Radar plugin v5.0.0 released

[lucseawalker]

Hi Sherry,

Thanks for the details ... it is indeed not as simple as one might think and I wanted to get recent news since equipment always changes so fast ...

I think we will also go for the Halo 20+ ... get is shipped as yacht in transit in Indonesia soon ... When everything is checked, as prices go, it is extremely rare than local international dealers are not much more expensive than US dealers. I guess the US dealers have volume sales and more competition so they keep they margins lower ...

I will now see which of the different brands selling the Halo 20+ has the best support & after-sales service.

Perhaps I will get some feedback here about that

Luc

Originally Posted by SoggyPaws

Hi Luc, we have been studying the same issue. I specifically asked here (in another thread) about Raymarine, because there's a Raymarine dealer here in Malaysia that has stock and would deliver. I was ready to buy, the OpenCPN documentation on Github says its supported (sort of), but I wanted to make sure it worked. James Khoo got the Raymarine dealer to bring his Raymarine Quantum 2 Q24D radar to Pangkor so I could try it. We literally just plugged the radar connector into a network hub that my laptop was also connected to, and I played with it for an hour and I couldn't get it fully working--though it was communicating enough to give me the model number and serial number of the unit. I am not a networking expert and didn't have the tools and knowledge I needed to help debug the situation. I THINK I could get it working, maybe with some interaction with the plugin developers, once I figured out what THAT unit was exactly doing. Was hoping the Raymarine tech guy who was helping me would get interested, but he's too busy installing multi thousand dollar setups on big ships in Singapore.

The primary developers of the OpenCPN radar plugin are all using the Navico Halo 20+ radar (under brand names Simrad, Lowrance and B&G--it's all the same unit with a different sticker). So, it makes the most sense to look at those as your primary choice. They also got a slightly higher rating on Panbo's practical/technical test in Dec 2022. And, with the Navico, you can actually have 2 radar screens up in OpenCPN at once (most people use a "look out for small fishing boats" screen and a longer range screen. The Ray can't do this. Part 2 of Panbo's Evaluation

I have a friend who's been using the Halo 20+ for awhile now with only OpenCPN, and he's very happy with it. He gave us a demo and I was pretty impressed. But one of the things you can't do without a chartplotter/MFD is update the firmware in your radar. (gotta find a buddy with a long cable!)

We're on the verge of buying one, the only thing that's holding us up is the 50% markup here in Malaysia. (was quoted ~USD $3,200 by Marine Supplies Asia not including tax and delivery--they're $2,300 at Defender US). And maybe a little big to pack into a suitcase.

https://defender.com/en_us/radars

Sherry, s/v Soggy Paws
Pangkor Marina, Malaysia

[Franziska]

Originally Posted by Hakan

Garbled?? Could you provide a screen shot.
And just for a common test. Change to Shader: In radar plugin preferences switch "GPU drawing method": Vertex array/Shader.
Ref: description

In radar with Vertex Array or Shader on, see attached.
It's the advanced menu which gets garbled up.
When I restart OpenCPN and radar in "daylight color" all is ok again.

Radar Plug-in Beta 5.5
OpenCPN latest version 5.8.4 Master
Windows 10

[Franziska]

Originally Posted by Hakan

Garbled?? Could you provide a screen shot.
And just for a common test. Change to Shader: In radar plugin preferences switch "GPU drawing method": Vertex array/Shader.
Ref: description

Hakan, see my last post with the screenshots from a while ago.

Did you ever get a chance to look into that?

Sent from my MHA-L29 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[Hakan]

Franziska..
If you mean the third picture with some "greyed out" menu buttons I haven't seen anything similar but I have a 3G if that could be a significant reason?
Let's see if Douwe comes up, he has a 4G what I know.

[Franziska]

Originally Posted by Hakan

Franziska..
If you mean the third picture with some "greyed out" menu buttons I haven't seen anything similar but I have a 3G if that could be a significant reason?
Let's see if Douwe comes up, he has a 4G what I know.

Actually pictures 3, 4 and 5.

All boxes have the same writing in them when not in OpenCPN's daylight color scheme (dark display scheme).
Once you go back to OpenCPN daylight color scheme, it still stays like this.
A restart of OpenCPN fixes this and everything is back to normal.

[Hakan]

Now I see and can reproduce. Sorry for my negligence to read careful enough.
For me here at home using radar type "Emulator" it's the text from the first button in Advanced menu, "Threshold...", that's used for many other buttons when a non daylight color scheme has been used.

I'll file an issue for this at radar Github.

Thanks.

[Franziska]

Originally Posted by Hakan

Now I see and can reproduce. Sorry for my negligence to read careful enough.
For me here at home using radar type "Emulator" it's the text from the first button in Advanced menu, "Threshold...", that's used for many other buttons when a non daylight color scheme has been used.

I'll file an issue for this at radar Github.

Thanks.

The thanks is on my part.
Great that you found it.

It will be very nice if that is fixed. Much better radar control at night [emoji4]

[Carryonsailing]

Dear All,
Firstly a quick thanks as always. I have done some testing of the plugin on various boats using numerous different routers/ switches all with the latest OpenCPN and stable release of the Radar plugin, I have tested on Windows, Mac and Linux (debian and fedora). I notice that every so often the setup window shows that either true heading or magnetic heading is missing just for a few seconds and then it disappears. the Radar overlay and the normal radar window still remain but the requisites window pops up for just a few seconds, then the heading tick box suddenly becomes ticked and the radar continues to work again. I can try to capture some video of this happening but it is quite difficult to repeat. Nevertheless if it is not a known bug I will endeavour to catch it. The Radar target scan resets when this happens and it begins it's sweep again. The other thing I notice that if you enable the AIS overlay inside the scanner window on a windows machine then it crashes Opencpn. This does not happen on linux and I have not been able to get it to happen on mac also. Can I add value to the community in any way to help?
Thanks
James of Carry on Sailing

[Hakan]

James..
The missed heading I can't reproduce. My thought it's some failure in your data stream?
You could check for example using the "NMEA Debug window" from Options=>Connections. There you can filter for HDT/HDM/HDG dependent on what you receive from your compass. There you can see if it's updated in due time. I'd say every second is a normal rate. (The more the better) If more than five seconds radar_pi will fail like you describe it.


The crash when enable AIS target on PPI window I reproduce on my Win as well. I have filed an issue for that.

[Carryonsailing]

Hakan,
Great to hear from you and thanks for your thoughts and continued efforts. Still a hero for the people as ever I see.
I will debug and revert on the different systems. The funny thing is that it is with two different vessels running totally different style instruments etc. Using different routers/ switches, the only commonality is that both are using the actisense multiplexer from a hardware perspective.
However I will do some sniffing now you have set me on the blood trail, so to speak....
Happy Friday.
James

Originally Posted by Hakan

James..
The missed heading I can't reproduce. My thought it's some failure in your data stream?
You could check for example using the "NMEA Debug window" from Options=>Connections. There you can filter for HDT/HDM/HDG dependent on what you receive from your compass. There you can see if it's updated in due time. I'd say every second is a normal rate. (The more the better) If more than five seconds radar_pi will fail like you describe it.


The crash when enable AIS target on PPI window I reproduce on my Win as well. I have filed an issue for that.

[Hakan]

For info about AIS targets on the PPI window.
The O crash bug while showing AIS on the PPI window is confirmed and not easy to completely solve in radar plugin for OCPN version 5.8.4. Next OCPN version will take care of this but that release will take months.
Meanwhile a "work around" in radar_pi may either block the AIS function for the PPI window or make a simplified AIS presentation. Some work has started.
If the AIS on PPI is important the only possibility for now is to use OCPN version 5.6.2 instead. (The misplaced AIS targets while using offset presentation will still remain though.)
Sorry for this bug not tested and detected before OCPN v 5.8.4 release.

[Hakan]

James.. (All..)
The OCPN crash while showing AIS targets on the PPI I could reproduce on a OCNP based on on current Git master branch, waht's used for further development. That bug is now identified and will be corrected in Git master.
BUT I could not reproduce it on the official OCPN version 5.8.4. There are AIS targets visible in the PPI window on my Win10 without crash.
So my post above is not correct. OCPN v 5.8.4 will work as v 5.6.2 for this purpose.

[Carryonsailing]

Originally Posted by Hakan

James.. (All..)
The OCPN crash while showing AIS targets on the PPI I could reproduce on a OCNP based on on current Git master branch, waht's used for further development. That bug is now identified and will be corrected in Git master.
BUT I could not reproduce it on the official OCPN version 5.8.4. There are AIS targets visible in the PPI window on my Win10 without crash.
So my post above is not correct. OCPN v 5.8.4 will work as v 5.6.2 for this purpose.

Hi Hakan,
Thanks for this. I noticed it works for some time and does not crash immediately. For me on win 11 takes about 20 mins or so.
James

[Hakan]

James..
Ok, so I made a longer test with the corrected code without an instant crash.
And.. Yes I can confirm that as well. It's what called a memory leak while using AIS on the PPI window. Hmm.. more investigation..
Thanks for the reply

[Carryonsailing]

Originally Posted by Hakan

James..
Ok, so I made a longer test with the corrected code without an instant crash.
And.. Yes I can confirm that as well. It's what called a memory leak while using AIS on the PPI window. Hmm.. more investigation..
Thanks for the reply

Ok Buddy,
I am slowly trying to understand this wizardy of coding etc and will now research memory leak.
Thanks as always you legend of the opensource revolution.
J