This week in GPS is a weekly link roundup of (mostly) GPS related odds and ends, from GPS Tracklog and other places around the Web. To get a few of the biggest stories as they break, follow me on Twitter. This week’s lead image is of the Garmin Vector bike pedal-based power meters, which are finally hitting the market.
From GPS Tracklog
Our posts from the past week:
Drones
- Ha! Colorado voters will decide whether to issue drone-hunting licenses
Garmin
- DC Rainmaker: First hands-on look & rides with the Garmin Vector power meter
- And a First Ride Review from BikeRadar, and a promo video
- Garmin’s wireless backup camera clears the FCC and is due to ship soon
- Older version of Garmin GPS has a hard time pronouncing the Brooklyn
BranchBridge - Garmin’s Voice Studio hits the Today Show
- Excerpts from an email I received this week from a loyal reader, reminding me of the utility of JaVaWa GMTK:
Just wanted to let you know I have found a tool that every Mapsource and Basecamp user needs to have. As you no doubt know, Garmin’s map product installers are a nightmare to use. There is no consistency in them: depending on the vintage of the product, some of them are hard coded to install the maps in specific places like C:\Garmin, and give you no option to change the install location, while others default to whichever drive has the most free space, but allow you to select another location. Then there are those EVIL maps that give you a dialog box to select the location you want, then IGNORE your choice and proceed to install the ma somewhere else anyway! City Navigator North America is one of these. So, you can easily end up with Garmin maps scattered all over the place, not only in different folders, but even on different drives.
I was searching the ‘net for possible solutions to this annoyance and found a utility program called “JaVaWa GMTK“. It does several functions, including backup and restore of mapsets and unlock codes, but the one I am most pleased with is that it can easily and quickly move entire map installs. When you run the program, it scans the registry for all installed Garmin maps, then you select each map product that got installed to a folder where you didn’t want it, and select the path where you want it moved to. Press the “go” button, and GMTK moves the entire batch of maps, and corrects all the pertinent registry entries so that Mapsource sees the map product in it’s new location. GMTK moved City Nav NA, Topo 24K National Parks West, and Topo Canada successfully and as far as I can tell, made all the registry corrections properly: Mapsource was able to see all of the relocated maps no problem. It handles both the older IMG format maps and the newer GMP maps.
For years I have been struggling with moving Garmin’s improperly installed mapsets and correcting registry entries manually, every time I have to do a Windows re-install after a crash or when buying a new hard disk. Now I’ll never have to go through that again.
DeLorme
- DeLorme inReach SE now syncs contacts with Explore website
TomTom
- MapShare too much of a hassle to use?
- TomTom maps work on TwoNav devices
Updates
- Garmin software updates this week: Edge 500, 510, 800 and 810
- Magellan Active website v 1.9
Geocaching
- Best geocaching towns?
- Geocaching version 3.0 for Android released
- More microcontroller based geocaches showing up
- Win personalized pathtags with OpenCaching
We’re jammin’
- N.J. man fined $32K for illegal GPS device that disrupted Newark airport system
- Every Three Years Someone Gets Busted for Using a GPS Jammer
GPS tracking
- Rialto police use GPS to track kidnapping victim
- GPS embedded insoles
- iPhone GPS led investigators to suspects in killing of Washington & Jefferson football player
- GPS helps track down stolen New Castle backhoe
- Suspect in gunfight with Boston police was wearing GPS tracker
- Rocky Mountain Tracking Adds CDMA Products and Services
- Private investigator fitted GPS tracker to 999 worker’s car while she was on sick leave from fire service
- Rental car’s GPS leads police to drive-by shooting suspect
- Chinese city uses GPS to address food waste
Going mobile
- Lots of Google Maps for mobile tips and tricks
- Why Does GPS Use More Battery Than Any Other Antenna Or Sensor In A Smartphone?
- Users report new Nexus 7 suffering from GPS issues
- Gotta kill battery life though…Hide From GPS With This Signal-Blocking Phone Case
- DigitalGlobe satellite imagery added to Trimble apps and maps
- ParkMe updates Android app with real-time street parking info
- Review: NAVIGON MobileNavigator iPhone app
- A guide to some of the best GPS fitness-tracking apps
- Poll: What’s your favorite GPS fitness-tracking app?…
GPS in the news
- Man blames GPS for illegal U-turn, rollover crash
- SatNav error blamed for cyclist’s death
- County to first responders: Don’t BYOGPS
The business of GPS
- Apple Maps is hiring
- LightSquared’s Harbinger sues Garmin, Trimble & Deere
Just geo
- The legal uses of Google Earth and Google Maps
- I’ve linked to GMap4 before, but here’s a post about it from All Points Blog
- Measuring distances with the Google Earth Ruler
- Uncharted territory in Canda
- Get to Know a Projection: Mercator
https://twitter.com/TheMindBlowing/status/365163581999816704
Miscellany
KickstarterFunded: Centimeter-level precision GPS for $900- Locating the brain’s GPS: Human neurons link to navigation in open environments
- Connected Cars Fueling Up to Take a Drive in Europe
- Remember last week when I said BHCnav seems to have some interest in the US market, but I wasn’t sure what type of US maps they have? Well I heard back from them:
2 dimension road map, may (sic) source is Atlas and Navteq. TOPO map is STRM3.
This watch came with a "GPS Cleaning Brush". Good, cause I always hated dirty satellites. pic.twitter.com/M4ZDvr8KyH
— Ray Maker (@dcrainmakerblog) August 3, 2013
Updated GPS reviews
I’ve updated these review and resource pages with the following links:
- Garmin nüvi 3597LMTHD — Digital Versus reviews this high-end model
- Magellan eXplorist GC — Our Kid’s Mom reviewss ths dedicated geocaching unit
About Rich Owings
+1 for GaVaWa GMTK! I have been using it for a year or two, and absolutely LOVE IT! It makes keeping the maps organized a “normal process”. It is also extremely handy if you use MapSource and/or BaseCamp on multiple computers (my home laptop and travel tablet), because you can easily distribute the maps over the computers after a single download.