Cachemate Step By Step?

[+Northern Trekker]

I am going paperless (commitment to myself at this point) . I have downloaded Cachemate, installed it on my palm and I have paid to become a Premium Member of Geocaching .

 

Ok, now I need the "go to the freezer and get the box" step-by-step directions (menu selections etc.) for getting the info from Geocaching.com to my PDA.

 

As an added bonus, does anyone have experience hooking up their GPS to the palm in order to automatically upload the files to the GPS - or can that be done directly from the PC with the Premium membership?

 

Thanks in advance for your assistance!!!

 

Northern Trekker

 

PS - not that I am impatient, but how long does it take to get the premium member benefits? 24 - 48 hours?

Edited December 2, 2003 by Northern Trekker

[+robert]

welcome to paperless caching! you will enjoy cachemate, it's a first rate program. make sure your pocket queries are set for GPX file, not LOC. it also helps to have them zipped to avoid various issues. when you get the file, unzip it to your desktop. run the CMConvert utility that comes with cachemate to create a PDB (palm database) file. you can now hot sync this to your handheld. after the file is on your handheld, run cachemate and it will ask you which category to put the file. i always put mine in the not found category, but after a while you customize your PQs a bit more for trips, etc. that's pretty much it. with the files you cannot however, dump the waypoints back to your gps AFAIK. you would create a separate PQ for that purpose, using the LOC option. there may be instances where you can dump the coords, but I don't know of any.

 

good luck!

[+pstar]

OK, lemme give this a shot...

 

If you have a premium membership, go to www.geocaching.com/pocket or click the 'visit the pocket query generator' via the link on your 'My Cache page'.

 

Create the search you want. I typically search by zip code. I choose 'EasyGPS GPX Format' and generate zip file. Run the search today if you want it today. This is a recurring search so every week this will run unless you delete after you get the zip file you want. Takes about 30 mins to get the file via email. Download the attachment, unzip the zip file.

 

Run cmconvert.exe (comes w/ cachemate). Select the options you want. I leave all boxes checked by default. Click 'Select All' then 'Convert'.

 

A Palm .pdb file will be created and it will prompt you for your Palm ID. The next time you sync, the caches will be downloaded to cachemate.

 

I love it! It's the only way to cache!

 

Good luck.

[+herbk]

I use a Macintosh and a Palm. As a charter member, I had been downloading the .loc and .prc files, the latter readable with MobiPocket (a most limited, annoying, and slightly flaky application). The .loc files I convert into waypoint files downloadable into my Garmin by using an application called MacGPS Pro.

 

My friend Steve L. one day sent me an email saying that he was dumping MobiPocket, that he was using a new application called Cachemate, and that processing the .gpx file was no more work than what we had been doing with the .loc file. He said that a freeware application called MacCMConvert would extract the .pdb file from the .gpx file, and that an animal called gpsbabel could extract .loc files from .gpx, and could also extract something that he could directly load into his Garmin, so that he didn't even need to create a .loc file unless he wanted to see the waypoint on a topographic map.

 

Well, for me, it was not that simple. He has a GPS V. I have a GPS 12. The difference is that I do not have all the icons on my Garmin, and the Geocache icon appears on my GPS unit as a little generic square icon. So, I use an editor on the .loc file and replace every occurrence of the string "Geocache" with the string "Flag."

 

The entire process is not too bad. geobabel is a UNIX application and I have to run it in terminal mode from a command line. It plants a .loc file wherever I want it. At that point, my process is the same as if I had requested a .loc file from geocaching.com. The other program, MacCMConvert produces the .pdb file that I load into my Palm.

 

I am ecstatic about Cachemate. With ModiPocket, all I could do was to look up the cache description with the "find" facility of the Palm. For the hint, this had to be done anew, as the hints were in a separate location. Stupid! With Cachemate, I can find any number of nearest caches to a given location, say home, can bookmark the ones I want for easy retrieval. The coordinates, description, and hint are separately accessible. I can log on that cache page the time of the find (both start and end times for the search) and any notes I want to make. I can mark the cache as "found," which puts it into a separate directory. Thus, when it is time to log my finds on the web site, I have all the information I need in the set of pages in the "found" directory. Truly makes life paperless except when I feel the need to print out a map before setting out.

[+GeoBond007]

To answer your other question about uploading to the gps. Use the same GPX file and use EasyGPS(free). Import the GPX into EasyGPS and then upload to your GPS. You will of course need the cable to connect the GPS to your computer. I use a Garmin yellow so I know Gramins will work I think the maggys work but snice I dont own one dont know for sure.

 

GeoBond007

[+herbk]

The point is that with my Garmin 12, the Geocache icon does not appear and gets replaced by a little generic icon which is the same as the one I get when I press the "mark" button. So, I want something distinctive, and the one I chose is a little flag. I therefore have to replace the word "Geocache" by the word "Flag" in the .loc file that I generate from the .gpx file. I cannot do this edit on the .gpx file; the word "Geocache" appears in too many extra places and I don't know what harm modifying it in all places would do. In the case of the .loc file, it appears once for every cache in the file.

 

So my point is that I must generate a .loc file. Direct loading of the Garmin from the .gpx file is not satisfactory for me. If I ever upgrade from by beloved GPS 12, it will be a different story.

[robertlipe]

an animal called gpsbabel could extract .loc files from .gpx, and could also extract something that he could directly load into his Garmin, so that he didn't even need to

Actually, GPSBabel should be able to do the upload itself, too. I've had reports that it works on a 12, but I've never personally tried it..

I use an editor on the .loc file and replace every occurrence of the string "Geocache" with the string "Flag."  The entire process is not too bad.  geobabel is a UNIX application and I have to run it in terminal mode from a command line.  It plants a .loc file wherever I want it.

Send me a beer and I'll send you a GPSBabel that adds a 'deficon' modifier to the 'geo' output so that it can fix your 'type' tags as it goes. gpsbabel [ .... ] -o geo,deficon=Flag [ ... ] will result in the .loc having "Flag" in all the '<type>' tags. (I've had the code laying around for a long time, but never checked it in before now.)

 

GPSBabel and CMconvert share the trait that they're highly automatable and portable enough to run on any interesting OS. I hate doing stuff like this by hand!

[+Learned Gerbil]

Cachemate now uploads waypoints to GPSrs as long as there is an appropriate plugin. Many Magelan and as far as I am aware, all Garmin devices can have waypoints uploaded.

 

Personally, I find the uploading of tailored waypoints in the field is much better than relying on what I uploaded at home from the PC.

[blocko1000]

Dont forget to register your copy of cachemate. Without registration you can only get 10 records I think it is. Also, there are step by step directions in the cmconverter file. Click on cachemate then click on the cmconverter and then click on the readme file. There it is. I just went paperless and had the same questions. After I asked for and got answers, then I noticed the readme file in the cmconverter. Anyways, its there. Good luck.