The course line is made up of line segments from waypoint to waypoint. The navigation application will display this line and give the bearing (magnetic or true) and range (yards, feet, or nautical miles) of each segment. Some navigation applications display this information on the screen beside the course segment while others display it in a table.

To plot a route, the chart display needs to be moved about the

screen, so one factor in judging the quality of a navigation application is how easy it is to move the chart display and the ease of plotting the course line segments. When you plot a course, you want to select a path that avoids hazards and shallow water. These features can be clearly seen on the display with the normal zoom (100% or 1:1). For seeing further ahead it is helpful to zoom out, so the ease of zooming is another quality of a navigation application.