[Potlatch-dev] GPX time elements

[Craig Stanton]

In my case I know that the single trk is indeed a single track and should remain so. I've written my own pruner to cut out the extra data points and have created entirely valid file. Is there really no way that I can tell Potlatch or OSM that I have a valid file and the 3 minute rule shouldn't apply to long distance hikes? I've yet to hear of anyone that can walk a few hundred miles without a little down time. I'm probably going to put together a little php script to fake the time stamps on the locations but it seems strange that I'm having to change valid data to fit an assumption that doesn't cover it, what ever that time stamp was going to be used for it's now going to be totally useless. Granted it probably works very well for most car journeys, but hiking isn't exactly uncommon. Maybe the import procedure could have a check-box to turn off the automatic splitting feature, or radio buttons to split by time, split by trk or don't split at all.


On a side note, does any one know the reason for the OSM API requiring time data?


Cheers,
    Craig


>>> Richard Fairhurst  10/11/10 7:04 AM >>>
Craig Stanton wrote:
 > I tried removing all the time elements and then Potlatch
 > complained that the GPX was not valid.

That's not Potlatch, that's a requirement of the OSM API (and has always 
been there).

> Actually I'm not really sure why Potlatch wants to know the time of
 > the points in the GPX, surely location is important and time is
 > irrelevant when creating a way.

As I said in my previous e-mail, "some GPX-producing software 
concatenates different tracks within the same trkseg or trk". Certainly 
I've seen tracks downloaded from some of the simpler Garmin eTrexes 
which are just one single  no matter how many times the GPX was 
turned off and on again.

OSM best practice is that you should set your GPS receiver to record a 
trackpoint at regular time intervals. If you are following this advice, 
and your receiver/software combination produces a single , then the 
3-minute limit prevents confusing and unsightly lines being drawn 
between separate tracks.

cheers
Richard

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