Watch App to display Bearing to waypoint (POI)
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Hi everyone, I’m new here!
I’ve been searching for an app (Ambit2) which will display the bearing (as an integer) to a defined POI (when in sport mode and navigation active). There doesn’t seem to be any in the listed apps on Movescount which include this simple function.
So…I tried to write my own. The problem is that I cannot for the life of me work out which function returns the coordinates to a POI. This is how far I have got so far:/* While in sport mode do this once per second */
RESULT = Suunto.heading(41.3800, 2.2200);
prefix = “TGT”;
postfix = “Deg”;As you can see, the lat - long coordinates are hard coded, and remain unchanged if you activate the app and enable navigation (selecting a POI).
What does, however, work is the function SUUNTO_DISTANCE_TO_NEXT_TARGET, so the ability to calculate is there apparently.Can anyone help me out?
Or point me to an app that does return the bearing to a POI as an integer…
(I would have thought this feature would be innate for a sports watch, but apparently not, which is incredible if you ask me…) -
Hello,
I have checked the documentation but I’m afraid that there seems to be no POI information available for apps.
http://content.static.movescount.com/downloads/SuuntoAppZoneDeveloperManual.pdf
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Thanks Johann… I also read (and re-read, and re-read etc) the Developer manual and couldn’t find an “obvious” function to return the coordinates. Other functions do take the POI into account (for example, SUUNTO_DISTANCE_TO_NEXT_TARGET), and you can code an app to set coordinates based on pressing the “lap” button on the watch (but that sets the location for that particular moment) and you can then use those with the Suunto.heading() function.
I seriously cannot believe that there is no way of getting a bearing (as an integer, not as a pretty little arrow on a dial) in an adventure/sport watch. There has to be a way, or an app…
Please someone enlighten me before I decide my Suunto watch is made redundant (I sail in regattas, and knowing a “bearing” is kind of essential) -
@PDBSuunto
I’ve just updated the title to avoid confusion with Suunto App “the phone App” -
Unfortunately PLAOAD (also known as “Thattaway”) does appear to be Suunto’s house style for navigational direction display. The later Ambit 3, Spartan and (afaik) S-series do not offer numerical bearing-to, either.
I think it would take FW revisions to put the feature on watches and, barring serious bug-fixes, the Ambits & Spartans appear to have had their allotment of those.
Can’t predict future S-series FWs, nor what the Digital Transition will do with current Ambit app capabilities but I haven’t seen any sign of company interest in that direction. Nor, honestly, does there seem to be massive support for the feature here.
I agree with you on this but our definitions of “adventure” and “sport” only overlap with Suunto’s to a degree (pun just sad). Speedy route-following and detailed workout record generation seem to be the overwhelming focus.
It makes its own kind of narrow sense: if you have the time or interest to look at an integer bearing, you’re probably having the wrong adventure or doing your sport the wrong way. Or wrong-for-Suunto, at least for the immediate future.
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@Fenr1r
Thanks for a very informative post. I really find it astonishing that “Bearings” have been omitted in these kind of watches. Pretty incredible really…
As far as a possible fix, I would bet that it can (easily) be done by adding a new function to the app coding functions roster. After all, there is a function called SUUNTO_DISTANCE_TO_NEXT_TARGET which in effect is calculating the distance between 2 coordinates (current and the POI set in “navigation”). I would suggest a derivation of this function along the lines of SUUNTO_BEARING_TO_NEXT_TARGET. (you could probably code this bearing “manually” in an app using trigonometry, but my maths glory days are unfortunately WELL behind me…).
I have worked out a VERY clumsy/rudimentary workaround involving setting the POI in navigation once the sport mode is set, activate the compass, go to the screen with the POI info (distance and “pretty little arrow pointing in the right direction”), align the arrow with the top (black line) marker on the watch, button press to get to the compass screen without batting an eyelid and keeping perfectly still (on a racing sailing boat…) and read the bearing off the compass to pass on to the skipper. (repeat every couple of nautical miles or so…). Clever me hey? Than you Suunto…
Quite a joke really…
I might just take my phone with me and use an app (free) which gives me all this info and more (and see the info on a synched watch screen if I want to be reaaally techie and/or sophisticated…), and unceremoniously toss my Suunto into the sea on our next race to give it an (ironically) appropriate sea-burial. -
@PDBSuunto said in Watch App to display Bearing to waypoint (POI):
Thanks for a very informative post. I really find it astonishing that “Bearings” have been omitted in these kind of watches. Pretty incredible really…
To be fair you can see it in compass mode (not sure if it was already available on Ambit2).
That said, I agree that is not an accessible data from elsewhere … but let’s keep this topic related to Watch APP.
We’ve already discussed about bearing in some other topics (eg. https://forum.suunto.com/topic/2372/where-is-the-compass-field-in-custom-hiking-mode/) -
Perhaps the title for this should involve “Ambit” so as to avoid confusion with the S7 app. There’s certainly overlap with other non-Ambit numerical bearing requests so where it goes is up to you.
To be fair you can see it in compass mode (not sure if it was already available on Ambit2). I agree that is not an accessible data from elsewhere …
The OP was looking for the numerical-bearing-to-POI-from-current-position, irrespective of watch orientation. Are you sure this is accessible at all?
The numbers my SSU (2.8.32) shows in Compass mode are the watch’s heading in degrees: its 6->12 o’clock axis vs chosen North. Call up a POI’s details and you can see its absolute coordinates and relative distance but not the bearing.
In POI Navigation mode the compass displays a red triangle for North, blue arrow for POI direction (relative to North), blue heading caret (at watch 12 o’clock) and numerical distance to POI.
Does your SSS on 2.8.28 work differently?
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@Fenr1r said in Watch App to display Bearing to waypoint (POI):
Perhaps the title for this should involve “Ambit” so as to avoid confusion with the S7 app.
Well, yes, but the category should be self explanatory
Does your SSS on 2.8.28 work differently?
No (and by the way I’m on 2.8.32 too, forgot to update the signature ) I was talking about degrees on compass, not bearing to POI, that for sure is calculated but not made available, as far as I can imagine.
But anyway I don’t have an Ambit to check -
Well, yes, but the category should be self explanatory
D’oh. Of course! Momentary idiocy attack here. Apologies.
On the other … the OP’s title was pretty precisely about bearing rather than heading in compass degrees, hence the workaround process, so I wasn’t quite sure what you meant by “it” being visible in compass mode.