Are GRIB files systematically optimistic ?

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I've been asked this question regularly, but until now I've never wanted to give my opinion on the subject publicly, so as not to offend anyone or create unnecessary controversy.. But after doing so many of my training courses, why not express it to me openly ?

My opinion, forged by observation and a long professional experience in pleasure boating (¹), is that this assertion of the systematic optimism of GRIB forecasts regarding wind strength, which unfortunately persists, no longer has any reason to exist, and has not been verified in practice for some time. Read more …

Bad weather for iNavX [Update]

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What I've been planning for a while has finally happened. : iNavX lost Navionics mapping ! It seemed obvious that the historic contract which allowed iNavX to have privileged access to Navionics cartography, since the origin of the application designed by Richard Ray in 2009, was threatened. Since then things have changed a lot : repurchase of the application by NavX Studio (¹), acquisition of Navionics by Garmin (²), generalization of the annual chart subscription policy (³)… Read more …

Alternative weather models [Update]

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[Updated 29 July 2022]

For several years, forecast files in GRIB format have been widely used in meteorological applications.. The majority of forecast models have been made freely available by meteorological services, all countries included. Apps like XyGrib, LuckGrib, SailGrib, Weather4D and others, offer a selection of atmospheric and oceanic models, up to 60 Weather Models, Waves and currents for Weather4D, more than thirty models with LuckGrib, in example. But there are always others that can usefully complement the standard offerings of these applications. Read more …

The S-100 standard for ENC charts is quickly evolving [Update]

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in May 1992, the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) had adopted a standard aimed at defining the specifications of electronic charts, the ENC, used by ships, as well as the devices that display them, Called ECDIS. This standard has been published under the name S-57 – IHO Special Publication N°57. This standard was subsequently significantly updated, The version 3.1, in November 2000. Ten years were then left to the various operators, manufacturers and publishers, to bring their navigation systems on board ships into compliance. In January 2010, A new standard S-100 IHO Special Publication – Universal Hydrographic Data Model has been published, an important evolution aimed at adapting to this rapid growth in the data available for navigation. Read more …

Predict storms with Weather4D

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In Weather4D (all versions) most weather models provide a data called CAPE.

Convective Available Potential Energy, in French : Energie potentielle de convection disponible. Behind this obscure acronym hides a powerful storm forecasting tool. CAPE is measured in Joules per kilogram of air (J/Kg) and defines the vertical buoyancy energy of a hot air particle in a colder atmosphere. In other words, vertical acceleration of the air particle will be directly related to this energy measurement. Read more …

Weather4D and iOS LAN

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From iOS/iPadOS 14.5, A new setting has appeared proposing to allow applications to access the Local area network. This option is offered when installing a new application, but is not necessarily activated if the application is already installed when the OS is updated.

Since then, Many of you are no longer able to connect certain applications (Weather4D, iNavX, aso.) Wi-Fi-connected devices : Iridium GO!®, Multiplexers, Miscellaneous NMEA gateways. To do this, you must activate this "Local network" option for the application concerned. Read more …