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Sharing Corrected Coordinates via Bookmarks


Mixed Breed

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When working on Geo-Art, I put the corrected coordinates on the cache page and save to a bookmark. If I use this bookmark to create a pq to put into GSAK, I get the corrected coordinates. However, if I try to share this bookmark with someone and they use it to create a pq for GSAK, they do not get the corrected ones, only the original ones. Is there any way around this?

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When working on Geo-Art, I put the corrected coordinates on the cache page and save to a bookmark. If I use this bookmark to create a pq to put into GSAK, I get the corrected coordinates. However, if I try to share this bookmark with someone and they use it to create a pq for GSAK, they do not get the corrected ones, only the original ones. Is there any way around this?

Not within the "terms of use".

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What do you mean put the on the page. Are you correcting them with the pencil or entering a personal note. Either way those are only available to you. What you need to do is create the pq yourself and send it to him. He can import it and it will have the coorected coords but GSAK doesn't know that since a PQ has no indictor. He can then go a global replace edit to set the corrected coords check box.

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What do you mean put the on the page. Are you correcting them with the pencil or entering a personal note. Either way those are only available to you. What you need to do is create the pq yourself and send it to him. He can import it and it will have the coorected coords but GSAK doesn't know that since a PQ has no indictor. He can then go a global replace edit to set the corrected coords check box.

Of course sending the PQ results is a violation of the Terms of Use. Like Ngrrfan said you have to be careful with the terms of use. You could make a text file that lists the cache code and the corrected coordinates. Then make a GSAK macro that reads this file and updates the corrected coordinates in GSAK. That would be within the TOU. Other than that there is no legal method.

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What do you mean put the on the page. Are you correcting them with the pencil or entering a personal note. Either way those are only available to you. What you need to do is create the pq yourself and send it to him. He can import it and it will have the coorected coords but GSAK doesn't know that since a PQ has no indictor. He can then go a global replace edit to set the corrected coords check box.

Of course sending the PQ results is a violation of the Terms of Use. Like Ngrrfan said you have to be careful with the terms of use. You could make a text file that lists the cache code and the corrected coordinates. Then make a GSAK macro that reads this file and updates the corrected coordinates in GSAK. That would be within the TOU. Other than that there is no legal method.

 

I used the pencil to correct the coordinates. Where can I find the terms of use? Maybe after I re-read them I will understand more but I don't see that sharing a bookmark I made after correcting coordinates would be any different than sharing it before correcting coordinates.

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What do you mean put the on the page. Are you correcting them with the pencil or entering a personal note. Either way those are only available to you. What you need to do is create the pq yourself and send it to him. He can import it and it will have the coorected coords but GSAK doesn't know that since a PQ has no indictor. He can then go a global replace edit to set the corrected coords check box.

Of course sending the PQ results is a violation of the Terms of Use. Like Ngrrfan said you have to be careful with the terms of use. You could make a text file that lists the cache code and the corrected coordinates. Then make a GSAK macro that reads this file and updates the corrected coordinates in GSAK. That would be within the TOU. Other than that there is no legal method.

 

I used the pencil to correct the coordinates. Where can I find the terms of use? Maybe after I re-read them I will understand more but I don't see that sharing a bookmark I made after correcting coordinates would be any different than sharing it before correcting coordinates.

 

Terms of Use

 

D Restrictions. Permission to use our services is subject to the following restrictions. Whether these restrictions have been violated shall be determined in our sole discretion. You agree not to:

 

iii Use our services, including GPX files, for any purpose other than your personal use without our written permission.

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There is also the Waypoint License Agreement

 

Uses Not Permitted:

• Licensee shall not sell, rent, lease, sublicense, lend, assign, time-share, or transfer, in whole or in part, or provide access to the Data, Related Materials, any updates, or Licensee's rights under this Agreement to any third party whatsoever.

 

I am wondering if another user of the site might not be considered a third party?

 

Meanwhile, a possible solution would be creating another "team" login to which both users would have the password; the OP could correct the coordinates under that login, allowing their associate to subsequently login and use them.

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What do you mean put the on the page. Are you correcting them with the pencil or entering a personal note. Either way those are only available to you. What you need to do is create the pq yourself and send it to him. He can import it and it will have the coorected coords but GSAK doesn't know that since a PQ has no indictor. He can then go a global replace edit to set the corrected coords check box.

Of course sending the PQ results is a violation of the Terms of Use. Like Ngrrfan said you have to be careful with the terms of use. You could make a text file that lists the cache code and the corrected coordinates. Then make a GSAK macro that reads this file and updates the corrected coordinates in GSAK. That would be within the TOU. Other than that there is no legal method.

 

I used the pencil to correct the coordinates. Where can I find the terms of use? Maybe after I re-read them I will understand more but I don't see that sharing a bookmark I made after correcting coordinates would be any different than sharing it before correcting coordinates.

Sharing a bookmark is not a violation of the TOU. But it is pointless since another user making a PQ from you bookmark would not get the corrected coordinates, that is something that is only available to you. The correction you made with the pencil is not viewable by another user. Otherwise just about all the puzzle caches would be available with corrected coordinate for everyone.

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When working on Geo-Art, I put the corrected coordinates on the cache page and save to a bookmark. If I use this bookmark to create a pq to put into GSAK, I get the corrected coordinates. However, if I try to share this bookmark with someone and they use it to create a pq for GSAK, they do not get the corrected ones, only the original ones. Is there any way around this?

When you correct coordinates, it is only corrected for you and no one else.

 

Sharing the bookmark does not violate the TOU. Unfortunately, sharing the bookmark does not allow them access to your corrected coordinates, as you found out.

 

The obvious way of sharing this is to generate a GPX file and pass it to them, but as others have mentioned, that would an obvious violation of the TOU, even though they are also premium members.

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What do you mean put the on the page. Are you correcting them with the pencil or entering a personal note. Either way those are only available to you. What you need to do is create the pq yourself and send it to him. He can import it and it will have the coorected coords but GSAK doesn't know that since a PQ has no indictor. He can then go a global replace edit to set the corrected coords check box.

Of course sending the PQ results is a violation of the Terms of Use. Like Ngrrfan said you have to be careful with the terms of use. You could make a text file that lists the cache code and the corrected coordinates. Then make a GSAK macro that reads this file and updates the corrected coordinates in GSAK. That would be within the TOU. Other than that there is no legal method.

 

I used the pencil to correct the coordinates. Where can I find the terms of use? Maybe after I re-read them I will understand more but I don't see that sharing a bookmark I made after correcting coordinates would be any different than sharing it before correcting coordinates.

 

Terms of Use

 

D Restrictions. Permission to use our services is subject to the following restrictions. Whether these restrictions have been violated shall be determined in our sole discretion. You agree not to:

 

iii Use our services, including GPX files, for any purpose other than your personal use without our written permission.

 

So wouldn't that preclude sharing any bookmark?

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What do you mean put the on the page. Are you correcting them with the pencil or entering a personal note. Either way those are only available to you. What you need to do is create the pq yourself and send it to him. He can import it and it will have the coorected coords but GSAK doesn't know that since a PQ has no indictor. He can then go a global replace edit to set the corrected coords check box.

Of course sending the PQ results is a violation of the Terms of Use. Like Ngrrfan said you have to be careful with the terms of use. You could make a text file that lists the cache code and the corrected coordinates. Then make a GSAK macro that reads this file and updates the corrected coordinates in GSAK. That would be within the TOU. Other than that there is no legal method.

 

I used the pencil to correct the coordinates. Where can I find the terms of use? Maybe after I re-read them I will understand more but I don't see that sharing a bookmark I made after correcting coordinates would be any different than sharing it before correcting coordinates.

 

Terms of Use

 

D Restrictions. Permission to use our services is subject to the following restrictions. Whether these restrictions have been violated shall be determined in our sole discretion. You agree not to:

 

iii Use our services, including GPX files, for any purpose other than your personal use without our written permission.

 

So wouldn't that preclude sharing any bookmark?

No, bookmarks do not contain any data. The TOU addresses the sharing of data. Bookmarks are nothing more than a list of caches. A loose analogy would be sharing the table of contents of a book as opposed to sharing the content of the book.

 

Since bookmarks are just a list of caches that is why sharing a bookmark of caches with corrected coordinates does not serve purpose of sharing the corrected coordinates.

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The API allows us to run a call thar returns caches not found by a group of people. Do they really think that those don't get shared. Personally I have never had a problem sharing a gpx file with another premium member.

The GPX police are not patrolling the streets, looking to ticket violators. But posting about your practices in the Website Bugs and Suggestion forum is sort of like double-parking in front of the police station.

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The API allows us to run a call thar returns caches not found by a group of people. Do they really think that those don't get shared. Personally I have never had a problem sharing a gpx file with another premium member.

The way I solve that problem is run the GSAK API to populate a database. I then use the API to populate a bookmark. Then sharing the bookmark everyone can create their own PQ and I have shared the list in TOU compliant manner. Even sharing with a premium member is not allowed. It boils down to a copyright issue.

 

Here in the Northwest we have a quarterly event called a cache machine where the organizer puts together a list of caches and publishes a Streets and Trips map of the route. I use that to publish a bookmark. I have been asked occasionally to make a .gpx file available. The answer is always no. Mostly the reason given is so the user sort field does not have to be manually filled in. I solved that problem by generating a text file containing the GC code of the caches with the stop numbers. I also provide a GSAK macro that will read this text file and populate the user sort field.

 

The OP could solve the corrected coordinate problem in much the same manner. I don't believe that these methods are in violation of the TOU. But if they are I expect the gpx police will show up with the black suv's, helicopters and the scary guys with no sense of humor.

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The API allows us to run a call thar returns caches not found by a group of people. Do they really think that those don't get shared. Personally I have never had a problem sharing a gpx file with another premium member.

The GPX police are not patrolling the streets, looking to ticket violators. But posting about your practices in the Website Bugs and Suggestion forum is sort of like double-parking in front of the police station.

 

Interesting analogy to use on a police officer who over the decades learned that the enforcement of the letter of the law is not always the best for the individuals involved or the community. Some allowance for current community standards when juxtaposed against strict enforcement must always be weighed carefully for its impact on the community as a whole. You have to ask "any damage done" before making that arrest or tagging that car.

 

I'll give one example. There was a group of island people who had weekend BBQ's in a local park and invariably after quantities of alcohol ended up in a brawl where no one really got hurt. We who had patrolled the area and knew them just let it fizzle out and then made sure everyone was okay. One day a new sergeant responded and insisted on getting involved and putting it to a stop. He waded in and rather quickly ended up penned in the bathroom calling for help. We waited it out and talked to the chief who freed him after awhile.

 

And if I double parked in front of a police station no one tagged my radio car.

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The API allows us to run a call thar returns caches not found by a group of people. Do they really think that those don't get shared. Personally I have never had a problem sharing a gpx file with another premium member.

The GPX police are not patrolling the streets, looking to ticket violators. But posting about your practices in the Website Bugs and Suggestion forum is sort of like double-parking in front of the police station.

 

Interesting analogy to use on a police officer who over the decades learned that the enforcement of the letter of the law is not always the best for the individuals involved or the community. Some allowance for current community standards when juxtaposed against strict enforcement must always be weighed carefully for its impact on the community as a whole. You have to ask "any damage done" before making that arrest or tagging that car.

 

I'll give one example. There was a group of island people who had weekend BBQ's in a local park and invariably after quantities of alcohol ended up in a brawl where no one really got hurt. We who had patrolled the area and knew them just let it fizzle out and then made sure everyone was okay. One day a new sergeant responded and insisted on getting involved and putting it to a stop. He waded in and rather quickly ended up penned in the bathroom calling for help. We waited it out and talked to the chief who freed him after awhile.

 

And if I double parked in front of a police station no one tagged my radio car.

 

Since complying with the TOU is so simple and trivial why ignore the TOU and violate the terms?

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First it isn't simple. It takes several steps. While I don't run across it often because I mostly single cache (insert snide comments on that here please) when I have gone with a group I have had people offer to do the group search for ones none of us has found. GS has in the past responded to community wants. The biggest example is power trails which at one time were not allowed and now have become a large part of this hobby. Why not a small modification to say sharing of info from this site between paying members is OK.

 

When a rule/law has a growing number of people who don't think it appropriate and disregard it the ruling group needs to examine it to see if it is currently valid. Marijuana is a good example.

 

Time to put the soapbox away I guess.

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First it isn't simple. It takes several steps. While I don't run across it often because I mostly single cache (insert snide comments on that here please) when I have gone with a group I have had people offer to do the group search for ones none of us has found. GS has in the past responded to community wants. The biggest example is power trails which at one time were not allowed and now have become a large part of this hobby. Why not a small modification to say sharing of info from this site between paying members is OK.

 

When a rule/law has a growing number of people who don't think it appropriate and disregard it the ruling group needs to examine it to see if it is currently valid. Marijuana is a good example.

 

Time to put the soapbox away I guess.

 

Sending a gpx file takes several steps. No difference.

 

The reason people ignore the law is because law enforcement officers like your self demonstrate that they do not have to obey the laws.

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First it isn't simple. It takes several steps. While I don't run across it often because I mostly single cache (insert snide comments on that here please) when I have gone with a group I have had people offer to do the group search for ones none of us has found. GS has in the past responded to community wants. The biggest example is power trails which at one time were not allowed and now have become a large part of this hobby. Why not a small modification to say sharing of info from this site between paying members is OK.

 

When a rule/law has a growing number of people who don't think it appropriate and disregard it the ruling group needs to examine it to see if it is currently valid. Marijuana is a good example.

 

Time to put the soapbox away I guess.

 

Sending a gpx file takes several steps. No difference.

 

The reason people ignore the law is because law enforcement officers like your self demonstrate that they do not have to obey the laws.

Thanks for that I will forward it to my professors who never thought to bring that up as a reason in my years of study.

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First it isn't simple. It takes several steps. While I don't run across it often because I mostly single cache (insert snide comments on that here please) when I have gone with a group I have had people offer to do the group search for ones none of us has found. GS has in the past responded to community wants. The biggest example is power trails which at one time were not allowed and now have become a large part of this hobby. Why not a small modification to say sharing of info from this site between paying members is OK.

 

When a rule/law has a growing number of people who don't think it appropriate and disregard it the ruling group needs to examine it to see if it is currently valid. Marijuana is a good example.

 

Time to put the soapbox away I guess.

 

Sending a gpx file takes several steps. No difference.

 

The reason people ignore the law is because law enforcement officers like your self demonstrate that they do not have to obey the laws.

Thanks for that I will forward it to my professors who never thought to bring that up as a reason in my years of study.

I've also had years of study. My professors always brought up personal integrity and honesty. You advocate ignoring the TOU since they don't matter, I advocate following the TOU because to me it matters. We will probably never agree.

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Why not a small modification to say sharing of info from this site between paying members is OK.

 

When a rule/law has a growing number of people who don't think it appropriate and disregard it the ruling group needs to examine it to see if it is currently valid.

The reason people ignore the law is because law enforcement officers like your self demonstrate that they do not have to obey the laws.

That's a bit harsh. Walts Hunting is suggesting a review of the rules to see if they still make sense. Which seems like a fine idea to me.

 

While I am not Groundspeak, and wasn't privy to the reasoning that led to the "thou shalt not share GPX files" rule, it seems feasible (even quite likely) to me that the intent of such a rule may have been to preclude sharing with people who may have had no other legitimate access to this data. Sharing it with others who can get the data themselves anyway may very well be against the letter of the law but perhaps not against the spirit of it -- in which case at least flagging it for review is certainly a valid suggestion.

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Terms of Use

D Restrictions. Permission to use our services is subject to the following restrictions. Whether these restrictions have been violated shall be determined in our sole discretion. You agree not to:

 

iii Use our services, including GPX files, for any purpose other than your personal use without our written permission.

I consider giving a pocket query to my premium member friend so we have the same PQ while we're caching together "my personal use". If it isn't, then one could claim if I handed my GPSr to my friend, that would also be a violation of the GPX files rule.

 

At any rate, it's hard to believe GS would really have any interest in preventing me from doing that, since it doesn't hurt them a bit, but it makes geocaching easier.

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