Boat Log
- Thread starter agprice22
- Start date
I use a Google Doc spreadsheet. I have columns set up for things like miles travelled, engine hours, total hours, weather, maintenance, and miscellany. I like that I can use normal spreadsheet functions to keep running totals of hours and miles, and to do things like compare miles this year with previous years.
One thing it doesn't really do that I would like is to associate pictures with individual trips. It would be nice to be able to select pictures I've taken from the camera roll and save them to go back. Would help not just categorize memories but also track things like pictures of maintenance steps.
One thing it doesn't really do that I would like is to associate pictures with individual trips. It would be nice to be able to select pictures I've taken from the camera roll and save them to go back. Would help not just categorize memories but also track things like pictures of maintenance steps.
Eeek! Why did I not think of this!
It would also be cool to link to weather forecasts and chartplotter plots.
It would also be cool to link to weather forecasts and chartplotter plots.
We added one of these to our N2K network. https://www.yachtd.com/products/recorder.html
Haven't actually checked the data yet.
Haven't actually checked the data yet.
Navico plotters (at least the Simrad NSS and B&G Zeus series) save the data themselves similar to what that product seems to do. You can export the data onto a micro SD card or save it via WiFi. The data rolls over every 50MB, but that's enough for a few days of sailing. I wrote a script to take the raw NMEA sentences it saves and turn them into Excel sheets and Google Earth KML files. With the KML you can see the tracks, and click on a point to see the data points at that spot.
I agree with Andrew too - it would be nice to save this data along with a log entry. Maybe even, in a perfect world, pre-populate a log entry with miles, travel time, and winds based on the NMEA data.
I use Navionics on my iPhone to track each sail. It tags your photos for that track, gives you data like speed, distance and time. I save each track and give it a sequential number followed by the year. IE: Sail 023-19. I then email it to my Evernote note program where I keep a log of each sail with the Navionics track as well as engine hours, weather and guests.
You are trouble. I was happy with paper until you started this thread.
Ken
Ken
Reports can use tweaking for sail usage. Wish it would auto separate powered vs unpowered segments.
Onenote works well for this. I use it for the maintenance log. Had high hopes of using it for the sailing log too. Would work fine if I actually did it. My wife is keeping a paper log of our trip currently from Erie, Pa up to the North Channel of Lake Huron. I save the tracks on Navionics and will eventually import them into Onenote. You can "share" them from Navionics directly to Onenote, but all it gives you is a link that sends you to Navionics to view the track. Other option is download the track and copy it to Onenote...requires 2 steps and why it's not done.
@LeslieTroyer If you add tach info to the N2K network, then engine hours could be tracked and with some filtering motoring vs sailing could be discerned. Adding some sort of sensor recognizes sail trim would also help.
I record Tach info along with oil pressure/temp and coolant temp. I’ll have to spend more time to get it to display what I want.
What I found over the many years I've had a digital camera (and a lot less years than most of you --- I still seem to be the last kid on the block when it comes to those type of things
) is the discipline required to organize my photos in folders with dates and associated naming, right as I upload the pictures from my camera/phone to my computer.My brother-in-law, who is a very good photographer, never bothered to do so, and can't find a darned thing.
The fact that my phone pictures have file names with the date included would, on the surface, seem to help. But not really.
For me, it's the creation of the folders and the names, which takes zilch time to do, that truly make a difference when I'm trying to find things later.
I don't know how any app can help without that discipline.
Good luck.
I used to have the discipline to do that, although I find it less necessary now than it used to be. Now I just rely on the time and place categorization provided by iCloud photos and Google photos. With iCloud you can zoom right in on a location and see pictures taken there on a specific date. With Google photos I can look by date very easily, and do searches for things like "sails" that show most of the pictures I've taken meeting those criteria. Still, building it all into one log would be a nice way to unify everything so I don't need to jump between multiple apps or folders to track things down.What I found over the many years I've had a digital camera (and a lot less years than most of you --- I still seem to be the last kid on the block when it comes to those type of things
My brother-in-law, who is a very good photographer, never bothered to do so, and can't find a darned thing.
The fact that my phone pictures have file names with the date included would, on the surface, seem to help. But not really.
For me, it's the creation of the folders and the names, which takes zilch time to do, that truly make a difference when I'm trying to find things later.
I don't know how any app can help without that discipline.
Good luck.
In Photos, I've been using Smart Albums. When I up load photos I add a keyword and then create a Smart Album based on that keyword. Photos can have multiple keywords and will show up in all of the albums. When I take photos of my boat, they get a keyword Second Star (the boat's name) and sometimes another keyword like Cruise 2019. Makes it much easier to find the photos. It is not necessary to tag each photo individually. Select a group of photos, chose Get Info and then add the keyword. All the selected photos get the keyword. This adds less than a minute to the upload time.