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I am happy to announce, for french-speaking users, the publication of my new blog Navigation Mac . Tricks and tips about GPSNavX, MacENC, iNavX, tutorials and "how to" with x-traverse, navionics, grib files and so on...
Enjoy !

From the folks that did the 'StarPilot' program for celestial navigation on PC and TI calculators. I have been on the look out for such an app.
http://www.starpilotllc.com/products/iNA.htm

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iNA - An electronic Nautical Almanac for the iPhone and iPod Touch

iNA computes all ephemeris data available in the daily pages of the USNO Nautical Almanac. This information is required when doing astronomical computations for celestial navigation, local noon, sunrise, and others. The program computes GHA, Dec, SHA, SD, HP, magnitudes, sunrise, sunset, LAN, twilight times, moonrise, moonset, moon age and phase for sun, moon, 5 planets, and 173 stars. INA also computes addition useful information not included in the Nautical Almanac such as ephemeris for Mercury, Hc at LAN, bearing of sunrise and sunset (amplitudes), and the GHA of Aries midway between civil and nautical twilights for star planning.

INA's internal celestial almanac is valid for the years 1582 through 2800 AD.

STORY:
I have had iNavX on my iPhone 2G since early 2008 but since it does not have GPS and I have not found iNavX friendly for dead reckoning it has seen little use except for the trial account w/ x-traverse to check out GRIB Wx. The early implementation of iNavX GRIB left me feeling frustrated so I went back to my windows GRIB programs, let x-traverse account expire and have forgotten the little I learned.
p.s. My wife is a captain 1600T Ocean and uses her iPhone 3G w/ iNavX constantly and shows/amazes the masses but is not using GRIB Wx. I want to get her iNavX doing all it can for her. I will be sitting on sidelines until upgrading to a GPS enabled version unless I get my 2G talking to Coastal Explorer some day.
(Thanks for the very helpful CE article on the web site.)

QUESTIONS:
(a) GRIB: What is the size (days) and resolution(time and degs) of the GRIB dataset and how does one scroll fwd/back in time within the iNavX interface?

(b) Chart Updates: How does one check (within iNavX) to see if charts that have been downloaded and are resident on the iPhone are the current version?

This one is also compatible with GPSNavX and MacENC. What is nice is it offers USB, RS-232 Serial and RS-422 NMEA connections. The G model offers a built in GPS receiver so it is one less device that needs to be separately interfaced.

AMEC CYPHO-101 AIS Receiver

Can the Tom Tom Car Kit (http://www.tomtom.com/products/product.p...ry=2&Lid=4) be used with iNavX?

It has it's own GPS, speaker, charging cable, and audio output jack for iTunes. Could this solve the problem of less that accurate iPhone GPS reported by Panbo?

iNavX has the ability to share Tracks and Waypoints on Facebook. On the iNavX "Tracks" view select "Export Tracks", "Yes, Share on Facebook". This will send the iNavX Track history and any waypoints (including associated photos) within 1 nm of the track to X-Traverse and the linked Facebook account.

More Info:

http://www.gpsnavx.com/iNavX/help/tracks.htm

http://www.fugawi.com/web/x-traverse/x-traverse_facebook_instructions.pdf

http://www.sis.si/iphone/wind-speed/3

One of the longstanding seafaring dilemmas is how close to the wind to sail, when tacking upwind. Whether in a nutshell pram or a big cruising catamaran, there is always the question of whether it would be faster to (a) minimize the distance by sailing close to the wind, or (b) head off the wind for more speed but a greater distance to cover.

Maybe you have tried to answer this question by using the ETA on your GPS chartplotter. But when you have been on a tack for awhile, the ETA on many brands will suddenly go blank right when you need it most.

And did you know that Velocity Made Good (VMG) decreases all by itself, the further you get off the rhumb line (the straight line to the destination)? If your speed is constant, even if you are on a correct tacking angle, VMG erroneously shows slower and slower speeds the longer your tack continues.

SailTimer solves these problems. It quickly tells you (1) how long is it going to take to tack to my destination, and (2) what are the optimal sailing angles to get there?

Even on an $800 GPS chartplotter, your normal sailing on tacks is viewed as "cross-track error". But now, if you have an iPhone or iPod Touch running SailTimer, you can plot a waypoint on an aerial photo and calculate the time to get there with tacking correctly accounted for. As you can see from the graphics below, you can also calculate the distances on each tack, and much more. SailTimer Lite is a FREE download from iTunes, and the full version is US $13.99.

The link to SailTimer in the App Store is at: IndepthNavigation.com





[image]http://www.motionparallax.com/TCDVDs/4versions/AppStoreGraphics/Map.jpg[/image] .. [image]http://www.motionparallax.com/TCDVDs/4versions/AppStoreGraphics/Options.jpg[/image] .. [image]http://www.motionparallax.com/TCDVDs/4versions/AppStoreGraphics/NameWaypoint.jpg[/image]

..

[image]http://www.motionparallax.com/TCDVDs/4versions/AppStoreGraphics/Results.jpg[/image] .. [image]http://www.motionparallax.com/TCDVDs/4versions/AppStoreGraphics/Waypoints.jpg[/image]

1) Quit GPSNavX or MacENC or GPSUtility (if running).

2) Install the Prolific Driver.

http://www.gpsnavx.com/downloads/Prolific14.dmg
(The installer should launch automatically, if not double-click PL2303_XXX.pkg icon. Note: OS X 10.8 & later users should initially [control] click on the installer icon, then select "Open" from the context menu.)

3) Restart Mac normally.

4) Connect the BU-353 USB GPS to your Macs USB port. If a dialog offering "Network Preferences" or "Cancel" appears, select "Cancel".

5) Launch GPSNavX or MacENC or GPSUtility and select "Connect" on the "GPS" menu. In the "Settings" drawer select "SiRF USB" for the type. Select the port. It will have the name "usbserial". Select "4800" for the rate.

6) If the port "usbserial" is not available:

A) Quit GPSNavX or MacENC.

B) Unplug BU-353 USB GPS

C) Delete any "ProlificUSBSerial.kext" is in the Macintosh HD / System / Library / Extensions folder.

D) Delete any PL2303_XXX files in the Macintosh HD / Library / Receipts folder.

E) Restart your Mac in "Safe Mode" by holding down the [shift] key as it restarts.

Return to step 2.

As a final note: It is important that the BU-353 USB GPS be connected to your Mac before starting MacENC or GPSNavX or GPSUtility.

[image]http://www.gpsnavx.com/images/BU353.png[/image]

http://www.nauticalcharts.noaa.gov/mcd/l...harts.html

http://www.nauticalcharts.noaa.gov/mcd/l...chart.html