Feature Requests

[Jon Hacking]

In Route Manager v2.5, clicking on a column header will sort by that column, which is very nice. But for Tracks, the only columns available are Name & Length. Sorting tracks by length doesn't make much sense. But sorting tracks by DATE/Time certainly does. In a long list of tracks, it's often difficult to remember what you named a track, so the ability to sort by date would be very helpful.

I'm currently working a lot with Route Manager. I'm trying to create a bank or repository where cruisers can download track files from other cruisers, using GPS Utility to convert between MaxSea & OpenCPN. (Cruisers are welcome to send me track files - it's still very new but what we have is here)

GPSU typically creates a single track file so I have to go split it up into (usually) day sails. With Route Manager's current (somewhat annoying) behavior of always returning to the top of the list, it would be nice to sort the list in inverse date order as I'm splitting the tracks.

Thanks!

[sailias]

Feature request:

Currently routes and stored as xml files in .opencpn on linux. They are random. If they were in a dedicated folder eg: /home/.opencpn/routes/example.xml then the entire folder could be symlinked easily allowing routing data to be stored or backed up more easily (via a script) to a USB stick making the data independant of the putter and install version.

Best regards

/ch

[nohal]

sailias,
could you explain me what are you referring to? All the navobject (routes, tracks and waypoints) are stored in a single file named ~/.opencpn/navobj.xml under Linux.

Pavel

[sailias]

Originally Posted by nohal

sailias,
could you explain me what are you referring to? All the navobject (routes, tracks and waypoints) are stored in a single file named ~/.opencpn/navobj.xml under Linux.

Pavel

Should have checked the files before posting. Me bad. I have navobject.xml, navobject.xml.1 etc etc. I indorrectly made the assumptions these were all active files rather then backups at the time of installation which they appear to be once you go through them. So problem solved for what I need, feature request cancelled...>

Best regards and thanks for your patience.

/ch

[nohal]

/ch
Yep, they are rotating backups. .1 the newest .X the oldest
Number to keep is configurable in the ini file with KeepNavobjBackups and defaults to 5
Didn't realize this could be confusing while implementing it

Pavel

[sailias]

...only if you are in a hurry, dont read the files, and playing on the putter while doing two other things....otherwise, its really simple... My ooops moment...then again others would say its a seniors moment...all is good.

/ch

[P_Dub]

Good job with 2.5.0. Thanks to everyone.
What about scaling the vessel for lenght and breadth? That is probably the only thing missing.
Bye

[bbalan]

Hi,
Version: 2.5.0 Build 2011-07-26

If an active leg of a route crosses the 180 degree meridian, the bearing shown to the next mark is not correct. It shows the bearing to that mark going the other way around the world (I think). See attached screen shot. Bearing when you point to the leg is 214. Bearing shown to next mark is 35.

Bruce Balan
s/v Migration

[clsailor]

I have Open CPN Version 2.5. I am trying to plan a trip from Deltaville, VA to St. Petersburg, FL. My problem is when I use route planner to go thourgh the Okeecohbie waterway I cannot get chart detail.

[fgd3]

Originally Posted by clsailor

I have Open CPN Version 2.5. I am trying to plan a trip from Deltaville, VA to St. Petersburg, FL. My problem is when I use route planner to go thourgh the Okeecohbie waterway I cannot get chart detail.

Have you turned off chart quilting? The detailed OWW charts are skewed and won't be included in a quilt, I believe.

Fabbian

[cagney]

Originally Posted by bbalan

Hi,
Version: 2.5.0 Build 2011-07-26

If an active leg of a route crosses the 180 degree meridian, the bearing shown to the next mark is not correct. It shows the bearing to that mark going the other way around the world (I think). See attached screen shot. Bearing when you point to the leg is 214. Bearing shown to next mark is 35.

Bruce Balan
s/v Migration

Thanks for the report. It looks like you found another dateline bug.
I entered it in the Tracker FS#620 : Another Dateline Mole, which is the way the OpenCPN project keeps track of bugs.
You are welcome to register and add bugs an feature requests yourself.
Thomas

[lutusp]

Hello OpenCPN forum. I am Paul Lutus, a longtime sailor (* Confessions Online) and a programmer as well (Apple Writer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, * JTides Home Page).

I have been evaluating OpenCPN 2.5. I think it is terrific program. I have suspended work on a similar program of my own because OpenCPN is obviously superior and I doubt I could catch up using Java (mostly because of speed issues). I have some suggestions:

* When the user left-clicks on a chart to drag and reposition, the cursor should change from a pointer to a hand -- this is the usual feedback that the user can drag-reposition an image.

* In the routes dialog, the action of deleting a route should have a confirmation dialog. This will prevent the inadvertent loss of a newly created route caused by accidentally clicking the wrong option with no confirmation.

* On the Linux platform (specifically Fedora 15), all OpenCPN tabbed dialogs suffer the defect that one can only change tabs by pointing the mouse at the tab row and scrolling the mouse wheel -- for some reason, clicking a tab doesn't work. I haven't tested on other platforms yet.

* Because vector charts take so long to process (unless the region has been scanned already), it would be nice to have a toolbar button to enable/disable them. That way, a user could choose a specific area and zoom level using raster charts, then click the vector chart button to get a vector display of that specific location without undue delays. I have been doing this by deleting my vector chart directory, moving, then reestablishing the directory to achieve this result. A toolbar button would be much easier.

* It would be nice to have an ETA column (using system local time and the vessel's present position) alongside the ETE column in the route properties table.

* Please use (for example) 14:33 instead of 14h 33mn in the tide/current prediction displays and in the route table for ETE and ETA -- it's easier to interpret and requires less space.

* While floating, the toolbar sometimes disappears entirely, and I haven't sorted out exactly when and why this happens. I would have preferred that the toolbar stay put, not be floating, only because it sometimes floats out of sight entirely. It could be made to disappear and reappear, for example during full-screen mode, but floating it seems to invite difficulties.

* In the function "polytrans" (source file "chartimg.cpp", beginning at line 4764), there are a couple of commented-out lines, apparently to avoid overrunning the contents of an array. This function provides an all-important conversion of coordinates for a BSB chart. As it happens, some BSB files actually have as many as twelve computed coefficients, which led me to write my function this way (Java):

public static double poly_compute(ArrayList<Double> al, double xm, double ym) {
        double r = 0;
        Double[] cs = al.toArray(new Double[0]);
        int len = cs.length;
        if (len >= 4) {
            r = cs[1]
                    + cs[2] * xm
                    + cs[3] * ym;
            if (len >= 7) {
                r = r + cs[4] * xm * xm
                        + cs[5] * xm * ym
                        + cs[6] * ym * ym;
                if (len >= 11) {
                    r = r + cs[7] * xm * xm * xm
                            + cs[8] * xm * xm * ym
                            + cs[9] * xm * ym * ym
                            + cs[10] * ym * ym * ym;
                    if (len >= 13) {
                        r = r + cs[11] * Math.pow(ym, 4)
                                + cs[12] * Math.pow(ym, 5);
                    }
                }
            }
        }
        return r;
    }

My point is that it would be a good idea to allow for the possibility that there might be as many as 12 coefficients, in some adaptive way as above. I found an example of a chart with 12 coefficients, unfortunately I can't locate it at the moment. It's most likely in a large chart with lots of detail, and/or a projection that covers a lot of territory, where the error-correction ability of these coefficient lists and computations is really put to the test. To discard available coefficients could have bad consequences on a chart with a lot of detail.

* I would be happy to contribute my sunrise/sunset/twilight computation code from JTides as an added feature. This could be provided for a given position on a chart as a right-click option.

Obliquely related, I just posted an article on my Website, primarily about OpenCPN: 07. Electronic Navigation

HTH

[P_Dub]

One additional thing is the scaling of vessel (lenght and breadth). This is absolutely must be added. It could be a plugin or in the program itself, but it must be done. I am not a programmer so I can not do it. the icon i have added does not fit when altering the scale.
Regards
P_Dub

[bdbcat]

lutusp....

Hi Paul! Welcome aboard.

Thanks for the comments and suggestions. All valid, and very welcome contributions.

We are currently in the process of a "reset" between versions, so now is the time to come forward with all radical and not so radical ideas for improvement. We would be happy to have you join the team in whatever way you would feel most useful.

Version 3.0 is coming next. There have been some discussions already regarding the plan. I'd like to hear your ideas as well. One big part relates to performance. We may move to OpenGL for display management, in anticipation of better performance and portability.

I expect to start some formal Beta testing of 3.0 in a few weeks. If you would like to hack on 2.5 and submit patches to me privately, now would be a good time....

Thanks
Dave

[bdbcat]

Paul....

Off topic, but I can't resist.....

Apple Writer: Wow....A blast from the past..... Do you remember Saturn Systems ram expansions and Titan Technologies Accelerator ][ products?
Apple II accelerators - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I designed them....

Dave