Mercator Templates

Using the ChartComponents package, I generated some Mercator Templates (aka Mercator Plotting Sheets) that can be used for celestial navigation. They're available as pdf documents in different sizes: 11" x 8½", 11" x 17" and 17" x 22".
The Letter format (11" x 8.5"), which is quite small. I need to try it to make sure this is not too small. I reduced on all versions the latitude span to 3 degrees (instead of 6, on the charts published by the French SHOM, format ½ Grand Aigle), for the definition of a mile not to be too small.

New feature: Load composite from the web

You can now load an archived composite from the web, in the Weather Wizard.
There are archived composites at http://donpedro.lediouris.net/weather/waz/, and they can be accessed directly. Go to File > Load Composite from the web.
There was a lot of activity in the tropical zone during the past weeks, hurricanes, typhoons, tropical waves, depressions and storms. They can be visualized this way, in case you did not follow those phenomenons on a daily base.

China Camp

We left Drakes Bay this morning at 6am, nice NW wind, 2 to 3 Beaufort.
The weather was cold, but the sky was 100% clear.
We went down the Bonita Channel at about 9 knots (on the ground), and through the Golden Gate and then Raccoon Strait.
We dropped the anchor at China Camp a 1:30pm.
Great sun, and warm wind!

Click this

Quitté Drakes Bay ce matin à 6 heures, dans un bon vent de noroît 2 à 3 Beaufort.
Le temps était froid, mais le ciel dégagé.
On a descendu Bonita Channel à plus de 9 noeuds sur le fond, et embouqué le Golden Gate puis Raccoon Strait.
On a mouillé à China Camp à 13:30.
Grand soleil, et le vent est chaud!

Drakes Bay

We switched to plan Z... With the wind as it is, there is no way we can go to the Channel Islands and come back in time...
We left Half Moon Bay in the end of the morning, heading North.
We arrived in Drakes Bay the next morning, after an easy light (but cold) night.

Check this.

On a changé de plan, avec le vent comme il est, ca n'aurait pas été raisonnable d'aller aux Channel Islands, on n'aurait pas pu revenir à temps.
On a donc quitté Half Moon Bay en fin de matinée, cap vers le Nord.
On est arrivé à Drakes Bay le matin suivant, après une nuit légère (mais froide).

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Anchored in Half Moon Bay

We left Oyster Point this morning, the wind outside the Gate was blowing South West, then West, then South West again, South-South-West, and finally, South (where we're going)!
We made a stop in Half Moon Bay...

On a quitté Oyster Point ce matin, le vent après le Golden Gate soufflait du SW, puis de l'W, et ensuite SW à nouveau, SSW, et pour finir, S (ou on va)!
On a fait un arrêt à Half Moon Bay...

Click this

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Routing Computation Improvement

Found - and fixed - an important performance bug in the routing computation.
That one appeared when a restriction like "Avoid TWS above XX" or "Avoid TWA below YY" was set.
It now behaves like the computation that has no restriction, which is good!
Update is available at its usual place, or through the automatic update mechanism.
Enjoy!

Repackaged...

I repackaged the install.
The dustlet is now implemented as a user-exit, that minimizes the dependencies.
I also integrated and modified the JGrib code, in order not to have to worry about Log4J, which was not quite mandatory in our case.
The best way to get the new version is to uninstall, and then re-install. This is because of some implied structural changes in the soft.

After that, the auto-update feature will keep working OK.

"What if" routing

Mostly dedicated to cruisers - not good for racing - here is a new feature.Think it like "What if I keep sailing at 50 degrees of the true wind, starboard tack, for 3 days?". Or "What if I keep heading 230 true for 5 days?".
This shows you where you would be! There are some limitations of course, like when you keep sailing head to wind, you wacky weirdo.

User Exit

Rendering of faxes and GRIB data seems to be an endless topic..., the soft this blog is about provides some options, but there is way more to do.

That's why we came up with this user-exit feature, that allows anyone who knows a bit of Java to do whatever he wants, with the faxes - reworked or not (color and transparency) - and the GRIB data. This creates an entry in the popup menu of the chart panel, which you can select to trigger external code. The only restriction is to implement a given Java Interface, and you can access the context of the chart panel. 

Above is an example of such a user-exit, smoothing and animating the GRIB data currently displayed in the chart pane. 500mb charts look a bit like a big slug drooling across the ocean...

We will soon post on the site a repository of such user exits (along with explanations about the way to write yours), the possibilities are endless.

The rendering provided by Processing is gorgious, I still need to look into it, for now I'm struggling with thread issues. They manage their own pool apparently, and I need to somehow sneak in... We'll see. 

The video above is a preview of the animated GRIB slug. It's smaller than the real one, but the picture on top will give you an idea of the actual size.

Introducing GRIB Slicing

We now have the possibility on rendered GRIB file to draw a line. A graph will then show up, representing the values along the line of the different data contained in the GRIB. 

If the mouse is held clicked on the graph, then a red dot is displayed on the map (and on the line of course), showing where the point is geographically. It becomes easy to see where the wind is the strongest, the pressure the highest, the temperature the warmest, the precipitations the heaviest, etc.

This feature is available immediatly.