Opencpn 4.1.1108 Documentation

[wdkester]

I agree that it only partly works.

See:
OpenCPN Beta Windows Plugins - Page 5 - Cruisers & Sailing Forums

Does anybody know who wrote/updated the GE plugin????

[rgleason]

Gille, c'est trez bon. Merci beaucoup!

NVC Charts page updated is online.
NV Charts | Official OpenCPN Homepage
Please, read this page and if you see spelling mismatch, please correct.
If you thing that some content is not good, said it or correct yourself.
Thank by advance. Gilletarom

I referenced your BSB4 and updated a few things here.

Thanks again.

[rgleason]

David & Gille,

Does anybody know who wrote/updated the GE plugin????

Thanks for testing. Wrote Pavel.

We've been working on Plugin documentation and wanted to have information about
Google Earth Plugin.

David Kester and Gilletarom have tested it and found that it was almost working but it hung up.
They wanted to know who programmed it.
Were you possibly the author? If not, who might we contact?

https://github.com/nohal/gecomapi_pi

also
https://github.com/nohal/imgkap
https://github.com/nohal/mc2bsbh
I am not sure if we should include it. Probably not.
Thanks
Rick

We don't have a page for GE Plugin yet.

[rgleason]

David and Gilletarom,

Please see Windows Beta Plugins page
http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post2013873

compiled gecomapi_pi-1.1-ov4.1.1301-win32

[rgleason]

Today we've been checking links and making small changes and getting the Plugins page more complete. Many have contributed to this joint effort. David, Gilletarom, Mike R., BCN, Peter. Thanks to you all. Tomorrow I will try to take a full copy of the documentation, and then create a smaller shorter version.

Here is something to think about tonight. Our plugin documentation is not really complete, matching what is available on the download page, and there are some other useful plugins that have been created. There are a number of authors who have been quite prolific (Thank you to all of you). The ones with an asterisk should probably be listed even if there is no dedicated page.

I am thinking that we should list on the External Plugin Page some of the smaller very useful plugins available with a brief description, but not linked to a dedicated page:

========

*AIS Radar View
Implements a radar-like display for AIS targets

*SAR
Creates Search and Rescue patterns with desired parameters.

*Calculator
This is a calculator & mathematical expression parsing plugin.
Would you like to know your hull speed?

*Route
Route Plotting plugin for OpenCPN
Plots Great Circle routes, Limited Circle Routes and Rhumb lines.

P.Nohal
*Chart Object Search
Allows search of named objects on S-57 and CM93 vector charts.

*Debugger
Shows the messages travelling through the plugin API
This plugin is aimed mainly at the developers and to help troubleshoot problems with NMEA data streams.

*Launcher
The plugin allows the user to define several buttons to launch external commands. Primarily targeting touch screen devices.

*Gecomapi
Google Earth Plugin Turn Google earth into chart overlays -Not completely operational at the moment.

*IacFleet
IAC Fleet Code plugin for OpenCPN visualizes the encoded data issued as part of the weather bulletins. The IAC Fleet Code provides size effective encoded synoptic charts for several areas of the world, especially useful with slow and limited connection to the Internet.
Coverage areas:

• South Pacific weather issued by Fiji Meteorologica Service in Nadi and available from Saildocs
• Weather over Brazil and adjacent partso of Pacific and Atlantic oceans, including direct download of the data from the Internet
• Weather analysis and 24 hour forecast for North Atlantic and Europe issued by NOAA, including direct download of the data from the Internet

Chart Downloader - done in plugin docs
Download, install and keep up to date the navigational charts provided by various free governmental sources worldwide directly from within OpenCPN's Toolbox.Easily access to download and update free charts.



S.Depagnier

*SweepPlot
Provides a historical plot of Speed (SOG) above Course (COG) for sailors.

*Chartscale
Slider to change the chartscale. Useful utility.

*RotationCtrl
Controls to rotate the charts in various ways. North up, South up, Course up, Heading up, Route up, Wind up, Tilt down, Tilt up. Rotate CCW, Rotate CW.

*Projections
Utility to project the charts in many alternative projections configured by the user.
Right-click shows "Projections" with user selection for Mercator, Orthographic, Polar, Stereographic, Genomonic, ane Equirectangular. These projections may be useful for a more accurate interpretation of navigational data. Mercator is especially skewed at high lattitudes. Requires opengl.

*Statusbar
This plugin replaces the built-in status with a more configurable one that is easier to read.
For best results, you should disable the built-in toolbar on the User Interface tab in the Toolbox and set the Y position of the plugin toolbar to at least the pixel size of the font selected in the plugin preferences.
M.Rasbats

oBabel - done in plugin docs
The oBabel plugin is intended to make the transfer of routes and waypoints from OpenCPN to (Initially) Garmin Chartplotters easier.

DR Dead Reckoning - done in plugin docs
Add DR positions to a GPX file exported from OpenCPN

oTcurrent -done in plugin docs
Display tidal current arrows for times other than the present

Tidefinder - ?
Help for Tide Predictions, looking ahead for several weeks.
Time Zone used is the computer clock time.
Todo: Show local time & prepare for translations.
The Marks text might be better bigger to see the names of the locations.

Survey_pi - ? and Pavel
Survey provides the tools necessary to record time, depth and location to a database and to export that data in various useful forms.
D.Coweld
TackandLay ?
Tack and Laylines for sailors. Linux only.

Big Tom
Sailing Console ?Working on a Sailors tool which utilizes instrument data to optimize boat progress.

[rgleason]

Today,
First I'll add a Plugin page "Other Useful 3rd Party Plugins" with most of the ones listed above. Perhaps with some screenshots.

Then I will download the PHP Export single Html file and images, and try to make an abbreviated version by removing certain sections and the photos.

I believe the current documentation is 15 mb. we will try to get close to that.
Sections targeted for removal in the abbreviated version.

1. All External and 3rd party plugins
2. Charts - remove Quilting, Formats, Advanced Chart Work, CM93 offsets
3. Advanced Features -Anchor watch, Automated Anchor, Nobj.xml, Keyboard shortcuts, command line, config file, opengl, network repeater, portable opencpn, low power systems.
4. FAQ
5. Links
6. Edit User Manual

Should we also remove Chart Sources too? We have Chart Downloader.

Also I am reluctant to remove Connections, but should we?

Should we move Keyboard shortcuts to just under "Right Click"?
and thus keep it in the abbreviated version. We will not change the URL and so all links should still work. How important is the Keyboard shortcut documentation? It can be moved.

I would like to hear what you think, considering both new users and experienced users who may rely on parts of this documentation.

I am listening before I do anything further, for awhile...


-

[ptulp]

Rick,

If I look at the doc that comes with O4.0.0 and check the sizes of the images, then ALL images are smaller than the ones on the new O4.1 docs.
Look like somebody ran a tool to resize the images for the export version.

Do you know what tools are used to create the docs that are included in the download in O?

Peter

[ptulp]

Rick,

I found this readme file:
https://github.com/OpenCPN/OpenCPN/b...ata/doc/readme
where a tool "optipng" is used to optimize the png files.
I don't know where this tool is located or on which system it is running.

Peter

[rgleason]

I did not realize 4.0 images are all smaller. I was trying to figure out how we get down to 15mb total.

The biggest 71 images occupy 25mb and getting them down to 550 x whatever should bring them under 200kb which would save 11 mb.

To answer your question. No I don't. Thomas might know, he handled it. I will write him.

I have asked if the export includes such a resizer, that resizes the images to the resolution is actually used. I determined that it did not.

I wonder if gimp 2.8 has a batch routine to resize and compress, picking up the size actually used in the html document?

Maybe we have to go through it by hand a resize, too bad we couldn't just put it back on the server for the main document, that would speed up the web doc too.

The Drupal image resizer is not very sophisticated. But it does let us enter width and it resizes proportionally (the one from [user] File Browser) We would want to know what the size used in the text is.

Also we don't have access to other peoples images, ...I think. Hmm.

[rgleason]

Very interesting. I had no idea about the Github repos for Documentation!

https://github.com/OpenCPN/OpenCPN/tree/master/data/doc

It looks like $optipng -o7 *.png

just compresses the devil out the the file and does nothing to the resolution which is where a lot of extra mb are too.

I hope we meet those requirements....I think we've been finding the links work a little differently than described after checking the export version, (but I certainly could be wrong).

Maybe we could find a program that would batch resize anything that is over 550 px wide? That would help some 11mb worth.

Then run optipng.

Condensed version
Also I would like to make a reduced version.
This document suggests to temporarily move the documents out of the
OpenCPN User Manual and do an export.

That would be easy to do.
I could do that right now if people agreed to the ones I suggested below....?

Thanks!

[ptulp]

So basically we should find somebody who can run the tool over the 4.1 doc and see how big the docs will be.

Peter

[rgleason]

Peter,

Golly, how did you find that? I have downloaded 4.1 docs and can do it again, its pretty easy. Then I would need the tool. Any idea where?

First I could move the extra docs out to Dev Manual now.
Then I could go after those 71 big files using the online resizer.
Then download and use the tool.

Can you advise?

[bobofthenorth]

Rick:

I sent you a private email but if you are reading this thread perhaps you could review the changes I made to the BSB4 documentation. If I'm on the right track let me know & I'll wrap it up before we move tomorrow morning.

[rgleason]

Found it here
OptiPNG Home Page

Will trial run it now.

[rgleason]

On windows, put the file in the same directory as the screenshots and just executed it from the command window.

The output is quite descriptive on a 900x350 it compressed 20%
I should find one of that size and try a GIMP resize to 550x whatever and see what the difference is. I will guess is will be substantially greater.

724 image files, currently 46mb
I don't know what this does, perhaps overwrite the files?

Anyway it's working.