Is anyone knowledgeable about Garmin Dakota?

[peregrina2000]

I have a GPS, I sometimes try to use it, and I am sometimes able to use it. In fact, today, I think I was able to get all of my tracks from this summer on the Camino from Llanca to Montserrat over to wikiloc.

But I am still not a competent user of the GPS. My first question is one that has been nagging me ever since the end of my Camino when I was alone on the Camino de Invierno. I saw that I had somehow moved some pre-recorded tracks (i.e., downloaded from wikiloc) from "current tracks" to "archived tracks" (two separate categories in "Track Manager"). No matter what I tried, I couldn't figure out how to "un-archive" them, and they were not usable by me as I walked when they were in the archive. So I was pretty frustrated, getting to a confusing part of the Invierno, knowing I had tracks there to follow, but being unable to open them!

Does anyone have any suggestions about this? Thanks much, Laurie

 

[mla1]

Hi Laurie- I had to check twice to see if this was really posted by you!
ml

 

[dougfitz]

I have had a look at this on a different Garmin, but the only way I have found to move them from the archive back is using the desktop application. I could not find a way of doing on the device directly.

 

[peregrina2000]

Hi Laurie- I had to check twice to see if this was really posted by you!
ml

Hi, ML, well, I'm guessing your surprise is at the fact that I'm using one, not at the fact that I can't figure it out. I got one for my Camino Olvidado in 2014 because I knew it had remote parts, had no others on it, and might not be well marked. All was true, and when my walking partner left after about 8 days it gave me a lot of comfort and on one or two occasions saved me from wandering around in unmarked woods. I never was very good at it though.

I took it again because I was walking another untraveled camino this year and had a lot of days alone, but it turned out to be mostly very well marked. I had some days where I could find the tracks that were on there and follow them and other days where I couldn't, which got very frustrating, especially the one day we could have used it when Susanna and I must have taken a wrong turn and wound up kms off route. I knew I had the route on the GPS I just couldn't find it. GRRRR. I am not sure if I'll bring it again next year or not but since I'll probably be on another lonely camino, I just might, at least if I can figure it out! Buen camino, Laurie

 

[peregrina2000]

I have had a look at this on a different Garmin, but the only way I have found to move them from the archive back is using the desktop application. I could not find a way of doing on the device directly.

Thanks, Doug, do you have any idea how I could have gotten them from current tracks to Archive? However I did it, it was not done intentionally. And when you say using the desktop application, do you mean basecamp?

Laurie

 

[dougfitz]

Laurie, if Basecamp is the Garmin application you are using, that should be able to make the move. It should also be possible to do this from the operating system by copying the files to a new location and renaming them so that the Garmin thinks they are active tracks. That second option will allow you to do this on a computer that does not have the Basecamp application loaded, but it has a strong geeky language warning.

The Basecamp approach is simple, but before you connect your GPS unit, take a note of the names of the archive tracks that you want to reactivate. They will appear on the device in a form like '2015-09-23 06:56:12' unless you have changed the default name offered when you archived the track.

When you connect your GPS, and its information appears in the Basecamp side panel, then

• select the first track you want to reactivate. Note that it should be the name you have already copied with a word like 'Day', 'Stopwatch' or 'Auto' at the end.
  
• open the context menu (alt-mouse button, normally right mouse button)
• click on the option 'Create Route from Selected Track'. A menu box will open.
• either leave the number of points to be selected automatically or enter a number, and press the 'OK' button.
• this will create a route. If you now want that to be a track that you can use, then
• select the route you have just created
  
• open the context menu
• click on the option 'Create Track from Selected Route'
  
• the new track should appear.

Repeat for all the archived tracks you want to re-activate.

If you want the instructions for doing it from the operating system, let me know. I can explain how to do it in a Microsoft Windows environment (not Apple or Android).

 

[peregrina2000]

Wow, thanks, I will try this next week at my computer and let you know how it goes. I really appreciate it. Laurie

Just one follow up question. I didn't knowingly archive the tracks, I just found them there one morning when I was looking for a stage of the Invierno. Can you tell me what steps I must have taken to move them on the device from current tracks to archived tracks??????

 

[dougfitz]

Laurie, I have done the same thing, and really cannot tell either. It might be to do with the layout of the track management options. For tracks other than the current track, the first selection is 'View Map', and the 'Archive' selection appears to be safely last. But if you go up rather than down at that point, the 'Archive' selection is the next option, and it might then be possible to activate it unintentionally.

Remember, the archived tracks are still all there. In looking into this, it appears that there are some specific folder and naming conventions that distinguish between saved and archived tracks. I guess that the people at Garmin knew what they wanted to achieve, but don't seem to have thought about those of us who sometimes want to recover stuff from an archive.

 

[grayland]

Newfydog is a very good source of information on all things GPS.
I think he uses the Garman Dakota himself .

If Doug didn't come up with what you need... PM newfy

 

[peregrina2000]

Laurie, if Basecamp is the Garmin application you are using, that should be able to make the move. It should also be possible to do this from the operating system by copying the files to a new location and renaming them so that the Garmin thinks they are active tracks. That second option will allow you to do this on a computer that does not have the Basecamp application loaded, but it has a strong geeky language warning.

The Basecamp approach is simple, but before you connect your GPS unit, take a note of the names of the archive tracks that you want to reactivate. They will appear on the device in a form like '2015-09-23 06:56:12' unless you have changed the default name offered when you archived the track.

When you connect your GPS, and its information appears in the Basecamp side panel, then

• select the first track you want to reactivate. Note that it should be the name you have already copied with a word like 'Day', 'Stopwatch' or 'Auto' at the end.
  
• open the context menu (alt-mouse button, normally right mouse button)
• click on the option 'Create Route from Selected Track'. A menu box will open.
• either leave the number of points to be selected automatically or enter a number, and press the 'OK' button.
• this will create a route. If you now want that to be a track that you can use, then
• select the route you have just created
  
• open the context menu
• click on the option 'Create Track from Selected Route'
  
• the new track should appear.

Repeat for all the archived tracks you want to re-activate.

If you want the instructions for doing it from the operating system, let me know. I can explain how to do it in a Microsoft Windows environment (not Apple or Android).

Hi, Doug, thanks for the detailed instructions, but I can't get past the first step. I am having trouble getting my files from my GPS to my computer. There seems to be a difference between tracks on the GPS that are filed in "internal memory" (those seem to be the ones I have actually recorded myself) and the ones filed on the memory card (the ones I copied from elsewhere onto the device before walking).

I think that at this point, the easiest thing for me is to delete the archived tracks and write to Garmin to see if they will tell me how I did it, so that I can have a fighting chance of not doing it again. But I will try your suggestions a few more times too, since I am really trying to become more proficient with the GPS. I plan to walk another solitary camino next year and when you get lost on a solitary camino you are unlikely to find someone to ask for directions, so this little machine is the next best thing. Laurie

 

[peregrina2000]

Laurie, I have done the same thing, and really cannot tell either. It might be to do with the layout of the track management options. For tracks other than the current track, the first selection is 'View Map', and the 'Archive' selection appears to be safely last. But if you go up rather than down at that point, the 'Archive' selection is the next option, and it might then be possible to activate it unintentionally.

Hi, Doug, one mystery solved. I wrote to the Garmin tech support email address (and SURPRISE, they answered promptly!!!). Here's what they told me about the archive function.

So basically your device has a 10,000 track point limit and soon as the device hits that limit it will archive the track.

Whenever someone answers a technology question for me it always creates another question, and this was no exception. I wondered why in the world it was that the device would archive the one track I hadn't yet used, and leave all the others in current tracks. This was really pretty frustrating. Since the device knows where you are, you would think that if they automatically archive something, they would archive something that you passed through days ago. For me, it was the last part of the Invierno that disappeared and wound up in Archive, while all those kms on the Cami St.Jaume, the Catalán, etc, just sat there in my current tracks, though the device knew I had already walked those kms. But it is good to know that I didn't push any buttons unintentionally because that is usually what I do. I guess the lesson is to make sure not to have too many tracks on the device at any one time. Buen camino, Laurie