2020-01-05, 10:02 PM
Hello, my name is Shawn, and I'm a new user of OpenPlotter. And I'm confused. I know the end result I want is a robust, open source chart plotter that does all the things, but I'm confused about how to get there. Here's my background for a frame of reference. I'm a US Navy veteran of 22 years that used my GI bill to attend the Northwest School of Wooden Boat Building in Port Hadlock, Washington to become a marine systems tech. I have spent the last year since graduating working on all manner of marine systems, while refitting and re-powering my own boat here in Port Townsend, WA.
I live aboard Sea Bear, a 1985 C&C Landfall 39 that I eventually hope to circumnavigate in. My plan is to continue working on and learning about marine systems, while paying off debt and finishing the refit. In the past few years I have sailed Sea Bear from San Diego to Glacier Bay, Alaska and back to the Puget Sound using Open CPN running on a Windows box. I tried to use linux on the box, but it was never stable. I was able to integrate my radar, radio and SDR AIS into the system, but I always wanted to be able to do more with it. That's what drew me to OpenPlotter.
Now that the introduction is out of the way, here's what I'm finding confusing. I have limited linux or programing experience, and I don't work in the tech industry. I was able to download and flash 2019-12-16-OpenPlotter-Starting-v2.0-pre-release-NOOBS.zip, and get that running, but I'm kind of at a standstill now. I know the kind of issues I'm having are noob issues, and those questions have probably been asked a thousand times, but, it seems to be exceptionally difficult to move forward via Google. The boards here are confusing and tedious, as most of the information relates to V 1.0, except for the now closed OpenPlotter 2 roadmap thread, and some post here in the General discussion forum. From my perspective, if the board opened a new forum dedicated to OpenPlotter 2 it would help to alleviate some of that. It would probably be helpful to relocate any threads pertaining to OP2 to said forum.
I guess that's my gripe in general, is that the documentation/information seems to be spread out everywhere, with no central location, making it a struggle to achieve my goal of a robust, open source chart plotter that does all the things. I realize that this is beta software, probably best left to more experienced user/hackers, and that waiting for V 2.0 stable is probably the best answer, but I'll admit, patience is not one of my virtues. All that being said, how can I help? I don't have a lot of experience in IT, but I'm willing to learn, and I'd like to be able to contribute if I can.
Shawn
S/V Sea Bear
I live aboard Sea Bear, a 1985 C&C Landfall 39 that I eventually hope to circumnavigate in. My plan is to continue working on and learning about marine systems, while paying off debt and finishing the refit. In the past few years I have sailed Sea Bear from San Diego to Glacier Bay, Alaska and back to the Puget Sound using Open CPN running on a Windows box. I tried to use linux on the box, but it was never stable. I was able to integrate my radar, radio and SDR AIS into the system, but I always wanted to be able to do more with it. That's what drew me to OpenPlotter.
Now that the introduction is out of the way, here's what I'm finding confusing. I have limited linux or programing experience, and I don't work in the tech industry. I was able to download and flash 2019-12-16-OpenPlotter-Starting-v2.0-pre-release-NOOBS.zip, and get that running, but I'm kind of at a standstill now. I know the kind of issues I'm having are noob issues, and those questions have probably been asked a thousand times, but, it seems to be exceptionally difficult to move forward via Google. The boards here are confusing and tedious, as most of the information relates to V 1.0, except for the now closed OpenPlotter 2 roadmap thread, and some post here in the General discussion forum. From my perspective, if the board opened a new forum dedicated to OpenPlotter 2 it would help to alleviate some of that. It would probably be helpful to relocate any threads pertaining to OP2 to said forum.
I guess that's my gripe in general, is that the documentation/information seems to be spread out everywhere, with no central location, making it a struggle to achieve my goal of a robust, open source chart plotter that does all the things. I realize that this is beta software, probably best left to more experienced user/hackers, and that waiting for V 2.0 stable is probably the best answer, but I'll admit, patience is not one of my virtues. All that being said, how can I help? I don't have a lot of experience in IT, but I'm willing to learn, and I'd like to be able to contribute if I can.
Shawn
S/V Sea Bear