Tracks and Data Fields

[stu1102]

Hi Panel

is it possible to have a track with data fields showing?

Currently my wife and I just plot a track and ideally what I would like to do is to have a couple of data fields showing miles\kilo travelled... and another data field showing miles to go or perhaps miles to next village etc

sort of like this

[IJL]

What device is it? you can certainly have the combination on an edge 705.

[Cudzoziemiec]

You can do that on the Etrex 20 too and one of the possible fields is "distance to next" but I've no idea how it defines "next".

[L CC]

Next is next route point if you're following a route rather than a track.

[Cudzoziemiec]

It still gives a figure if you're following a track though.

[Si S]

I think its the next point you 'clicked' when plotting the track.

[Feanor]

On my edge 800, 'Distance to Next' when navigating a Route seems to mean 'next navigational instruction', which may or may not be a route point.

It's the distance to the point where it pops up an instruction, and the map zooms into detailed junction view.
Sometimes, this is a 'spurious' point, where it's telling you to 'go left', but that's all the road does anyway.

[Kim]

It still gives a figure if you're following a track though.

Could it be the distance to the next auto-generated summit (or whatever) when it's a recorded track with elevation data?

[stu1102]

Hi All

Device we use is Etrex 30

thanks for any support

[Oaky]

It still gives a figure if you're following a track though.

Could it be the distance to the next auto-generated summit (or whatever) when it's a recorded track with elevation data?

It will do distance to next auto-generated summit/valley etc. with any track with elevation data (or track without if your map has elevation data)  but also, it will do next Waypoint in memory that is on (or near enough to) the track.

I use this quite a lot.  I have "Waypoint at next" and "distance to next" displayed on the screen and navigate via tracks only.  I can then load e.g. audax controls, towns, or other points of interest as waypoints and see the countdown as required.  (This also means that my extensive database of local pub waypoints on the device show up as countdowns on most of my local rides )

My main annoyance is that I can't turn off the auto-generated summit/valley stuff (well, you can,  but only by removing elevation data from the track AND map.  I do remove the track elevation data for this very reason which means you get far fewer high-point/low-point markers,  the elevation data in a track generated by e.g. ridewithGPS or bikeroutetoaster being far finer grained than that in the map contours) but it still generates them from the map, and I like having contours on my map!).

(eTrex 20 and eTrex 30)

[Cudzoziemiec]

Yeah, sometimes Garmin's idea of a summit is a rather... insignificant. I might like to know how far to the top of the hill, I don't want to be told how far to the next bit where the road goes down one metre!

How do you load waypoints? I've tried adding audax controls and so on to a track downloaded from somewhere, by loading it up to Bikehike and adding them – but when I save it, something often, but not always, goes wrong. The Etrex won't see the track and trying to reload it to Bikehike gives the message "XML error: Entity Ref: expecting ';' at line 1" . Hmm, I suppose I should try on Basecamp. 

[Phil W]

Yeah, sometimes Garmin's idea of a summit is a rather... insignificant. I might like to know how far to the top of the hill, I don't want to be told how far to the next bit where the road goes down one metre!

How do you load waypoints? I've tried adding audax controls and so on to a track downloaded from somewhere, by loading it up to Bikehike and adding them – but when I save it, something often, but not always, goes wrong. The Etrex won't see the track and trying to reload it to Bikehike gives the message "XML error: Entity Ref: expecting ';' at line 1" . Hmm, I suppose I should try on Basecamp. 

Basecamp works really well for organising waypoints, adding alarms to them etc. Plus your tracks and / or routes.

[frankly frankie]

And you don't have to load Tracks and Waypoints together - they can be completely un-associated but the Waypoints will still be picked up when you navigate the Track.

[Oaky]

And you don't have to load Tracks and Waypoints together - they can be completely un-associated but the Waypoints will still be picked up when you navigate the Track.

This ^

I create a list in Basecamp for each specific ride and pop the track plus a bunch of ride-specific waypoints into there.



When I want to put them on the Garmin, I just connect it (Mass Storage mode) and right click the list and select "Send to..." and choose the eTrex SD card (Userdata) folder.  Job's a good 'un.

I already have a bunch of waypoints separately (Essex Suffolk pubs, assorted 24hr garages in the area etc.) on the eTrex, and all of these will be picked up as well if they are near enough to the track.

I occasionally go through and clean out some waypoints on the eTrex (I don't need Audax controls in there indefinitely, but nice cafes, pubs, notable villages etc. can stay).

[Cudzoziemiec]

I've pretty much completely ignored Basecamp so far. I think that's because of the (admittedly minor) faff of having to plug the Etrex in to make it do anything, whereas something like Bikehike just works. So I must try it one day!

Back to data fields for a minute: I tried riding yesterday's audax with one data field set to ETA at destination. This was fairly interesting when doing an average sort of speed but apart from that rather useless as it varies so wildly according to instantaneous speed. Can be 18:00 at the bottom of a hill, 24:00 at the top and 12:00 going down the other side! In the afternoon it became irrelevant anyway as my batteries went flat.  They had been showing four bars the day before but I guess they really need charging up before each ride.

[Oaky]

I've pretty much completely ignored Basecamp so far. I think that's because of the (admittedly minor) faff of having to plug the Etrex in to make it do anything, whereas something like Bikehike just works. So I must try it one day!

Basecamp will work without the Garmin plugged in - I only plug mine in when I want to transfer stuff to it.

I should add that I don't actually use Basecamp for the route planning itself.  I purely use it to organise and store my tracks/waypoints and transfer themto to Garmin... It's entirely possible that all of my preferred workflow could be easily accommodated without it.  My routing tool of choice at the moment is gpxeditor (although since some of the more recent changes, I'm slowly leaning back towards ridewithgps/others).

[frankly frankie]

... it became irrelevant anyway as my batteries went flat.  They had been showing four bars the day before but I guess they really need charging up before each ride.

Rechargeables can drop off the cliff and no battery guage will give much warning.  Literally the voltage for a pair of NiMH AAs in good condition can drop from 2.4V (normal operation, maintained for several hours) to 2V (GPS will switch off) within 10 or 15 minutes and that's normal.

[stu1102]

Hi Panel

I followed Oaky instructions and it worked in that:

I could see the Waypoint marked on the Etrex 30 on the screen and in the waypoint manager BUT

What is confusing me is the Data Fields, I get Distance to Destination and that worked

'Distance to Next' I understand that Garmin defines this as the 'The remaining distance to the next waypoint on the route' but I'm pretty sure it was seeing (or appeared to be seeing ) the next elevation point on the route? Im not bothered seeing if hills or elevation is coming up but just want to see the distance to the next village

Other questions I notice that the Etrex takes a long time to load elevation data and I presume the 3000 track points on a 126 mile route---can't I just use Phils utility https://simple-gpx.herokuapp.com/ or basecamp and strip out elevation data and leave an optimal number of track points?

[Oaky]

'Distance to Next' I understand that Garmin defines this as the 'The remaining distance to the next waypoint on the route' but I'm pretty sure it was seeing (or appeared to be seeing ) the next elevation point on the route? Im not bothered seeing if hills or elevation is coming up but just want to see the distance to the next village

If your map has elevation data (or your track has elevation data) then the eTrex 20 / 30 treats the auto-generated summits and valleys as if they were waypoints with the name "High Point" or "Low Point" as far as this feature is concerned.  I also display the field "Waypoint at Next" alongside the distance so I know what I'm counting down to.

I remove elevation data from tracks to minimise the noise from the high/low points, however I still get a few from teh elevation data in my map (but those are much less frequent).

[stu1102]

thanks Oaky appreciated

[Phil W]

Other questions I notice that the Etrex takes a long time to load elevation data and I presume the 3000 track points on a 126 mile route---can't I just use Phils utility https://simple-gpx.herokuapp.com/ or basecamp and strip out elevation data and leave an optimal number of track points?

You can. It'll still pick up elevation data from the map, but with a lot less trackpoints and no elevation data in the track to deal with  it is much quicker.

My Wild Atlantic Way tracks which I've split down to 200km each load in blink.