Chart/Course software

[bholderman]

I'm trying to plot the course of a historical ship via its log. Does anyone know of a program that will take daily coordinates, chart the route and overlay it onto a map?

[kc8pql]

Any navigation program should do this. Just enter the coordinates as a route. The problem is you need charts of the area traveled in order to display the route. Here's one that offers a free demo version that allows route planning but not all the actual navigation functions. You can also download free C-map world background and A and B level world charts with the program. They aren't detailed enough for navigation but would probably be fine for what you want to do. Sounds like fun. http://www.globenav.com/

[Terry Etapa]

Try Google Earth. I know that it will take data from the nav software I use, and plot it out.

[Bruce Hooke]

I agree with Terry. I think if you mess around a bit with Google Earth you'll be able to get it to do what you want. You can certainly have it go to specific locations based on lat & long.

[Terry Etapa]

Google Earth uses KML files. Here is a link to a website that generates KML files from GPS data: http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/map?form=googleearth

[Michael s/v Sannyasin]

If you go the google earth way, then constructing a KML file for your positions is the way to go. I wrote a script to generate a KML file for my buddy Reid's 1000 Day voyage. You can go to the link below and it will generate a KML file of his track. That will give you the basic format of a KML file, then you can plug in your own coordinates.

Note, in that file, there will be 3 folders, one is simply the daily noon position fixes (called Noon Positions). One is a "tesselated path" of each days hourly positions (gives you a line on the map, I call this folder Path Segments). The third contains positions of ships/bouys within 150 mile radius of their most recent position (called Ships and Bouys).

http://www.1000Days.net/googleKML.php