When did you lose track?

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A few thoughts about logging via a computer's electronic sources....

My first computer was a Suunto, and I got the electronic logging feature that used the computer's serial port. People old enough to remember what a serial port was will get a good laugh at that. That obviously ceased to be an option after a short while.

It is like a lot of other technical stuff in my life. I have a lot of vinyl records--but no record player. I have lots of old VHS tapes of my young family at play, but no functioning VHS player. I am told that if I want to pay some big bucks, I can get someone to transfer both the vinyl and the VHS to a more modern format--hopefully before that format goes out of existence.

If I had started my diving millenia ago with a papyrus logbook, with proper preservation techniques I could still read them.
 
A few thoughts about logging via a computer's electronic sources....

My first computer was a Suunto, and I got the electronic logging feature that used the computer's serial port. People old enough to remember what a serial port was will get a good laugh at that. That obviously ceased to be an option after a short while.

It is like a lot of other technical stuff in my life. I have a lot of vinyl records--but no record player. I have lots of old VHS tapes of my young family at play, but no functioning VHS player. I am told that if I want to pay some big bucks, I can get someone to transfer both the vinyl and the VHS to a more modern format--hopefully before that format goes out of existence.

If I had started my diving millenia ago with a papyrus logbook, with proper preservation techniques I could still read them.

Yes. "Before it goes out of existance". How about more than 3 (big)suitcases full of audio cassettes of the school bands I taught and my own playing. You can get cassette players, transfer stuff to newer technology, etc.--if you want to pay enough. I keep with the paper log and xerox each page to go into the firebox--I don't even trust that the house won't burn down. For data that really must be stored on computer, I have it on the home PC, the laptop, and on two flash things (whatever they're called). To me, if you can't hold it in your hand, it just may disappear someday.
 
I find this to be a fascinating thread. I log all my dives, of course I don't have all that many yet. I'm just a wee bit OCD, so I tend to sit down not long after getting off the boat and recording information that I find to be useful about the dive. Exposure protection, currents, weighting, gas mixture, who my buddy was, anything interesting we saw, anything interesting that happened, the dive op, etc. I try to put any information that I might find useful or interesting when in 20 years I look back on my logs.

Just last week I played around with my weighting and didn't like how I redistributed the weight, so I put that in the comments for the dive. And the wild dolphins we saw that came to play with us as we were jumping in for our first dive? Oh yeah you know that made it into my log. :)
 
I still log every single one of my dives, around 1200 at the moment (I am too lazy to check the actual number, excuse me :wink:). I just write site, date, max. depth, bottom time, and if anything remarkable happened, if we saw anything noteworthy etc. If I am teaching I also write down the names of the student, which trainingdive it was and let them sign my logbook. Sometimes they write sweet comments or draw funny pictures so it's a pleasure to flip through old logbooks.

I just use notebooks by the way, like a moleskine, no standardized logbooks. This leaves me plenty of blank pages to draw maps, fish or other marine life etc.
 
A few thoughts about logging via a computer's electronic sources....

My first computer was a Suunto, and I got the electronic logging feature that used the computer's serial port. People old enough to remember what a serial port was will get a good laugh at that. That obviously ceased to be an option after a short while.
Not true! RS232 still lives on...

I lost the "log" passion a long time ago. My dive buddy has not. She still has 13 more dives than me. But who's counting? I no longer need to count since i can remember the number 13. It has been the same number for over 25 years. As a consolation prize, she is 1 year older than me. Every year on her birthday i remind her that i will never be as old as her. Karma.

We started with with the dive shop $$$$ PADI book, then went to $$ dive shop book, then designed our own excel spreadsheet log book paper page. Been using that for over 20 years. It jams a dual buddy dive onto 1 side of the page with room to draw a site map and a site contour drawing on the other side. We track air in, air out, bottom time this dive, bottom time this trip

I value bottom time versus # of dives. I am lazy. Gearing up take effort. On a liveaboard we do not do all dives (afternoon nap time!) but mostly always end up with the most bottom time. By a fair margin.

We actually spend more effort on a separate "fish id" chart that we fill out over a dive trip. Again an excel spreadsheet that we print out on paper. List of fish / creatures with 1, some, many, juvenile checkbox.

BUT: we have many (most?) of our dive profiles captured electronically (thank you RS232!) from our numerous uwatec aladin's onto a set of Palm Pilots! We do actually look at our dive depth profiles on a regular basis as a reminder about bouncing around and quick ascents.
 
I keep track on paper. In the past I have used at the same time the Aladin software, but logged them on paper as well.
It's not just the count, it's more about the memories and the details about the dives. They are helpful when others ask for information or when returning to a dive site or configuration after a long time.
 
I still log, even after thousands of dives. Admittedly its nothing particularly thorough, since I dive the same sites frequently. A line of a journal detailing dive number, dive site and date is enough. I will do more detail on dive trips or holidays to other areas though.
 
I'm still logging my dives - though a total number would be a guess - or I'd have to go count up the sheets of paper. I started numbering my logs sequentially, then added a sequential number by year, then by trip (2 weeks in Bonaire for example) then solo dives. Somewhere along the way the numbering system went snafu. It's there - I just can't decipher it. They are all in sequential order (more or less) and like entries are stapled/clipped together - but I have no exact number.

My current numbering system is a sequential number since I lost track and a sequential number for the year and then year. I really don't need an exact number anyway. Has no effect on my skills.
 
None of my dives from 1962 to June, 2000, are logged. I lost track early because I had no need to log dives. Then in June, 2000, when I realized I wanted to do some international dive travel, I started logging my dives so I'd have a record to show dive ops elsewhere (after all my c-card was from the 1960s). Since I have OCD, I've kept on logging them since then. Kind of the reverse of what many long-time divers have done (but I am a contrarian)!
 
My first few years I logged in my official SSI book. That was helpful in getting weighting dialed in and a place for notes on sites and things new to me, and there were a lot of new things. I was using tables then, the book also made a place for them to reside and the calcs to be entered.


Then I took a few years off from diving (I plead temporary insanity/sanity, take your pick). When I was preparing to dive again I found my log was in my old gear bag pocket and had been placed there wet. But was just able to just make out 157 or 167 dives total.


So I resumed diving, with a computer with download capability. I fell back into logging, I was on a re-learning curve so it was once again a learning aid of sorts as I downloaded from the computer and filled in the various categories of the e-log.


But a few years into round 2, I stopped filling in the details and ever since I just download the profiles. Good for answering the age old question, "Just how cold was it? And assessing depth control, or proof of dives should that ever be needed. I think my UW pictures serve as a log of sorts now, for sights seen.


Yes the e-log deal is vulnerable to software or hardware issues and I was nearly victim (thanks habitual backups on external hard drive!) but for my purposes it wouldn't have been the end of the world if I had no backup. And as I proved the paper log can be easily defeated too.
 

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