The Applications
Navigatrix comes pre-configured with a comprehensive set of applications
for almost anything one could want to do on a boat with a computer:
navigation, communication, word processing and spread-sheeting, photos
and graphics, sound and video, ... - you name it. This section provides
an overview of the applications that can be found under the “Manta Menu”
in the bottom left of the Navigatrix desktop.
Where available, the text below will provide a link to the applications
online documentation and/or project website for further information.
Accessories
- Archiver: Compress and decompress data with Xarchiver. Offline help
under /usr/share/doc/xarchiver/html/index.html (will be opened in
Firefox when selecting “Contents” from the help menu.) URL:
xarchiver.sourceforge.net
- CD/DVD Burner: Burn CDs and DVDs with Xfburn. URL:
goodies.xfce.org/projects/applications/xfburn
- Disk Encrypter: Disk Encryption with TrueCrypt. An excellent
cross-platform utility to store encrypted files on a physical or
virtual disk. Good PDF user guide available locally by selecting
“User’s Guide” from the Help menu. The Help menu also contains
web-links to a beginner’s tutorial, FAQs and online documentation.
There is a thread on the Navigatrix Support Discussion
Board on how to
create a fully encrypted bootable USB stick with Navigatrix. URL:
www.truecrypt.org
- File Copier: Manage files with two panels side by side using Double
Commander. Handy utility for copying and moving files around the file
system. Also good for renaming multiple files in one go without
command line acrobatics, comparing the contents of directories and
many other basic tasks. URL:
doublecmd.sourceforge.net
- File Manager: Browse the file system and manage the files with
PCManFM. Similar to the Windows file manager. Default configuration
will delete files permanently after confirming (no trash bin). You
can change this in the File Manager’s menu under Edit -> Preferences
by checking “Move deleted files to trash bin”. To toggle displaying
hidden files on/off you can use the keyboard shortcut: [ctrl]+[H].
Under Unix, hidden files start with a “.” and are primarily used for
configuration files and internal housekeeping. Usually you don’t want
to see them to avoid clutter but sometimes you’ll need to get to one.
URL: pcmanfm.sourceforge.net
- Password Storage: Store your password safely with KeePassX. This is
the Unix version of the KeePass password manager that is available
for Windows. The Unix version supports automated login into
applications and websites. See the “User Guide” available offline
under the application’s help menu. URL:
www.keepassx.org
- PGP Encryption Keys: Manage your PGP encryption keys with Seahorse.
URL:
www.gnome.org/projects/seahorse
- System Profiler and Benchmark: Only developer documentation available
online. Application should be self-explanatory though. URL:
wiki.hardinfo.org/Documentation
- Terminal Emulator: Use the command line with LXTerminal. Can also be
invoked anytime by pressing [ctrl]+[alt]+[T] key simultaneously. From
the File Manager’s Tool menu you can also open a terminal window in
the File Manager’s current directory (in File Manager: Tools -> Open
current folder in terminal - pressing [F4] in File Manager does the
same). URL: lxde.org
- Virtual Keyboard: Use your mouse as a keyboard with onboard.
- World Clock: See the time in other timezones with gworldclock.
Games
- Go: Play the oldest board game of the world with qGo. Extensive
offline documentation for this game can be accessed locally on your
computer.
- Mahjongg: Disassemble a pile of tiles by removing matching pairs.
- Sudoku: Test your logic skills in this number grid puzzle.
Graphics
- Chart Converter: Convert images to kap charts and calibrate them. The
menu entry invokes the shell script makekap under /usr/local/bin.
This script first asks for an image file to be calibrated, converts
it to chart.jpg under /home/<user>/Desktop and then launches the
Windows program SeaClear for the user to perform the geo-referencing.
The user then saves the calibration (as
/home/<user>/Desktop/CHARTCAL.DIR). Upon the user exiting SeaClear
the script calls the tif2bsb utility to create a \*.kap chart file
from the original image plus the calibration data. The chart can be
loaded into OpenCPN. Sounds complicated but it is in fact pretty
straight forward and the makekap script displays messages and
instructions along the way. There is also a helpful
entry on the
Navigatrix Support Discussion Board.
- Image Manipulator: Create images and edit photographs with Gimp.
Powerful open source image editing at the same level as PhotoShop.
Extensive offline documentation available under the application’s
Help-menu. URL: www.gimp.org
- Painting Program: Create pixel art and manipulate digital photos with
mtPaint. URL:
mtpaint.sourceforge.net
- Photo Manager: Organize your photos with Shotwell. This is a photo
library similar to Picasa with some basic image touch-up functions as
well. URL:
www.yorba.org/shotwell
Internet
EMail Client: EMail client Sylpheed. Fast and light-weight email
client. Documentation is available offline under the Help-menu.
Helpful posts on the Navigatrix Support Discussion Board
(browser-email integration):
(1) and
(2) URL:
sylpheed.sraoss.jp/en/
File Transfer: Download and upload files via FTP using FileZilla.
URL: filezilla-project.org
Messenger: Chat over IM. Supports AIM, Google Talk, Jabber/XMPP, MSN,
Yahoo and more with Pidgin. URL: pidgin.im
Planet Viewer: Explore, search and discover the planet with Google
Earth. URL: earth.google.com
Relay Chat: Chat with other people using Internet Relay Chat and
XChat.
Remote Access: Share your desktop using a VNC server. You could for
example run OpenCPN below decks and repeat the desktop image to
another display/tablet on deck via a wifi link.
Remote Access Viewer: Connect to a remote desktop using a VNC Viewer.
The client side counter part to the “Remote Access” VNC server above.
Satellite Connection: Connect to the Internet using a satellite
phone. This menu item invokes the shell script
/usr/local/bin/satphone which calls another script (comports in same
directory) to link usb2serial ports and then calls the wvdial PPP
dialer utility.
Skype: Internet Telephony with Skype.
Tor Proxy: Browse Anonymously over the Tor Network with Vidalia. This
is a tool to bypass restrictions on wifi (or cable) networks that
block critical information and block downloads based on filename
extensions. You start Vidalia (Manta Menu -> Internet -> Tor Proxy)
and wait until the window that pops up shows that you are connected
to the Tor network.
Then, in the Firefox web browser, click on the little onion with the
red “X” in the upper right (next to the search box) and select
“Toggle Tor Status” which should make the little onion turn green.
Just remember with great power comes great responsibility... URL:
www.torproject.org/vidalia
Torrent Client: Download and share files over BitTorrent with
Transmission. URL:
www.transmissionbt.com
Web Browser: Browse the World Wide Web with Firefox. Navigatrix has
Firefox pre-configured with some useful add-ons (in addition to the Tor
“anonymous browsing” utility mentioned above). One is ScrapBook, a utility
that lets you download webpages, and store and organize them in a library for
later offline reading. Scrapbook also allows to make annotations to
downloaded pages. It can be accessed under the ScrapBook menu in Firefox. You
can display a list of your downloaded pages by pressing [alt]+[K] in Firefox.
The other helpful add-on is “DownThemAll!”, a download manager that - amongst
other things - allows you to download multiple links from a webpage.
DownThemAll! is available in the context menu in Firefox whenever you
right-click on a link. It can be configured under Tools -> DownThemAll! Tools
in Firefox.
XGate: A high-performance e-mail satellite program for satellite phones.
Requires an account with Global Marine Networks which can be set up through
the application. There is a free 3 day demo trial available.
To configure XGate to work with the Sylpheed email client that is
part of Navigatrix follow these steps:
- Start Manta->Internet->XGate and setup for your Satellite Phone.
- Goto XGate->Options->Settings->EMail Settings and choose the Option
Selected mail application within Preferred Mail Client.
- Enter Appcation Path /usr/bin/sylpheed and click Ok.
- Start Manta->Internet->EMail Client and click on
Configuration->Create new account.
- Select POP3 and enter your name and email address (e.g.
name@ocens.net), click Forward.
- Enter your Ocens “User ID”. Afterwards set POP3 Server to 127.0.0.1 and
SMTP Server 127.0.0.1. Leave all check boxes unmarked. Click
Forward and then Close.
- Now go to Configuration->Edit accounts; choose your newly created
account and click Edit.
- In tab “Basic” enter the password for your Ocens account into the
“Password” field.
- In tab “Advanced” mark Specify SMTP port and enter 2500. Also
mark Specify POP3 port and enter 1100.
- Thats it! All done and ready to go. When you compose an new email
make sure you select your Ocens email in the “From” Field. After
sending the email within Sylpheed you have to click on “Start” within
XGate. And of course...XGate has to be running when you send an email
through Ocens within Sylpheed.
Navigation
CelNav:Celestial Navigation for cruisers; electronic almanac and sight
reduction. See application’s Help menu for details. Addtional info
available in the
Quorum section of the
Navigatrix discussion board.
GPS Converter: A graphical front end to GPS Babel, a pretty universal
converter between GPS data files in different formats (e.g. OpenCPN’s GPX
format to/from native GPS formats such as various Garmin flavors). The GUI
should be self-explanatory; detailed help on the underlying GPS Babel program
is available locally under /usr/share/doc/gpsbabel/htmldoc/index.html.
GPS Panel: Large GPS Instruments Panel using Matrix Mariner GPS.
GPS Satellites: Monitor your GPS with XGPS. This is a graphical
interface to the gpsd daemon described in GPS and Navigatrix.
Grib Files: View and Download Grib Files with zyGrib. URL:
www.zygrib.org
Grid Calculator: Distance and bearing calculation with QGrid.
Instrument Panel: Instrument Panel PolarCOM.
Navigation Console: Comprehensive collection of navigation tools
including planetarium, star finder, lunar distance clearing, sight
reduction, nautical almanac pages, real time almanac and tides. More
info at The Navigation Desktop
Project and the
developer’s website.
Nautical Alamanac: Nautical alamanc data and sight reduction with
Nautic.
OpenCPN: Navigate with OpenCPN. There is extensive offline
documentation available by clicking on the “?” symbol in the OpenCPN
toolbar and then on the Help tab in the About OpenCPN Window.
This will open the local file
/usr/local/share/opencpn/doc/help\_en\_US.html in Firefox (it may
take a while for Firefox to display the page). URL:
Opencpn.org
Planetarium: Watch the stars with Stellarium. Excellent star and
panet finder. Will use your latest GPS position as the point from
which you view the virtual sky (see GPS and Navigatrix and Application Wrapper Shell Scripts). URL: www.stellarium.org
Polar Smoother: View, edit and smooth polar data for your boat. Comes
with a selection of sample polar data files for different boats which
you can use as a starting point/approximation if you don’t have polar
data for your boat. Look under
/opt/WeatherWizard/all-scripts/polars/polars.
- Sailboat Router: Routing software for virtual and real sailboats.
This is the qtVlm application that was originally developed as the
user front end for the “Virtual Loup de Mer” on-line sailing race.
Feed it with a GRIB wind forecast and polar data for your boat speed
at varying wind speeds and angles, and it will calculate the
(theoretically) optimal (fastest) routing to your sailing
destination. Set up your own boat in the application under Boat ->
Account Management by adding a new boat and setting the type of boat
to “Real Boat” rather than “VLM Boat”. Define the polar data for your
boat under Boat -> Boat’s settings. You can tweak one of the
availabel polar data files to fit your boat (these are simple csv
files - look in /opt/qtVlm/polar). There is extensive help and
documentation available at the Virtual Loup de Mer
website, including specific
info about the
application.
- Tidal Calculator: Calculate worldwide tides with JTides. URL:
www.arachnoid.com/JTides
- Tidal Calculator (legacy): Calculate worldwide tides with WXTide. A
Windows program which Navigatrix runs under Wine. Has been superseded
by the “Tidal Calculator” above in the latest version of Navigatrix
but is still available as “legacy”. URL:
wxtide32.com
- Tidal Calculator (USA): View USA tidal and current predictions with
XTide.
- Weather Wizzard: Superimpose weather fax and GRIB data to check for
tropical phenomenae. Documentation and examples available at The
Weather Wizzard Project.
Office
- Calculator: Perform simple and scientific calculations. Can even be
switched to RPN mode under Calculator -> Notation Modes.
- Electronic Library: E-book library management: Convert, view, share,
catalogue all your e-books with Calibre. URL:
manual.calibre-ebook.com
- Mind Mapper: Create mind maps with VYM. URL:
www.InSilmaril.de/vym
- Personal Organizer: Personal Organizer Osmo. URL:
clayo.org/osmo
- Scan Documents: Scan Documents with Simple Scan. URL:
https://launchpad.net/simple-scan
- Spreadsheet: Calculation, Analysis, and Visualization of Information
with Gnumeric. Gnumeric can read and save MS Excel and Open Office
formats. While it’s not as feature-rich as Excel, its data analysis
capabilities are on par and it is very nimble and fast. URL:
www.gnumeric.org
- Sticky Notes: Jot down notes for later on post-it type pads that you
can put on your desktop.
- Text Editor: Edit text files with medit. This is the more powerful
one of the two text editors available in Naviagtrix. medit knows
different high-lighting modes (for various programming and mark-up
languages, e.g. XML and HTML), can do spell checking, and can be
extended via external tools. The full manual for medit is available
under the application’s Help menu. The other editor that comes with
Navigatrix is Leafpad - no frills but lightning quick. Leafpad is not
accessible through the Manta Menu but by default a double-click on a
text document in the File Manager will open it in Leafpad. URL:
mooedit.sourceforge.net
- Wikipedia: Read wikipedia offline with Kiwix. A great tool if you’re
in places where the internet is not as ubiquitous. Kiwix is the
reader application. To get wikipedia content you’ll have download one
of the data files (“ZIM files”) available at the Kiwix
website.
These files contain compressed wikipedia content and are available in
several languages. An English version with a selection of 45,000
articles (pulled from wikipedia in December 2010) is about 3.7 GB to
download. An English version with all wikipedia articles as of
January 2012 (but without pictures) is 10 GB to download. Keep in
mind though, that USB sticks and SD cards typically don’t allow
individual files to exceed 4GB. Hence the 10 GB version will only
work from a harddisk. URL: www.kiwix.org
- Word Processor: Compose, edit, and view documents with AbiWord.
AbiWord can read and save MS Word and Open Document formats (and many
more). URL: www.abisource.com
Sound and Video
- Music Player: Listen to music with Audacious.
- Video Player: Play your Videos with MPlayer.
- Webcam Application: Use your webcam with wxCam.
SSB Radio
Airmail: Check you SSB eMails with Airmail. This is the Windows
application running under Wine (see Installing Windows Applications).
You configure and use the program in the same way as you do under Windows.
Navigatrix also keeps your position data in Airmail updated with your GPS
position (see GPS and Navigatrix). If you use Airmail with a Pactor modem via USB or
Bluetooth Navigatrix will automatically configure the required com ports.
For this to work you need to power on your modem while it is connected to
your computer but before you start Airmail. If you’re new to Airmail:
There is a good introduction and “how-to” guide available from the Sailmail
website at http://www.sailmail.com/smprimer.htm.
Note: Some early versions of Navigatrix version 0.5 had a small
error in the script that handled the automatic com port set-up. If
you experience trouble with the automatic com port configuration in Airmail
please check this post in the Navigatrix
Support Discussion Base.
Data Transfer: Amateur Radio Data Transfer with ARQ and flARQ.
Digital Modem (fldigi): Amateur Radio Sound Card Communications
flDigi.
Fax Reciever: Recieve radio facsimiles with JWX.
Fax Reciever/Sender: Transmit and recieve radio facsimiles with
HamFax.
Morse Decoder: Decode Morse Code with xdemorse.
Navtex Reciever: Recieve Navtex Weather Data with JNX.
PSKMail: Transmit and recieve eMail over SSB with jPSKMail.
Radio Terminal: Use MFSK, RTTY, THROB, PSK31, MT63 and Hellschreiber
modulations with gmfsk.
Slow TV/FAX: Transmit and receive slow-scan tv and radio facsimiles
with QSSTV.
Preferences
Think “Windows Control Panel”. These little utilities should be largely
self explanatory.
- Advertising Blocker: Blocks advertisings on websites.
- Appearance Settings: Customize the look of the desktop.
- Bluetooth Manager: Blueman Bluetooth Manager.
- Calibrate Touchscreen: Run the calibration tool for touchscreens.
- Configuration Manager: Configure and personalize the Openbox window
manager.
- Disk Utility: Manage Drives and Media.
- Firewall Configuration: Allows you to configure ufw firewall.
- Keyboard and Mouse: Configure keyboard, mouse and other input
devices.
- Keyboard Layout: Select your keyboard layout.
- Language Support: Configure multiple and native language support on
your system. See this
post on the
Navigatrix Support Discussion Board for help on how to change the
default language setting for the system.
- Monitor Settings: Change screen resolution and configure external
monitors.
- Network Connections: Manage and change network connection settings.
- Online Accounts: Online account credentials and settings.
- Package Manager: Install, remove and upgrade software packages with
Synaptic. See the section about Installing Applications From a Linux Repository
for more information and an example of installing an application with the
Synaptic Package Manager. In addition, offline documentation can be accessed
/usr/share/synaptic/html/index.html.
- Partition Editor: Create, reorganize, and delete partitions with
GParted.
- Power Manager Settings: Settings for the Power Manager.
- Printer Configuration: Configure printers.
- Software Center: Catalogue of publicly available software for your
system.
- Screensaver Properties: Change screensaver properties.
- Sound Mixer: ALSA Sound Mixer.
- Startup Disk Creator: Create a startup disk using a CD or disc image.
- Time and Date: Change system time, date, and timezone.
- Users and Groups: Add or remove users and groups.