Waypoints – The early edition

I decided to post ahead of the Christmas holiday, figuring many of you will be too wrapped up tomorrow to have time to peruse the links. For the noobs, Waypoints is a weekly link roundup of (mostly) GPS related odds and ends. To get many of these stories as they break, follow me on Twitter.

Garmin

• It’s Christmas Eve, not April Fools day; I really didn’t expect Garmin’s first US iPhone app to be something like this! WTF?
• Garmin’s iPhone navigation app to be announced at CES early next month? See tidbit in next to last paragraph
• Very cool — Create Garmin Custom Map overlays In ArcGIS Explorer
• DCRainmaker is a brave blogger; he does a water immersion test with the Garmin Edge  and CycleOps Joule cycling computers
• If these cases are any clue, it looks like the Garmin GTU 10 tracking device is going to be a simple data logger

Updates

• DeLorme Cache Register 2.0 for Earthmate PN-series
• DeLorme Earthmate PN-60 v 3.1.563103
• ExpertGPS v 4.25; via @gpsfix
• Garmin ANT Agent for Mac v 2.1.6.3 beta
• Garmin Dakota v 3.82 beta
• Garmin Forerunner 310XT v 3.10
• Garmin GPSMAP 62/78 v 2.92 beta
• Garmin Oregon v 4.12 beta
• Garmin Oregon x50 v 4.32 beta
• Magellan eXplorist GC v 1.6

Geocaching

• OpenCaching gets a review process; CacheMania shares his concerns
• Geocaching.com gets a major refresh; CacheMania summarizes the new features
• Geomate.jr beta release of a MAC update kit

GPS in the news

• Tracking Santa
• Top 5 Events in GPS/GNSS for 2010: A Year-End Review
• Why Cyclists should use GPS 
• Giving GPS trackers to domestic abuse victims
• GPS data contradict Denver cop’s story
• Not this cop; he knows how to disables his GPS
• Stolen GPS Leads To Argument, Fatal Stabbing

Android

• Best little-known feature of Google Maps for Android – ‘star’ something in your browser and it’s automatically starred on your phone; via @johnhanke
• Trapster 2.0 released for Android
• How to use the new Address Click feature in Navigon MobileNavigator

iPhone

• TomTom iPhone app v 1.6 adds Map Share
• NavFree launches free US iPhone navigation app with offline map data

The business of GPS

• Are tablets more a threat to GPS devices than smartphones?
• TomTom to deliver maps for ROUTE 66; interesting that Tele Atlas isn’t mentioned 
• Garmin loses patent dispute with Pioneer
• Mitac sues maker of Papago GPS, which is apparently a leading seller in SE Asia

Just geo

• A map-based census data explorer; via @geographytools
• Great peakbagging lists here; via @Cumbyrocks
• Global temperature changes by decade; via The Map Room
• A Google Earth plugin for simulating forest fires
• USGS announces the National Map Users Conference and USGS Geographic Information Science (GIS) Workshop
• Unprecedented topo maps of the moon