Feature Requests

[Hakan]

Paul...
Use the ship icon left of Hamburger menu, see more here
Keyboard shortcuts: F2 or Ctrl-A

[P_Dub]

I had a crash on android cell phone and had to re-install Opencpn. Unfortunately I can not install my own tidal data. Can you help?

[rgleason]

https://opencpn.org/wiki/dokuwiki/do...lation:android

Read about Android files and tools to use!

[P_Dub]

Found it, Thanks.

[el caribe]

Originally Posted by yugo_76

Hello there.

Here goes my suggestion:

I'd like a plugin where we could simulate the traditional compass, pencils, eraser, plastic plotters, triangles, rolling rulers etc. Being digital is fine, but having the old way of doing things would be great. This idea was inspired by the DR plugin. This feature would also be good when plotting LOPs in celestial navigation or coastal navigation.

Totally agree on this; the draw plugin doesn't cut it for actually attempting to annotate a chart with things like bearing pointers, lines of position, or no more than/no less than bearings. It would be AMAZING to be able to annotate things like the NMT and NLT bearings when preparing for a trip so it's right there on the chart when you are actually there. The current setup is definitely geared toward having a functioning GPS source of position while underway rather than the planning or loss of GPS situation.

[Stingo]

Wow, at the risk of suggesting a feature that someone has already suggested, please accept my apologies. There is no way that I am going to read through 172 pages to check. Sorry.

At the bottom of screen where the "Piano Keys" show and where a pop-up shows the charts details on mouse-over, what is the chance of showing the file name in the Piano Key eg "Carriacou z10 - z18 Nav Sonic.mbtile" (or whatever file name I have used when creating charts with SAS Planet.

This means a very quick mark I eyeball scan of the Piano Keys will show me where a particular mbtile charts is eg I might be looking for the ARCGis z18 file.

TIA

[Jon Hacking]

Stingo, I feel your pain. My senior-level eyes have a hard time with those piano-keys as well. It takes more time than I like to wait for the file info box to pop up, & then it's hard to figure out which tile it really is. So I abandoned the entire piano-keys concept entirely & came up with a better solution.

My mbTiles are big enough that we usually only load them for one area. For instance, my Eastern Caribbean mbTiles cover the whole of the Eastern Caribbean, from Grenada to Puerto Rico, & out to Barbados. (See our Chart Downloads Page if you'd like a copy - Z10-18 of ArcGIS, Bing, Google, CMap, & Navionics.)

So what I do is to put each map into its own Chart Group (3rd tab over in the Options/Charts page). I always use the same chart order (as above) so I know that 1 is ArcGIS, 2 is Bing, etc (zero brings you back to the "normal" display).

This is one reason I recommend glomming smaller mbTiles into one larger one. You still have to split them up by map-type, but if you only have 1 mbTile area to deal with, you don't have to use the piano-keys at all.

[Stingo]

Thanks, Jon, that sounds workable. I'll try that.

[bbalan]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Antipole
It's very easy. Read the plugin User Guide.

Tony
--------
"If all else fails, read the instructions."

Originally Posted by bbalan

Wow, Tony. Super cool. I had no idea. I'll try it soon. Thanks!
Bruce

Tony, the javascript you gave me to make OpenCPN beep when a waypoint is reached works great. Thank you so much. So nice of you to help me out with that one.
Cheers,
Bruce

[dlj]

I don't know if it has been suggested or if there is a way to do this, I haven't found it in any case.

I'd love it if the pointer showing the direction the boat is heading could go out to essentially infinity. I've found that coming into ports I often like to zoom into the region showing entrance bouys and such useful as a quick visual that I'm heading correctly. I'll often be at a zoom level where I can't see the boat on the screen but if I could see my heading it would be helpful.

dj

[Jon Hacking]

DLJ, under Options (gear icon), Ships tab, the top item is: "COG predictor length (min)".

That determines the length of that pointer. It defaults to where you'll be in 5 minutes (at current course & speed), but you can make that number as big as you like.

[dlj]

Originally Posted by Jon Hacking

DLJ, under Options (gear icon), Ships tab, the top item is: "COG predictor length (min)".

That determines the length of that pointer. It defaults to where you'll be in 5 minutes (at current course & speed), but you can make that number as big as you like.

Awesome! Thank you!

That's even better to be able to select a time length!

dj

[sailingharry]

Originally Posted by dlj

Awesome! Thank you!



That's even better to be able to select a time length!



dj

My Furuno chart plotter has an interesting twist on this.
Heading, as in the compass reading, is a green line that goes to infinity. This provides the info you are looking for, but is not quite as accurate as the predictor. It does not account for compass error or leeway/current.
The 5 minute predictor is red. Presumably it is adjustable. This is awesome, not only for us, but since it also shows the 5 minute predictor for all the AIS and radar targets as well. This makes it super easy to assess crossing situations.
I bring this up, even though it's not on OpenCPN, because if you can set that in some fashion on OpenCPN it gives you the best of both worlds. The heading line lets you see generally how you are approaching a distant harbor. The 5 min line gives you crossing info and also allows you to easily assess piloting situations (by mentally scaling that 5-minute line, I can tell that I will be at that mark in 2 minutes, or have 10 minutes before I have shoal water and have to tack, etc)

[dlj]

Originally Posted by sailingharry

My Furuno chart plotter has an interesting twist on this.
Heading, as in the compass reading, is a green line that goes to infinity. This provides the info you are looking for, but is not quite as accurate as the predictor. It does not account for compass error or leeway/current.
The 5 minute predictor is red. Presumably it is adjustable. This is awesome, not only for us, but since it also shows the 5 minute predictor for all the AIS and radar targets as well. This makes it super easy to assess crossing situations.
I bring this up, even though it's not on OpenCPN, because if you can set that in some fashion on OpenCPN it gives you the best of both worlds. The heading line lets you see generally how you are approaching a distant harbor. The 5 min line gives you crossing info and also allows you to easily assess piloting situations (by mentally scaling that 5-minute line, I can tell that I will be at that mark in 2 minutes, or have 10 minutes before I have shoal water and have to tack, etc)

I run predictors in my AIS and in my RADAR. As I'm kind of "old school", both are standalone units and I handle them as such. In my AIS, I use a point of closest contact of 2.5 NM. If my AIS calculates any AIS target is predicated to come closer than 2.5 NM then it alarms. Of course, running close to shore this is not how I run it, way too sensitive, but that's how I do it for off shore passages. That way I might get an alarm where the approaching boat may be 25+ NM away. Great, at 2 or 3 O'Clock in the morning, I like having plenty of advance notice if I need to do something. In my RADAR, I have a range set at an angular distance off my bow where if a boat is going to pass within that sector, I get an alarm. Again, for off shore I prefer early warnings.

If I'm running up a coast then it depends upon how "busy" it is...

A 5 minute predictor would not fall within a time frame I'd be comfortable with in either case. With freighters running at 15 knots and above, I'd prefer 30 minutes. But I can imagine in very busy locations that might need to be adjusted.

dj

[sailingharry]

Originally Posted by dlj

I run predictors in my AIS and in my RADAR. As I'm kind of "old school", both are standalone units and I handle them as such. In my AIS, I use a point of closest contact of 2.5 NM. If my AIS calculates any AIS target is predicated to come closer than 2.5 NM then it alarms. Of course, running close to shore this is not how I run it, way too sensitive, but that's how I do it for off shore passages. That way I might get an alarm where the approaching boat may be 25+ NM away. Great, at 2 or 3 O'Clock in the morning, I like having plenty of advance notice if I need to do something. In my RADAR, I have a range set at an angular distance off my bow where if a boat is going to pass within that sector, I get an alarm. Again, for off shore I prefer early warnings.



If I'm running up a coast then it depends upon how "busy" it is...



A 5 minute predictor would not fall within a time frame I'd be comfortable with in either case. With freighters running at 15 knots and above, I'd prefer 30 minutes. But I can imagine in very busy locations that might need to be adjusted.



dj

The 5-minute predictor is not an alarm window, but an on-screen graphic indicator. That gives my indicator about 1/2 MI out, and freighters about 3 MI out. Making that indicator longer would be exceptionally cluttered and might not provide much value.
These indicators are much more useful in close in situations.
Again, if I am under sail in a channel and see the next mark two arrow lengths away, I visually and instantly know that in 10 minutes I have to make sail changes.
Or if I'm coming up the bay, and a freighter is overtaking me, if his 5-minute arrow is a couple of hundred yards off my starboard side, I know that if I run a course parallel with his or slightly left of his that the passing will be a smooth one. And I can update that interpretation every 30 seconds or a minute by just glancing at the plotter.
Or when a fishing boat going 12 or 15 knots has my 5 minute arrow in the middle of his 5-minute line, it is quite obvious that he will be passing well ahead of me.
None of this of course is a substitute for a high level of watch standing. But all of it provides instant update, confirmation, and feedback to factor into the situational awareness.