Navizon

[mexiken]

Hey all. Just to catch you up:

There is a free program called Navizon (www.navizon.com). While its a bit memory intensive for the WM6 version, its a great idea and program. It basically creates a virtual GPS for your phone, similar to the way the "My Location" works on Google Maps. However, this one only works when the locations have already been mapped out with a GPS or WiFi receiver, and uploaded to the server. This only needs to be done once. If you have internet and a GPS receiver, you can be a sort of "uploader" and contribute to the mapping.

I wanna do this. My question is, does anyone know the settings for us Q9h users to get the GPS to report location ???? I was playing around with it for awhile last night after downloading, and got it to light up the green symbol for the GPS, but I can't get it to grab a location. The weird thing is, Google Maps and WLS have a lock, but for some reason, I can't get Navizon to read that lock.

Anyone wanna download the free program and play around with it to see if we can get the correct settings to report GPS position ???? We can post them here for future users. There are a bunch of combinations, I've tried some but I can't keep track of which ones. Anyone willing to help ???? Its a great alternative for us WM5 and WM6 users for which "My Location" on Google Maps doesn't work. Plus, you're helping people in any area you report with your GPS for those who don't have GPS. Let me know what you all think.

[mexiken]

Ok so here are my results. After reading over some other forums and lots of researching, the easiest way to make your GPS both work consistently (which all us Q9h users crave) and make the GPS recognized on Navizon:

First, download the GPSID utility. You can find them around. Google them. For Q9h, set your "Software port" to COM 1 OR 3, doesn't matter, but choose one of these two. They are the only ports that are open and will not cause your battery to be drained much more than you would like. The baud rate can vary. Some people differ on their opinions on this. I set mine at 9600, seems to work fine. You can go up to whatever you like. I read about baud rates, and generally, the more, the better.

Restart the phone. Don't know if its necessary, but do it anyway.

On Google Maps, it should work a little more consistently, as well as with WLS. Keep the settings that should work. On Google, "Set by Windows", and on WLS, "GPS Intermediate Driver". They should work better now.

Now. Whatever you set your COM to (should be either 1 or 3), fire up Navizon, and go into the GPS settings. Match both the settings for GPS and the GPS Baud Rate. Set the Output Virtual Port to off. Under the Advanced softkey, make sure everything is unchecked. You can leave the Auto Start checked, however this has caused crashing problems for me, so I leave it unchecked. Go back to the "Dashboard", you should now have the GPS button light up green, and when it picks up sufficient signal, you should be able to track yourself on the map.

As a side note, I have noticed two things:

Standard GPS signal takes about 4 satellites out of the 24 orbiting the earth to determine your orientation in 3D space: x, y, z, and time. Under some circumstances, you can get away with using 3 if one of the variables is constant. Time is obviously not ever constant, so theres only 3 possible variables. For example, if you're sailing, obviously your "z" variable is constant since you're at sea level. The problem with our GPS chips is that they just aren't that good. Take a look at the GPS Test, it actually tells you the satellite number and the signal level. I sat there with the GPS Test running in my car which has a Navigation system, and opened up its diagnostic mode. When my car saw 6 satellites, the Q9h saw 4-5. When it saw 5, the Q9h saw about 3-4. It just doesn't lock as well as other devices, thus the start up lag when initializing the GPS module.

Two: On the new version of Google Maps (2.0), some of you may notice that you hit the "Use GPS" button, it tells you its seeking satellites, then it disappears. I've confirmed through testing (back and forth between GPS Test and Google Maps) that whats going on is the GPS has found satellites, but either they aren't of a reliable quality or there aren't enough. If you wait it out, it will usually pick up the sufficient strength needed to acquire a signal. If you get anxious like me, and unselect it and start over, you have to start this process all over.

Again, these are my observations. But the procedure to stabilize the consistency of our GPS receivers is pretty accurate for the Q9h.

Any comments, feel free to post. I'd be happy to help any way I can. I've had this phone since Day 1, I've just been a little shy about modifying it too much until recently. Hope this helped.

[ptlee8202]

This registry setting will put a gps status icon on your title bars.

HKLM\Services\LCAService\DisplayIcon

DisplayIcon=0 - off
DisplayIcon=1 - on

It will show you the activity of the gps.

I have navizon loaded and it is not giving me any location data from cell towers. Also, if I have not fully acquired enough satellites when I start navizon it will error out.

[mexiken]

Yeah I remember reading about that. Modified the registry, but it got a bit annoying when it was blinking all the time.

The same thing happens for me. It worked, but would not collect towers. And also, if the GPS isn't running, like you said, it errors out. An, "out of range" exception.

Hope they fix those errors soon.

[U-2]

Originally Posted by ptlee8202

This registry setting will put a gps status icon on your title bars.

HKLM\Services\LCAService\DisplayIcon

DisplayIcon=0 - off
DisplayIcon=1 - on

It will show you the activity of the gps.

I've checked with abcTaskMan and this setting <DisplayIcon=1> pumped up cpu usage of home.exe to 50% when gps was running. This significantly slowed down the navigation program.
Removed it immediately.

[larsdennert]

Since the smartphone doesn't have a gps manager builtin like the ppc you can't run two mapping programs at the same time and share the com port. You'd have to add a manager. You can have navizon output a virtual port for google to use though without adding a gps manager. You could just use one mapping app at a time. I've long ago become disillusioned with Navizon as their servers/system have lost hours of my mapping data and it doesn't pay ($15 for 10000 points). There is a blackberry app similiar that pays pretty well but I forget the name of the company. I have a gps, I don't need to map cell towers. Navizon is a great idea though if you don't have a gps.

[mexiken]

Originally Posted by larsdennert

Since the smartphone doesn't have a gps manager builtin like the ppc you can't run two mapping programs at the same time and share the com port. You'd have to add a manager. You can have navizon output a virtual port for google to use though without adding a gps manager. You could just use one mapping app at a time. I've long ago become disillusioned with Navizon as their servers/system have lost hours of my mapping data and it doesn't pay ($15 for 10000 points). There is a blackberry app similiar that pays pretty well but I forget the name of the company. I have a gps, I don't need to map cell towers. Navizon is a great idea though if you don't have a gps.

That was true of WM5, but WM6 uses a virtual intermediate GPS port, which allows multiple programs to use the port, as opposed to a static port. I've used GM and WLS and Garmin Mobile all at the same time, with no problems. The problem was because WM6 was new and so was the GPS driver, it gave developers problems at first trying to access the Windows API to use the port. However most have been overcome since.

You can make the changes in the registry without adding the GPSID utility, however it gives you a GUI, which makes life easier.

[larsdennert]

Ah good to know