[AugustH]

AyeTides 1.2 is now available through the App Store.

New on the Main view is the Favorites menu, and the last 3 opened stations are listed on the Main view too, instead of just the last opened station. The Geographic menu is reorganized and hopefully easier to navigate.

The Nearest menu now shows what the GPS location is as it updates, and has a timeout function that will ask you if it should continue searching if the location can't be found to within 100 meters after 45 seconds. In most of my tests the iPhone was able to find itself within that time, but not always

Bug fixes include showing the correct daylight hours in Australia, rotating the iPhone no longer makes the Information button on the Text view unresponsive, corrects the text for the moon phases on the Information view, and improves the various translations.

Enjoy!

[AugustH]

Hmm, well, um... ok there's a few typos in an XML file that cause the app to crash when looking at the Geographic list for the US. I've fixed them and will post the update to Apple today, which means 1.21 will be out next week.

This is when not having beta testers is a real pain!!!

[ebgb]

This is when not having beta testers is a real pain!!!

need any volunteers..... I'm sure there'll be plenty, although, I know its a tricky subject with the iPhone

[cyberhusky]

Hi
is it correct that currents are only available for US stations?

I haven't found any for European stations in France, Belgium, Netherlands or Germany

Thx for clarifying.

Regards,

manou

[FF44]

There are no currents stations in France. Currents are provided on charts and tidal streams booklets by the french hydrographic office. Stations provide only tidal datas (hours and heights).
Francis

[cyberhusky]

Currents are provided on charts and tidal streams booklets by the french hydrographic office. Stations provide only tidal datas (hours and heights).

But how do other tidal programs calculate the currents for these regions? Do they just interpolate the data?
Many PC nav related programs show currents arrows. MaxSea does have it's own data, but many non-expensive progs just have the feature to show the currents. So there must be some data available.
Even on my old Psion 5MX Pro pocket computer I had the ability to not only show the actual tide values for any station in France but it did also show current directions and strength.

[FF44]

The answer comes from MaxSea website :

Those information usually come from official organismes and are free of charge. Maxsea do not provide them so we cannot guarantee their reliability, their change, their cover etc!
We keep searching best potential providers for free of charges and reliable data in order to give our customers quality weather forecasts.

[FF44]

And more :

- Current forecasting : If you are in a yacht, strong currents or changing currents will have a real influence on your optimal route. Using them in your routing is not mandatory, but it is strongly recommended.
See the details of the current atlases available in the [color:blue]catalog[/color].

See the page below, and clic on the "[color:blue]catalog[/color]" link in "What information does MaxSea need ?" current forecasting section :
MaxSea current forecasting
So I remember that Richard didn't agree to integrate currents in MacENC, refering these previous posts here and there.

[MarkCherrington]

Hi August: Thanks for the updates. I'd noticed the incorrect implementation of daylight saving times in Australia, and was going to ask.

Now, if I go to the state of Queensland (where they don't have DST, or Western Australia, where it starts this Sunday (eastern states of Australia began beginning of October -- don't ask why, long story: times here http://www.australia.gov.au/Time), I presume my iPhone will recognise the local time, and will AyeTides also adjust accordingly?

Another thing I've noticed (and sorry if this seems over-picky) is that the times and heights in AyeTides can differ by up to 15 minutes, and by up to 150 mm from the "official" tide times/heights.

Currently for us this doesn't matter, but there's certain places in Queensland (which has enormous tides) where the "window" to get through a few spots can be only a few minutes, and having the correct tide times is critical.

I noticed the same disparity on TideTool, which was my previous favourite tides system on my Palm Treo. Are you using different data or algorithms to what are used in Australia?

Here's a couple of sites where you can compare differences:

http://www.seabreeze.com.au/graphs/nsw.asp
http://www.bom.gov.au/oceanography/tides/

The BOM (Bureau of Meteorology) site would be the most accurate, and I would presume most other sites derive their data from here.

This is today's tide times and heights from the BOM site for Sydney (but note this site doesn't add 1 hour for DST, but I've done that in the brackets); also variations don't seem that much today:

Wed 22
Time Ht
0237 (0337) 1.16
0805 (0905) 0.61
1436 (1536) 1.57
2135 (2235) 0.38

AyeTides
Wed 22
Time Ht
0338 1.10
0907 0.59
1537 1.52
2238 0.34

I just checked the times and heights for Gladstone (Queensland), where the tides are much bigger, and the differences are considerably more.

Please don't regard this as a complaint (if I were sailing in Queensland or other critical waters, I'd be foolish to rely on anything but official government tide times and heights); it's more in the nature of an observation.

I'd be interested to know your response.

Thanks again for a great product.

[AugustH]

The vast majority of current stations are in the US. There are models for tidal flow in say the British Channel, but I've not come across a description of them that I could implement in a program. Currents are harder than tides by far to measure, and that I believe is why there are so many fewer of them. That, and whoever is measuring them is just not releasing the data.

[AugustH]

Now, if I go to the state of Queensland (where they don't have DST, or Western Australia, where it starts this Sunday (eastern states of Australia began beginning of October -- don't ask why, long story: times here http://www.australia.gov.au/Time), I presume my iPhone will recognise the local time, and will AyeTides also adjust accordingly?

Another thing I've noticed (and sorry if this seems over-picky) is that the times and heights in AyeTides can differ by up to 15 minutes, and by up to 150 mm from the "official" tide times/heights.

Hi OzSailor, nice to hear from you!

Yes the iPhone should adjust automatically for Summer Time. The underlying code is all OS X and it handles all the time zone and summer time changes without me having to do anything. Quite amazing, really!

As for the tides being off, the harmonics for Australia are somewhat old. The Australian tide people (can't think right off the bat who they are) haven't released any new ones and they admitted years ago that the ones I have aren't accurate. But they refuse to release any ones that are better. There is a book that I was sent having some harmonics in it, but only 8 (in some cases fewer) listed and that's generally not enough to make accurate predictions. They'll be "close" but not the same as the official tide predictions. It's the same problem I have with the British harmonics; they only give 4 and admit that they use up to 140, so there's no way I can be as accurate as they are.

Well, maybe 'accurate' is the wrong word. I can't match what they have, but unless someone on the ground can watch the tide and can say when and how high it was, then who knows which set of predictions is right?

[MarkCherrington]

Thanks for that reply August. If you think it would be any use the boating/sailing/cruising/fishing community here providing any pressure, let me know (along with the contact details).

If we can present it as a safety-related issue, that may come back to haunt them, that may give us some leverage. I see you have a general disclaimer; is it worth having a region-specific one for instances like this, just to protect you?

[AugustH]

Thanks for that reply August. If you think it would be any use the boating/sailing/cruising/fishing community here providing any pressure, let me know (along with the contact details).

If we can present it as a safety-related issue, that may come back to haunt them, that may give us some leverage. I see you have a general disclaimer; is it worth having a region-specific one for instances like this, just to protect you?

Others in Australia have tried and the response has been "we don't release that information". I'll have to dig back into my email and find the details, but the user in Australia was completely stonewalled and we gave up trying. It is, alas, an all-too-common response.

[nuffbitfish]

since updating to 1.22 AyeTides has been displaying incorrect information. I live in new york city. For example:

Manhattan Bridge, East of, East River New York Current

Displaying Tide info -7.11 low tide 9.76 high tide obviously wrong and 17 foot tide!

Brooklyn Bridge, 0.1 mi SW of East River Current

displaying -11.37 foot low tide
12.55 foot high tide....hmmmm

Eastchester Bay, near Big Tom Oyster Bay New York Current

Displays tide info with is incorrect.

Stratford Shoal, 6 mi E of CT River, CT Current

displaying tide wrong data...

Whis is when I stopped searching. When wil this be fixed?
Thank You

[AugustH]

AyeTides 1.23 is out and fixes the display bug with current stations - they're now in knots again, not feet. I'm very chagrined by these bugs, I'm really going to test everything no matter how small the change, just to be sure.