Geocaching.com and a Linux desktop

[+astro-nut]

I saw the previous posts out here on using Linux and not being able to access a GPS device (ie, "send to my GPS" on the website). Unfortunately

this seems to have broke when I moved from Windows/XP to Linux (Redhat). I have a virtual Windows/7 environment (built with GTK-VNC, SPICE-GTK and libvirt)

that seems to run things fine (expect that it says my GPS isn't connected).

 

It seems like the Linux host "sees" the GPS (when I do a lsusb) I see it in the list - but things fail when communicating with it.

 

anybody have any ideas ? help....please !!!!

 

oh - it's a Garmin GPSMap60C if that matter

 

--Matt (aka astro-nut)

[+Gitchee-Gummee]

I admit to being clueless regarding Linux.... but you mention Win7, so maybe it would help you to look at this link: http://support.Groundspeak.com/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=215 .

[+Viajero Perdido]

So if I understand you correctly, you're trying to have the GPS connect to the Windows 7 virtual machine, not the Linux host, right? It can be connected to one or the other, but not both.

 

I do this myself; I run Linux Mint for day-to-day stuff, but fire up a crusty old Windows XP VM for GSAK and MapSource as needed. Years ago I had to dig into the configuration files in the host (inside .vmware if I recall correctly) to enable pass-thru; details long forgotten. The HOWTO will be different for your setup anyway.

 

So I can't really help you, sorry. The setting is somewhere on the host. Try googling for "USB pass thru" or somesuch. Good luck!

[+astro-nut]

So if I understand you correctly, you're trying to have the GPS connect to the Windows 7 virtual machine, not the Linux host, right? It can be connected to one or the other, but not both.

 

I do this myself; I run Linux Mint for day-to-day stuff, but fire up a crusty old Windows XP VM for GSAK and MapSource as needed. Years ago I had to dig into the configuration files in the host (inside .vmware if I recall correctly) to enable pass-thru; details long forgotten. The HOWTO will be different for your setup anyway.

 

So I can't really help you, sorry. The setting is somewhere on the host. Try googling for "USB pass thru" or somesuch. Good luck!

 

Yes, I'd like to access it via the Window's 7 virtual client (since the plugin for adding caches to a GPS isn't supported on linux). But I'd be just as happy

taking a pocket query and uploading it from the Linux host.

 

do you use anything to access your GPS from a native Linux box ? I'd like to see if its an issue of communication between linux and the GPS or the virt client

and the Linux box.

 

thanks....

[+Viajero Perdido]

Directly from Linux, I only use the file manager (I meant command line, cough) to sometimes rearrange files manually. For everything else, I just resort to the Win apps. Not enough time in the day to make a complete break from Windows...

 

Thinking about it again, I think nowadays my VMware Player takes care of grabbing the USB from the host if needed; it'll pop up a dialog asking for permission to do so, etc. It was in the days of PDAs when I had to manually tweak the config files to pass thru the PDA and not other gadgets; it was possible to configure it somehow to tell the difference.

 

For debugging, you may want to try accessing the GPS from Windows Explorer. That would test the pass-thru from Linux. (Oh, and you need to put the GPS into USB Mass Storage Mode to see the files, and NOT put it in that mode for Win apps to talk to it. You knew that, right?)

 

Unfortunately, your GPSMap60C doesn't take GPX files directly, though there might be a Linux app to convert them (anybody know?), allowing you to bypass Windows.

Edited January 2, 2014 by Viajero Perdido

[robertlipe]

GPSBabel supports that Garmin model and works exactly the same on Linux, Mac, and Windows. That model was way before file transfer of GPX files; it requires a custom USB protocol that I had to reverse engineer using equipment costing many tens of thousands of dollars.

 

As for virtual machines, many of them don't get the USB plumbed through quite enough to be transparent for devices of this type. The 60CS is far more finicky (pronounced "makes a far bigger mocker of the USB specification that any VM implementor would care about) than, say, a USB thumb drive. Using a Windows GPSBabel via VMWare or Parallels or VirtualBox or Wine or whatever is far more likely to be an adventure than using native GPSBabel.

[tttedzeins]

I would say Viajero Perdido is very close. Can you use your USB ports normally in the windows vm ? If so try unmounting the g's from within Linux and see if that helps. Sorry I can't be too much more help but am not familiar with redhat at all.

[robertlipe]

The 60c has no mass storage mode. There is nothing to unmount. Its Garmin protocol only.

[+MartyBartfast]

GPSBabel supports that Garmin model and works exactly the same on Linux, Mac, and Windows.

 

Another vote for using GPSBabel from the Linux box to send the .gpx to the GPS, I've been doing this for several years now and it's a breeze. If you also use GSAK for other features then I guess you'd want to export your caches from GSAK to a .gpx file, then send that to the GPS from the Linux commandline. If you really want you could also write a udev rule on the Linux box so that as soon as it sees the GPS plugged in it will go hunt for the .gpx files and automatically upload them - I used to have it do that with my Vista but since I switched to an Etrex 30 I use the Mass Storage mode now.

[+sastorsl]

Since this was the first post that popped up on Google when I search for "geocaching" and "linux" I'll add what I found.

 

I installed Fedora 20 - fedoraproject.org.

 

The following I did according to a doc - so please search and find the latest process for your Linux variant and what you need to install!

 

Updated to be sure I had the latest updates and kernel, and did a reboot.

Installed: yum install binutils gcc make patch libgomp glibc-headers glibc-devel kernel-headers kernel-devel dkms

Then I installed VirtualBox, with the yum.repo from VirtualBox.

Added my personal user (not root...) to the "vboxusers" group.

Installed the Extension pack to VirtualBox.

 

In VirtualBox I've created a guest OS with Windows 8, connected USB, installed GSAK, and just 60 minutes ago used the GarminExport macro to update my GPS with the latest updates.

[robertlipe]

GSAK is a nifty program and if you need what it does, it's at the front of the class.

 

If you just want to ship a pocket query to a GPS (because you've done all the appropriate filtering when creating the pocket query) installing VirtualBox and Windows and GSAK and Export macros and so on are overkill. It's kind of baffling that your recipe involves installing compilers, assemblers, and linkers[1].

 

If you have a old GPS that needs funky files (Explorist x00, instead of x10) or a custom protocol (Garmin 60, 60C, 60CS, anything with a serial port, etc.) use native Linux GPSBabel - even the GUI - and choose GPX as the file input and the appropriate device/format/protocol for output.

 

If your GPS is pretty much anything designed in the the 6-8 years (i.e. it's geocaching aware and supports pocket queries) just copy the GPX file to the device. For this class of devices, you can still use GPSBabel to "fix" names, suppress duplicates, and so on, but it really is optional.

 

You might even find inspiration in http://www.gpsbabel.org/tips/geocaching.html or (the admittedly aging) http://www.gpsbabel.org/tips/browser.html ,though you can adjust that for newer devices.

 

[1] And, yes, I DO know what those are; I was a maintainer of several of packages long ago. There is a directory in G++ testsuite named "robertl" - that's me.)