HOW TO: Make course line easier to see

Great stuff, I had a similar thought but stopped work on it as sensor  "dropouts" encouraged me to return to Version 7.10

https://forums.garmin.com/sports-fitness/cycling/f/edge-530/259642/route-color---change-to-green/1397936#1397936

I can't test this as I am back at 7.10 but I am not sure it is this simple. Firstly after some guidance from the Garmin Beta Team it seemed (at least in earlier versions) that the standard Theme files were recreated at each device startup so if you wanted to change any colours you had to copy an existing one, edit it , save with a new name and then "select" it in the Themes option.

There also seemed to be multiple "styles" that might impact this, different ones for Courses (CRS), Routes (RTE) and Activities (ACTV).?

The colour of the line also seems to depend on state of the "Turn Guidance"  if you are following a course and different if you are navigating to a dropped pin or saved location. I assume your example above is navigating to a saved location without a course/route loaded?

The thicker line only seems to appear if you are using Turn Guidance, I don't generally use this but would still like the thicker line in the brighter color.

Anyway you have dived deeper than I had so might be on the right track. Hopefully it can be sorted out, I might be tempted back to version 9 or later if it worked

thanks

I agree. If you're navigating to a point (or to the start of the course, or to get back on course) the line is fat and easy to see.

In this example I just dropped a GPX file onto the device and loaded it as a course. 

Not sure if Garmin ever published the various fields used in their theme files or whether they're extrapolated from the map TYP file. 

Away from home but when I get back I'll add a screenshot of the routing settings page. I do have turn by turn on as it means I don't have to stay on the map page when following an unfamiliar route.

Fursty_Ferret said:

For some reason Garmin use a thin dark purple line for guidance if you're following a course.

The reason it's thinner and darker is so it's different than the calculated course line.

When you use "turn guidance" the device calculates a second separate course. 

I think you are on the right track with the "MPM_ACTV_CRS_CLR" field, looking at the standard Mountain (#ffc88cc8) & High Contrast (#fff854a8) Themes the slight difference in the loaded course line color (without the calculated route overlayed) corresponds to the color value of this field. In each case the "secondary" parameter is #FF000000 ie black corresponding to the color of the route boarder? There is some discussion in the Fenix 6 forum along these lines.  (The Classic Theme does not have this field so I understand it uses a default built into the software which in this case is the same color as the High Contrast).

So using the "#ffff00ff" value for both primary & secondary "should" give us a nice bright route line, (with or without Turn Guidance), of apparent larger size due to the borders being the same color as the center. There appears to be no parameter for the actual wider calculated route line although the Fenix discussion mentions a "scale" & "border" parameter but these might only be implemented in Garmin CAR navigation devices

<style field="MPM_ACTV_CRS_CLR" scale = "2" border = "1.00">

forums.garmin.com/.../how-to-change-the-colour-of-navigation-course-follow-line-with-your-own-map-theme

If your example above is using a GPX route then the test is what do you see with the Turn Guidance disabled?

                 Mountain                                       High Contrast

Yes and it is odd that after 10 years of small GPS device user interface / usability experience Garmin overlays the less visible route line over the more visible calculated line? What I want is the route line to be as visible as the calculated but without needing to use Turn Guidance which has minimal value for me

PS They could be the same color and width as when (if) they diverge due to map or calculation issues the "calculated" route gets the much loved (not by me) chevron / arrows (a good example of the relative visibility of the two lines here)

The "calculated" route line is more visible because it is about 50% wider and a more visible color than the loaded route line the visibility of which is further degraded by the thicker black borders,. The loaded route line gets overlayed on the calculated line effectively hiding it, who designed this ??

If @Fursty_Ferret's hack works then this would go a long way to improving the visibility, lets hope.

Fursty_Ferret said:

If I get around to it I'll make a tool that lets you pick your own colours and generates a theme file for you.

Someone might have already?

www.javawa.nl/zumocolors.html

Although there seems to be differences in the format it expects?

L.Rouge said:

The loaded route line gets overlayed on the calculated line effectively hiding it, who designed this ??

This isn't a problem (not at all).

As long as you know there's a secondary calculated route, you only need to know when it deviates from the track line.

L.Rouge said:

PS They could be the same color and width as when (if) they diverge due to map or calculation issues the "calculated" route gets the much loved (not by me) chevron / arrows (a good example of the relative visibility of the two lines here)

See, even you realized it wasn't a problem.

The track and calculated route have to be different. The chevrons are only a recent option and you want them to be optional (which would mean they wouldn't work to distinguish the two).

The chevrons are added to the track when "turn guidance" is disabled, which means they can't really be markers for the calculated route (it would be confusing: it wouldn't be clear whether the chevrons were referring to the calculated route or the track).

Great Success then !!

My 530 was offering me version 9.30 today so I though why not and I can try the MapTheme hack, I can always revert again and it will give me another opportunity to whine about the direction arrows & drop-outs to my Tacx "Smart" trainer. I have a couple of not great screen shots, (now inserted below, better later), but the forum isn't (wasn't) letting me insert images again (why does it sometimes not allow and other times allow inserts?), I will get some better examples and try to post them later but otherwise the change in the MapTheme seems to work well with both Turn Guidance and without, route line is way more visible, only slightly less without Turn Guidance (the route line slightly less wide). Having the line borders the same color (via the secondary value) as the line (ie not black) makes a big difference.

Thanks FURSTY_FERRET

          No "Turn Guidance"                            With "Turn Guidance"

Note the TG version has a slightly wider route line  but the non-TG one is almost as visible due to the boarders not being black but the same color as the line making the apparent width wider.

(following a separate discussion a month or two ago I also changed the Position marker color, also via the Map Theme)

PS: Also noting the direction arrows grow smaller (good) when using Turn Guidance!

Great stuff! Is this hack also possible on the Edge 520? I cannot find any *.kmtf files or folders as "/Garmin/MapThemes/" or any other files that have a XML stylelist.

arnhub said:

Is this hack also possible on the Edge 520?

Unfortunately no, the MapThemes have been on Garmin Car Navigation devices for a long while, on some watch devices for a year or two and on 530/830/1030/1030+ since FW version 8, but unlikely to ever come to 520s and other older devices