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If you find these tutorials useful and would like to link to them from your own pages,please contact the Drew Spatial Data Center Director, Dr. Catherine Riihimaki via email. You are invited to leave comments or ask questions in any of the Comment areas of each tutorial page. |
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Recording and Displaying Waypoints
- Use the eTrex HC series quick start guide to record Waypoints. You can check out a copy of the quick start guide from the Spatial Data Center.
- Once you've recorded them, navigate to the Find function in the Main Menu.
- Select Recent Finds from the available options. A list of the recently recorded Waypoints will be displayed.
- Highlight a Waypoint and Click on it with the Rocker Key to select it. Selecting the Waypoint will display the Note (Name), Location (Latitude/Longitude), Elevation, and distance from your Current Location.
Displaying Latitude and Longitude in Decimal Degrees
The default display format on the eTrex unit for latitude and longitude coordinates is in degrees, minutes, seconds (DDMMSS) and looks like this: N 40°45.537
In this example, the degrees unit come before the degree symbol (°). The minutes unit comes right after the degree symbol and before the period (.). The seconds indicator comes after the period.
If you want to use the latitude/longitude coordinates you gather on the eTrex with ArcMap software, you will need to change the display format to decimal degrees (DD). To change the display format:
- Navigate to the Main Menu.
- Choose the Setup option
- In Setup, choose the Units option.
- Highlight the field under Position Format and then click on it with the Rocker button.
- Select the first Position Format of hddd.ddddd°
- Click twice on the Menu button on the side of the eTrex unit to return to the Main Menu.
Reading the Waypoint Data on the eTrex
When reading the latitude and longitude data from the Waypoint recorder, remember the following information:
Latitude
- Latitude refers to the Y coordinates in ArcMap.
- They are represented on printed maps by horizontal lines. A simple mnemonic device for remembering this is "LAT is FAT."
- Latitude will be displayed as either N (North) or S (South) on the eTrex.
- In ArcMap, Southern latitude values are indicated with a "-" (minus) sign. In the eTrex unit, the minus sign is replaced with a "0" (zero).
Longitude
- Longitude refers to the X coordinates in ArcMap.
- They are represented on printed maps by vertical lines. A simple mnemonic device for remembering this is "LONG is TALL."
- Longitude will be displayed as either E (East) or W (West) on the eTrex.
- In ArcMap, Western longitude values are indicated with a "-" (minus) sign. In the eTrex unit, the minus sign is replaced with a "0" (zero)