Personal golfing assistant and method and system for graphically displaying golf related information and for collection, processing and distribution of golf related data

Abstract

A personal golfing assistant system is comprised of software running on a PDA attached directly or remotely to a GPS receiver that enables the user to survey and/or electronically capture geophysical golf data. A handheld device connected to or integrated with a GPS receiver can instead be used. Software allows a golfer to use a handheld PDA/GPS unit during the course of play to mark a ball location automatically and/or determine the distance to golf course targets and/or objects, and to analyze golf related data and generate statistics. The system can send a set of parameters tailored for a specific course to a real time tunable GPS to adjust for optimal performance and can adjust measurements to compensate for environmental condition changes. The system provides an improved graphical method for measuring and displaying distances between a golfer and a golf course object, for displaying multiple measured distances along a line of sight between a golfer and a golf object or target, and for orienting a target or object on a display to coincide with a user's line of sight. There is also provided a method for collecting and uploading golf course geographic information services (GIS) data to an internet accessible server, processing the uploaded data, distributing data upon an authorized user request, and downloading the requested data to an electronic device.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A handheld apparatus for displaying a graphic representation of a golf course, comprising:
 a location measuring device configured to generate location information corresponding to a location of the handheld apparatus;   a memory configured to store location information corresponding to each of a plurality of features of the golf course;   a computing device connected to the location measuring device and the memory, and configured to retrieve a subset of the plurality of features of the golf course based on the measured location information generated by the location measuring device; and   a display connected to the computing device and configured to display a graphic representation of the retrieved subset of the plurality of features of the golf course.