Zumo XT - Break the link with Garmin Explore - Query

[jfheath]

We probably all know how to do this now.
Click the speedo on the map, long press the circular speedo. Reset Explore Database in Developer Test and Tools.

But I have only just discovered that this trick does not permanenetly break the link. Either that or the system has recently updated itself.
I don't think that it is the latter, because I have reverted back to v6.30 and that version does the same.

The issue is that the connect restores itself after a while - or probably after visiting Where to->Favourites.

The only way I have found of preventing this is to either turn off BT, or turn off Drive on the smartphone. OK when testing things out on the desk, but not otherwise. The only other thing I can think of is to delete all user data - which I don't want to do.

Has anyone else either come across this or found a way to permanently disconnect from Explore - without completely resetting the device.

[Berin]

Whether this is a permanent solution or not, I don't know;

On the Drive app on the phone, forget device. Go through the pairing procedure again, but don't complete the task to connect to Explore - just exit. The phone remains paired via the Drive app, but not Explore.

On my XT, when I look at the Explore app, it's not connected. I can still search a destination in Drive and send it to the XT

I've been through several updates like this.

[Stu]

if you go to the app on your phone you can opt out of garmin storing your data I wonder if this will do what you are after?

Screenshot_20220512-221712_Explore.jpg (107.97 KiB) Viewed 1920 times

[jfheath]

Many thanks @Berin and @Stu

The section that @Stu mentioned prevents the data from going to and from the Explore account - which will do the trick.
Certainly making sure that the link to Explore is not longer present does the same thing.

Both should work - and at first test, like the things that I tried - they did.

Go to Where To->Explore - the screen shows up that says the two aren't connected.

But go to Where To -> Favourites - and the XT picks up the favourites from the Explore connection and shortly after,
Where To->Explore shows the data in 'Explore Format' rather thant he not conencted screen.

So that seemed to be a dead end. But in fact it has been useful because going through the process entirely from scratch - resetting the Explore Database, getting rid of both Explore and Drive from my phone and reintroducing them one at a time enabled me to spot when this was happening.

And it reminded me of the number of times that I have tried to get rid of transferred routes, only to have them re-appear again. Data is copied from elsewhere. (someone posted a link the the places in .System where it is obtained from a few days ago. I've yet to look at that in detail and respond). Bottom line is, it sometimes takes more than one operation to clear things out.

In this case, it seems that after re-setting the Explore database, the XT needs to have a cold restart before it has chance to find the Explore data again.

I do so many restarts when I am testing and answering member's queries that I have never encountered this issue before. I thought that just resetting the database effectively switched off the link to Explore.
I'll modify my notes, but keep checking whether this continues to work.

But at present it seems that :

To get rid of the Explore Link on the XT

• Long Press the circular speedo (10 secs). Reset Explore Database in Developer Test and Tools.
• Then immediately hold in the power button to turn the XT off, and then start it up again.

[Stu]

Is there any pro's and cons to having explore?

[colirv]

I'm feeling quite smug, because after various hints from jfheath I decided not to touch Explore with a bargepole!

[jfheath]

I'm feeling quite smug, because after various hints from jfheath I decided not to touch Explore with a bargepole!

You could have told me. I clearly wasn't paying attention when I said it !

Is there any pro's and cons to having explore?

There are some nice features. But as yet, none that I wish to use regularly. As you may have gathered, I keep turning it on and off again to experiment. And it is still being developed - eg the App for smartphones and Ipads is ahead of the website interface.
On the Website, you can create tracks - but you point and click and it joins a new point to the last with a straight line.

The tool for making the straight line fit the course of a road is quite good on the website. It involves a lot of dragging and dropping, but they offer the handles that you need to do this, by bisecting each section between existing points and offering a new point to move into position. This would be excellent for anyone plotting a route off road in areas where there are no navigable off road maps available. The fact that you can zoom in on a map with contour lines, to a level with houses and street names, and further to satellite images is really superb. This is a big improvement on the Basecamp maps and a contender for the MRA mapping.

The mobile device app has gone a step further. They now have the same sort of feature that Google Maps has, where you place the next point of the route, and it joins the route to the last point, but it automatically follows the course of the road. However, TopActive has footpaths clearly marked, and the course creation tool will happily snap to these if the route is more direct. Digital Atlas is no good as it doesn't show many minor roads.

However, what you get is not a route, or a track. This is called a 'Course'. The XT cannot see courses at present, so they can be converted into a track or a route and the XT will pick them up the next time it synchs.
Tracks and routes created int his way look identical on the XT. There are no route points. Tracks you can navigate from start to end or from end to start. Routes can be naviagted from the start or you can get it to take you to the closest entry point. These behave like the Trips that you can create in the XT from a track. Turn by turn navigation, never recacalculates, but if you go off route, it will find a way to get you back to the closest point.

It seems to me that Garmin may be turning away from having key route points (Vias and Shaping), and finding clever ways of navigating complete planned routes. Waypoints are now things that are not part of the route but pop up on the map along side it, so that you can see them as you approach. Garmins POIs have a proximity alert (like speed cameras) and you can get them to play an MP3 snippet when you get within a specified range. I played around with that many years ago when I got my first 550. Odd to hear my own voice coming over the satnav, telling me that 5 miles ahead there is something interesting to look at, tap the button to go and visit it.

I notice that in Basecamp, Waypoints have a proximity field. I wonder if this is the intention for future Garmin devices ?


I have navigated using a trip-track, and although its behaviour when I deviated was odd, onbce I'd worked out what it was trying to get me to do, it was entirely predictable. But I've had odd behaviour from another route, when it kept trying to get me to go back to its last re-route instruction.
But like the 660 used to do - as soon as you rejoin the magenta line at any point, it will continue navigating from there onwards - and it will not recalculate.

For that, there are a lot of advantages. It is like having a route with No Vias and all Shaping Points and with auto-recalculate turned off. But there are no route points plotted. It is just a magenta line.

But you can do that with tracks on the XT without having explore loaded.

I must say that it is really nice being able to view a route on the ipad, my smartphone and the computer at the same time. Make changes on one and the other synchronise (eventually), and thay all appear on the stanav pretty quickly. No cables, no transfers, no fuss.

But I'm not ready to use it full time yet. There is too much that isn't working in the way that I would like it to at the moment.

The final thing is that I can post a website address, and you can get whatever I place in one of my collections, and get it onto your XT.

[Stu]

Thanks for that @jfheath

I don't really use any of those features to be honest but reading what you have put it sounds to me like explore is maybe going to be a replacement for basecamp or a contender for other easily accessible route planning software like MRA

I will leave it all enabled and watch to see what happens with it!

Plus you can never have too many options for planning routes while out and about

[Fallguy67]

Sorry to be a little off topic. But the explorer app on my phone says the XT is not compatible… Am I doing something wrong?

[lkraus]

...
But at present it seems that :

To get rid of the Explore Link on the XT

• Long Press the circular speedo (10 secs). Reset Explore Database in Developer Test and Tools.
• Then immediately hold in the power button to turn the XT off, and then start it up again.

It may be helpful to first temporarily disable the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connections to be sure that the database can not re-establish itself before you can restart the XT.

I'm in the "Heard about too many limitations and unexpected behaviors" group, so I've never enabled Explore, and probably will not until I read better reviews. A USB connection works reliably, and Drive mostly works to share a gpx from my phone. Some apps don't recognize Drive as a sharing target.