25 replies to this topic

[DryArmour]

Saw the APP from Nose Down for improving your race starts on the mythical Front Page and so I thought i would check it out. Anyone use this yet? Feedback?

http://nosedowncompu...x.php/start2win

[JustDroppingBy]

Not to be a smartass (or too much of one) but when it says it computes whether you started too soon, too late or on time, isn't that pretty obvious when you start?

[DryArmour]

Not to be a smartass (or too much of one) but when it says it computes whether you started too soon, too late or on time, isn't that pretty obvious when you start?

On a super long or very large line if the committee boat shows Individual Recall I can see how having this app help you decide if you are one of the flagged boats wouuld help.

[JustDroppingBy]

Not to be a smartass (or too much of one) but when it says it computes whether you started too soon, too late or on time, isn't that pretty obvious when you start?

On a super long or very large line if the committee boat shows Individual Recall I can see how having this app help you decide if you are one of the flagged boats wouuld help.

Hmmm, we just had an interesting rule prohibiting cell phone usage during a regatta, and while it did not specifically cover something like this, I can't believe there's someone on the boat in a large fleet situation (I'm thinking Laser, J22, J24, Star, etc) who has time to whip out a phone and check it, were it allowable in the SIs

And yes, I know there's a person with an iPad or some such running Expedition etc on the back of a lot of big boats during the entire race, but you don't see that many giant fleets for big boats these days

[Foolish]

A problem with previous aps was that they projected your time to the line in a straight line from your boat to the line, i.e. at 90 degrees. They did not project that you are travelling towards the line on a 45 degree angle. Has this ap corrected that issue?

[USA190520]

Not to be a smartass (or too much of one) but when it says it computes whether you started too soon, too late or on time, isn't that pretty obvious when you start?

On a super long or very large line if the committee boat shows Individual Recall I can see how having this app help you decide if you are one of the flagged boats wouuld help.

Hmmm, we just had an interesting rule prohibiting cell phone usage during a regatta, and while it did not specifically cover something like this, I can't believe there's someone on the boat in a large fleet situation (I'm thinking Laser, J22, J24, Star, etc) who has time to whip out a phone and check it, were it allowable in the SIs

And yes, I know there's a person with an iPad or some such running Expedition etc on the back of a lot of big boats during the entire race, but you don't see that many giant fleets for big boats these days

Life proof case, dual lock... Instrumentation

IRegatta... Pretty cool app for whatever it was and I use it regularly.

[bloodshot]

evlstrom sails has a good one too.

but I mean, banning cellphones during a race? I suppose that would make sense in a large Laser fleet where not all boats will have one, but with PHRF fleets and such with TackTicks and chartplotters and all that, isn't that a bit insane?

[NoseDownComputing]

A problem with previous aps was that they projected your time to the line in a straight line from your boat to the line, i.e. at 90 degrees. They did not project that you are travelling towards the line on a 45 degree angle. Has this ap corrected that issue?

It's taking care of this. It's showing a line of travel, which extrapolates the current bearing. If it's crossing the start line it displays the distance to the startline, if outside it displays respective info.
See also the last two chapters of the manual
http://nosedowncompu...onsManualV1.pdf

[NoseDownComputing]

Not to be a smartass (or too much of one) but when it says it computes whether you started too soon, too late or on time, isn't that pretty obvious when you start?

On a super long or very large line if the committee boat shows Individual Recall I can see how having this app help you decide if you are one of the flagged boats wouuld help.

I can't believe there's someone on the boat in a large fleet situation (I'm thinking Laser, J22, J24, Star, etc) who has time to whip out a phone and check it

Start2Win has speech output and AudioVario, so you don't have to whip out your phone at all. AudioVario is inspired by (sail)planes and playes different sounds if you are too fast or too slow.

[NoseDownComputing]

Not to be a smartass (or too much of one) but when it says it computes whether you started too soon, too late or on time, isn't that pretty obvious when you start?

It's obvious when to start but it's not obvious if you cross the start line on time. That's what Start2Win computes.

[jonoflewis]

Love it. when u gonna get a version for the iPhone??

[NoseDownComputing]

Love it. when u gonna get a version for the iPhone??

Jon, we are discussing this, there are not yet specific plans however. So I don't have more informtion at this point in time.

[Beau.Vrolyk]

Too bad. I've got an iPad and iPhone but no android stuff. See you when you run. On the iPhone.

Could you make this an add-in to iNavX? That's rapidly becoming the mainstream phone-pad navigation ap as the Expedition guys seem to be falling behind.

[us7070]

Too bad. I've got an iPad and iPhone but no android stuff. See you when you run. On the iPhone.

Could you make this an add-in to iNavX? That's rapidly becoming the mainstream phone-pad navigation ap as the Expedition guys seem to be falling behind.

Expedition and iNavX are not even remotely comparable.

I own both.

I don't think that Expedition is trying to be a "mainstream" navigation program, and that market is left to other programs and apps.

Relatively few people need or want to do many of the things that Expedition does.

Nevertheless, t would be nice if some of the features of Expedition were more easily accessible on a phone or tablet. The start line functions and layline calculations are obviously in this category.

As has been noted, some peole are using VNC to accomplish this.

But not all of the Expedition features are really suited for phones or tablets. For example, I like a big display for editing polars. At least for me, route optimization is not something I do in a few seconds, and then follow the line - it's more of a series of experiments that gradually refine my thinking, and i'm happy to do that at the nav station.

According to the Expedition website, the newest version of Expedition, has some built-in integration with the Ventus app. This app has been has been discussed in other threads. I don't own the Ventus app, so I'm not sure what this integration is yet, but I'm interested to see.

[jackdaw]

A problem with previous aps was that they projected your time to the line in a straight line from your boat to the line, i.e. at 90 degrees. They did not project that you are travelling towards the line on a 45 degree angle. Has this ap corrected that issue?

That's not a problem, its good design. Distance to line off the nose sounds good until you get close and then turn down the line, then the numbers jump all over the freeking place, 20 feet, 100 feet, 500 feet, 30 feet as your bow points away and comes back up. Meanwhile your hull has stayed basically the same distance away from the line.

The math problem you are describing is Ange-Side-Angle, and when the known angle gets close to 90 degrees (running the line), the missing side in question (distance to line off the bow) gets HUGE.

You don't want that. Trust me.

[ShockValue]

Not dissing on this app, but I'm not sure I see what it does that the other starters don't already do (BC Racer, iRegatta, RegattaStartTimer, etc).

[addi238]

Not dissing on this app, but I'm not sure I see what it does that the other starters don't already do (BC Racer, iRegatta, RegattaStartTimer, etc).

Probably w.r.t. basic features you may be right SV. One outstanding feature, which I like very much is its “Audio Vario 2 Start”. It is similar to the Variometer known from gliding and paragliding. I tried it out. You don't need to look at the display (, which you may not be able to read with the sun glasses on a bright day anyway). I stowed may device away in a dry-safe pocket and had my blue tooth thing in the ear. It gave me acoustic signals on the estimated arrivial at the start line, telling me if I would be arriving there too early , too late, or in time. And the count down was spoken to me, too.
For me that was very helpful. Using the eyes as usual (wind, trim, competitors) and getting additional information via ear is a good idea

[NoseDownComputing]

That's right, we always want to develop an app that assists you and doesn't distract you from sailing.
We think there shouldn't be an extra guy needed for operating the sailing app ;-)

[markvannote]

Tried the Elvstrom app on a couple of different boats. I don't know if it is a function of the iPhone position refreshing rate or the app but it worked well on the boat which reaches at five knots before the start and was not good for the boat that reaches at 9-10+ depending on the wind strength. You would be over the line before the app says you are.

I have not tried the App in question on this forum.

Mark

[NoseDownComputing]

Mark,

I'm not sure if I understood your concern. Are you worried the accuracy of the app?
The accuracy of the app is determined from the accuracy of the GPS (around 3ft with additional calculations). We can say that at higher speeds, our app is more accurate than at lower speeds because the error of the GPS gets relatively smaller than the distance between 2 GPS fixes. GPS calculations are not very accurate at speeds below 2 or 3 knots.
Once a second, a GPS fix goes into the calculation. This is more than enough for rather slow speed and direction changes of sailboats.
So this is the theory. I hope I could make clear that with our app, you'll never cross the line before the app says you are at the line if your speed is 5 knots or faster (didn't happen to us in practice either).

[markvannote]

Just to clarify, my experience is with a different app than yours. That said, the app in question worked well in a small boat but did not update quickly enough on a faster boat when we tried it out. (not the actual start, we use Expedition for that) The app would have had us over early.

Is yours available for the iPhone?

[NoseDownComputing]

We have plans to release it for the iPhone but unfortunately there is no release date yet.

[NoseDownComputing]

We're happy to announce that we released a new version of Start2Win.
Most important, there is a new feature that tells you if you started to early or to late and what your distance to the start line was as start. How do you like that?
Check it out here.
We also have a new site at our website that recommends best practice with Start2Win.

[Christian]

Too bad. I've got an iPad and iPhone but no android stuff. See you when you run. On the iPhone.

Could you make this an add-in to iNavX? That's rapidly becoming the mainstream phone-pad navigation ap as the Expedition guys seem to be falling behind.

How you can even compare Expedition and iNavX is beyond me - sure there is a small overlap (they can both be used as chartplotters) but the main purpose of the two are completely different.

[Asymptote]

Jeez, whatever happened to having a cute bowgirl in the pulpit holding up fingers for distance to the line and a snack-tician (preferably also cute) calling out time to go?

Seriously, I've tried some of this stuff, but in the last minute or so its head out of the boat time and the driver and trimmers working the problem. And if its so close you can't tell if you're over, having the antenna in the back of the bus isn't going to help.

[Bump-n-Grind]

I'm not so sure I want to be on a starting line with a lot of boats that are this dependent on their gimmicky electronics and can't get their own head and eyes out of the boat long enough to do a start. I have a cell phones off rule on my boat. My time on the boat is my little holiday from the real world, thank you very much.