Antares charts with MX Mariner

[JumbleDuck]

Has anyone had any luck converting Antares charts to work with MX Mariner for Android. I've tried the conversion utility, MXCart, under XP, W7 and Wine and it fails on startup in different interesting ways under each system. They say it's beta, so I'm not too bothered. but it would be nice to have Antares as well as UKHO working.

 

[NormanS]

I have Antares on an Android Tablet accessed through Memory Map. Don't know anything about MX Mariner, but if you email Antares, Bob will explain all.

 

[JumbleDuck]

I have Antares on an Android Tablet accessed through Memory Map. Don't know anything about MX Mariner, but if you email Antares, Bob will explain all.

I may have to go that way, but I fancied having both sets of charts on one system, and MX Mariner is £8.50 for software and all the UKHO charts I need ...

 

[biscuit]

I haven't used MX Navigator, but I have installed VMH's charts on Marine Navigator on my Nexus 7 and Nexus 10, and imported Antares charts on to this arrangement. (A good android file manager is essential, I found File Manager HD the most comprehensible.)
In practice, when zooming in on an anchorage, the Antares chart automatically replaces the VMH raster, which is exactly what is needed.
I mean to try Antares with vector charts, for comparison, but haven't decided which set up to go for yet.

 

[jdc]

Has anyone had any luck converting Antares charts to work with MX Mariner for Android. ...

I have succeeded in running Antares with SeaClear (easy enough using their import program MapCat_2) and on SeaPro, which was much harder. What I have found is:


- Plotting programs always have two steps: (i) charts have to in in the right formats and in the right directories with the right file extensions (eg .kap and .bsb), and (ii) there is a registration step such as 'build folio' before the plotting program will put the new chart in its internal catalogue.
- some programs require .bsb files as well as the .kap Antares come with. These are easy enough to create yourself in a text editor. I think this is unlikly to be your problem, but definitely is with SeaPro.
- SeaPro always renders colour 127 as black, whereas Antares use it for white. To fix this I used imgkap, editing the C++ source code to reduce the maximum allowable number of colours to 127 (was 128, ie from 0 - 127) and re-compiling. I then made the modified chart files on a Linux build machine before importing them to Windows and Android. So even if you get the chart into and recognised by the plotting program there is sometimes some cosmetic work left!

My advice is not to try to import all files at once but choose one (I chose Loch Scavaig for no very good reason) and experiment with it.

EDIT: I found MX Mariner's on-line help; hmm, it's not very good at explaining! They do say "The regions will be stored in the <storage>/mxmariner directory on your device. On some android devices, this directory is an SD Card while others it is built in storage. You will need adequate storage space to download the chart regions you want to use."

So I fear you will have to do some poking about and find out the directory structure of the charts you already have successfully installed and attempt to mimic it.

 

[JumbleDuck]

EDIT: I found MX Mariner's on-line help; hmm, it's not very good at explaining! They do say "The regions will be stored in the <storage>/mxmariner directory on your device. On some android devices, this directory is an SD Card while others it is built in storage. You will need adequate storage space to download the chart regions you want to use."

So I fear you will have to do some poking about and find out the directory structure of the charts you already have successfully installed and attempt to mimic it.

I'm happy to do that ... or would be if I could get the charts in the right format. I finally managed to get MXcart, the conversion program, to run, when pointed at a folder with the Antares charts in it runs for a while, complains that it can't open a catalogue file it is trying to create, and hangs. I think the problem may be with either the length of or the presence of commas in Antares chart file names.

Ah well. Worth a try, but no time for further experiments. I'll just load the image files onto the tablet and browse them that way. I'm not interested in using GPS, just in having a way of looking at charts, and the Antares ones cover such small areas that you're either there or you're not.

 

[cpedw]

Yes, I did that with MX Cart. It didn't work first time so there was a switch off/on sequence then I tried with a single Antares chart to test. When that worked, I went for the whole lot in 1 shot and it worked, but it took AGES (several hours).

The result is OK but it's necessary to switch Chart Region in MX Mariner (Menu/Display/Chart Region/Select Antares/OK) to access Antares Charts, once you've copied the 2 files (about 1GB) to the right directory. If you're short of storage on the Android, it may be better to convert a few Antares charts. not the whole lot.

Derek

 

[Steve_N]

I'm not interested in using GPS, just in having a way of looking at charts, and the Antares ones cover such small areas that you're either there or you're not.

The free version of the Marine Navigator app is perfect for that.
5 mins. to set it all up and then you can pan and zoom into the Antares charts using the overall view selector chart that is provided.
Plus it works with the GPS of course.