Active Captain Discontinuation

I'm now doing nav comments and marina reviews on waterwayguide.com

It's easy to do and I buy a couple of their guides so I have a hard copy for planning the old fashioned way with the chart out. (and the IPad)

WG has all the marina info - just missing boater reviews like AC. But AC has become too hard for me to use and the writing is on the wall.

WG really needs a internet connection outside of the navigation app. So I'm using SeaIQ to navigate and rather than poking at my navigation chart and making it disappear while I try to read an AC comment, I run up the second IPad (cheap used IPad Air can be found on Ebay) and call up Waterway Guide.

Latest news from Garmin regarding support of Active Captain.
http://marketinginfo.garmin.com/u/gm.php?UID=5tKQFuB1CP&ID=120148819_2215393_126224

I saw in that announcement that Garmin intends to have Active Captain support in the Navionics Boating App by the end of 2018. That sure sounds good to me!

Text copy of an email I received from Garmin. This all sounds very ecouraging to me......

---------------------------

ActiveCaptain Is Here for You
Our ActiveCaptain® Community will continue to be a free online site, connecting you with user-generated information that can bring added fun and know-how to your boating experience. Watch for upcoming announcements as we evolve the technology behind this fast-growing marine network.

A New Website Is Coming
Our new site, which will launch on May 23, allows us greater flexibility to expand the ActiveCaptain Community with new users and contributors — while continuing to provide useful, up-to-date information on marinas, anchorages and other points of interest.

We’re Integrating with Navionics
We’re happy to bring the ActiveCaptain Community to the Navionics® Boating app. We plan to have this available before year-end 2018.

You Built This Community
Remember — the more you participate and leave feedback for others in the ActiveCaptain Community, the more everybody benefits. We’re committed to growing the community with you. Watch for more updates coming soon.

Bingo.
We probably all for the same email.
Does sound good.

With the Garmin charts, I get a message some charts need to be updated but it doesnt tell me which charts. To download the new charts, takes forever, even on WiFi

Wxx3 said:

Bingo.
We probably all for the same email.
Does sound good.

Click to expand...

It does in some ways, but is also interestingly silent in other ways.

It says the online site will continue. That's their web site, with a revamp coming on May 23rd. Ok, no surprise that the Garmin AC web site will continue.

They commit to adding AC to the Navionics App, which of course is now a Garmin app/product. No surprise there.

But it says absolutely nothing about 3rd party apps, and makes no commitment nor sets any expectations in that regard. So far I actually have not heard any public commitment from Garmin to continue to support 3rd parties. Now that doesn't mean they won't keep doing it, but that's different from standing up and making a pledge.

boathealer said:

Text copy of an email I received from Garmin. This all sounds very ecouraging to me......

---------------------------

ActiveCaptain Is Here for You
Our ActiveCaptain® Community will continue to be a free online site, connecting you with user-generated information that can bring added fun and know-how to your boating experience. Watch for upcoming announcements as we evolve the technology behind this fast-growing marine network.

A New Website Is Coming
Our new site, which will launch on May 23, allows us greater flexibility to expand the ActiveCaptain Community with new users and contributors — while continuing to provide useful, up-to-date information on marinas, anchorages and other points of interest.

We’re Integrating with Navionics
We’re happy to bring the ActiveCaptain Community to the Navionics® Boating app. We plan to have this available before year-end 2018.

You Built This Community
Remember — the more you participate and leave feedback for others in the ActiveCaptain Community, the more everybody benefits. We’re committed to growing the community with you. Watch for more updates coming soon.

Click to expand...

This is great news

siestakey said:

This is great news

Click to expand...

Yet no mention of third party apps integrating with AC, and no commitment about continuing to support that.

I think what they didn't say is way more significant than what they did say.

twistedtree said:

Yet no mention of third party apps integrating with AC, and no commitment about continuing to support that.

I think what they didn't say is way more significant than what they did say.

Click to expand...

I agree but compared to what we were hearing ealier

only time will tell if what Jeff built will be what we hope for.

siestakey said:

I agree but compared to what we were hearing ealier

only time will tell if what Jeff built will be what we hope for.

Click to expand...

I suppose it might be better than some of the speculation that AC was going away completely.

But I don't think this relieves any concerns over support for 3rd party apps. All it says is that AC will be part of Garmin products (the web site and Navioncs) going forward. That's not really news.

I actually think their failure to say anything about supporting 3rd party apps increases concerns. It would have been so easy to say "we will continue to support 3rd party applications through the new AC API", or something like that, and the whole thing would be over. I would have put the fire out cold. But they didn't.

So I was trying to view my routes and can't seem to find them. I also wanted to ceate a route. Any suggestions?

I don’t know why Garmin bought AC. I know they bought Navionics to get the layering technology for their aviation products. They also made clear that Navionics was so expensive that it needed to continue as a profit center. (You can get all this from reading stock reports) I don’t know if AC was purchased to enhance their products or to pull the rug out from underneath all the iPad type competitors.

I just received this Email from Garmin. Looks like they are going to keep moving ahead with AC.

ActiveCaptain Is Here for You

Our ActiveCaptain® Community will continue to be a free online site, connecting you with user-generated information that can bring added fun and know-how to your boating experience. Watch for upcoming announcements as we evolve the technology behind this fast-growing marine network.
A New Website Is Coming

Our new site, which will launch on May 23, allows us greater flexibility to expand the ActiveCaptain Community with new users and contributors — while continuing to provide useful, up-to-date information on marinas, anchorages and other points of interest.
We’re Integrating with Navionics

We’re happy to bring the ActiveCaptain Community to the Navionics® Boating app. We plan to have this available before year-end 2018.

You Built This Community

Remember — the more you participate and leave feedback for others in the ActiveCaptain Community, the more everybody benefits. We’re committed to growing the community with you. Watch for more updates coming soon.

Alaskan Sea-Duction said:

So I was trying to view my routes and can't seem to find them. I also wanted to ceate a route. Any suggestions?

Click to expand...

Routes went away some time ago when Garmin changed the website significantly.

The cynic in me believes that they did that so you couldn't download your routes to non Garmin devices.

David

djmarchand said:

Routes went away some time ago when Garmin changed the website significantly.

The cynic in me believes that they did that so you couldn't download your routes to non Garmin devices.

David

Click to expand...

Figures. I use CE for my planning purposes and down load that to my Raymarines. I won't use Garmin....

Apparently that May 23 date is a pretty major shift. I got this message the last time I opened SEAiq which I use on my iPad

"We are informed on May 23, 2018 Garmin will make incompatible changes to the ActiveCaptain server. After this date, the current ActiveCaptain data will continue to work in SEAiq. However, no further updates will be available for download. We recommend users sync offline data on their devices before the May 23 cut-off. We are considering updating SEAiq support for ActiveCaptain but do not have definite plans yet."

So apparently Garmin is doing their thing and if others can keep up then maybe Active Captain will continue to be available on other devices.

I really like Active Captain but I don't like the smell of this.

Ken

Call me when it is all sorted out and then I will make my decision.
Until then, I will just update the chips I have in my chart plotters.

Well, I loved the recent news from Garmin that they're shutting down the Eboatcards due to lack of interest. I just remember Jeff arguing with us here over the cards.

BandB said:

Well, I loved the recent news from Garmin that they're shutting down the Eboatcards due to lack of interest. I just remember Jeff arguing with us here over the cards.

Click to expand...

Dont be surprised if they phase out support for all competing products, over time.

In the news from Garmin referenced above there was a set of faqs attached, one of which is copied below. Not as positive a commitment to support third party apps as I would have liked to see as it seems to be a one way commitment, but at least it is something.

David


Is the ActiveCaptain Community still supported by 3rd party applications?

We are working with our 3rd party developers to make changes to support ActiveCaptain Community. Our developer tools continue to be free to the developers to put into their apps. We’ll work with all of them to continue to update their products to keep the latest Community data available to you.

djmarchand said:

David


Is the ActiveCaptain Community still supported by 3rd party applications?

We are working with our 3rd party developers to make changes to support ActiveCaptain Community. Our developer tools continue to be free to the developers to put into their apps. We’ll work with all of them to continue to update their products to keep the latest Community data available to you.

Click to expand...

"If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor."

I think they've been very clear and fair. They were required to make some programming changes themselves. They've opened the software to others, but it requires others making some programming changes at this point too. This is typical of software providers from Microsoft to all the others and those of us in business are used to complying with the requirements.

They can only do their half of the interface.

BandB said:

Well, I loved the recent news from Garmin that they're shutting down the Eboatcards due to lack of interest. I just remember Jeff arguing with us here over the cards.

Click to expand...

As I recall he also assure everyone that AC was going to stay free and little would change.

Capt.Bill11 said:

As I recall he also assure everyone that AC was going to stay free and little would change.

Click to expand...

Well, so far it's free. The mapping has changed and will do so more apparently. Routing within Active Captain is ending per Garmin's release. It has changed from flash which is in the long term probably a positive. I find it serves most of the same function as before for us. Garmin has done nothing that disturbs me so far.

BandB said:

Well, I loved the recent news from Garmin that they're shutting down the Eboatcards due to lack of interest. I just remember Jeff arguing with us here over the cards.

Click to expand...

Maybe Jeff listened to us? A friend forwarded this to us back in March.

Of course, we had to re-print the boat cards we just received. This means we have to keep her!

BandB said:

Well, so far it's free. The mapping has changed and will do so more apparently. Routing within Active Captain is ending per Garmin's release. It has changed from flash which is in the long term probably a positive. I find it serves most of the same function as before for us. Garmin has done nothing that disturbs me so far.

Click to expand...

I thing the only issue is the compressed time line if the API changes. As of a couple weeks ago, there was a statement that at least one aspect of the new API hadn’t been released yet. Even if it came out the next day, it’s ridiculous to expect apps to take a new API, evaluate it, plan the changes to switch over to it, implement, test, and release in what’s less than 30 days. For any sort of professionally developed product, that would be a min 3-6 month process.

twistedtree said:

I thing the only issue is the compressed time line if the API changes. As of a couple weeks ago, there was a statement that at least one aspect of the new API hadn’t been released yet. Even if it came out the next day, it’s ridiculous to expect apps to take a new API, evaluate it, plan the changes to switch over to it, implement, test, and release in what’s less than 30 days. For any sort of professionally developed product, that would be a min 3-6 month process.

Click to expand...

Good point, but perhaps we need to give Garmin a bit of a pass this one time. I can easily imagine no work had been started on that when they acquired Active Captain leaving them with a very compressed time frame.

BandB said:

Good point, but perhaps we need to give Garmin a bit of a pass this one time. I can easily imagine no work had been started on that when they acquired Active Captain leaving them with a very compressed time frame.

Click to expand...

It's certainly possible. And I don't know how long the EU privacy regulation has been on the horizon.

Larry M said:

Maybe Jeff listened to us? A friend forwarded this to us back in March.



Of course, we had to re-print the boat cards we just received. This means we have to keep her!

Click to expand...

That is a great boat Jeffery was able to get. Hopefully he is getting plenty of time to enjoy it.