On Sun, 18 Dec 2016 03:18:27 -0500, micky
wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Sun, 18 Dec 2016 00:01:43 -0500,
wrote:

On Sat, 17 Dec 2016 22:07:16 -0500, micky
wrote:

In alt.home.repair, on Sat, 17 Dec 2016 11:45:00 -0500, Ed Pawlowski
wrote:



I don't carry paper maps any more but long before a trip I do use them.
Always good to know the relative distance to where you are and where you
want to go. Compass is handy but you have to be careful. The roads
often twist and turn so you may show south in portions but the road is
going to end up east.

Last few trips to Europe I used a GPS and it is very handy to have.
Bigger and better than using a phone, IMO.

I'm just not willing to spend more money on something I will only use on
this trip.

By phone, do you mean an app for the cellphone. I thought you meant
that so Iwent to the Playstore and it lists 20 compass apps.

However about half require the phone to have a magnetometer, which I
don't have,, and I don't know what they others require. Maybe that cell
towers be nearby and that won't be true everywhere I plan to go.

There are several ways the cell phone can get position, and I suppose
they will also tell north, but other than using cell towers, I don't
know what they are.

Magnetometer or GPS will give you north with a "compass" app. There
are apps that use magnetometer, and ones that use GPS. GPS tells you
which way you are going while in motion but will not tell you which
way is north when standing still

That's good enough. When I'm not moving, I really don't have to know
which way I'm (not) going.

.Magnetometer gives you north
reference even when not using, but can be affected by external
magnetics.

Good point. So we're back to "in the car" problem, what makes it so
hard to set the compensating magnets on early car compasses.. Maybe my
rear view mirror one works so well because it's up high, away from
speakers, and surrounded by glass. (And in my car the roof is mostly
canvas.)

And it is only accutae to "about" 45 degrees. It says n, nne,ne e, se,
sse, s,ssw, sw,w,nw,nnw. and N.. Accuracy to even 5 degrees is almost
impossible with the cheap mirror compasses.

So I'm better off with the GPS, which works out since I don't have a
magnetometer.

It only showed 20 apps when I looked the first time, but now it shows
more than 100. I'm sure I'll find some that say they use GPS. I just
checked and the phone itself has A-GPS.