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Navigation and other popups while riding a course

bobl
over 1 year ago

I've gotten some good tips from folks here on navigation operational behavior, but I've reached a sticking point.

I created a small test course that contains course points for turns and other informational points on the course (e.g., "aid station"). Turn guidance setting is ON, guidance prompt setting is MAP, and course points setting is ON. I see the course points data screen, so I know they are there (and I've verified using Fit File Viewer). This is what I experience when riding the course:

  • A turn guidance popup occurs about 300 ft ahead of the next navigational point, with a warbling alert sound. The popup is the map screen, some text explaining the intended navigation (e.g., Turn Right on *street name*), and two data fields (heading and time to next). The *street name* comes from Garmin's map. This screen is persistent, but can be dismissed. This is the information I'd like to see, except I'd like to show my curated course point names instead of the Garmin map names (I realize I may be out of luck on that).
  • When I come to the actual point in the course where I should turn, I get another popup (with a single beep), which I'll call a course point popup (not sure what it's official name is). This appears as a banner on the bottom of the screen and shows a directional icon and the name I put into the course point. This is just the information I want, but the banner stays on the screen for only a few seconds and is dismissed automatically.
  • I get a similar course point popup for non-turn course points, such as my aid station. Single beep, banner displays, banner disappears after 2-3 seconds.

The fact that the course point popup gets dismissed automatically, and in such a short time, isn't very helpful (it also doesn't help that the single beep that accompanies the popup will often not be heard while riding). I can't find any way to affect how course point popups behave and appear. I'd either like to make them persistent and dismissible, like the Garmin-generated turn guidance alerts, or have them stay on the screen longer than 2-3 seconds. Does anyone know if this can be done?

  • +1 over 1 year ago

    There aren’t any options to change the behavior of how course points are displayed. 

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to dpawlyk

    I was afraid of that. IMO that's a serious shortcoming. Time to file a feature request!

    Thanks for the quick reply.

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to bobl

    It’s been this way for years. It’s not likely Garmin is ever going to change it. So, by long history, it’s not a “serious short coming”.

    File the request but don’t expect anything.

    There are actual bugs with the 1040 that should probably take precedence.

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to dpawlyk

    I don't disagree, and I've experienced my share of bugs that I'd like to see fixed ASAP. But the navigation experience needs to be improved to really be useful. There are lots of threads on the forums on this subject, and I'm hoping Garmin will take note.

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to bobl

     and I have discussed this before but Garmin has once done exactly as you, I and many Audax riders want. On the 520 in the last year of its support life (in FW version 12.1, it stopped at 13) Garmin introduced a major change. If you had Course Points in your loaded Course it would use these to display in the map Guide Text the current distance to next point, the point type (L, R etc) and the short name of the point. If you were on another data screen it would display the same at the bottom of the screen starting about 100m from the point with an updating distance count down. I will find my old screen shots and insert.

    It was simply brilliant , just perfect , much loved by Audax riders. Unfortunately the same was not ported to the 520+ or any subsequent device. Noting that the 520 supported a small OSM but did not have formal Turn Guidance

    so they could dig out the old code if they wanted

    PS On your 1040 you could disable Turn Guidance , disable top of screen Guide Text and use bottom of screen data fields for Next Waypoint (which will show Course Point name , 10 characters) and CRS Pt Dist (course point distance, which is a compound field with point type and distance)

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to L.Rouge

    Wow, I used to have a 520 but couldn't remember how it actually did such things. Several Edge device generations later, I'm as wanting as you are for something I (and others like us) consider pretty basic and straightforward functionality. I can't imagine technology being the driving factor for removing it -- seems more like a product design decision. And if it is, it was poorly made.

    BTW, between the two of you and your many forum posts, I've learned (and re-remembered) a lot about how Garmin does course management. Thanks for continuing to contribute here!

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to L.Rouge
    L.Rouge said:
    so they could dig out the old code if they wanted

    They wanted (or needed) to remove the old code. 

    (They probably didn’t remove it to annoy people but who knows!)

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to dpawlyk

    Yeah, but arbitrarily removing important functionality is annoying.

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to bobl

    You (we) have no idea whether it was "arbitrary". There may have been a good reason to remove it and you can't please everybody.

    I suspect not many people used it. If so, it would have been an "important" feature to a few people.

    But, sure. it's annoying that a feature you used/liked is removed.

  • 0 over 1 year ago in reply to bobl
    bobl said:
    between the two of you and your many forum posts, I've learned (and re-remembered) a lot about how Garmin does course management

    I have to acknowledge that most of what I have learned over the last decade (Garmin 200, 510, 520, 530 and now a grown up 1040) comes from the superior knowledge and posts from people like and with a little trial and many errors of my own