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GSAK (Geocaching Swiss Army Knife)


ClydeE

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]I don't have a problem exporting waypoints from GSAK to SA 2004, but when I try to export the map with the waypoints to my handheld, I can't get it to happen.  I just get the map with no waypoints.  Anyone know what I might be doing wrong?  I have a Tungsten T-3, so room is not a problem!

I'm a little confused by your request, Paul...GSAK can't do anything with maps. It's pretty much waypoint management.

 

Are you trying to export maps (with waypoints)from StreetAtlas to your PDA? Trying to run waypoints from SA through GSAK to your PDA? Trying to export HTML of waypoint information from GSAK to your PDA? We may be able to help with the last two, but probably not the first one (which would need SA expertise).

embra,

 

Thanks for the come-back.

Yes, my problem is exporting the map with the waypoints to my handheld from Street Atlas. I have no problem getting the waypoints from GSAK to the map in SA. I also have no problem getting HTML from GSAK to my handheld (using plucker).

I realize that this is probably a SA issue, but I thought I would run it by the board as there is much more traffic here than on the delorme forum.

I did post it on the delorme forum, but no answer yet.

 

Thanks, Paul :(

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Well, in that case you asked your question pretty clearly. It appears I was confused more by the context.

 

You might luck out with someone having a solution to your problem here, but I would recommend starting a new topic so your respondent pool is not limited to GSAK users.

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I think I found a slight glitch. I've noticed that some archived caches do not show as archived in GSAK. Any ideas?

Unless something has changed recently, Geocaching.com doesn't send "Archived" cache records with the pocket querys. So when you check on a cache on line and see it is Archived, you need to right click on that record and manualy toggle the Archive Status. Otherwise, GSAK has no way of knowing that information.

 

Gary

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Is there any way to output the "placed" field? I'm using GSAK to pull the data from my PQs to maintain a database on my website, and could really use the placed date field to sort the caches by the date they were placed.

You can filter your cache list by "placed date" which shows as a user choice in the "set filter" screen. You can access it by clicking on the "search" icon button on your tool-bar or pulling down the "search" from menu bar.

Once you have filtered your list then export it in whatever file format you require that is offered by GSAK.

Hope I have helped.

 

Olar

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This question isn't necessarily about GSAK, but I figure someone here could help. Why is it that when I click to download waypoints on GC.com they are saved as .aspx files instead of .loc? I can't figure out why it does this, or how to convert them into .loc and I am getting a little frustrated. Anyway, any info couldn't hurt, keep in mind I am not a computer whiz, so be gentle....

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I was wondering what people do to utilize GSAK with Topo USA 4.0 or 5 I guess. Right now I export as an SA text file and import that in Topo as a plain text file/draw layer.

 

I am kinda curious why there is more support for Street Atlas than Topo from both the GC'r community and Delorme with regards to Geocaching specifically. It seems that it would make the better choice for the sport.

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Is there any way to output the "placed" field?  I'm using GSAK to pull the data from my PQs to maintain a database on my website, and could really use the placed date field to sort the caches by the date they were placed.

You can filter your cache list by "placed date" which shows as a user choice in the "set filter" screen. You can access it by clicking on the "search" icon button on your tool-bar or pulling down the "search" from menu bar.

Once you have filtered your list then export it in whatever file format you require that is offered by GSAK.

Hope I have helped.

 

Olar

I don't think it really helped. What I want to do is export a text file, which is then read into a MYSQL database, where I can do all sorts of fun stuff to it. However, without a "placed date" field to export, that info doesn't go into the database, and I can't sort out the ones placed in the last week automatically. I hope this makes sense; I'm not that great at explaining stuff like this; I'm better at showing than telling.

 

--Dave

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I think I found a slight glitch. I've noticed that some archived caches do not show as archived in GSAK. Any ideas?

Unless something has changed recently, Geocaching.com doesn't send "Archived" cache records with the pocket querys. So when you check on a cache on line and see it is Archived, you need to right click on that record and manualy toggle the Archive Status. Otherwise, GSAK has no way of knowing that information.

Yes, I just went and did a cache that was archived because I had no idea it had been archived. Too bad GC.com does not give that as an option - but then again - the PQs were not designed to be used like we are using them in GSAK - they are current.

 

I have begun to sort any caching filter by 'date updated' to check on caches that have not been updated in a while to make sure they are still active before going out on a search.

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Here is something that hopefully Clyde will be able to fix when he gets back from vacation.

 

If you select a different 'center point' then go and choose a filter - it will forget your center point and revert to 'home' as the center.

I think that's "working as designed".

 

The center point is stored with the filter.

 

I have a number of filters with saved center points, and I'm quite happy with how that works, so I hope he doesn't "fix" this.

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Here is something that hopefully Clyde will be able to fix when he gets back from vacation.

 

If you select a different 'center point' then go and choose a filter - it will forget your center point and revert to 'home' as the center.

I think that's "working as designed".

 

The center point is stored with the filter.

 

I have a number of filters with saved center points, and I'm quite happy with how that works, so I hope he doesn't "fix" this.

Had not thought about that possibility -- makes sense.

Since it does not show up as part of the 'saved' data I did not even consider it was part of the 'filter'. I agree - leave it as is (or maybe show it in the criteria).

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I thought I saw somewhere in the GSAK docs that you can have it 'abbreviate' names for you? So that a series of caches - like "I love Highway 14: XXXXX" could be abreviated to "14:XXXXX" etc. I have searched the docs and cannot find it now!

 

Am I dreaming? Or can it be done?

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Playing with the HTML output of GSAK --

For Distance & Bearing it would be nice if there was a place to put the Maximum Distance - IE If I am going on a trip and have 500 caches along the interstate, I don't need the caches that are 200 miles away to show up for the different locations - would be nice to be able to say 20 miles if I wanted.

Just found out that GSAK does handle this!! My HTML 'locations' has these lines:

 

# Victoria Trip

Seattle - Roosevelt Hotel, 47.61181, -122.33359, 10

Butchart Gardens, 48.56308, -123.46410, 20

Victoria - Grand Pacific, 48.42092, -123.37069, 50

 

As you can see, if you add a comma and the distance you want to go out from that point, GSAK will only index distances and bearings out that far - so you don't end up with caches 500 miles away when you only need them close.

 

I have used this for stops along a trip, interstate exits, etc.

 

Theoretically, you could have all the caches in your state in GSAK, but limit the indexes to 2 miles of each interstate offramp - boom - a great travel index.

 

Now to find out where to get the lat/long of all interstate exits :)

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I thought I saw somewhere in the GSAK docs that you can have it 'abbreviate' names for you?  So that a series of caches - like "I love Highway 14: XXXXX" could be abreviated to "14:XXXXX" etc.  I have searched the docs and cannot find it now! 

 

Am I dreaming?  Or can it be done?

Perhaps you are referring to the special tags used in the file/export waypoint names options. (e.g.: "%smart"). More extensive information for your particular desired truncation is in the GSAK help file.

Edited by embra
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Well, I made a mistake and upgraded my StreetPilot III to Garmin's latest 2.70 firmware without waiting to see whether anyone else had problems with the release.

 

Well, I got a problem now. GSAK has developed a sudden aversion to speaking with the StreetPilot III now that I upgraded. The error message I get when trying to download directly is

"Error sending waypoints:

GPS_Packet_Read: No DLE

GARMIN: Can't Init COM5".

 

The exact same setup with no configuration changes works fine with a Garmin eTrex Summit or Vista, but not with the SPIII. And it's the same setup that worked fine with the StreetPilot at revision 2.50.

 

The same hardware setup and cable and StreetPilot works fine uploading or downloading waypoints using MapSource. My workaround is to export the caches from GSAK to MapSource, then to use MapSource to download the waypoints, but that's a minor pain for something that worked fine before.

 

Any suggestions on what to try to get it working again?

 

Jon

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I thought I saw somewhere in the GSAK docs that you can have it 'abbreviate' names for you? So that a series of caches - like "I love Highway 14: XXXXX" could be abreviated to "14:XXXXX" etc. I have searched the docs and cannot find it now!

 

Am I dreaming? Or can it be done?

Youmight be dreaming. I am dreaming about the same...

I did ask for something like that a while ago. Not shure what the status is.

 

I suggested an user definable 'translation table', to let us change

'Highway Heaven' to HH, 'Bernhard #' to B-, Adventure # to Ad, and so on.

Could also be useful to replace troublesome characters (like our nordic æøå which today only can be omitted, sometimes giving strange results)

 

If more people find this useful we might see it in a future release.

 

hbrx.

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My apologies if this have been covered before,

But in that process it 'looses' koordinate-information. All coords are reset to

N00 00.000 E000 00.000.

This is not really Clyde (Just a holiday ghost) :D

 

Another good reason to keep you version of GSAK up to date.

 

This was a known major bug for European users, and was notified to all users on the GSAK mail list and in the forums. This was fixed in version 3.03 - please see the version history at www.gsak.net

O boy. Do I feel like the noisy boy in the back of the room not paying attention in class :D

 

I had stopped at 3.02, and now feel even more embarassed as when I cjeck my mail I find that I have read your mail about the fix.

Well, back to what I do best...eh...ehhh. OK back to sleep then.

 

hbrx.

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Have you tried the GPS setup in GSAK, setting it to the com port you are using?  Perhaps the firmware update changed the GPS to grab a different com port.

Yep - I tried re-setting up the com port with GSAK with no change in results.

 

Funny thing is that where GSAK generates the error message, MapSource works without touching a single cable connection or reconfiguring anything or restarting the system - just change programs and the com port works. And I didn't upgrade Mapsource or GSAK at the same time, so they are both at the same software versions that worked before the upgrade too.

 

Still puzzling....

Jon

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Compound name generation seems to generate one less character than specified on the waypoint export dialog. For example, I prefixed all my smart names with a plus sign to avoid overwriting any existing waypoints in my gps. The string I used was "+%smart" and I limited the characters to 10. However all the waypoint names came up as 9 character names instead of 10.

 

I imagine that forcing the smart name to 9 characters and using a larger limit than 10 would provide a workaround, but it isn't too much of a problem, just wanted to report it so Clyde will have something to look at when he gets back.

Jon

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I suggested an user definable 'translation table', to let us change

'Highway Heaven' to HH, 'Bernhard #' to B-, Adventure # to Ad, and so on.

Could also be useful to replace troublesome characters (like our nordic æøå which today only can be omitted, sometimes giving strange results)

 

If more people find this useful we might see it in a future release.

 

hbrx.

I'm not sure if GSAK takes advantage of these features of GPSBabel, and if so, it is driven by the capabilities of the target format and not the user, but GPSBabel does have logic to tame those cases.

 

For a Banana, the first name will get abbreviated to HIGHWY. On a Magellan it will become Highwy H. On a 76, you'll get HIGHWAYHVN. Case, whitespace, length, and the valid character set are different for each target.

 

When given input in UTF-8 that isn't ASCII, GPSBabel knows to "dumb down" to ASCII for many, but not all, formats. (Specific translations can be added; just provide a recommendation and a GC# that shows the problem...) The characters you cite would be translated to "ae" "0" and "a" in a format that can't handle things beyond ASCII. Yes, it's enough to make some cringe, but the increase in readiability was requested by many users.

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Well, I got a problem now.  GSAK has developed a sudden aversion to speaking with the StreetPilot III now that I upgraded.  The error message I get when trying to download directly is

"Error sending waypoints:

GPS_Packet_Read: No DLE

GARMIN: Can't Init COM5".

 

The exact same setup with no configuration changes works fine with a Garmin eTrex Summit or Vista, but not with the SPIII. And it's the same setup that worked fine with the StreetPilot at revision 2.50.

 

This is where I fake shock that Garmin changed the serial protocol in a minor firmware upgrade, right? Is there anything in the version notes that offers any hints?

 

Treat this as a GPSBabel issue, not a GSAK one. To the GPSBabel-misc mailing list, send the full output of

 

gpsbabel -D9 -i garmin -f COMx [ edit: original had upper case F which would be wrong]

 

(where COMx is, of course, replaced by whatever your serial port is.)

 

I can't say that I know of anyone else using a SP III with GPSBabel, so it'll be up to us to figure this out remotely or by having you send me a unit.

Edited by robertlipe
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Jon, I just got the same message when I tried to send waypoints to my Legend in GSAK. I had the interface set to NMEA for use with Mapopolis, and I forgot to set it back to Garmin before I tried to send waypoints. Garmin GPS units must be set to Garmin interface to transfer waypoints. Are you certain your III is set to Garmin interface?

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Does anyone know how the current version 3.03 of GSAK will export to the new Garmin Mapsource 6.1?

The new mapsource has a differnt database format and a new file name extension, it is no longer .mps but instead it is now .gdb extension.

Anyone??

 

Kirk out.

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I can't load any more new files. I keep getting "There are no matching files in the folder to use. Import aborted"> I then get an illegal operation window and the program aborts. This is new since I loaded some loc files. Before I always loaded gpx files.

 

I'm running Win98 SE and GSAK 3.02

 

Any help?

 

Alan

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Does anyone know how the current version 3.03 of GSAK will export to the new Garmin Mapsource 6.1?

The new mapsource has a differnt database format and a new file name extension, it is no longer .mps but instead it is now .gdb extension.

Anyone??

 

Kirk out.

You can go ahead and export to the Mapsource MPS file format, and then when you open Mapsource 6.1 go to the File Pulldown and choose import. This will import the old format into Mapsource and you can then save it in the new format if you wish.

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Does anyone know how the current version 3.03 of GSAK will export to the new Garmin Mapsource 6.1?

The new mapsource has a differnt database format and a new file name extension, it is no longer .mps but instead it is now .gdb extension.

Anyone??

 

Kirk out.

There is no explicit support for the new GDB format in GPSBabel, which GSAK uses to export to Mapsource. People that actively follow these things say that there is an import/export facility to still read and write the MPS files and that the GPSBabel continues to work with those just fine.

 

Huga has given some tips on MPS, but routes and tracks aren't sufficiently reverse engineered yet and I've been unwilling to take a step backwards in functionality and haven't had time to help with the R/E efforts.

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I can't load any more new files. I keep getting "There are no matching files in the folder to use. Import aborted"> I then get an illegal operation window and the program aborts. This is new since I loaded some loc files. Before I always loaded gpx files.

 

I'm running Win98 SE and GSAK 3.02

 

Any help?

 

Alan

When you bring up the Open dialog make sure you have the proper file type checked (GPX probably). :lol:

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I'm running Win98 SE and GSAK 3.02

It may not make a difference, Alan, but you probably ought to update to 3.03. Actually, I'm half-hopeful that the re-install will re-set or refresh something.

 

Is this just trouble opening gpx files into existing databases, or does it include opening gpx files into new databases?

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Hi All,

 

Finally back from vacation :lol:

 

The first few days I had a few withdrawal symptoms from not being on the computer, but after a while I found it quite liberating and really enjoyed it. I think that is the longest break I have taken without a computer - my wife thought it was just great.

 

I did lurk a bit in the background, so many thanks to those who jumped in and answered questions. It was very much appreciated.

 

I have a whole stack of emails to wade through, but I will try to answer all I can.

 

I will also take a look back at the thread and see if there are still some unanswered problems, but you may have to refresh my memory if I don't get on to it.

 

Cheers

Clyde

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I can't load any more new files. I keep getting "There are no matching files in the folder to use. Import aborted"> I then get an illegal operation window and the program aborts. This is new since I loaded some loc files. Before I always loaded gpx files.

 

I'm running Win98 SE and GSAK 3.02

 

Any help?

 

Alan

When you load a folder of LOC files you must make sure you have the LOC box checked. I suspect you have not checked this box. See image below.

open1.jpg

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Youmight be dreaming. I am dreaming about the same...

I did ask for something like that a while ago. Not shure what the status is.

 

I suggested an user definable 'translation table', to let us change

'Highway Heaven' to HH, 'Bernhard #' to B-, Adventure # to Ad, and so on.

Could also be useful to replace troublesome characters (like our nordic æøå which today only can be omitted, sometimes giving strange results)

 

If more people find this useful we might see it in a future release.

 

hbrx.

You will be happy to know that I will be adding the Smart Name field as a user updateable field for edit and add in the next release.

 

This effectively will enable you to have your cake and eat it too so to speak. The logic being that if you enter something in the smart name field then GSAK will use this rather than the calculated name. That is, GSAK will only calculate smart names for waypoints that have this field blank.

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Welcome back, Clyde. Glad your batteries are recharged. :lol:

 

When I download to my Garmin Venture, using %smart for waypoint names and asking for 10 characters, I get only 8. I've checked with EasyGPS and I can download 10 character waypoint IDs with that.

 

What am I doing wrong?

 

(A suggestion on threads. Maybe every time you release a new version you should close the "version" thread and start a new one. That would make the discussions more manageable and alert everyone to the new version.)

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Welcome back, Clyde. Glad your batteries are recharged. :lol:

 

When I download to my Garmin Venture, using %smart for waypoint names and asking for 10 characters, I get only 8. I've checked with EasyGPS and I can download 10 character waypoint IDs with that.

 

What am I doing wrong?

 

I think you are misunderstanding how the %smart tag and the maximum characters work. Please refer to item 4 of the GSAK FAQ at www.gsak.net

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Compound name generation seems to generate one less character than specified on the waypoint export dialog. For example, I prefixed all my smart names with a plus sign to avoid overwriting any existing waypoints in my gps. The string I used was "+%smart" and I limited the characters to 10. However all the waypoint names came up as 9 character names instead of 10.

 

I imagine that forcing the smart name to 9 characters and using a larger limit than 10 would provide a workaround, but it isn't too much of a problem, just wanted to report it so Clyde will have something to look at when he gets back.

Jon

I believe this falls into the same category my very last post. If this is not the case, please let me know.

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Welcome back Clyde, hope your vacation went well.

 

A question.

 

Is it possible to extract the numerical cache id from GSAK with a '%tag'?

 

It's in the GPX PQ file (Groundspeak:cache id="1111111) so I guess you must handle it, store it and then export it when exporting a GPX file.

 

I wish to use it in a custom URL.

 

Cheers

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Welcome back Clyde, hope your vacation went well.

 

A question.

 

Is it possible to extract the numerical cache id from GSAK with a '%tag'?

 

It's in the GPX PQ file (Groundspeak:cache id="1111111) so I guess you must handle it, store it and then export it when exporting a GPX file.

 

I wish to use it in a custom URL.

 

Cheers

Clyde - please ignore this Q.

 

Further investigation has shown the URL I was hoping to use won't do what I was hoping it would do.

 

Cheers

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Well, I made a mistake and upgraded my StreetPilot III to Garmin's latest 2.70 firmware without waiting to see whether anyone else had problems with the release.

 

Well, I got a problem now.  GSAK has developed a sudden aversion to speaking with the StreetPilot III now that I upgraded.  The error message I get when trying to download directly is

"Error sending waypoints:

GPS_Packet_Read: No DLE

GARMIN: Can't Init COM5".

 

The exact same setup with no configuration changes works fine with a Garmin eTrex Summit or Vista, but not with the SPIII. And it's the same setup that worked fine with the StreetPilot at revision 2.50.

 

The same hardware setup and cable and StreetPilot works fine uploading or downloading waypoints using MapSource. My workaround is to export the caches from GSAK to MapSource, then to use MapSource to download the waypoints, but that's a minor pain for something that worked fine before.

 

Any suggestions on what to try to get it working again?

 

Jon

We've encountered the same problem. The bad new is, Garmin does not maintain archival copies of software for use by their customers (shame on them <_< ). The good new is the latest version of EasyGPS recognizes the 2.70 software in Street Pilot and will upload waypoints. The version of EasyGPS we had on the computer from pre-GSAK days would not work, but the upgrading to the latest version fixed it. Of course, you don't have all the features that make GSAK such a great utility, but it's better than nothing.

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Well, I got a problem now.  GSAK has developed a sudden aversion to speaking with the StreetPilot III now that I upgraded.  The error message I get when trying to download directly is

"Error sending waypoints:

GPS_Packet_Read: No DLE

GARMIN: Can't Init COM5".

 

The exact same setup with no configuration changes works fine with a Garmin eTrex Summit or Vista, but not with the SPIII. And it's the same setup that worked fine with the StreetPilot at revision 2.50.

 

This is where I fake shock that Garmin changed the serial protocol in a minor firmware upgrade, right? Is there anything in the version notes that offers any hints?

 

Treat this as a GPSBabel issue, not a GSAK one. To the GPSBabel-misc mailing list, send the full output of

 

gpsbabel -D9 -i garmin -f COMx [ edit: original had upper case F which would be wrong]

 

(where COMx is, of course, replaced by whatever your serial port is.)

 

I can't say that I know of anyone else using a SP III with GPSBabel, so it'll be up to us to figure this out remotely or by having you send me a unit.

Actually someone else is using SP III with Babel/GSAK. It makes a great "cache radar" when traveling. I don't know if you communicate with the authors of EasyGSP, but they've apparently solved the problem, intentionally or otherwise, with their latest release.

 

The hot weather is upon Houston again. Doesn't that mean it's time for you to make another caching run on the area? <_<

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GSAK has developed a sudden aversion to speaking with the StreetPilot III now that I upgraded [ to 2.70 ]

We've encountered the same problem.

Jon & Miki are working with me on this. We've already discovered that he problem is the introduction of yet another undocumented packet. (Thanx, Garmin.) See the discussion as it progresses on the gpsbabel mailing list and offer to help debug or test if you can.

 

http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.p...m=gpsbabel-misc

 

The hot weather is upon Houston again. Doesn't that mean it's time for you to make another caching run on the area?

It's merely hot and not "emergency heat alert" yet. Besides, I'm waiting for the banana spiders to grow more. I'm going to bring a saddle and ride them to the caches next time. <_<

Edited by robertlipe
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USB SUPPORT

 

Wading through my emails, I still notice quite a few asking when will I provide USB support for GSAK. I have even had a couple that have abused me for not doing so.

 

As stated before, GSAK uses GPSBabel for all GPS communications. I have no intentions of spending many hours re inventing the wheel in this department.

 

USB users now have a clear path to help themselves. GPSBabel has set up a fighting fund specifically for this project, and Robert Lipe has generously offered his time to make this all happen. So, if you are serious about getting USB support, now is you chance to make it work – don’t waste it. Details can be found here

 

As I have a vested interest myself (I really am tired of users asking me the question of USB support) I have already donated my $20 to the project, so please don’t let it be in vein.

 

Thanks

Clyde

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Is there any way to output the "placed" field?  I'm using GSAK to pull the data from my PQs to maintain a database on my website, and could really use the placed date field to sort the caches by the date they were placed.

Currently No.

 

However, I do plan to add complete user contol of fields for export, giving you the option to export in CSV, Excel, Html, Word doc.

 

Please see this post for more information

Edited by ClydeE
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You will be happy to know that I will be adding the Smart Name field as a user updateable field for edit and add in the next release.

 

This effectively will enable you to have your cake and eat it too so to speak. The logic being that if you enter something in the smart name field then GSAK will use this rather than the calculated name. That is, GSAK will only calculate smart names for waypoints that have this field blank.

I wonder if the new "SmartName" field could be set when a new cache is imported? If the new field was visible on the main screen, the user could always override the "automatic" naming by entering a specific name for a certain cache.

 

I see a couple of "watch out's" with the approach though.

 

One is that there would need to be a button or menu or configuration to adjust the length of the automatic names for folks with older GPS's that don't have 8-character waypoint names. But if the user asks that the names to be shortened, the program would have to remember which ones were automatic and which were manually overridden and present the user with options for the too-long manual names to shorten them to the "standard".

 

The second problem area is one that GSAK will probably have to handle somehow anyway and that's duplicate checking when the user enters a name. The problem will occur if the user names two caches the same thing manually, so maybe one solution can fit both the case of user-entered duplicates and overlaps between automatically entered names and user-entered names.

 

I'm hoping the new smartname field could be used instead of the GC number in Cachemate - right now there is no link between the GPS name and the Cachemate name, which gets to be a problem particularly when a series of caches have very similar names like Oh What a Beautiful Mourning I, Oh What a Beautiful Mourning II, etc. It often winds up that OhWhat1 is really Oh What a Beautiful Mourning II etc and you wind up going to the coordinates to figure out the matching caches in the GPS and Cachemate.

 

In any case, being able to see what the smartname is going to be before exporting and being able to edit it would be a really nice feature from my point of view.

 

Jon

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You will be happy to know that I will be adding the Smart Name field as a user updateable field for edit and add in the next release.

 

This effectively will enable you to have your cake and eat it too so to speak. The logic being that if you enter something in the smart name field then GSAK will use this rather than the calculated name. That is, GSAK will only calculate smart names for waypoints that have this field blank.

I wonder if the new "SmartName" field could be set when a new cache is imported? If the new field was visible on the main screen, the user could always override the "automatic" naming by entering a specific name for a certain cache.

 

I see a couple of "watch out's" with the approach though.

 

One is that there would need to be a button or menu or configuration to adjust the length of the automatic names for folks with older GPS's that don't have 8-character waypoint names. But if the user asks that the names to be shortened, the program would have to remember which ones were automatic and which were manually overridden and present the user with options for the too-long manual names to shorten them to the "standard".

 

The second problem area is one that GSAK will probably have to handle somehow anyway and that's duplicate checking when the user enters a name. The problem will occur if the user names two caches the same thing manually, so maybe one solution can fit both the case of user-entered duplicates and overlaps between automatically entered names and user-entered names.

 

I'm hoping the new smartname field could be used instead of the GC number in Cachemate - right now there is no link between the GPS name and the Cachemate name, which gets to be a problem particularly when a series of caches have very similar names like Oh What a Beautiful Mourning I, Oh What a Beautiful Mourning II, etc. It often winds up that OhWhat1 is really Oh What a Beautiful Mourning II etc and you wind up going to the coordinates to figure out the matching caches in the GPS and Cachemate.

 

In any case, being able to see what the smartname is going to be before exporting and being able to edit it would be a really nice feature from my point of view.

 

Jon

The main reason I have resisted having the smart name as part of the database is all the "gotchas". You have mentioned a couple, but believe me there are many more and it does open up a whole can of worms by including it fully in the database. For the moment I will just stick with the override approach and see how that settles in.

 

If you would just like to see the smart name calculation for any cache, you can do that now. Go to Tools=>Options=>HTML. Now in the "Waypoint description for HTML view" add the %smart tag (or %smart=nn syntax). You can then see the calculated smart name in split screen view or any offline produced HTML pages.

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I can't load any more new files.  I keep getting "There are no matching files in the folder to use.  Import aborted">  I then get an illegal operation window and the program aborts.  This is new since I loaded some loc files.  Before I always loaded gpx files.

 

I'm running Win98 SE and GSAK 3.02

 

Any help?

 

Alan

When you load a folder of LOC files you must make sure you have the LOC box checked. I suspect you have not checked this box. See image below.

open1.jpg

Nothing works. I reloaded 3.02 also. It seems like ever since I tried the loc load one time, I cannot load another file.

 

ALan

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