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Disappeared when updating Weather4D Pro to Weather4D Routing (¹), Iridium satellite passage prediction returns as a small stand-alone application : iWatchSat.
Presented with the same interface as Weather4D apps, it optimizes the connection for downloading GRIB files.
June 2012, I wrote a post about the future constellation of communications satellites Iridium NEXT. While intended for operational use in 2017, the calendar was shifted a few months. Indeed, the launch of the first ten satellites by the private company SpaceX, originally planned on 12 September 2016, was postponed for a few months by the explosion on September 1, a Falcon rocket 9 rocket explosion during the fuel filling on its launch pad before a shot of engine test.
[Update 15 February 2019] The recent update of the application Iridium Mail & Web app gives me the opportunity to refresh the ticket originally written in December 2011.
The Wi - Fi gateway Optimizer RedPort the company enables owners of a mobile satellite phone to query and receive GRIB weather files from an iPad or iPhone on the high seas, into the wild, anywhere on the world.
Having implemented and tested this solution on a long journey, it has proven perfectly operational. However, it is limited to receiving only predictions GFS weather model global, and model WW3 waves, obtained by the autoresponder US server Saildocs.
Iridium has just published an update of its Iridium GO device firmware! to correct a number of dysfunctions, including the slowness of data transfers (Messaging, GRIB files, aso.) but also recurrent problems of voice connection with the network. Read more …
If satellite telephony tariffs, mainly Iridium and Inmarsat, have not evolved in the U.S.A., this is not the case in France. After storage removal of products remained on the shelves, new distributors supplies have suffered a sharp rise. Indeed, the combined action of Euro decline and French VAT rise obligated to a significant prices increase, both the material as communication SIM vouchers, pre-paid or post-paid. Read more …
Iridium announced in its distribution network shutdown late February router WiFi AxcessPoint (¹) which allows an iPad or an iPhone to connect to an Iridium phone to access a messaging service.
No need to worry to have for current users : the associated Iridium messaging service will remain active and accessible to all users. But this router can no longer be ordered from 25 February. Read more …
Since release Apple iOS 8 early October 2014 the messaging app Iridium Mail & Web app (which replaced Iridium Mail & Web app) was no longer able to export an attachment in another application by the function "open in".… ". This fact could no longer use a weather GRIB file received as an attachment from the SailDocs server in any application, mainly Weather4D PRO.
It took more than 3 month for two successive updates come correct this problem severely handicapping for client users of Iridium :
Since the release of Iridium GO! (¹) There were two different pages of subscription (for free) to messaging service, and two applications (iOS/Android) to connect to the Iridium devices. Now there is only one application : Iridium Mail & Web app to connect to the router Optimizer, either Iridium GO! Read more …
Since its announcement last February, the GO! is expected to come from dealers at the beginning of this month. Company E SAT gave me one to conduct some tests. Although too late to perform these tests at sea, the Quai des Antilles on the Ile de Nantes offers a wide sky clearance also than the deck of a boat, enough to connect satellites of all-round. Two types of test were conducted : requests and receipts of GRIB weather files from an iPad featured with Weather4D PRO app, functions related to the telephony from an iPhone.
Iridium GO! in the Buren Rings on the Quay of Antilles. An invitation to travel ?
We read in the newsGlobal satellite company aims at the consumer market with Iridium GO!™ : pack it for camping or world travel (¹).
In all public places where you can connect wirelessly to the Internet today, Wi-Fi is not yet ubiquitous. And if you are a boater, backpacker, pilot, camper or someone who spends a lot of time in nature, the chance to connect to cyberspace in some remote locations is almost impossible. It is not just data. Try making a cellular phone call in such places !