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Cheap Software To Retrieve Tracks From Etrex?


Bob Blaylock

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  I just recently finally got cable to connect my eTrex either to my old beige Power Macintosh G3 (running MacOS X 10.2.8) or to a Windows 2000 system that I also have here.

 

  I'm on an extremely tight budget, at this time, so I can't spend very much on this hobby.  I've got EasyGPS on the Windows system, and GPS Connect and MacGPSBabel on my Macintosh. MacGPSBabel works for converting file types, but it freezes up my system if I try to use it to talk to my GPS.  GPS Connect works great for what it does, but what it does isn't very much.  Between the two, at least I can now download waypoints from Geocaching.com, and send them to my eTrex; which seems to be about the scope of what EasyGPS will do for me on the Windows system.

 

  What I would really like to do is to download the recorded tracks from my eTrex, and put them into some form that I can examine in detail.  Anyone know of any free/cheap software that can do this?  I prefer using my Macintosh, but I can use the Windows system as well.  I'd be quite happy just to get that data into a form that I can import into Excel.

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Hi,

 

Perhaps, rather than looking for something else you might like to help me find out why MacGPSBabel is causing your system to freeze. It certainly shouldn't do this and I would like to try to fix it for you, but I can only fix bugs if they are reported to me.

 

JeremyA

Edited by JeremyA
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Perhaps, rather than looking for something else you might like to help me find out why MacGPSBabel is causing your system to freeze. It certainly shouldn't do this and I would like to try to fix it for you, but I can only fix bugs if they are reported to me.

  At this point, I've just been downloading and trying things to see what works.  MacGPSBabel seems to work for converting files from one type to another (though I cannot seem to find the Geocaching.com .LOG format in the MacGPSBabel menus, though I've successfully converted from that format using the command line version of GPSBabel build into MacGPS Babel); but so far, every attempt I have made to talk to my GPS via MagGPSBabel has resulted in my system freezing up.

 

  I haven't yet tried talking to my GPS using the command-line version, and I'me not entirely sure what to give as the -f parameter to do so (Probably something like “/dev/cu.printer”). There are a lot of answers, I'm sure, that are there waiting for me when I take the time to look fo rthem, but I haven't done so yet entirely. I'll gladly take whatever answers you're willing to hand me on a silver platter.

 

  Let me give you some background and system information:

 

  The system in question is an old beige Power Macintosh G3, 266 MHz, 384 megabytes of RAM, running MacOS X 10.2.8. This is the earliest model to support MacOS X (but alas, not MacOS X 10.3 or later), and it is the last Macintosh model to have built-in RS–422 serial ports.

 

  I connect my eTrex (the basic Yellow version) to the “Printer” port (there being a fax modem already on the “Modem” port).

 

  GPS Connect, another freeware program, talks just fine to my GPS over this connection.

 

  Now, when I use MacGPSBabel, I click the “Use GPS receiver for input” check box, select the output format, and click the “Download” button.  I get a dialog that lets me select the GPS type (“Garmin”) and the port (pre-set to “Modem”, I change it to “Printer”).  I click the “Continue” button.  I don't remember all of what exactly I see after that point, but I know that the spinning ring thingy (I heard it described as a “Norelco” symbol, which makes perfect sense to anyone familiar with that company's famous electric razors), which spins for a few seconds, then stops.  At that point, my mouse pointer will move, but my system doesn't respond to anything else I do.  The clock is stopped in the upper right corner.  If I go to my Windoze system, I can ping my Macintosh, and get a response, but I cannot telnet into it.  Left with no means to perform an orderly shutdown/restart, I am forced to do the Cmd-Control-Power sequence to do a cold reboot, hold S 'til I get to the single-user command line, and run fsck -y to repair the damage done by the improper shutdown, before doing a full reboot.

 

  I suppose it might be worthwhile to try using the command line version of MacGPSBabel, in order to determine whether GPSBabel itself is the problem, or your front-end for it. I'd guess “/dev/cu.printer” is probably the right thing to specific for the -f argument.  Do you know any differently?

 

  Also, I have spent some time playing with the Windows version of GPSBabel.  I was able to get it to talk just fine to my eTrex.  I tried downloading data from it into many different file formats, then looking into the resulting file for track data.  In every case,I found all my waypoints there, but no track data.  If GPSBabel in either form is capable of getting track data, the answer is most likely the same for both the MacOS X and the Windows versions thereof.  What amI missing?

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Also, I have spent some time playing with the Windows version of GPSBabel.  I was able to get it to talk just fine to my eTrex.  I tried downloading data from it into many different file formats, then looking into the resulting file for track data.  In every case, I found all my waypoints there, but no track data.  If GPSBabel in either form is capable of getting track data, the answer is most likely the same for both the MacOS X and the Windows versions thereof.  What am I missing?

  The “-t” switch; that's what I was missing.

Edited by Bob Blaylock
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Perhaps, rather than looking for something else you might like to help me find out why MacGPSBabel is causing your system to freeze. It certainly shouldn't do this and I would like to try to fix it for you, but I can only fix bugs if they are reported to me.

It now appears to be a handshaking issue of some sort.  Same thing happens from the command line.

 

  With my computer frozen as previously described, it occurred to me to put in a diagniostic device that has LEDs showing activity on the differnet RS-232 lines.  When I did that, my computer unfroze almost immediately, the LEDs showed activity in both directions, and the transfer completed.

 

  Doing further experiements, I see that when I begin a transfer, there's a little activity in both directions before it freezes.  If I disconnect and reconnect the cable, the system unfreezes, and the transfer completes.

 

  I wonder if it would help to loop the handshake lines together, since the GPS doesn't touch them at all.

 

  [Added later, after a few more experiements.]

 

  Nope.  Looping back the hardware handshake lines doesn't seem to do it.  Only completely disconnecting and reconnecting the whole thing at the relevant point.

Edited by Bob Blaylock
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