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Feature requests for BaseCamp 4

Zebrastreifenhoernchen
Hello,

I've some suggestions to improve BaseCamp for Windows:

1) CRTL+Z (undo) terminates route creation
When creating a route, I (and suppose many other as well) do no always want to find the fastest connection between two points but the most beautiful, or the one with the least cat traffic etc. I hence use the manual route creation process with via points.
In the latest 4 beta versions, however, clicking CRTL+Z to delete a via point when BaseCamp chose the 'wrong way' terminates the route creation process. Please restore the old behaviour, i.e. let CRTL+Z undo the latest action and nothing else.

2) show the length of a route
In BaseCamp for Mac, the current length of a route is displayed in the status bar. This is quite helpful for leisure activities where, for instance, a cycling route should not be longer than 150 km or a walk not longer than 10 miles etc.
This should be very easy to port to the Windows version.

3) let the user set a speed for cycling routes
When planning a cycling trip, it is not only important to know the length of the route but also the expected time of arrival (e.g. the tour should not take longer than 4 hours). It is of course possible to calculate it from the distance but this is cumbersome - and the information is available to BaseCamp anyway (at least if you could specify your speed).
The total time could then be displayed in the status bar (together with the distance).
This feature request is also relevant to the Mac version.

4) export to Edge 800 / export of TCX files
I haven't found out how to export a route to my Edge 800 from BaseCamp while maintaining the waypoints in the route, so that I'm able to see the next waypoints with distance/ETA while I'm riding.
As a work-around, I wrote a Perl script that creates a TCX file from the GPX file and writes the waypoints to the file (it also sets the speed). It would of course be much easier if BaseCamp could produce and export TCX files with the waypoints included. With my feature request #3, this would be perfectly possible for planned routes.
This feature request is also relevant to the Mac version.

5) better information for waypoints on a route
The route info windows shows a list of via/shaping points and waypoints with the time of arrival. It'd be useful to have another tab that is listing only the waypoints along with their distance and the ETA.
This feature request is also relevant to the Mac version.

6) allow the user to choose between ETA and length of time
When you exactly know when you'll start your trip, the display of the ETA is useful. In many cases you don't know it and are rather interested in the duration of a trip. Please create an option to allow to choose to ETA display to be either time of day or hours:minutes from the start.
This feature request is also relevant to the Mac version.

7) dynamically change the names of via points
When a via point is moved, it keeps its name. It might thus show the name of a completely different location. While waypoints may have user-defined names (e.g. 'dinner') that should be kept, this is definitely not true for the automatically assigned names of via points. So please give the route points an internal flag (user-defined yes/no) and dynamically change the name to the current location for those that are not user-defined.
This feature request is also relevant to the Mac version.

Please let me know if I'm simply overlooking something...

P.S. I (and I'm pretty certain many others as well) am very interested in the configuration files. Are there any hidden settings that might help us to adapt BaseCamp to our needs?


Best regards & thanks in advance,
Dominik
  • Former Member
    0 Former Member
    As long as you're looking at the "announce" discrepancy, I notice (with admitedly limited testing based only on the appearance of flags at points on the route) that at least on the Zumo 550, true waypoints are always announced even if they are set as don't announce in BC, and map intersection points used as shaping points are never announced even if they are set to announce in BC. I doubt these behaviors are a serious problem, but they are inconsistent and leave you scratching your head. Could it be set to either: 1) Zumo respects any announce setting in BC regardless of point type, or 2) BC does not allow announce settings that are not allowed on devices. BTW, the 550 does now respect the BC setting for announce or not for shaping points not at intersections, not sure when that started.


    As long as the Zumo 550 does't get a firmware update, full support of shaping points cannot be done. We have a suspicion though that for repeating route vias we are just doing something wrong in BaseCamp that can be fixed so it would work on the 550.

    As to not allowing to set shaping points if the device doesn't support it, that is somewhat difficult because routes are not tied to devices. What if you create a route for the Zumo 550 (which doesn't fully support shaping points) and then buy a new Zumo (which does fully support shaping points)? So we rather just allow setting shaping points. Support for shaping points can only get better.

    We made changes in BaseCamp 3.3 to flag intersections (and adresses) appropriately so the Zumo 550 would recognize it.
  • 0
    Thanks as usual for your prompt response. I understand about the firmware, although keep in mind that there was 5.0 firmware release for 550's recently, so it is not a lost cause entirely, or at least one can hope... Glad to know when that tie to the 550 was made, I sure missed that in the change summary. 3.3.3 is what I'm using for my tests.

    If it helps your diagnosis, I have found that if I import routes created in MS into BC where the same intersection shaping point is used in 2 routes, BC will add the "1" suffix to the point in the second route, but when then sending on from BC to the 550, even after recalculating in BC, there is still no flag at the point in the second route. But if I then in BC delete the shaping point and then rubber band the route right back to that same point, it will have the same name, suffix "1", but then after sending to the 550 it will now have the flag. So it's not just the name, BC is doing something else in the point creation process that's flummoxing the 550. Hope this helps. (Were there changes made in 4.0.0.6 that might affect this behavior, if so it will need to be tested there.)
  • 0
    I am sorry, Pieter. I haven't forgotten about this. There is still a case for this in our database. We still haven't found the time and resources to make it happen. I apologize.


    No worries, tnx Falagar - appreciated.

    Kind regards

    Pieter
  • Former Member
    0 Former Member
    If it helps your diagnosis, I have found that if I import routes created in MS into BC where the same intersection shaping point is used in 2 routes, BC will add the "1" suffix to the point in the second route, but when then sending on from BC to the 550, even after recalculating in BC, there is still no flag at the point in the second route. But if I then in BC delete the shaping point and then rubber band the route right back to that same point, it will have the same name, suffix "1", but then after sending to the 550 it will now have the flag. So it's not just the name, BC is doing something else in the point creation process that's flummoxing the 550. Hope this helps. (Were there changes made in 4.0.0.6 that might affect this behavior, if so it will need to be tested there.)


    Thank you. I think that confirms my suspicion. We are doing something wrong in the via point creation (we are using the old via as blue print, not the intersection).
  • 0
    Dominik,

    thank you very much for your detailed feedback. I will try to give my input to each of your suggestions.

    1. That is something we are definitely trying to fix. I am afraid the fix won't make it 4.0.1 though.
    2. That's something I've had on my list for a while. As a work-around, if you open the route properties dialog for the route while you are creating the route, you can see the total length in the statistics.
    3. That one is also definitely on the list of things we'd like to do. Currently the routing algorithms takes some fixed speed for bikes.
    4. If you can program in Perl, maybe https://forums.garmin.com/showthread.php?13452-Data-Converter-Plugin-Development is interesting to you. Then you could export in whatever format you like. Or you could change the already existing XSLT for GPX to TCX which is located at %APPDATA%\Garmin\Plugins\com.garmin.GPX11toTC2.GarminPlugin. We'll see if there is something we can do to improve functionality for Edge 800 users.
    5. Interesting suggestion. I am a bit worried about adding yet another tab though. No plans to do this at this point.
    6. BaseCamp already displays this. Click 'More Info' in the route dialog and you will see leg time and total time.
    7. I believe waypoints already have this flag. This feature worked in MapSource, so it's definitely doable. Someone else reported this before, and I added it to our to-do-list.
    P.S. There are the registry settings (HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Garmin\BaseCamp\Settings) and the config files at C:\Users\{Username}\AppData\Local\GARMIN_Corp. But I don't think there's much to tweak.


    Hi Falagar,

    I have tried changing com.garmin.GPX11toTC2.GarminPlugin as suggested, but upon selecting Import or Export in Basecamp, the changes get undone.
    Is this known to work with the Windows version of Basecamp (the original instructions refer to the Mac version)?
    What could I be doing wrong?

    Steve
  • Former Member
    0 Former Member
    Steve,

    looks like I sent you on a wrong path there. I apologize. It looks like we overwrite the plugin every time with the original (which is included in BaseCamp's resources). I don't think there is a feasible way for you to prevent this from happening.

    So you'd have to create a separate plugin. What I don't know is if exporting to the same extension and/or the same namespace is supported by our plugin architecture.

    Again, I apologize for suggesting something that doesn't work. I didn't think we'd overwrite this every time.
  • Former Member
    0 Former Member
    I double-checked the plugin issue.

    You can create a duplicate of the tcx plugin and then you can choose in BaseCamp which format to export to. I attached a screenshot for proof and a plugin folder that should get you on your way. It has the info.xml file updated. You'll just have to adjust the xslt to your liking.

    If you create a nice plugin that you think would benefit other users as well, please share.
  • 0
    Thanks Falagar, that worked for me as you describe. I'll have a play.

    Steve
  • Former Member
    0 Former Member
    I am using BaseCamp from my laptop when I am travelling and from my desktop PC if I am at home.
    In both cases I should of course use the same database, so I like to put the databses in my DropBox folder, because this folder is shared on both PC's.

    I do this also with MapSource; I have all my gpx files in my DropBox folder so they are accessable from both PC, this works perfect!

    [FONT=Arial Black][/FONT]So please come soon with a version where I can define the location of my database!!