gpsBabel

Pic is of my gps. As you might have surmised from the pic, it is no longer functional. I left it outside for a long time. I thought it would be ok, because it appeared to be a sealed unit. I was mistaken. It has a lot of rust and worked intermittently until it died. I tried to clean the rust, and tried soldering a rusted spot or two. No luck.

Fortunately, back in Baltimore Glen's Fred loaned me a handheld gps. (Everyone should have a Fred. Glen has his, and I have mine. They're quite handy.) Unfortunately, the gps Fred loaned me is a garmin etrex. Garmin, in its great wisdom, has decided that the open standard for gps does not apply to them. To hell with the nmea standard and com ports. (I know this is gibberish to most readers, but trust me, these are important for getting autopilots, gps, compasses, and other marine electronics to work together.)

Anyway, I found some open source software, GpsBabel, with which I was able to convert the proprietary rubbish from the garmin into something useful. GpsBabel is not the most user friendly software. The documentation is lacking. But if you are patient and persistent, you may find it helpful in translating the output of your gps into a language you can understand and use.