The blog
Launched at the same time as the iPhone 3GS and iNavX app, and a few months before the first iPad, This blog follows since 10 n the continued growth of mobile devices used in marine navigation.
Through more than 350 Articles, I tried to guide users through the evolution of Apple mobile navigation hardware and applications. Read more …
Weather4D had been ported to Android from fall 2013. One year later, in December 2014, Weather4D integrated charting navigation, NMEA data support via TCP-IP protocol, Autopilot control. Routing was only missing, already developed on iOS for Apple devices.
Alas, the following years, the time-consuming increase in iOS development had not allowed the developer to keep up with the Android version at the same level of features. Finally, two years ago, Google has announced that apps using native code should include a version 64 Bits (in addition to the 32 Bits). Read more …
My friends Christiane and Jochen Lührs are the proud owners of a superb classic ketch German building, Socorro, with which they regularly cross the west European coasts. Fully built of solid woodin 1951, they maintain her with meticulous care, after many navigations from Norway to Scotland, and from Europe to the Antilles.
In stopover a few days ago in Vannes, I had the great pleasure to visit them. I knew Jochen when he was the German translator of iNavX, now a fan of Weather4D. I was finally able to visit their magnificent boat, which attracted more than one glance along the quay, with its perfect varnishes, its gleaming stainless steel, its masts Spruce, and impressive wheelhouse. I also discovered an amazing invention there… Read more …
Geogarage, the mapping platform of raster charts derived from official services, today introduced two ENC-S57 rasterized charts layers for Weather4D Routing & Navigation, covering ’Spain and Croatia. The recent update June, 12 th of the application allows the activation of these two new chart sets. Read more …
I relayed in December 2018 an excellent issue published on the blog of our friends at Geogarage, who make a permanent duty of a press review of the best foreign articles concerning cartography, meteorology, and more generally all subjects related to maritime navigation. Here is a translation freely adapted and commented on in French. Read more …
Numerous AIS tracking networks broadcast over the internet are available. Among the best known : Marine Traffic, Vessel Finder, SiiTech, LocateEverything, and many others. One of these networks particularly stands out, AISHub, an AIS NMEA data sharing center, which offers developers an API allowing the integration of its network into applications, and therefore display of AIS targets received over the Internet directly into the application. Featured from the beginning in Weather4D Routing & Navigation, this system has made it possible to envisage new and particularly innovative services. Read more …
This question comes up to me from time to time, and as no one is supposed to ignore the law, I feel obliged to make my contribution to the edification of the crowds (of boaters) by providing a collective response.
Manual or electronic navigation, which one to choose ?
The new AIS AIT5000 transponder (from Digital Yacht) increases transmission rate depending on ship speed.
A new generation of transponder (¹) AIS Class B+ claims to make pleasure boats more visible. Here's how… Read more …
Since 30 th 2018 (*), I already had information regarding discontinuation by NAVX Studio LLC of the development of two historical applications created by Richard Ray : GPSNavX and MacENC. The buyers of these applications and iNavX had clearly announced focuse only to the development of iNavX, on iOS and Android. It is likely that applications on Mac were no longer profitable, especially with the loss of Navionics maps for MacENC. Read more …
Navigation apps are full of acronyms. This coded and abstruse language was originally developed for electronic navigation instruments, GPS mapping and other chartplotters. These acronyms, in the form of three letters most often, are the contraction of terms defining specific navigation data and according functions. This facilitates on-screen display taking few space. If some of these acronyms are relatively well assimilated by the boater, as SOG for Speed Over Ground (speed over the bottom), you can quickly access subtleties that are not always mastered as COG for Course Over Ground, meaning "route runned on the ground", that the word "Course" in English can mean "Route" or "Heading" according to the context. Read more …