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New plugin: Navico Autopilot (navico_autopilot_pi) #1484
Description
Hi @rgleason and catalog maintainers,
I'd like to introduce a new plugin, Navico Autopilot, and get it into the Alpha catalog.
What it does: controls a Navico autopilot computer (B&G and Simrad NAC-1/2/3, AC12, AC42) directly over NMEA 2000: Standby, Auto, Wind, Nav and No Drift, course changes of 1 and 10 degrees, and it shows the mode, heading and target heading or wind angle. It only uses OpenCPN's N2K API (RegisterTXPGNs, WriteCommDriverN2K and listeners), so any gateway that can transmit works. It needs OpenCPN 5.14 for network gateways.
- Repo: https://github.com/xanderburchartz/navico_autopilot_pi (GPLv3)
- Built from the ShipDriver template, API 1.18
- Used on my own boat with a B&G NAC-3 from macOS and from a Raspberry Pi 5 (flatpak); Windows (Win32) tested against a simulated gateway
- Test builds for all targets: https://github.com/xanderburchartz/navico_autopilot_pi/releases/tag/v0.1.0-alpha
- Manual page in Antora layout in
manual/, ready for opencpn-manuals if you want it there
Hosting: I plan to host the tarballs on GitHub Releases, as route_toolbar_pi does (#1438), and then open a PR against the Alpha branch with the metadata files.
The code was written with an AI coding assistant; the protocol bytes come from canboat and from recordings on my own boat.
Any advice on the catalog process, or things you'd want to see before an Alpha PR, would be very welcome.
Thanks!
Activity
rgleason commentedon Nov 12, 2026
Congratulations
That's great to hear! I use B&G NAC-2 so it will be very useful on my cell phone, controlling the boat remotely through the Vesper server.
Good job, I see you have built this supported OS. I don't see metadata there, just tarballs. Do you have a repo in Cloudsmith yet? Are you using Circleci to build and deploy to Cloudsmith yet?
I can set up some repos for navico_autopilot_pi in cloudsmith/opencpn/ and invite you to join the plugin team so you have access with your cloudsmith key to deploy to those repos. You should sign up for free opensource accounts at circleci and cloudsmith. Then once you are deploying to cloudsmith/opencpn/ or your own individual account repos in cloudsmith you will be able to make a PR to opencpn/plugins/alpha or beta and bdbcat will merge. This commit uses just the metadata to add it to the opencpn PImanager catalog.
The shipdriver documentation has information for this.
rgleason commentedon Nov 12, 2026
Have you seen our Dashboard and Tactics and Dashboard_Tactics? These need improvement, updating and consolidation in the worst way, and I can't help but notice this work https://github.com/xanderburchartz/sailingpd-starterkit is there any possibility of help in this regard?
The screens are wonderful, nice work.
xanderburchartz commentedon Nov 14, 2026
Thanks Rick, also for the offer.
The metadata is now in the v0.1.1-alpha release next to the tarballs, and I have opened a PR against Alpha: #1487
I build all targets with GitHub Actions from the ShipDriver template, and host the tarballs on GitHub Releases, as route_toolbar_pi does (#1438). The metadata points at the release, and passes validate_xml.sh and check-metadata-urls. So for now I have not set up CircleCI or Cloudsmith. If bdbcat prefers Cloudsmith before merging, I will gladly take you up on the repos and the plugin team invite.
A NAC-2 report would be very welcome, as it has only been used on a NAC-3 so far. The plugin needs an NMEA 2000 connection in OpenCPN that can transmit. I don't know yet whether commands get through the Vesper from a phone, so I would be curious how that works for you. The Android builds compile but are untested.
xanderburchartz commentedon Nov 14, 2026
Merged into Alpha in #1487, thanks bdbcat. Closing this.