Contents 1 Columbus V-900 1.1 Software 1.1.1 TimeAlbum 1.1.2 BT747 1.1.3 GpsBabel 1.1.4 JOSM Plugin 1.1.5 Columbus to GPX 1.1.6 Misc 2 Columbus V-990 3 Links

Columbus V-900

The Columbus V-900 is a GPS receiver and logger with voice recording function. It is also known as Visiontac VGPS-900.

Logs are stored on Secure Digital microSD cards with a capacity of up to 2GB. Format of the track logs is a kind of comma-separated value (CSV) text file with fixed-length \x0-terminated fields. Audio recordings are stored as WAV files.

• £55 WWW:
• Logger; Receiver (Navigation: )
• CPU: (OS: ), Flash:32MB (external: microSD (2GB))
• GPS: 51 channels, ( WAAS;egnos, hdop;vdop;pdop )
• Display: , Connectivity: Bluetooth
• Internal: Microphone Batteries:

Addresses	POIs
Mass Storage mode	? Waterproof

Pros:

• Tagging with voice recordings is unusual
• Small and neat device
• Storage on microSD card

Cons:

• Accuracy with marginal reception is not optimal, e.g., when carried in pocket while walking
• USB is only used for charging/power supply, not data transfer

Notes: Bugs: In the southern hemisphere the device fails to find a GPS position. In reality, it makes a fix, logs a few points but then throws away the solution to start over. The bug is recognized by the manufacturer and units delivered after August 2009 should not have this problem any more.

• 

  Columbus V-900 at 319 km/h in a high-speed train, along with Holux M-241

• 

  320px|Visiontac VGPS-900 revision 2.0 PCB side A

• 

  320px|Visiontac VGPS-900 revision 2.0 PCB side B

Software

TimeAlbum

TimeAlbum, the software supplied by the manufacturer is written in Java and should at least run on Linux, Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. It features export of logs to KMZ (zipped KML) format.

BT747

BT747 is able to read and convert this CSV dialect to GPX, KML/KMZ and other formats, including a neat and efficient HTML format that shows your track fast on Google Maps (and OSM data) in any browser? The fastest way is to drag and drop your CSV files to BT747 and a few clicks further your data is exported into a GPX format that is optimized for OSM.

GpsBabel

While gpsbabel is able to convert CSV files to GPX and other formats, it is convenient to do some preprocessing of the CSV log.

v9csv2gpx.sh is s script which does this:

#/bin/sh
#
# Convert Visiontac VGPS-900 log file to GPX
#
# 2009-02-08
# mip@rootcamp.net
#

SED='/bin/sed'
GREP='/bin/grep'
GPSBABEL='/usr/bin/gpsbabel'

for FILE in $* ; do
    if [ -f "${FILE}" ] ; then
        TMPFILE1=`mktemp`
        TMPFILE2=`mktemp`
        TMPFILE3=`mktemp`

        OUTFILE=`echo ${FILE} | ${SED} -e 's/\.csv/.gpx/i'`

        # Reformat CSV into something understandable by gpsbabel unicsv
        # moving E/W,N/S from lon/lat fields into separate ones,
        # renaming of audio references to proper file names,
        # reformatting of date and time fields
        ${SED} -n -e ' s/\x0//g;
                    1s/INDEX/NAME/;
                    1s/TAG/ICON/;
                    1s# N/S#,N/S#;1s# E/W#,E/W#;
                    1s/VOX/URL/p;
                    1d;s/\([NSEW]\{1,1\}\),/,\1,/g;
                    s/ ,/,/g;
                    s/VOX\([0-9]*\)/VOX\1.WAV/g;
                    s/,\([VCT]\{1,1\}\),\([0-9]\{2,2\}\)\([0-9]\{2,2\}\)\([0-9]\{2,2\}\),\([0-9]\{2,2\}\)\([0-9]\{2,2\}\)\([0-9]\{2,2\}\)/,\1,20\2-\3-\4,\5:\6:\7/p' \
                    "${FILE}" > ${TMPFILE1}

        # Get trackpoints and convert to gpx
        ${GREP} -E ',T,|URL' ${TMPFILE1} | ${GPSBABEL} -i unicsv -f - -x transform,trk=wpt,del -o gpx -F ${TMPFILE2}

        # Get waypoints and convert to gpx
        ${GREP} -v ',T,' ${TMPFILE1} | ${GPSBABEL} -i unicsv -f - -o gpx -F ${TMPFILE3}

        # Merge track and waypoints into single gpx, substituting url tag with link tag as known by JOSM 
        ${GPSBABEL} -i gpx -f ${TMPFILE2} -i gpx -f ${TMPFILE3} -o gpx -F - | ${SED} -e 's#<\(/\{0,1\}\)url>#<\1link>#g;' > "${OUTFILE}"
    
        rm -f ${TMPFILE1}
        rm -f ${TMPFILE2}
        rm -f ${TMPFILE3}
    fi
done

JOSM Plugin

Oliver Wieland wrote a JOSM plugin to import CSV files.

Columbus to GPX

Russ Nelson's Python program to turn a Columbus pseudo-CSV into a GPX file is in OSM's SVN: http://svn.openstreetmap.org/applications/utils/gps-tracks/columbus-to-gpx/

Misc

Wang Chun wrote a simple Perl utility to convert from CSV to GPX format: columbus.pl

Ludo released VGPS-900toGPX which runs on Mac OS X.

Istap built a nice application using Nokia's Qt SDK called v900togpx (runs on Windows/Linux and Mac OS X).

Columbus V-990

Columbus V-990 is the next generation of the V-900.

Links

• Visiontac website (EN)
• Columbus website (CN)
• Visiontac VGPS-900 topic on GPSpassion Forums
• Columbus V900 an in-depth review
• Columbus V-900 review from Cloudmade