NavList:

Q1: "What did the German and Japanese navies use for an almanac? l believe that the almanac was a British publication"

They had their own nautical almanacs, calculated and produced "in house" by experts in their individual countries. Even the US had independently produced its own almanacs from first principles starting in the 1850s. But was all this duplication of effort necessary? When you're at war, or when there's a significant probability of finding your country at war with another, there's a seeming necessity. But then again the basic astronomical data is public, universally available, and nearly impossible to keep secret. So maybe a better plan would recognize that reality in advance and maintain open access to astronomical data and computations... The astronomers liked that idea, but it wasn't really their decision unless they limited themselves to the esoteric. Observations of stellar spectra and ephemerides of minor planets could be shared without drawing any attention, but sharing an actual nautical almanac... that can help belligerent navies sink ships and kill people? That's a whole different level of permission.

By the way there are various levels of independence in almanac publications. For some, where either national sovereign power or simple national pride come first, completely independent computation was (and/or "is") the rule. This was not difficult by the twentieth century and a manageable expense. For most national governments and navigation authorities, some degree of international sharing and borrowing of astronomical data made (makes) good sense. They could make a trade for the computed astronomical data, apply various consistency checks to make sure it was good data, and then re-arrange for their own navigators. And for some, independent nautical almanacs could be little more than translations and re-arrangements of presentation (usually these are done under license). That's only slightly more expensive than buying the original almanacs, as published, unmodified, in a foreign language and investing in basic English lessons for the small target market.

Q2: "Also how did Capt Cook navigate for years with no updated almanac?"

Depends a little on the era, or in the case of Cook, the specific voyage.

First, just to get this out of the way, official nautical almanacs were not the only source of data, even in the earliest decades (excluding lunars tables). Navigators used Sun declination tables, for example, that rolled over every four years (but not the single non-leap year 1800). So if the official nautical almanac ran out on an extended voyage, or if a mutineer stole or burned the official document, there was still enough navigation data available to get complete a reasonable mission and eventually sail home with only moderately reduced efficiency and slightly greater risk.

As for official almanacs on long voyages, there are really two options: buy the almanacs, in advance, for the later years of a long expedition, or buy them annually as you go --when visiting well-travelled international ports on the far side of the world. The latter option was not available to Cook on the earliest voyages, of course. There were no international ports to speak of. Yet for a New England whaleship in the Pacific, let's say 75 years later, that was a reasonable plan. Stop in Hawaii or Peru once a year and pick up the latest nautical almanac along with any mail from home, etc. For earlier decades, the best option was to buy several years of data before leaving home. Precisely to satisfy this demand, the almanac team at Greenwich made a huge effort to get their product out some years ahead of the calendar. A navigator could buy the almanac for the year 1775, for example, as early as 1770 (or maybe '71 or '72 --I would have to check).

Frank Reed
Clockwork Mapping / ReedNavigation.com
Conanicut Island USA