I just do not think we need to come up with a new wireless protocol to do that. Possibly I'm missing somethine here, but in my world I'm seeing a huge increase in manufacturers embedding web servers into their devices, making them accessable via a browser. In the case of a boat, you could develope a device that takes NMEA 0183 and 2K and offers it up as HTML.
You are missing something. html will not allow my Android tablet to control my autopilot let alone the many other things that should be possible by accessing and sharing sensor data.
First, ActiveCaptain isn't doing this Kickstarter. We're just giving exposure to Digital Yacht's product because I think it's awesome. There's no commercial interest that ActiveCaptain has in it. In fact, I purchased one at the normal Kickstarter price myself yesterday.
The problem with NMEA 0183 is that it is too old to handle many of the information data exchange needed in 2015. It was also designed to be point-to-point and doesn't play very well when there are multiple talkers and listeners at the same time. Things like iPads and laptops have created many more talkers and listeners. NMEA 0183 fails for this new generation. The fact that many iPad navigation apps have been around for 5+ years and yet nearly none of them can display depth while underway is testimony to this. And while many apps can create routes, they can't control an autopilot along the route because there's no way to send the data to the controller. That's just the beginning of the issues.
Then there's NMEA 2000 (N2K). This is a very proprietary protocol. There's no wireless support and if I wanted N2K support in my apps, it would cost $5,000 for licensing and require an approval process. Not only that, but it too is very lacking in new types of data exchange needed - after all, it was created for release 15 years ago which is 3 lifetimes in this electronic world. While N2K adds multiple talkers and listeners, and even some new data types (tank levels, engine controls), it doesn't begin to touch the other general types of data that should be shared among devices. Things like your slip assignment, the video camera settings in the engine room, or the destinations of the boats around you have no place in N2K.
What's needed is an open protocol that allows 2015 types of data interchange between devices. It needs to be built from current web architectures like json (to make it trivial to interface with). It needs to be simple to add into software and chartplotters. And it needs to sit on top of all the general network and web technologies that exist in nearly every other area of use.
That's where Signal K fits in.
In order to get a lot of apps and products supporting Signal K so my iPad can control my autopilot as well as control the quadcopter drone looking ahead at depths from the boat ahead of me (also possible), the attention of the developer community has to take place so they'll support the protocols. And that's why we're involved - to get a bunch of these things purchased so every app developer gets hit between the eyes to support Signal K now.
Digital Yacht's goal was to generate $20,000 of pre-purchases for iKommunicate (the NMEA 0183, NMEA 2000, to Ethernet gateway). At noon after our newsletter release at 7:30 this morning, they have nearly $70,000 of backers. I'd say there are a lot of people who understand the value and want to help make the next generation of marine electronics happen.
There is still time to get in on it and save $70. But backing this project does a lot more than give you a nice discount - it helps shape the industry and tells developers to take advantage of this new protocol. And you get the gateway hardware from a reliable, known, hardware manufacturer.
I added Signal K support into my Locations app for Windows, Max OSX, Android, and iOS in 3 hours. It supports position and heading data which are pretty simple to support. But still, 3 hours is nothing for full integration - the user-interface part of it was 2 of the 3 hours too.
The reason things have moved so slowly in marine electronics is that the standards have been tightly held and controlled. This is the beginning of the new age of data and connectivity in our boats. But you have to step up and help it.
