Maretron & Carling, more N2K happiness, mostly

The screens above, bigger here , show Maretron’s prototype for N2KView, an engine (and more) monitoring program. Of course it handles most any raw NMEA 2000 data in a boat’s backbone, including J1939 engines via Maretron’s gateway. But an extra neat feature is that N2KView is actually a server, able to deliver the goods to all sorts of Flash clients, including that WiFi enabled phone.
  Perhaps even happier N2K–wise is the news that Carling Technologies—the substantial old line manufacturer of switches, breakers, etc (and owner of Moritz Aerospace, i.e. Octoplex)—has just invested in Maretron. And soon I’ll be able to tell you about another big brand that is adopting NMEA 2000. Could we be reaching a tipping point? Heck, even some of the habitues of Google Groups are having an intelligent conversation about its costs (for a change).
  But I also just finished up an N2K feature for Sail, and this morning took this plug picture below. Left to right they are NMEA 2000 standard Micro size, SeaTalk2, LowranceNet, and SimNet. They all do the same thing with those 5 pins, and all could have the same name! (I also heard that Lowrance may not change plugs to the standard as promised {a rumor later shot down, thankfully}). Patch cables work but this confusing nonsense has really set a good multi-manufacturer data standard back. If you too want to see the tipping sooner than later, complain!