Hillwalker News 2004/05 - The High Alps
In this Newsletter
- Events
- Product News
- Special Offer
- New Licence Agreement
- Hill News
- Computer / Science News
- Branding
- Hints and Tips
- Ancient Nags
- Humour?
You have heard about the program for several months. Now you can have it! The High Alps is now on sale from ISYS - and it is fantastic.
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13 July 2004 @ 18:00 Borders Bookstore, Buchanan Street, Glasgow - The High Alps preview
Come and see the very latest product from ISYS. The High Alps is a joint venture with Martin Moran. This will be worth it just to see the photographs and the video clips.
19 to 22 July ROYAL WELSH SHOW, Builth
As the Ordnance Survey will not be there, neither will ISYS. This is a great disappointment as the Royal Shows have done very well for us. At the Royal Highland Show, we not only outsold all our competitors but we sold more than all of them combined! When people can compare, they buy MapWise from ISYS.
The High Alps is now available. Details of the program are given below.
MapWise Deluxe and 250: the 2004 mapping is now available. The Deluxe (Landranger maps) includes the M6 Toll road. The 250 now has metric contours and the HW and HX squares (the Pentland Skerries) are included.
Now we can concentrate on providing the Explorer Series, something that our users having been asking about for a long time. Full details will be in the next Newsletter.
The High Alps
This is a spectacular program! Written as a joint venture between Martin Moran and myself, it has been nearly two years in the making. It combines Martin's deep and very current knowledge of the Alps with proven Hillwalker technology. There are 28 video clips, a virtual reality clip of the Matterhorn and 350 absolutely stunning photographs and photodiagrams.
Climbs and routes are provided for all the 4,000m peaks and many subsidiary summits.
Read Martin's descriptions of huts, peaks and valley bases.
You can create your own climbs using the new Spidering Technology. You click on a waypoint or a hut or a summit and all possible routes from that point are shown as a spider. Select the one you want; it is added to the spider card and a new spider is drawn from the new point. There are 1,800 spider links covering all the 4,000m peaks. The completed Spider Card can be downloaded to a GPS or exported to a spreadsheet.
If you enter your personal climbing grade, spider links with a more difficult grade are shown in red as a warning.
Whether you want to use this program as an Alpine climbing tool or just to dream, you can purchase hours of entertainment now on any ISYS website in our Shop.
We still have stocks of version 4 Corbetts and Mountains of Wales. Remember that all version 5 programs will update these without charge to integrate with the version 5 programs. The offer will close at the end of July and all version 4 stocks unsold will be destroyed. These are just £9.50 each or £17.50 for both, less than half price. Please add £3.50 p&p to any order. These CDs are unboxed but it is a great way for MapWise users to experience the joys of Hillwalker. These will integrate with MapWise even if your maps do not cover the same area. To order, visit the website and use the Special Instructions to get these prices.
Beinn Os
I am sorry to report that a walker was killed recently on Beinn Os, struck by lightning. Lightning will always be attracted to the highest, sharpest point and a person on a ridge is ideal. Dinghy sailors know this and if they can't run for shore, will capsize and lay the mast along the water. Walkers must get off the ridge. The kneeling position with hands and knees on the ground with a humped back is good. If lightning strikes it runs down the arms or legs but avoids the heart.
If there is a thundercloud on a hill, you are safe enough. When the cloud moves away that is when the lightning will strike.
Mountain Rescue Radios
The Scottish Executive is to provide £400,000 towards the provision of new radios for all Mountain Rescue Teams in Scotland. Every member will have a new handset when on a rescue to enable good communications between team members. The hills are notoriously difficult for high frequency radio reception as these waves travel in straight lines and are easily blocked. The new state-of-the-art radios will be a tremendous help in co-ordinating rescue activities.
Wind Turbines
Don't know if you've missed my current involvement in a political campaign against wind-turbines, but it's all on www.saveourhills.org
Brendan Hamill
Discussion, please, on the Yahoo Group: http:\\groups.yahoo.com\group\hillwalker
Venus
I thought that I was going to provide news not obtained elsewhere when I mentioned the transit of Venus. Never did I expect the media interest! Viewing here (Glasgow) was impossible with cloud all morning. Never mind, there is always 2012.
Summer Solstice
The northern sky from the Central Lowlands northwards was never dark during the week either side of the solstice on 23 June. Glasgow is about 54 degrees north or only about 12 degrees from the Arctic Circle. The sun is therefore just 12 degrees below the horizon at midnight at the solstice, not low enough to make the northern sky dark.
In Shetland, where you would be even closer to the Artic Circle, the sky is bright with the sun just 6 degrees below the horizon. Here the nights are called the "simmer dim".
Of course, average daylight is always 12 hours and the brighter the June, the darker the December.
All Hillwalker programs can find the sunset times for any date for any place on the Earth's surface in Expedition Planning | Sunrise and Sunset Times.
Back in 1996 when the world was a simpler place, ISYS started the outdoor software revolution with The Munros through Windows version 1. The Newsletter was a Munros' newsletter. Lakeland Fells, Corbetts and Mountains of Wales all required that the newsletter covered a wider area. Now we have not just hillwalkers but cyclists, canoeists, ramblers, walkers and now Alpiniste mountaineers all receiving the Hillwalker News.
ISYS itself is now re-branded as ISYS OUTDOORS to reflect our widening horizons and the Newsletter must do the same. The name Hillwalker News must now change and the announcement will be made next Newsletter.
Our website is already www.isysoutdoors.com and email can be sent to:
- sales@isysoutdoors.com
- support@isysoutdoors.com
- info@isysoutdoors.com
Legacy websites and email addresses will continue to function for some time yet.
This month I have some very simple tips for all our new users.
The Vector Map is an ideal tool for locating the Image Maps. Right click on the Vector Map to produce a popup menu. You can then create an Image Map centred on the clicked point. The selection of maps available naturally depends on the area and scale that you have bought.
The Vector Map shows the location of all open Maps with a rectangle. You can see this by dragging the edge of an Image Map and watching the rectangle on the Vector Map; it moves in real time.
Initialize | Preferences or Initialize | Preferences Tree contains the parameters which control how the program behaves. You can set these to you own requirements; and they will be remembered.
To create a Route Card, select Mode | Route Card | New. A Route Card is created. Does the new window cover your map? Just drag it off to the side. MapWise likes all the Windows at a reasonable size. Minimizing is unnecessary and will cause unnecessary grief.
Now you just click round the route on the map and the Route Card is filled in, in the background. Does it stop working after a few clicks? Check the light blue rectangle. Here is the mode of the program. It should say Route(CIAfter) standing for Route Card, Continuous Insert After Mode. When in this mode, a click on the map will add a point to the end of the route card.
If it just says Route, then perhaps you have clicked too close to an existing waypoint. You can specify how close you must be before the point is selected. This is the Click Fuzziness. If the program snaps to a point when you think it shouldn't, reduce the Click Fuzziness. If it fails to pick up a point when you think it should, increase the Click Fuzziness. In recent programs, you can set Click Fuzziness by clicking the button with the square eye with the squiggles round it. In all programs, you can set it in Preferences or Preferences Tree.
Please, when mailing ISYS, always put your User Number in the subject line. With the amount of spam that there is around, a thousand e-mails get deleted every week so each one gets only a very short time for a decision. We want to read yours, so please follow this simple rule.
The other ancient nag: If you change your email address, please tell us so that you can continue to receive the Newsletter.
Walk long and safely,
Iain R White
ISYS Support
http://www.outdoors.com <<<< new branding!
0845 166 5701 (local call cost)
Semiopathy - the deliberate misreading of signs
Travelling south down the M74, I saw the notice: Farmshop left under bridge. As it wasn't there, I assume someone else must have moved it.
Left me leave you with these thoughts from a user:
Subject: FW: Stupidity
Hope this makes you smile...
EVER WONDER where we are headed...
Why the sun lightens our hair, but darkens our skin?
Why women can't put on mascara with their mouth closed?
Why you don't ever see the headline: "Psychic Wins Lottery"?
Why "abbreviated" is such a long word?
Why Doctors call what they do "practice"?
Why you have to click on "Start" to stop Windows?
Why lemon juice is made with artificial flavour, while dishwashing liquid is made with real lemons?
Why the man who invests all your money is called a "Broker"?
Why there isn't mouse flavoured cat food?
Who tastes dog food when it has a "new & improved" flavour?
Why Noah didn't swat those two midges?
Why they sterilize the needle for lethal injections? (Could have done without that one!)
Why they don't make the whole plane out of the material used for the indestructible black box?
Why sheep don't shrink when it rains?
Why they are called apartments when they are all stuck together?
If con is the opposite of pro, is Congress the opposite of progress?
Why they call the airport "the terminal" if flying is so safe?
