I am trying to use the AIS function in Navigatrix .4 on a Acer extensa 4620 laptop.

I have modified two vhf radios and connected them to my small Asus EEE sound card and am able to get the shipplotter program under windows XP to display AIS sentences from near-bye ships..

When I connect to my Acer Laptop using Navigatrix 0.4 I am unable to get the modified radio and sound card to talk to Opencpn 2.5 (very old now).

When I start the ais soundcard utilities I get two boxes displaying signals and mixer levels etc and opencpn crashes.

I have not found a guide anywhere to trouble shoot. Navigatrix AIS.

Some pictures of what is supposed to happen would be helpful. Especially how to tune the sound card.

When I check the Navigatrix website download section it says that "0.5 Navigatrix is coming in days?".

I am not sure whether to pursue trying to get .4 Navigatrix AIS working or wait for .5 to come out, which may solve my problem.

I think Navigatrix is a fantastic idea and a great Opensource project for sailors.

George

There is one configuration file for gnuais which is the underlying AIS decoder. This configuration file needs to be set correctly. To do so open a terminal (Manta->Accessories->Terminal Emulator) and enter the command arecord -l this gives you a list of all the sound capture devices on your computer. In my case it looks like this:

card 1: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 0: ALC887-VD Analog [ALC887-VD Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

Which means there is only one card with one subdevice. Note the Card Number... in this case "1" and the device.. in this case "0" afterwards edit the gnuais configuration with this command sudo gedit /etc/gnuais.conf. Look for the line which says "SoundDevice hw:x,y" change x,y to cardnumber,device .... in my case it would be 1,0.

David thanks for your excellent reply.

I did as you said and edited my gnuais file and my card is now hw 0,0 instead of default.

i still have the same problem of no ais coming through. When i run the ais decoder adjustment software it looks the same activity as before. if i pull the vhf radio mike in connector out all activity stops.

i manually typed in a terminal opencpnais and this is what i got.

george@george-acer:~$ opencpnais
/dev/com1 -> /dev/ttyS0
/dev/com2 -> /dev/ttyS1
/usr/local/bin/comports: line 21: [: /etc/comports{LXE900C0168200A5F62000: binary operator expected
find: `/sys/bus/usb-serial/drivers': No such file or directory
/dev/com3 -> /dev/rfcomm0

opencpn then opens but no ais targets appear?


Any advice would be appreciated.

George

Start the AIS configuration and activate the audio capture devices inside the mixer panel. You may also adjust the capture volume so its not too loud and not too low. You have to play a little with the values to see which one works best. Exit the config tool and start opencpn to see if you have the right setting. Also check how it works with or without the mic booster enabled.

In OpenCPN the AIS Data Port needs to be pointing towards /tmp/aisfifo.

...just want to clarify.