Take a good long gander at the full size screen above. That's Coastal Explorer 2010 in Guide Book mode, which already offered a wealth of port information, but as of last night (announcement here) can also show ActiveCaptain community generated info. The particular detail shown is my own enthusiastic take on our Public Landing, written when AC first launched (and still true), but notice how you can also access Atlantic Cruising Club's professional view of the facility, as well as three different angles on Wayfarer Marine and the Camden Yacht Club. The chances are good that a visiting boat can find all the information it needs in this one spot. In fact, while my entry on the neat ACC integration was titled "CE & ACC, great but not enough! Part 1," today Part 2 is pretty much irrelevant...
I've always liked the idea of route planning software, but Navionics NavPlanner was somewhat troubled from the start. Hence it seems like great news that Navionics dumped it entirely in favor of a partnership with Fugawi, leading to this recent joint announcement of NavPlanner2. Fugawi figured out how to present Navionics data well years ago, and then went on to produce the excellent Navionics HotMaps Explorer. Judging from the NavPlanner2 screen shot above -- which shows off Google Earth synchronization -- it shares a lot of code with the HotMaps lake planner. But NavPlanner2 has many added features...
Green Marine is a new company, but the principals already knew a lot about high bright LCD panels like the ones you see outside some fast food restaurants, and have even supplied screens to some familiar marine brands. And I like their approach to the retail marine market -- offering only LED backlit displays that are extra bright but at relatively reasonable prices. They've also at least started to do something I wish every manufacturer did, which is to detail their specifications against the competition...
The tidal wave of interesting iPhone boating apps rolls on! The screen at left above (click for bigger) shows a beta version of Memory Map's upcoming charting app and I can tell you that it already handles NOAA raster charts and topo maps with speed and smoothness I didn't think possible on plain 3G hardware. At middle is the brand new Ships Ahoy!, a $3 AR (augmented reality) relative to Ship Finder and the other AIS viewers that lets you just point an iPhone 3Gs (you need the compass) toward a vessel or two to get their names and details (if the area is covered by a network receiver). And finally there's Navionics' neat new Ski:US, which admittedly has nothing to do with boats but does speak to this big marine company's big commitment to mobile apps. It happens to have my local Camden Snow Bowl among the so-far-limited ski area coverage, and it works great. In that screen shot I'm playing back the tracks (in yellow) I cut right after last week's big snow dump, in particular the --- MPH moment I lost board control in a huge drift. All these possibilities, and lord knows what else, will expand if Apple introduces a 4.0 version of the iPhone operating system this afternoon. But of course the bigger questions swirl around the Apple tablet, or whatever they decide to call it...
My longtime admiration for Jeff and Karen Siegel, and their creation ActiveCaptain, has started to lean dangerously toward jealousy! They've spend many months cruising from Maine to Florida and judging from their blog and the latest AC newsletter, they've not only been having fun but also writing code and making deals the whole way. Version "X" of the interactive cruising guide is really taking shape, and other developments coming soon do indeed sound "huge"...
I can't imagine why anyone with a Garmin plotter, a Windows PC, and a bit of ability to use both wouldn't find Garmin Homeport more than worth the $30 charge. I was able to easily copy the 5212's embedded charts -- plus the mess of tracks, routes, and waypoints I put on it last season -- and then review/manage all on my home computer. I stowed away some memorable tracks, quickly cleaned up some extraneous waypoints (careful with that track-to-route feature), polished some favorite routes, and then overwrote the user data on the 5212 with a much more useful set. But today's look at some deeper Homeport features gets the benefit of a friend's embarrassing navigation error. Click to enlarge the screen above and I'll explain after the break...
If I was walking the London Boat Show this week, I'd sure visit Digital Yacht, which seems to be on a new product streak. Besides the tiny, self contained ANT200 AIS receiver I mentioned here, they have a new line of 5-inch C-Map plotters -- one with an AIS receiver built in (which I'll cover soon) -- and an interesting new series of marine PC systems called "aQua". The boat show deal, which will purportedly be duplicated at the Miami Show, just might get your attention...
Wow, isn't an interesting crowd of chart, map, and data suppliers gathering rapidly around the iPhone/multi-other-platform X-Traverse service? I recently discussed the velocity of this and other iPhone-related developements, but was still surprised to learn today that Navionics is officially on board (Americas charts and U.S. Hotmaps available now, the rest of the world portfolio coming "in the next couple weeks"), that Hilton's Realtime-Navigator fishing overlays will go up on X-Traverse in May, and that "agreements are in place with several other chart manufacturers to bring expanded coverage and choice (raster or vector)."
I spent some of this weekend installing and trying out Coastal Explorer 2009, and was thoroughly impressed. CE, also sold as Maptech Chart Navigator Pro, has always been an excellent charting program, in my opinion, and the 2009 edition is a worthy successor. The screen shot above, for instance, shows the slick new automated NOAA raster and vector chart updating routine (and the fact I was doing the updating while riding a train, via a Sprint EVDO WiFi server, suggests how possible online onboard is getting). CE 2009 also easily incorporated lots of Maptech data -- photo maps, topos, harbor photos, and marina databases -- that was already on my PCs. But CE's included Guide Book data, access to TerraServer photo maps and its new abilities to display Panoramio photos and CE user community POI info (photos included) make Maptech data somewhat less important. Which may be a good thing, in a way, as the relationship between CE's creator, Rosepoint Navigation, and the company that took over Maptech's digital chart business, Maptech Navigation, has gotten a little confusing...
Hot damn. The nine and ten inch screens on these new ASUS Eee PC T91 and T101 “netbooks” swivel to tablet mode and are not just touch but multi touch. The small one weighs just over two pounds, and can have a GPS built in. Now I’m quite aware that my interest in the big HP TouchSmart series isn’t shared by many boaters, but, geez, couldn’t one of these little puppies make a nifty nav/comms accessory? Engadget and particularly LaptopMag have good T91/T101 coverage. Pricing isn’t noted but the existing ASUS Eee series bodes well. Also at CES, Spot announced a roadside assist add-on service that might be great for trailer boaters. I’m sure there’s more of interest at the show, and will keep looking.
bodes well. Also at CES, Spot announced a