Pocket Navigator: Navigation using Pocket Navigator

Free GPS Software | GPS Software Hub | September 18, 2007 at 8:29 am

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Navigation on Pocket Navigator supports both route navigation and direct navigation to a waypoint. Routes are collections of waypoints that are expected to be traversed in a given order. This order can be reversed to return back using the same route.

To initiate simple goto navigation select the target waypoint and choose ‘GoTo WP’ from the menu. A navigation window will appear with the target, an arrow pointing the way, and a distance and heading. Follow the arrow to get to the destination. (The behavior of this screen is changed in 3.0) If you kill the window then navigation is terminated but you can resize it and move it. Navigating a route is just as simple once you have one built. Just find the route on the screen and select it and choose “Follow Route”. The same navigation window will appear and guide you from point to point in the route.

Only the route name is shown however. I think it would be better to show the name of the upcoming waypoint. It will switch automatically as you pass a waypoint but will not warn you about upcoming waypoints except by showing you the distance. It also will not show you which way to turn until you go too far. One trick is to place the waypoint slightly ahead of the turn or after the turn to fool the arrow into guiding you better. You might think that setting proximity alarms at key turn decisions would be useful and they would be except … the designer seems only to have expected them to be used for hazard areas so there is no way to shut them off except to turn off sound on your pocket pc entirely. Note that if you set the proximity alarm you should realize that the distances are always in meters no matter how you have your preferences set.

Displaying routes can tie up computer resources that are needed for navigation guidance so it is best to hide all routes and tracks except the one you want to use. Unfortunately this is not easy to do since you have to find all of the routes graphically and hide them one by one. There really needs to be better route and waypoint management on the pocket pc.

Building and editing routes

A route can be imported from a Garmin gps, downloaded from the pc program, or built on the spot. It can also be added to or the waypoints can be moved around as needed. You can build a route from scratch just by starting a new route and tapping successive places on the map. You can stop the route building and scroll the map and then add some more points. You can even tap on existing waypoints to include them in your route, however be careful since you cannot remove them from a route without deleting them. You can select a route and view its properties to change the name of the route and to rename the individual points in the route to more meaningful names if you wish.

You can also reverse a route to return back the way you came. However you can’t delete route points or do any other maintenance from this screen. Route maintenance must be done graphically. Another choice is to upload the route to the pc and edit it on the pc. Note that any downloads from the pc does not merge with existing data but will replace all of the data of that type, therefore upload any data you wish to save first.

A route can also be built to aid in the calculation of an area. If the route is closed where the end point and the start point are the same the area in acres (or hectares for metric) will be displayed. If you traverse a perimeter a tracklog will provide the same data.