+kunarion Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 If I'm given a list of waypoints (coordinates for temporary caches) on paper, what's the best way to send them to a GPSr, and particularly to a bunch of GPSrs? I'm kinda thinking of something like OCR on a laptop -- scan them all in, convert them somehow to GPX files (I'm pretty sure GSAK can do that part), then load each GPSr via the USB port. But ...as streamlined as possible. Sometimes I'll bring my Garmin to a Geocaching 101 event, so there's one more GPSr available. Usually there's a list of temporary caches, with "cache names", hints, and coordinates, printed on a sheet of paper. Eventually, someone drops by with a half-dozen GPSrs I've never seen before (and get to figure out how to enter the "caches" into before the hunt can begin). So I fat-finger most of them OK, but one's probably in the Indian Ocean or Peru. Sorry. Quote Link to comment
team tisri Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 If you dropped one in Peru by mistake it will be a good lesson to people that sometimes coordinates are inaccurate. Seriously, I've seen a cache go live barely half a mile from my home that described a tree when the coordinates were for a block of flats, only to find someone put W instead of E on their coords. I've also seen a puzzle cache in the US based on a mythical cacher who was supposed to leave their box in mainland China but got W and E mixed up. Mixing up N and S at the same time would take some doing but if you're using numeric format rather than hemisphere format it's easily done if you put the wrong signs on. Quote Link to comment
+user13371 Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 K, I think you've already outlined the "best" solution. You're gonna need to scan, OCR, and proofread the caches, run them through GSAK, and load them. The proofreading is going to be very, very important - because a mistake in OCR will be as likely to drop you in the ocean as fat-fingering it the old fashioned way. Maybe a valuable exercise for you students. Quote Link to comment
seldom_sn Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 When do you get the paper, and how do the caches get on the paper? At home or in the field? Pen or pencil or printer? If in the field, and printer, why can't they be on a memory stick as a CSV file instead? Quote Link to comment
+kunarion Posted May 24, 2012 Author Share Posted May 24, 2012 (edited) why can't they be on a memory stick as a CSV file instead? Yeah! I'll just tell the class coordinator that I require a certain file format on a memory stick before I shall grace the event with my presence. That'll learn 'em! I just now noticed that I can "Send To GPS" my non-active caches (yet the "GPX file" link gives a blank screen, unfortunately). Once a cache is in GyPSy, I can send waypoints to certain other modern Garmins -- that's a wonderful feature. Anyway, if people want to learn Geocaching, they probably need the cache page loaded onto their GPSr just as it would normally (hint and all, if supported). So if I did have that CSV file, I could make cache pages by cut-and-paste of the coords -- no typos! Except that I don't have a live data connection (no wireless contract on my laptop), which means no website to edit a cache on. I'd have to find a Hotspot. Maybe if I get to the event early enough... Edited May 24, 2012 by kunarion Quote Link to comment
seldom_sn Posted May 24, 2012 Share Posted May 24, 2012 Except that I don't have a live data connection (no wireless contract on my laptop), which means no website to edit a cache on. I'd have to find a Hotspot. Maybe if I get to the event early enough... I don't geocache, so this may be really ignorant, but can't you find an offline app that will do what you want, GSAK maybe? I know you can turn CSVs to Waypoints with GPSbabel, and you can turn CSVs to POI with Garmin's POI loader. Both those run off a local drive. Quote Link to comment
+kunarion Posted May 24, 2012 Author Share Posted May 24, 2012 (edited) Except that I don't have a live data connection (no wireless contract on my laptop), which means no website to edit a cache on. I'd have to find a Hotspot. Maybe if I get to the event early enough... I don't geocache, so this may be really ignorant, but can't you find an offline app that will do what you want, GSAK maybe? I know you can turn CSVs to Waypoints with GPSbabel, and you can turn CSVs to POI with Garmin's POI loader. Both those run off a local drive. I did use POI loader a couple of years ago (for my car GPS, and POIs formatted so I'd get an onscreen notice when a Geocache was near). Yes, ordinary waypoints are fine, just a name and coords. A real Geocache often involves no typing, just "send it" from the web site. At some Events, I'm handed a sheet of paper, "These Geocaches are new, so they'll be active within the next couple of days". I like to go find them, but I do not like sitting around for a while entering them into GyPSy. That's a lotta typo potential . I'm still eyeing some OCR software, but also will spend more time on touch-screen typing practice. Edited May 24, 2012 by kunarion Quote Link to comment
+kunarion Posted May 24, 2012 Author Share Posted May 24, 2012 Except that I don't have a live data connection (no wireless contract on my laptop), which means no website to edit a cache on. I'd have to find a Hotspot. Maybe if I get to the event early enough... I don't geocache, so this may be really ignorant, but can't you find an offline app that will do what you want, GSAK maybe? I know you can turn CSVs to Waypoints with GPSbabel, and you can turn CSVs to POI with Garmin's POI loader. Both those run off a local drive. I did use POI loader a couple of years ago (for my car GPS, and POIs formatted so I'd get an onscreen notice when a Geocache was near). Yes, ordinary waypoints are fine, just a name and coords. At some Events, I'm handed a sheet of paper, "These Geocaches are new, so they'll be active within the next couple of days". I like to go find them, but I do not like sitting around for a while entering them into GyPSy. That's a lotta typo potential . I'm still eyeing some OCR software, but also will spend more time on touch-screen typing practice. Quote Link to comment
+Viajero Perdido Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 I hope the software can perfectly tell the difference between, say, "4" and "9" in the second-last position. One wasted search and you'll be happily entering coords by hand the next time. Quote Link to comment
+kunarion Posted May 25, 2012 Author Share Posted May 25, 2012 I hope the software can perfectly tell the difference between, say, "4" and "9" in the second-last position. I haven't used OCR in a while, but it was often pretty good with numbers on a printed page. Whether it can understand how to format coordinates, I have no idea. I was kinda hoping I wasn't breaking new ground here, but that there were several common ways to load a mass of temporarary caches on-the-fly from a list. Ah, well. Such is the life of a visionary... A Palm PDA stylus is working well on the touchscreen. I have a bunch of styli from the semi-retired PDA to choose. So that would help with the manual entry. Quote Link to comment
+Don_J Posted May 26, 2012 Share Posted May 26, 2012 (edited) I'll let you do the research, but the modern versions of Excel do have OCR capability. I have never used it so I can't comment on its capabilities. Assuming you can get it into Excel and format it properly, you can save it as a CSV file that GSAK will import it. The GSAK help file is here: http://gsak.net/help/hs5270.htm Edited May 26, 2012 by Don_J Quote Link to comment
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