OSMTrack 3.0.3

Since the iOS 5.0 was available to general public in October some people have reported that the app crashes under 5.0 when downloading map. In fact, I could reproduce the crash myself, but the crashes were irregular and at different places. Unfortunately I had little time to really take care of the issue but I kept it on the back of my mind. This week I'm already on my Christmas holidays so I decided to look closer at the problem and indeed, Google is our friend, I could find where the problem lies. In addition I made a couple of fast changes according to comments on this blog. Here is the full list:

• Fixed occasional crashes when downloading map under iOS 5.0
• If no map visible the maximum zoom level limitation of 400 meters is removed
• Re-gain the iOS 4.0 compatibility to support iPhone 3G
• Reversed the order of the traces list: now it is latest on top

As usual, I will update this post as soon as the update gets approved. And hopefully next year will be less stressful and that I can really continue the development. Merry Christmas!

UPDATE: the version 3.0.3 was approved today. Just in time to tell you: happy new year!

OSMTrack 3.0.2

The iOS 5.0 will be available tomorrow, and similar to many other apps the OSMTrack doesn't work properly under iOS 5.0. The version 3.0.2 just repairs what is broken by iOS 5.0.

I know, a regular bugfix update is long overdue, and the wish list in comments to my previous posts is long, but somehow I'm still not quite up there... and I'm sorry for that! Hopefully, things will go better in some near future that I have a little bit more time.

OSMTrack 3.0.1 available

OSMTrack 3.0.1 has been approved December 16, the update should work fine now.

Oops... OSMTrack 3.0 adopted, there is a bug when updating the tracks database

OSMTrack has been adopted yesterday, however a small bug prevents the tracks database to update correctly. If you can, wait a little longer please, the fix is on the way. Alternatively you can remove the app from the iPhone/iPad and reinstall it from iTunes. This way you will loose all your tracks, but will be able to use the app immediately.

OSMTrack 3.0

Today I have posted the next version of the OSMTrack to Apple. Sorry, it took me much longer to finalize it than originally supposed (due to some personal issues I had very few to no time to work on it since september). Though I don't pretend that the update "changes everything", but at least for how I use the App it's actually pretty close to that. The new things are:

• Maps. The maps are offline, rendered on the device from the vector data, and downloadable in real time directly from the OpenStreetMap server. Offline means you don't depend on whether you have a connection, e.g. you see the map also on an iPod Touch with TomTom car kit (though I don't officially support the combination people have reported it to work fine). Rendered from vector data means that a lot more data will take a lot less space than if when you would use pre-rendered images, but don't start to download the complete world, it takes a lot of time to "compile" the XML vector data obtained from the server into the internal application format - try a small region first to get an idea of how long it takes on your device really. Downloadable in real time from the OSM server means that you don't need to wait for anyone to render new tiles for the changes you made in the map - just download the data and you have the most recent map.
  
  


• iOS 4.0, multitasking, retina display are supported. You don't have to keep your iPhone's display constantly on to keep the GPS running. Though I find myself doing that nevertheless to see the map :)


• iPad is supported natively.
  


• A lot of other smaller changes and fixes, too many to list them all, especially because I don't remember them all anyway.

Though a lot of things are done now, some things are still to be done (I write it also for myself as a to do list to not forget):

• Map download interface has some minor sharp edges and glitches. It's a bit slow - slower than those based on the routeme framework, but routeme was not used for a reason. However, overall there should not be any big issues with it, it seems to work quite stable.


• In the map download interface I plan to visualize parts of the map already in the database (and how old they are). At some point I could also add an interface to delete parts of the map that are not used any more.


• The map doesn't have any labels yet, furthermore point features (POIs) are not visualized yet as well. Both labels and points are in the database however, just not rendered yet.


• Relations are unsupported yet.


• Drop a pin in the logging state is still not accompanied by a visible effect. To be changed in the next version.


• Since a long time already the are more options than just making a trace public or private. Again, it will be fixed soon.


• Day/night mode (yes, I read reviews in the iTunes App Store).

OSMTrack at the SotM'2010

It is a long time ago I have posted an update to this blog. However, in the background a lot of work has been done and ongoing. This weekend (Saturday, 13:00) at the State Of The Map 2010 I'm going to give a presentation about the current state and discuss future plans for the OSMTrack. I hope you will not be disappointed :) See you in Girona!

UPDATE: Sorry, I posted the link to the slides on the OpenStreetMap Wiki, but have forgotten to update the blog. The slides can be downloaded from here.

Documentation updated

Finally I have managed to update the application documentation. Now it corresponds to the version 2.5. I must apologize for my broken English, I have written the documentation mostly nights (you see it by the time the screenshots were made). Definitely it has not improved the text, but this was the only time I could find. I prefer to use the daytime for the development :)