other Groundspeak supported mobile apps) so you can do a multi/puzzle cache with an iPhone.

 

So you must be talking about some 3rd Party solution...which is not Groundspeaks' problem/issue.

[+niraD]

The Groundspeak app for the iPhone allows you to create your own waypoints (not sure about other Groundspeak supported mobile apps) so you can do a multi/puzzle cache with an iPhone.

Does it copy all the cache info when you create the new waypoint? Or do you have to keep switching between your new waypoint (with the solved coordinates) and the original waypoint (with all the other information about the cache)?

 

Is there any plan to port the Groundspeak app to other platforms? Or to integrate the features into the Geocaching.com site itself so it's available to anyone with a web-enabled mobile device?

[AZcachemeister]

This sounds more like a planning issue than a technology or software issue.

Ah, the venerable "I don't need this feature so nobody does" argument. Haven't seen it for three or four days. How lucky you are that the way you cache is the way everyone should cache.

 

I've personally experienced several different situations where I would have very much liked this feature that have nothing to do with "planning." I was visiting family this summer, for example, and I was able to update cache pages in my PN-40 using the "send to GPS" feature on their Mac. Too bad I couldn't "plan ahead" and run GSAK on their machine, huh?

 

OK, so you went to bed (in your own bed in your own house) but you woke up on the couch at your relatives house with an unplanned urge to go Geocaching?

 

What I derive from this request is the ability for every user to modify and save their own personal version of every cache page and store it on the Geocaching website. Then, when they send it to their 'unit', their modified co-ordinates (or whatever) are sent rather than the 'original' content of the cache page.

 

No need for third-party software.

No need to know how to operate your overly-complicated GPSr.

 

Is that about right?

[+niraD]

Is that about right?

Yes, that's about right.

 

For traditional caches, I can just download a PQ to my device and go.

 

I'd like to be able to do the same with puzzle caches, once I've solved them. And in some cases, with multi-caches, when I don't find the final on the same day.

 

I don't want to edit the coordinates on the device, only to have the corrected coordinates overwritten when I download the next PQ.

 

I can use third-party apps, but that adds another step to the process, which has to be repeated every time I download another PQ. It also adds a dependency on the system that runs the third-party app. I'd rather have the corrected coordinates as part of the existing set of tools: Geocaching.com PQs and my device. Also, if the feature is added to my device (or to the app that I run on my device, or to a third-party app), then it benefits only people running the same set of tools. If the feature is added to Geocaching.com, then it benefits a lot more people.

 

Also, this is useful for more than just searching for caches. When I'm ready to hide a cache, it would be useful to load all the nearby caches, including the finals for the puzzles and multis that I've found, to check whether my potential hide is too close to any of them.

[+fegan]

I can use third-party apps, but that adds another step to the process, which has to be repeated every time I download another PQ.

No, that's not correct...if you're using GSAK. Once you have corrected the coordinates in GSAK they will stick. Any future download of that same PQ (e.g. one that includes a solved, yet unfound, puzzle) will retain your corrected coordinates.

 

Also, this is useful for more than just searching for caches. When I'm ready to hide a cache, it would be useful to load all the nearby caches, including the finals for the puzzles and multis that I've found, to check whether my potential hide is too close to any of them.

Again, using GSAK will give you exactly that. I have all my found and hidden caches loaded as Points of Interest (POIs)...as well as the caches I'm searching for. So, should I decide to hide something I will have all the information I need to avoid placing something inside the 528ft rules...possible exception being a new hide that's still in the review queue, or a puzzle/multi I haven't found yet (I've done almost all of those within a 20 mile radius of my home, so I don't have many worries there).

 

Those who haven't learned the power of GSAK area really missing out. It makes your geo-life so much easier once you've learned to leverage its power.

[+fizzymagic]

I was visiting family this summer, for example, and I was able to update cache pages in my PN-40 using the "send to GPS" feature on their Mac. Too bad I couldn't "plan ahead" and run GSAK on their machine, huh?

OK, so you went to bed (in your own bed in your own house) but you woke up on the couch at your relatives house with an unplanned urge to go Geocaching?

No, I went to my family's house in another state for more than a week, during which time new caches came up, I solved a couple puzzles, and existing caches had new logs and other changes. I also had the opportunity to go caching in an area that I had not planned for and did not load caches into my GPS, as it only holds 1000 waypoints.

 

What I derive from this request is the ability for every user to modify and save their own personal version of every cache page and store it on the Geocaching website. Then, when they send it to their 'unit', their modified co-ordinates (or whatever) are sent rather than the 'original' content of the cache page.

 

No need for third-party software.

No need to know how to operate your overly-complicated GPSr.

 

Is that about right?

Nope.

 

Nobody is asking for entirely changed cache pages; just for an ability to modify coordinates of those unknown caches that they have solutions for on the fly.

 

What I derive from your (rude and condescending) response is that every cacher should be psychic and always able to prepare for caching ahead of time in every instance.

 

Is that about right?

Edited August 29, 2009 by fizzymagic

[+fizzymagic]

.if you're using GSAK. Once you have corrected the coordinates in GSAK they will stick. Any future download of that same PQ (e.g. one that includes a solved, yet unfound, puzzle) will retain your corrected coordinates.

Wrong. Corrected coordinates are not preserved across databases. You have to re-apply them in every database you download the waypoint to.

 

Those who haven't learned the power of GSAK area really missing out. It makes your geo-life so much easier once you've learned to leverage its power.

Nice little advertisement, but there are a couple little problems. First, GSAK does not run on non-Windows machines (haven't we mentioned that before), and second, GSAK is not included with your site membership.

 

Also, the author of GSAK takes other people's innovations and makes money off them while pretending they are his own. Behavior quite similar to that of Microsoft, in fact.

Edited August 29, 2009 by fizzymagic

[+niraD]

I can use third-party apps, but that adds another step to the process, which has to be repeated every time I download another PQ.

No, that's not correct...if you're using GSAK.

Even with GSAK (which is not available on the platforms I have), I would still need to rerun GSAK for every PQ. That's what I meant by "adds another step to the process". Right now I do pretty much the same thing, except I send PQs through Geocaching Basecamp, rather than sending them through GSAK. But it would be easier if I could just download PQs directly to the device with the coordinates already corrected.

 

Those who haven't learned the power of GSAK area really missing out.

So I've heard. Maybe I should ask for some of those great features to be supported directly by Geocaching.com, so more people can take advantage of them, and so they're easier to use...

[AZcachemeister]

 

No, I went to my family's house in another state for more than a week, during which time new caches came up, I solved a couple puzzles, and existing caches had new logs and other changes. I also had the opportunity to go caching in an area that I had not planned for and did not load caches into my GPS, as it only holds 1000 waypoints.

 

So you were visiting for over a week (in an area you had not planned to cache in, yet there was no lack of planning issue) and in that period you were not able to figure out how to modify the co-ordinates in your GPSr for the puzzles you solved, nor how to download the newer caches in the area?

 

Is that about right?

 

What I derive from this request is the ability for every user to modify and save their own personal version of every cache page and store it on the Geocaching website. Then, when they send it to their 'unit', their modified co-ordinates (or whatever) are sent rather than the 'original' content of the cache page.

 

No need for third-party software.

No need to know how to operate your overly-complicated GPSr.

 

Is that about right?

 

Nope.

 

Nobody is asking for entirely changed cache pages; just for an ability to modify coordinates of those unknown caches that they have solutions for on the fly.

 

What I derive from your (rude and condescending) response is that every cacher should be psychic and always able to prepare for caching ahead of time in every instance.

 

Is that about right?

 

OK, so you just want the ability to change the listed co-ordinates in your personal version of the cache-page? Perhaps only an option for the Unknown cache type?

 

Is that about right?

[+fegan]

.if you're using GSAK. Once you have corrected the coordinates in GSAK they will stick. Any future download of that same PQ (e.g. one that includes a solved, yet unfound, puzzle) will retain your corrected coordinates.

Wrong. Corrected coordinates are not preserved across databases. You have to re-apply them in every database you download the waypoint to.

No, actually you're doing something that simply doesn't make sense to me.

 

Why would you load the same PQ into a different database? Loading it into the same database will build a history of logs (beyond the 5 you get from a PQ, or the 20 you get from a cache page) and will retain any notes, corrected coordinates, child waypoints, etc. which you've added.

 

And...if you copy a waypoint from one database to another database it WILL retain corrected coordinates, notes, child waypoints, etc.

 

Sounds like you need to brush up on GSAK so you understand how it works, rather than simply saying it doesn't work.

[+fegan]

I can use third-party apps, but that adds another step to the process, which has to be repeated every time I download another PQ.

No, that's not correct...if you're using GSAK.

Even with GSAK (which is not available on the platforms I have), I would still need to rerun GSAK for every PQ. That's what I meant by "adds another step to the process". Right now I do pretty much the same thing, except I send PQs through Geocaching Basecamp, rather than sending them through GSAK. But it would be easier if I could just download PQs directly to the device with the coordinates already corrected.

 

Those who haven't learned the power of GSAK area really missing out.

So I've heard. Maybe I should ask for some of those great features to be supported directly by Geocaching.com, so more people can take advantage of them, and so they're easier to use...

 

Well I don't consider it an extra step because I run all my PQs through GSAK. I don't load the entire 500 caches from each of my PQs to my GPS...only the ones I intend on looking for in my next geocaching trip or two for a particular area. Of the 6,000 geocaches I have in my GSAK database I only load about 1,500-1,600 on my GPS. So, as I already said, I run ALL my PQs through GSAK and have the records I'm going to load on my GPS flagged so I can update them (with new logs) or remove them (if they have been disabled or archived)...and those which I've added corrected coordinates, child waypoints, etc. retain that information so I don't have to update it every time.

[AZcachemeister]

.if you're using GSAK. Once you have corrected the coordinates in GSAK they will stick. Any future download of that same PQ (e.g. one that includes a solved, yet unfound, puzzle) will retain your corrected coordinates.

Wrong. Corrected coordinates are not preserved across databases. You have to re-apply them in every database you download the waypoint to.

No, actually you're doing something that simply doesn't make sense to me.

 

Why would you load the same PQ into a different database? Loading it into the same database will build a history of logs (beyond the 5 you get from a PQ, or the 20 you get from a cache page) and will retain any notes, corrected coordinates, child waypoints, etc. which you've added.

 

And...if you copy a waypoint from one database to another database it WILL retain corrected coordinates, notes, child waypoints, etc.

 

Sounds like you need to brush up on GSAK so you understand how it works, rather than simply saying it doesn't work.

 

Actually this is pretty-much on-target.

I have both a state-wide database, and a 'personal list' database.

The statewide database is for all caches in AZ, and the 'personal list' is for those in AZ that I have not found.

I only load the PQs into the statewide database to keep track of individual cache status.

[+fizzymagic]

No, actually you're doing something that simply doesn't make sense to me.

 

...

 

Sounds like you need to brush up on GSAK so you understand how it works, rather than simply saying it doesn't work.

 

Ah, so now we get the "you don't do things the way I think you should, so you are wrong" lecture.

 

How amusing, given that the whole "corrected coords" thing is one of those features that ClydE stole without attribution.

 

From me, as it happens.

[+dakboy]

Those who haven't learned the power of GSAK area really missing out. It makes your geo-life so much easier once you've learned to leverage its power.

Call me when GSAK runs natively on MacOS or Linux.

 

And no, MacCaching doesn't cut it.

Edited August 31, 2009 by dakboy