Hillwalker News 2004/02
In this Newsletter
- Events
- The Munros in Winter
- Product News
- Tickets for the Outdoors Show
- Support
- Hints and Tips
- Happy Birthday
- Nags
- Humour? (The question mark is back)
Thursday 11 March 2004 19:30 King Malcolm Hotel, Dunfermline THIS WEEK
Martin Moran and I are giving the first public demonstration of our new CDROM product "THE HIGH ALPS", which is a comprehensive interactive guide to the 4000m mountains and many other peaks of the Alps. This will be followed by Martin's slide lecture on a pioneering trek and climb to the LITTLE KAILASH range on the Indo-Tibetan border. Entry is £3. If you would like to come, please let me know and I will arrange for your tickets to be available on the door.
Friday 2 April - Sunday 4 April, Birmingham
Outdoors Show, NEC, Birmingham. ISYS will be on the Ordnance Survey stand. If you would like to collect your advance copy of The High Alps, please pre-pay £24.99 and I will have your copy for collection on the stand. All other ISYS products will be available there. If you are a user and coming to the Show, please drop in to the stand. It is always nice to meet users.
Saturday April 24th The Munro Society, Stirling
After The Munro Society AGM at the Pathfoot Lecture Theatre (Stirling University) the afternoon and evening sessions will be open to non-members.
The afternoon session from 1:45-5:30pm has presentations on ‘The Rev A E Robertson’, ‘The First 100 Munroists’, and ‘Mountain Quality Indicators’ plus the film ‘First Ascent of Tower Ridge’.
From 7-10pm ‘An Evening with JIM CURRAN’ will feature slides/films/book readings – a unique opportunity to enjoy this outstanding lecturer who has been described as the ‘Renaissance man of British mountaineering’.
Tickets £5 for each session – from TISO Stirling or SAE & cheque payable to The Munro Society to TMS, 5 Deer Park, Pitcairnfield, Perth PH1 3SP or at the door on the day.
Martin Moran completed all the Munros in the Winter of 1984 / 1985. In fact he took just 83 days out of a possible 90. His book, The Munros in Winter is currently out of print but some copies (paperback) can be obtained for £11.50 including postage. Just send your order to MartinMoran@isysdirect.com and I will forward it to him. Let me know if you want them signed.
Interestingly, Martin Moran used the accepted Alpine definition of Winter as 21 December to 20 March. This agrees with the astronomers who have winter from the solstice to the equinox. The meteorologists seem to want Spring to start on 1 March, but in spite what the gardens are telling us, it is still Winter for a day or so yet!
Last month, I announced three new MapWise Deluxe products: MUNRO MAPS, SOUTHERN UPLANDS and LAKES and PENNINES, all at £25 each. For Deluxe just read "uses OS Landranger Maps".
In answer to your many questions:
- Yes, you can print as many A4 copies for your personal use as you want.
- Yes, you can print at 1:20,000, 1:25,000, 1:50,000 or 1:100,000.
- Yes, you can upload and download routes to GPS.
- Yes, you can create Route Cards just by clicking the route round the map
- No, there are no seams and no edges (until you get to the edge of the area)
- Yes, all ISYS products integrate to give a single interface to all programs.
- Yes, they run on all Windows from 95 to XP.
- Yes, they will upgrade existing Hillwalkers to version 5.
Note that SOUTHERN UPLANDS includes all the maps for the Southern Uplands Way.
I also mentioned that it was not worth buying these products if you already had the Maps! Thanks to everyone who pointed out all the advantages of the CD over maps: print over sheet boundaries, keep your own maps pristine (or at least halt the decay!), plan routes by having the computer do the calculations, ... !
Yes, yes, I know all that. The problem was that when I said it was not worth buying if you already had the maps I was thinking of the maps on CD! For example, if you have MapWise SCOTLAND, there is no point in buying MUNRO MAPS. Sorry, I had just about forgotten paper maps. If you haven't yet got the CD maps, of course these are worth having.
New for the Outdoors Show will be:
THE MUNROS version 5. The Munros using Landranger Maps. £39.99. For those still on version 4, upgrade by getting MUNRO MAPS.
LAKELAND FELLS version 5. Lakeland Fells using Landranger Maps. £39.99. The OS coverage extends through Lancaster, across England and north to the border. Again you can upgrade just by getting MapWise LAKES and PENNINES.
PRICE REDUCTION. MapWise Deluxe England is now available for £99, a saving of £30 on buying ENGLAND NORTH and ENGLAND SOUTH.
I have also had a few enquiries about the OS Explorer Series on CD. I have sample data from the Ordnance Survey but do not intend to release until July 2004 when the price will come down. Obviously, the price will be higher than for Landranger for the same area. Note that version 4 Munros, Corbetts and Lakes all currently have mapping at 1:25,000 detail.
TICKETS FOR THE OUTDOORS SHOW, NEC, Birmingham 2 - April 2004
Many of our users have been asking about tickets to the Outdoors Show. We offered tickets for last year's Show. We do have some to give away. Yahoo group members had a few hours advance notice. The number of free tickets available is much lower than last year - and last year was a 'sell out', so if you do want these tickets you need to act quickly.
Here is the deal! Tickets will be given out singly or in pairs, please specify.
If you have registered with us at least three MapWise Deluxe products (or GB) and at least three Hillwalker, then just apply for tickets. Half the tickets will be available in this way to our biggest customers and will be given on a first come, first served basis.
If you do not have this installed base, then we will give tickets (if asked) with any Hillwalker or MapWise order over £20.
Finally, any tickets left by 22 March will be given to any of our users who ask.
Upgrades to version 5.3.1.15 are available for £5 + p&p. The upgrade will be free after 15 April (except p&p). Sorry for the extension but the Birmingham Show and the product work associated with it means that we cannot cope with too many upgrades at the moment.
The version number 5.3.1.15 perhaps needs some explanation. The format is now an industry standard. The first number, 5, is the number of the major version; 3 is the minor version number; 1 is the release number and 15 is the build number. The build number is not reset after every release, so it will grow to be quite large. It will probably be reset if ever we produce a version 6. The format is quite useful, although possibly a bit of overkill for our current needs. At least there will now be no more Beta versions and no more letters appearing occasionally in version numbers.
Last month I suggested putting printed maps in freezer bags to prevent the mist and rain reducing their effectiveness. John from Norway points out that Ortleib make an A4 bag for this very purpose. At about £9 it is a lot more expensive than the freezer bag!
No photographs on the slide show? This might be a variation on 'no hills on the map'. Check the hill filter to ensure that you have at least some hills selected. Each photograph is attached to a hill. If there are no hills selected, then there are no photographs available.
The normal way to show an Image Map is to right click on a Vector Map and select the type of Image Map you want. You can also go to List Sheets and select a sheet or a raster map. If you choose an Image Map, it will open it for you, centred on the centre of the sheet.
If there is some aspect of the programs you would like to see discussed here, please discuss on the Yahoo group. Join at http://goups.yahoo.com/groups/hillwalker and I will try to accommodate the most popular requests.
Happy Birthday, dear ISYS. ISYS is 15 years old. ISYS was formed at the start of 1989. The first outdoors program on CD, The Munros through Windows was launched 1996 for £79. Today you can buy that same program, version 1 for £9.99 - and it runs on XP!
Emailing ISYS Support? Please always quote your User Number as shown in the Subject line of this e-mail. This is not now just to save us time. There is so much spam about that genuine emails without a User Number can easily be missed.
Do you want to keep receiving this newsletter? Then don't forget to let us know if you change your e-mail address.
Walk long and safely,
Iain R White
ISYS Support
God and St Peter are sitting down discussing things down on Earth over a cup of tea and a digestive.
God says to St Peter "did you know that 95% of all people on Earth are drunken layabouts?"
"95%!" exclaims St Peter "I had better e-mail the other 5% then"
Do you know what was in that e-mail?
No?
So you're in the 95% then?
My thanks to Antony in Hampshire for this contribution.
