Perfect all-in-one sailing gadget, the iPhone? - Part 1
by Mark Cherrington on 17 Jul 2009
So many ’Apps’ - but some are good for sailing Mark Cherrington
Apple's much-hyped iPhone has attracted much attention since the global release in 2008 of the iPhone 3G, with tens of thousands of applications, and more coming.
So what does the iPhone have to do with sailors and sailing?
Quite a lot, because buried among the many thousands of applications, some of which are rubbish, are others that are excellent and purpose-designed for sailors, as Mark Cherrington describes.
This is Part One of a Three Part Series.
Apple’s much-hyped iPhone has attracted much attention, commentary and criticism since it was first released in the US in 2007. The global release of the iPhone 3G in mid-2008 saw it quickly become one of the most popular 'smart phones' around.
A major part of the reason for its popularity is the huge number of applications (known as 'Apps' in Applespeak) available for the iPhone.
As of the end of June, there were tens of thousands of Apps available for the iPhone through Apple’s Apps Store. More than half of these are priced at less than $10 – including over 12,000 that are free.
They cover an incredible variety of subjects, categories and capabilities – and there’s a lot of rubbish in there as well. But what’s an iPhone got to do with sailing? Quite a lot, actually. Of those billion or so Apps available, there’s quite a few that have specific sailing/marine applications, and are purpose-designed for sailors.
As with a lot of the latest mobile phones, the iPhone has built-in GPS, and there’s increasing numbers of Apps taking advantage of this – including some for serious navigation purposes. (That’s also a useful safety feature; if you do ever get lost or in trouble – and you’re in phone range – you can provide details of your exact location to rescue authorities.)
If you download Apple’s iTunes application (Windows or PC), then go to the Apps store (and you don’t need an iPhone to do that), you’ll find a substantial number of Apps coming up when you search for keywords such as 'sailing', 'yachting' or 'marine'. More are being added all the time.
Again, there’s a lot of rubbish among them, but there’s some incredibly powerful Apps that have the potential to replace quite a few other gadgets and instruments on your boat (and for many you don’t need to have phone coverage).
I’ll start here with a couple of the best sailing Apps for iPhones.
The nice things about Apps:
One nice thing about the Apps for the iPhone business is that most of the sailing-related Apps have been developed by small companies or enthusiasts. That means they tend to be very responsive to queries, comments, suggestions, etc.
So far, I’ve found all of the ones I’ve purchased have been happy to respond to any queries, constructive criticism, etc. That makes a nice change from dealing with large multinational software suppliers/developers with non-existent customer service.
The other great thing is that new features are being added to the best Apps all the time, and to date have been made available free of charge. As a new version goes up in the App Store, you are notified next time you synchronise your iPhone, or whenever you tap the App Store button on the phone.
It then downloads and installs automatically.
AyeTides:
AyeTides is a lovely tide prediction program, developed by August Hahn, of Hahn Software. Before the iPhone came along, he’d also developed Mr Tides, a Mac-based tides program.
This App is completely self-contained, with all tide data kept on the iPhone, so you don’t need internet access to predict tides. It also allows you to predict tides out to 2100.
New features are being added all the time. You can put in 'Favourites' for the areas where you commonly sail, so you can call them up easily, plus it’s easy to find other locations around the world.
It makes nice use of the iPhone’s built-in accelerometer. Hold the device upright, and you see a table of the tide times and heights for the day; turn the iPhone on its side, and you see it in graphical format – it’s also interactive in this mode, allowing you to drag the cursor to see the tides at any time.
AyeTides links in with the iNavX navigation program, which I talk about below.
Ayetides is not expensive at all. For more information about the program, including prices, go to www.ayetides.com.
Other Tide Programs:
There are quite a few other tide prediction programs available; I tried a free one before AyeTides was released, and found it crashed the iPhone. While that issue has probably been fixed now, I’ve been happy with AyeTides since I bought it, and have seen no reason to try anything else.
iNavX:
This is a seriously impressive navigation program, which essentially gives you a high-quality chartplotter within your iPhone.
Developed by the people who produced the respected GPSNavX program for Macintosh, it’s a fully featured navigation program that gives you just about everything you need for navigation, including detailed maps, at a very affordable price. (Varies from country to country, but less than $80 or equivalent)
Certainly as a backup system, it’s a no-brainer.
If your boating area is primarily in the United States, you can get free access to NOAA RNC raster United States waters marine charts covering the West Coast, Gulf Coast, East Coast, Great Lakes, Alaska, Hawaii, and Virgin Islands.
Elsewhere in the world you will need to purchase chart software, with a number of sources available.
The best deal at the moment is Fugawi X-Traverse Navionics charts, which are available at (Northern Hemisphere) 'summer special' prices. This deal is good for the southern hemisphere too. I purchased detailed charts for ALL of Australia (that’s right, the entire country) for $19. Usually they are around $60 (still a bargain). At that price, I bought the NZ charts as well.
The level of detail and accuracy is phenomenal; I can get in close enough to see the individual berths at the marina adjacent to my sailing club.
And as well as real-time chart plotting, iNavX supports waypoints including KML (Google Earth) and GPX import/export, track log, measuring bearing/distance, GRIB weather forecast, tides/currents and port/navaid searches.
For tide data, it integrates with AyeTides, and lets you easily swap between the two Apps if you have both on your phone.
It is a little tricky getting your head around accessing the charts you purchase (you need to go to the X-Traverse website and purchase them separately, but there’s direct links off the iNavX website that help you to do this).
You download the charts to your iPhone as you need them (or anticipate you will), so they are always there. You are not dependent on a phone signal or internet access to view them.
Single Device:
The Navionics charts from X-Traverse licence is limited to a single device; if you lose or upgrade your iPhone, you will have to jump through a few hoops to be able to use your charts on your new device.
The iNavX/GPSNavX developers also operate a very useful website/bulletin board at www.macsailing.net. Originally developed for discussions and troubleshooting around Macintosh-based sailing and maring applications, it has expanded to
include iPhone marine applications, which you can view here http://www.macsailing.net/fbb/showforum.php?fid/11/keyword/iPhone.
Questions about Apps such as iNavX or AyeTides are answered directly on the site by the developers, so the lines of communication are very short.
iNavX costs probably less than $60 or equivalent. For more information, go to http://www.inavx.com.
Navionics:
It’s worth pointing out that you can also buy standalone Navionics charts through the Apps store at very low (less than
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