Mapping software and GPS.

[Neil]

Great, got it, done. I'll PM you with my email address & you can let me know where to send the processed file to.

Save this as "downsample.awk" and run "gawk -f downsample.awk textfile.txt >textfile_d.txt" in a Command Prompt on Windows or a shell in unix. "gawk" is Gnu AWK and for Windows you can get the .exe file in UnxUpdates.zip from http://unxutils.sourceforge.net/

It worked perfectly and because there were so many trackpoints the route was faithfully reproduced.
Now, when you say to run "gawk -f downsample.awk textfile.txt >textfile_d.txt" in a Widows prompt do you mean on a black screen like in the Dos days? Or in "run" which is accessed from the Start button at the bottom left corner of my screen? If I do that should I leave the file on my root directory?

 

[DougPaul]

Neil,

You may know this technique, but I'll mention it just in case you don't:

I normally just put a route into my GPS by putting waypoints at points of interest (peaks, trailheads, trail junctions, etc) and connecting them into a route. The GPS draws straight lines between the waypoints.

Not as detailed as turning a track into a route, but simpler and the GPS can tell me the distance to the next waypoint as I hike. Substitute road junctions for trail junctions and it is very useful for solo driving in new places. Just watch the distance to the next waypoint and when it says ~100 ft, you are almost at the intersection. (I've had more need of the navigational help driving than hiking...)

Some of the newer GPSes (Garmin 60CS and 76CS) can auto route on the hiking trails of a (Garmin 24K) topo map. Sounds almost like cheating to me...

Doug

 

[arghman]

It worked perfectly and because there were so many trackpoints the route was faithfully reproduced.
Now, when you say to run "gawk -f downsample.awk textfile.txt >textfile_d.txt" in a Widows prompt do you mean on a black screen like in the Dos days? Or in "run" which is accessed from the Start button at the bottom left corner of my screen? If I do that should I leave the file on my root directory?

Under Win2K there is a program called the "command prompt" like in the DOS days, slightly improved but not much. You can get to it from the Start button->"Run..." and type "cmd.exe" (I put it into a shortcut button & have lots of other shortcuts/settings on my PC to make this easier, but it's hard to describe via messages like this one. Not sure how all this works in WinXP, probably similar.) You'd then have to use "cd" to change directory to where your data file is. Just make sure gawk.exe is somewhere in your path. (type "echo %path%" in the cmd prompt, I have a c:\bin directory where I put stuff like gawk, you can edit your path via in the Control Panel under System->Advanced->Environment Variables and the PATH variable is under System variables... just make sure you know what you're doing. it's a list of directories separated by semicolons ";" )

"textfile.txt" is the name of your input file, "textfile_d.txt" is the name of the processed output file that will be created.

what kind of format is that, anyway? (thank goodness it was a textfile!)