altendorff.co.uk

The UKHO - yes its British! – is one of the world’s premier suppliers of navigational paper charts and publications, with a folio of over 3300 charts and 220 publications, sold under the Admiralty brand. Over three-quarters of the UKHO’s charts and publications are sold to the world’s commercial shipping market to satisfy Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) regulations. Not everything is American….although I do envy the US sailing fraternity for the hueg amount of information that is available to them.

Digital products are becoming increasingly important to the sailor. The UKHO currently provides near worldwide coverage with electronic charts via its Admiralty ARCS and ENC services, and global coverage of digital tidal and lights information through TotalTide and the Admiralty Digital List of Lights.

The UKHO is very protective of its copyright – and has taken active steps to stop people using its harmonic tide data. Well as a UK taxpayer I should be happy that our government is wising up to the value of e-commerce (they stopped the excellent WXTide32 from publishing UK tidal data – we have to pay for it on this side of the pond)