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A Better Breed of GPS Software?
willo asks: "I recently built an on board computer for my Grand Cherokee.
The initial uses for it include music, gps navigation, on board diagnostics and a baby cam so I can see how my kid is in that rear facing seat. After lots of research and testing, I'm really disappointed with the
mapping software out there for Linux. Gpsdrive provides the basic functionality I need, but the street names are built into the image and
are difficult to read at a glance while driving. Not to mention that it has to download the maps it needs ahead of time. Xastir can handle almost any map out there, but it reads through every map for each redraw! It also seems to lack the ability to zoom intelligently based on location. Note that it's not really designed to be a navigation aid, but rather a ham radio APRS tool. (I am a ham). Delorme Street Atlas USA does what I really want, but it's been a pain to make run properly under wine. Is anyone else out there working on a decent navigation application?"
Map Sources do exist for this! Bruce Perens made TIGER/line data availible. NAVTECH is the map source for pretty much all the vehicle navigation systems out there, and high resolution maps are availible from the Geographical Information Survey."
"To be really usable navigation software should do the following:
- handle maps efficiently and draw them quickly
- have intelligently organized map sets for countries/states. (You can't download a friggin map in the middle of Montana!)
- include serial gps/gpsd support. (just about everyone has this)
Map Sources do exist for this! Bruce Perens made TIGER/line data availible. NAVTECH is the map source for pretty much all the vehicle navigation systems out there, and high resolution maps are availible from the Geographical Information Survey."
Okay, this might be a really stupid question. Why not install Windows with some commercial software instead of trying to patch together some half-baked solution?
Jason.
just draw it on the back of your hand, then you can glance at it and see it
... and install win2k
Gentlemen, the time has come for a serious discussion on whether or not to continue using C for serious programming projects. As I will explain, I feel that C needs to be retired, much the same way that Fortran, Cobol and Perl have been. Furthermore, allow me to be so bold as to suggest a superior replacement to this outdated language.
To give you a little background on this subject, I was recently asked to develop a client/server project on a Unix platform for a Fortune 500 company. While I've never coded in C before I have coded in VB for fifteen years, and in Java for over ten, I was stunned to see how poorly C fared compared to these two, more low-level languages.
C's biggest difficulty, as we all know, is the fact that it is by far one of the slowest languages in existance, especially when compared to more modern languages such as Java and C#. Although the reasons for this are varied, the main reasons seems to be the way C requires a programmer to laboriously work with chunks of memory.
Requiring a programmer to manipulate blocks of memory is a tedious way to program. This was satisfactory back in the early days of coding, but then again, so were punchcards. By using what are called "pointers" a C programmer is basically requiring the computer to do three sets of work rather than one. The first time requires the computer to duplicate whatever is stored in the memory space "pointed to" by the pointer. The second time requires it to perform the needed operation on this space. Finally the computer must delete the duplicate set and set the values of the original accordingly.
Clearly this is a horrendous use of resources and the chief reason why C is so slow. When one looks at a more modern (and a more serious) programming language like Java, C# or - even better - Visual Basic that lacks such archaic coding styles, one will also note a serious speed increase over C.
So what does this mean for the programming community? I think clearly that C needs to be abandonded. There are two candidates that would be a suitable replacement for it. Those are Java and C#.
Having programmed in both for many years, I believe that C# has the edge. Not only is it slightly faster than Java its also much easier to code in. I found C to be confusing, frightening and intimidating with its non-GUI-based coding style. Furthermore, I like to see the source code of the projects I work with. Java's source seems to be under the monopolistic thumb of Sun much the way that GCC is obscured from us by the marketing people at the FSF. Microsoft's "shared source" under which C# is released definately seems to be the most fair and reasonable of all the licenses in existance, with none of the harsh restrictions of the BSD license. It also lacks the GPLs requirement that anything coded with its tools becomes property of the FSF.
I hope to see a switch from C/C++ to C# very soon. I've already spoken with various luminaries in the C coding world and most are eager to begin to transition. Having just gotten off the phone with Mr. Alan Cox, I can say that he is quite thrilled with the speed increases that will occur when the Linux kernel is completely rewritten in C#. Richard Stallman plans to support this, and hopes that the great Swede himself, Linus Torvalds, won't object to renaming Linux to C#/Linux. Although not a C coder himself, I'm told that Slashdot's very own Admiral Taco will support this on his web site. Finally, Dennis Ritchie is excited about the switch!
Thank you for your time. Happy coding.
and the problem is the datasets....
I have the complete specs and entire dataset for the USA for the 1997 Census data set.. which includes streets,addresses,etc... It's free for public use and most companies base their dataset on this (although a current version of the data) or they use a closed and secret dataset... The problem is that the closed data set... I have the full specs on how to use it with sample C code from them on how to use it, and they basically wrote me my app except for the GUI... but the Dataset SUCKS (NavTech comes to mind).. and is horribly expensive... a 3 state CD costs $150.00 and is missing anything that is not a major metropolitan area.. which is useless as when you get lost it's out in the middle of nowhere...
gpsd is a must have, it's the best GPS data server on the planet (and the only one) but except for GPS drive, there is nothing that is worth even messing with as they are either too young to use, or havent been worked on cince 1999 and are dead/dying...
I'd help but I'm no C programmer... and C++ is plain evil (in my opinion) I dont know GTK, or Qt (Please PLEASE stay with GTK so I can use it with xfce or another window managet that is sane in size and resources needed)
But the same thing is happening on the windows side... Delorme tripmate software from 1998 is nice but needs help... the newer stuff is nothing but a rehash with the latest libs and designed to use the newest dataset. but as far as GPS navagation software, Microsoft platforms have crappy software too.. I want to do many different navigation things, How about storing a waypoint easily? how about storing the current position as a waypoint right now without disrupting the current nav operation? Nope...
Linux doesnt have that "itch" that needs to be scratched. At least not by a talented programmer.
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