Articles written by Lars Brandstäter

numbers: around 100 new users registering every day, 264 people did upload more then 800 images over the last 30 days, more then 900 users made use of the personel vessel-list, our keen moderators sorted out around 40 images due to quality and copyright reasons in this period, communication needs (mail, phone) around the site are rising…

new AIS receptions:
[+] added new AIS antenna: Germany, Bremen
[+] added new AIS antenna: Germany, Mannheim (Rhine, inland AIS)
[+] added new AIS antenna: Austria, Vienna (Danube, inland AIS)
[+] added new AIS share: USA, Savannah
[+] added new AIS antenna: Spain, Vigo
[+] added new AIS antenna: Portugal, Tavira
[+] added new AIS share: SouthAfrica, Richards Bay
[+] added new AIS share: Singapur, SingapurCity

[+] set up a GIS database of world wide ports and areas
[*] rewrote the Port Listing area to reflect the new Port-Areas in GIS – DB
[*] extended our zone alerting for more then 300 new areas (beta)
[*] made all internal AIS statistics available for sharers
[+] added new page: My AIS Station (users sharing with DS, have access to various parameters of their antennas)
[+] added new page: Chat (for users, looking for a fast way of communication)
[*] reworking the search engine for overall search
[*] created a desktop uploader (ImageManager) for power users (closed beta)

[?] did you try out the site-wide search lately ?

We are always looking for new AIS coverage. If you could share a signal or establish a new antenna in your port of interest, let us know: Contact

Check out the tanker BRITISH PRIDE which is sending us signals directly from their journey over the Atlantic.
The vessel sends the signal right to our server, which makes the blue water monitoring possible. It is heading to the port of Sikka in India. We hope this will be an example for many vessels to come in the near future.

http://www.digital-seas.com/vessel_search/vessel_details/on/british%20pride_q45989.html

Live view and the 24h track of the British Pride is available at our SharingPage: http://www.digital-seas.com/sharing

did bring 20 years of freedom in my live.
We had a big party last night to honor living in a free country almost half of our lives .
In the night of the 9th November 1989 the wall in Germany came down and we jumped into our “Trabant” car to leave Rostock (EastGermany) on the way to the “green Border” to visit the city of Lübeck (West Germany) for our first time ever. That was a really great time and tears are in my eyes watching all those historic backviews in German television. I am still very glad, that I have the right to say and to do what I think is right.
I would never had the chance in East Germany to do stuff, like this site.

Things can change really quick sometimes, keep believing and take the wave of permanent movement…,
that’s what I learned from our history at least :-)

we have done a bit of sorting in our new AIS sources from Africa, Asia and Europe and created new pages for the real time view with Fleetmon:
new regions are now online:

Atlantic.PT.ES.FR:  http://www.digital-seas.com/fleet_tracking/regions/atlanticptesfr.html

Africa: http://www.digital-seas.com/fleet_tracking/regions/africa.html

Southamerica: http://www.digital-seas.com/fleet_tracking/regions/south_america.html

Asia: http://www.digital-seas.com/fleet_tracking/regions/asia.html

Australia + New Zealand: http://www.digital-seas.com/fleet_tracking/regions/australia_nz.html

statistics: we crossed the 9.000 permanent tracked vessels this month,  almost 90.000 vessels in the database, 16.000 vessels with images…

going for a mindopen dive now:

[+] added new page: My Vessel List (list of monitored vessels)
[*] changed vessel lists + vessel thumbnails to new option of monitoring

[+] added new page: My Ship Finder (visualizing SP XML files)
[+] added new page: Uploads Timeline (all image uploads browsable)

[+] added new Tutorials in the FAQ section (you can listen to Lars voice in the iPhone demo:-)
[+] created new Page explaining DynDNS in the FAQ section

[+] API extensions for Fleetmon :mobile for zone alerts

[*] reaching milestone 2/3  in Fleetmon V2 development

[?] did you try the sitewide search lately ?

We went to Hamburg this week for exhibiting our Fleetmon software on Europas biggest fair for the Cruise Ship business.  The Seatrade 2009 had 250 companies from around 50 contries showing their services.
Also our iPhone App Fleetmon :mobile had lots of interest. Owners, Agents and suppliers love to have informations available on the road about the journey of a vessel. We had talks to people from all over the world. Seatrade is a nice international fair and meeting place of  people in the Cruise, Ferry, Rivercruise and Superyacht industries.
As a result of our presentation all users of Digital-Seas can look forward to the extensions of new AIS covered destinations in the world.

site: www.seatrade-europe.com

here is a really good article with the story of the journey of ARCTIC SEA. The German Magazine “Telepolis” is a technology related publication with lots of backgrounds to developments.
This article is in German language only.

Einen sehr guten Bericht über die Reise der ARCTIC SEA hat Telepolis heute veröffentlicht. Politische Hintergründe des Seetransports und damit passend zu Digital Seas…

http://www.heise.de/tp/r4/artikel/31/31151/1.html

the ARCTIC SEA on FleetMon

[+] added new AIS antenna: Germany, Düsseldorf  (inland AIS)
[+] added new AIS antenna: NL, Enkhuizen
[+] added new AIS antenna: Spain, covering Strait of Gibraltar
[+] added new AIS antenna: GB, Greenok
[+] added new AIS antenna: GB, Falmouth
[+] added new AIS antenna: USA, Cincinetti, Ohio River

[*] changed main menue for new ports sections
[+] added complete new section PORTS (vessels present and arrivals)
[+] added new PORT-DETAIL pages
[+] added new iPhone optimized Port pages http://mobile.digital-seas.com
[*] adjusted table view of last movements on VesselDetailPage (now sortable)
[*] changed BLOG location to OpenSpace area
[*] adjusted QuickNav to new menue structure

[+] added admin tools for vote controlling

[+] added automatic image addition for missing vessels in  Rostock-Port (port entry camera shoot)
[+] added admin tools for vote controlling
[+] added admin tools for image quality controlling
[+] added admin tools for image copyright controlling
[+] added Fleetmon twitter feet to BLOG section

[*] Bug fix for search list in Fleetmon for iPhone

-User to comment here on the new BETA part of Digital-Seas?
Go find the spot inside this website, come back here and send us your comment.
We will give out promotional codes for Fleetmon mobile for the first five users :-)

Late last week we put the finishing touches to a very special project we’ve been wanting to share with you for a while now. After many weeks of burning the midnight oil at JAKOTAs ofice in an effort to squeeze into it every drop of spotting goodness, we’ve finally completed work on the Fleetmon mobile app for the iPhone and sent it over to the nice people at Apple.
And now guess what, we are talking about this not as a rumour, but an approved application in the Apple Store. So get your iPhone connected, or fire up iTunes and take a look yourself…

We thought it might be nice to show you a video of what we’ve built so far for you (still in the works, as of my writing…).

There is a dedicated new area here at Digital-Seas website: www.fleetmon.com/products/fleetmon_mobile
and of course a support space in our Forum section: fleetmon.com/community/forum/

We would love to hear your comments, if this is of any use for your daily work or spotting experience.