Help checking viability of Compass App for a Blind Sailor

[alteredoutlook]

Hi All,

I've a blind sailor friend (nb. the correct terminology is 'Visually Impaired' as many blind people can actually see a bit!) and wishes to use a phone app to help him steer a better course whilst sailing.

He's asked me to investigate some apps currently available.

I've looked into some and 'Speaking Compass' by Richard Turner (android play store) seems to be the best.
(There are others but they seem pretty useless to me for his purposes)

But I haven't used it whilst on the water. 'its January' (I'm a whoos!) and 'I've also sold my boat'(true) are some of my excuses.

Is there anyone out there who is ACTUALLY on the WATER and SAILING who could check it out for me? i.e. Close your eyes for a few minutes, steer and see how good it is in helping you keep a course. You might like to try it out under different boat speeds, wind speeds, wind angle, sea state, etc.
Obviously you should have someone else who is fully sighted to monitor how good you are doing (and for safety purposes!)

It should be a fun thing to do ......and certainly makes you appreciate how good some folk are at overcoming their handicaps!

Many thanks
Dave


nb. your phone may not be compatible with this app - it may not have the right accelerometer/magnetometer hardware within it. You may also have to calibrate your compass before you use it!

 

[RupertW]

I know the reply doesn't answer your question but from a lot of night sailing experience, often pitch black, then I find that the compass is not the best tool compared to wind angle for sailing well. For decades now we know we don't have to steer a rigid compass course to avoid getting lost so without visual clues there are loads of sensory ones from wind on the face to wave rythmn to the heel and feel of the boat and wheel - with a check on the compass every few minutes.

If there was an app which I can imagine helping then it would be fed from wind angle as well.

 

[lw395]

If this is for racing, it may not be about steering to the compass.
People steer by the sails and use the compass to detect shifts, to tell them when to tack.
So you might want the heading info less often than if you are steering to it?
I sometimes sail upwind asking the crew for a compass reading from time to time. Some dinghy crews do a lot of the wind tactics. some end up sat between the helm and the compass...

Many classes have rules about what an electronic compass can tell you. E.g. it may not be allowed to report trends or tell you that the wind has shifted since the previous lap.

 

[alteredoutlook]

Thanks for your input so far. I agree with all of your comments - particularly that it it better to sail simply by the feel of the boat and sails. However, my friend simply wants a bit of technology to assist. He like most of us, has a smart phone and just wants to use an off the shelf app - not buy some other gadget. Whether he ultimately decides the app is superfluous or not is another question.