[Xastir] Serial GPS support in Xastir built from Darwin Ports?

[Curt, WE7U]

On Fri, 27 Apr 2007, Bernard Michael Tyers wrote:

> On 27/04/07, Curt, WE7U <archer at eskimo.com> wrote:
> > On Fri, 27 Apr 2007, Bernard Michael Tyers wrote:
> >
> > > which doesn't really tell me about GPS support. So I am guessing it doesn't.
> >
> > GPS Support in terms of download waypoints/tracks/routes from your
> > GPS, or GPS Support in terms of decoding NMEA sentences?
>
> Um, I guess the former. Really all I want from the GPS is it to tell
> Xastir where I am. I am not (too) worried about waypoints at the mo'.

You mean the latter is what you're interested in then.

One thing that can be useful is to create maps from stored tracks in
your GPS, so you can go drive some roads, then tell Xastir to
download the track and make a Shapefile map out of it.

For just telling Xastir where you're at, you want the NMEA decoding,
which requires only a serial port or else a GPSD instance to connect
to, and all the code is built-in to Xastir.

Serial ports though on Unix/Linux/MacOSX must have permissions set
properly so that Xastir can access them, or else Xastir must be set
to "SUID root" mode so that it can become root when it wants to
open those ports.  Xastir drops permissions when it doesn't need
them.

So your options are, from best to worst method:

*) Add yourself to the group which has serial port access.  "ls -l"
   on the serial port device itself to see the ownership &
   permissions.  Add yourself to the group and make sure the group
   has read/write permission.

*) Change ownership on the serial ports so that you own them, then
   make sure you have read/write access.

*) Change permissions on the serial ports so that everyone has
   read/write access.

*) "chmod 4755 /usr/local/bin/xastir" so that Xastir gains root
   privileges when it needs to.

Again, you only need one of the above, done properly, to let you
have access to the serial ports.

--
Curt, WE7U.   APRS Client Comparisons: http://www.eskimo.com/~archer
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