GSAK and membership

[ForeFeathers]

I’m playing around with trying to figure out all this downloading and mapping. This is fun stuff. Being able to see waypoints on Streets and Trips can help you to be on the right side of the river, find the nearest roads- well, it’s a big advantage over the blank map screen of my etrex Legend.

But the LOC files are very bare bones and it looks to me like if you’re going to go this route you pretty much need the GPX files to really make this work. Otherwise you don’t have clues, ratings, and other important to know details.

True??

[Todd Bloomingdale]

we use the PQ’s and GSAK together. I love it!! It is so simple once you get the hang of it. Its a pretty much a 1 stop place for all your caching needs such as sending your PQ GPX file to your GPS, then to your PDA. and to any mapping program. it works nifty.

as for LOC files. they are bare boned files and dont have any of the featured info. I recommend getting a geocache membership going and work with the GPX files and PQ’s. It has its advantages.

Smokey

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“Be safe and Keep on Searchin”
“Only You Can Prevent Forest Fires”
My Current Coin List
Wisconsin Coulee Region Cachers

[ForeFeathers]

Thanks for the reply. I must now go and research PQ’s. I don’t have an understanding of what the difference is between the GPX file and a PQ. I also don’t have a PDA. So, I see a problem here- even if I have the laptop in the car…

I don’t have any information with me on the trail unless I print out paper anyway. Perhaps I should just invest in more ink cartridges!

[Cathunter]

A PQ is a query that you submit detailing what cache info you want in your GPX file. You can choose distance from a location, cache types, difficulty, owned by, etc, etc, etc.

Once you select what you want, the GPX file is emailed to you, normally within minutes.

Although a PDA is handy on the trail, you can use a GPX file in your laptop to travel with, enabling you to view all the cache pages without an internet connection.

If you want a GPX file to experiment with, send me an e-mail and I will send you a GPX file to test out.

I also think GSAK is the greatest thing out there. Try it- you will eventually buy it!

russelj @ gmail . com

[NSLP1]

I agree, the gpx files sent by PQs are great. As the GSAK page mentions, if you are using gpx files, then you are only get about 10% of the functionality of GSAK. I’ve gone paperless for hunts using my palm m500 (older low end palm). (though we do log our finds into a small notebook, and also use it for taking notes)

here is a very good ‘how to’ document created by the florida geocaching association.
It is focused on GSAK, Cachemate, and Palm. http://65.34.18.106/content.php?article.15

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Mike of team: Not So Lost Puppies

[This message has been edited by NSLP#1 (edited 09-20-2005).]

[hogrod]

i agree that using gpx files with GSAK is the way to go…. but if you have a few minutes of time you can add even more info to the loc file with gsak.(or even add info to the gpx) it even gives you the ability to add pictures/JPEG sreenshots of maps.
all you have to do is highlight the cache you want to edit, and right click it with your mouse and goto add/change/delete note.

[This message has been edited by hogrod (edited 09-20-2005).]

[ForeFeathers]

This is all great information. The page from the Florida site is probably the best one-stop source I’ve seen.

Even using the lOC files would enable me to map on Streets and Trips as well as download waypoints into my GPS- I haven’t got that far yet, but I pulled them out so it can’t be that hard to put ’em in.

I guess what I need to decide is just how much caching we intend to do. One thing I can see is the more you do the more driving you’d better be ready to do also. At least from central Wisconsin.

I truly appreciate all the help you folks have given. I have a much better understanding of all of this than I did a couple of days ago. Too bad geocaching is an activity where you don’t meet the other folks doing it! We’ve haven’t run into anyone else yet. Seems like a nice sort of people are involved…

[ForeFeathers]

Oh, and Cathunter,

I’d like to take you up on your offer- email sent.

[Miata]

1 Pocket Query .GPX file and you will be hooked! GSAK is excellent as well as the author, Clyde.

I did the same thing by getting a sample file. Have fun!

[ForeFeathers]

Yes,

It was no problem getting the file into GSAK and exported back into Streets and Trips. Sigh, you’re right, it would be hard to live without it after you’ve seen what it can do…

To think we’ve been just plugging the coords in by hand to a GPSr with no mapping ability. It’s amazing we could be using GPS technology and be so “low tech”.

[Cathunter]

Another shortcut-

If you have a GPX file on the desktop, zipped or not, you can drag it and drop it onto the GSAK desktop icon and it will load the file into GSAK. This also works with GPX Spinner.

[hogrod]

that is a cool trick with dragging the GPX file onto the desktop icon! I was just wondering how many of you set up the “get data via email” function in gsak. this seems the best way since geocaching.com is emailing your the file anyway.
i set up a gmail account just for this(and for my geocaching.com contact email)
under the file menu, click get data via email and will open the setup page. is pretty much the same as setting up a email account in outlook or similar program. once you get it setup it makes getting new GPX in gsak a simple 2 second process.

[This message has been edited by hogrod (edited 09-21-2005).]

[ForeFeathers]

I’m doing pretty well with this but one thing that should be simple is escaping me. I have over 130 waypoints in my “Summit” database- all the waypoints that I’d gathered over four years. I finally erased all the waypoints out of my unit for the first time. I’d like to have many of my waypoints back but not nearly all. I haven’t figured out how to pick and choose which ones to put back in. I can adjust the number at the top of the upload screen, but I can’t figure out how to get just the ones I want to be the first 20 or so. It must be done with flagging under the little man icon?

I figured out to handle the six character waypoint name limitation in my Summit. My son informed me his new Legend can handle up to 10. It does take some time to figure this all out.

[ForeFeathers]

I got it. You flag all the ones you want and then click on the column icon. They all float to the top. Now I just need a column that’s numbered so I know how many I’ve picked…I’ll bet that’s possible.

[ForeFeathers]

ForeFeathers,

You use the user flags and then the search function where you can filter out only the caches that you have flagged. Yes, I know, I’ve started talking to myself. I’ll stop posting questions now because it seems like if you spend a few more minutes you can figure it out yourself. Sorry!

[Author]

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