Route Planner 8 Expands

Surface running Route Planner 8 and Nokia 920 running Walk-Run-Bike-Drive

My Surface tablet arrived about 4 weeks ago. Testing began for Route Planner 8 on ARM. Actually being able to test wasn’t as straight forward as expected. Let’s just say developer tools for deploying and testing on ARM are in their infancy — or perhaps it just took me longer to “learn the ropes” than anticipated.

Eventually, I was able to deploy and test on my Surface tablet. Happily it works! Works well! I was a bit apprehensive given the low power of the ARM processor. But, there was no stuttering or significant speed differences between ARM and high-power Intel processors.

In addition to performance testing, I spent time making sure the sharing of routes works as easily as possible. Some tweaks to Walk-Run-Bike-Drive for Windows Phone were published to more easily share routes with Route Planner 8.  If you haven’t read about it, see this post.

Recently, updates to Route Planner 8 have also been published in the Windows Store. The app is also now offered for ARM devices.

Also, Route Planner 8 (as well as Walk-Run-Bike-Drive) is now available in all Windows Store markets world-wide. Well, almost everywhere. It seems that China does not like Bing Maps so no apps using Bing Maps are allowed in China.

Walk-Run-Bike-Drive Version 1.10.1.3 Now Available

An update to Walk-Run-Bike-Drive is available in the app store now. The changes are all in the “under-the-hood” category.

Microsoft now allows just about any file type to be stored in SkyDrive. At the time of designing Walk-Run-Bike-Drive, only a few basic file types could be uploaded to SkyDrive, for example, TXT for text files, JPG for photos, etc.

Walk-Run-Bike-Drive imports and exports GPX file types. GPX stands for GPS Exchange Format. In the early days of Windows Phone, SkyDrive would not allow GPX file types. To get around that, we made our file type “.GPX.TXT” since text files were allowed.

Fast forward to present day: Now we can store GPX file types in SkyDrive. And our new Windows 8 app, Route Planner 8 (for your Windows 8 tablet or desktop) does open and save GPX file types to SkyDrive.

To make the sharing of routes between your tablet, desktop, and phone easier, we’ve updated the phone app to use “GPX” file types instead of “.GPX.TXT”.

Confused? Well, basically this update simply means you can create a route on your Windows 8 desktop, save it to SkyDrive, and open it on your phone without needing to rename or move any files.

Also, routes and tracks you find on GPS sharing sites can be opened on your phone without renaming the file.

For compatibility, Walk-Run-Bike-Drive will still find and read the previous file type too. But new routes saved to SkyDrive will be “GPX” type. This is handled automatically by the app.

Route Planner 8 now in Windows Store

Our latest Route Planner app is now available for Windows 8. You will find it in the Microsoft Windows Store at http://apps.microsoft.com/webpdp/app/route-planner-8/49d2e96a-2a74-47b1-b603-7de565f93cf0.

Now, your favorite routes and tracks can be viewed and edited on either your Windows Phone or tablet or desktop PC.

Check our Route Planner 8 page for more details on the app.

Our Windows Phone 7.5 app, Walk-Run-Bike-Drive, shares routes and tracks with Route Planner 8. Sharing between your devices is easy using SkyDrive. Also, Route Planner 8 uses Windows 8′s native sharing allowing you to email a map of your route or location to anyone.

For example, use your Windows 8 desktop PC with Route Planner 8 to set your route. Enter all your waypoints using your keyboard. Then use RP8′s Save-As app bar menu choice. Pick SkyDrive and save your route to your RoutePlannerWP folder.  Then you’ll be able to open the route on your Windows Phone from SkyDrive.

Next up, a new version designed specifically for Windows Phone 8 and additional features for Route Planner 8.

Send us an email or comment if there is a feature you would like to see added.

Walk-Run-Bike-Drive New Version

An update to our Windows Phone comprehensive GPS app, Walk-Run-Bike-Drive, has been sent to Microsoft Marketplace today. This update, to version 1.6, gives the user an option for starting the app with a map of your last route and track displayed first. Also, new, your current GPS location, altitude, current speed, and compass course are shown in the lower right corner of the map.

As before, your track (path you took with “tracking” on) data is displayed in the lower left corner. Elapsed time, total track distance, and average speed for the track are shown.

Displaying your current position and current GPS information can be disabled and enabled in the settings page.

Look for this update to hit the Marketplace in the next few days. You can try it out here: http://windowsphone.com/s?appid=395e46dc-09dd-4fcb-b8cb-bf9c826ec7ea

For more information on the app, go to Walk-Run-Bike-Drive.com.

We’re Honored in Microsoft’s App’y Nokia New Year promotion

I was notified by the Microsoft Windows Phone Team that Walk-Run-Bike-Drive was selected in their “App’y Nokia New Year” promotion. They are shipping me a shinny new Nokia Lumia 800!

You know how everyone says “I never win anything!” Well, I won’t be able to say that for a while now.

The phone I’ve been using to test apps is a Samsung Focus — the first gen focus. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a nice phone. But, I look forward to taking the Lumia for a test drive!

Walk-Run-Bike-Drive Now in Marketplace

A couple days ago, Microsoft certified Walk-Run-Bike-Drive for the North American Marketplace.  The app is being re-submitted for the World-Wide marketplace. Since it takes longer for World-Wide certification, I decided to go the two-step approach.

You can try a free trial from the marketplace using this link: http://windowsphone.com/s?appid=395e46dc-09dd-4fcb-b8cb-bf9c826ec7ea

For a complete description with screen shots and a video, look at the app website:
walk-run-bike-drive.com.

Walk-Run-Bike-Drive for Windows Phone 7

Aerial Map View showing

wayoints, track, elapsed time,

distance, speed.

Based on my experience with Route Planner for webOS, I developed a mapping-routing-tracking app for Windows Phone 7.5, also known as Mango. Since it has so many additional capabilities, I renamed the app to Walk-Run-Bike-Drive. Check its home page at Walk-Run-Bike-Drive.com for more details.

I’m currently looking for beta testers. Using Microsoft’s private beta service, Microsoft’s marketplace approves the app and allows downloads from pre-approved Windows-Live accounts.  If you’re interested, send me your Windows Live account email address.

Stay tuned. I will announce when the app goes live in the “real” Marketplace.