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Archive for December, 2010

The Inception Effect

Published in augmented reality, demo and fun. 0 Comments

Application Name: Inception: Mobile Architect

Description: Duplicates the “landscape-bending” effect from the movie Inception on your Android unit.

Publisher’s website: Inception: Mobile Architect

Cost: Free

Version/date reviewed: v.1.0  /  12-20-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

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Android Market link (mobile app only)
Android Market link (browser)

In the recent movie Inception, there’s a prominent special effect where the landscape on the horizon bends up into the vertical position. The Inception: Mobile Architect app tries to duplicate this effect on your Android phone, with limited success.

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Figure 1: To set up the bending parameters, hold your phone in portrait mode, and tilt it until the horizontal white line lies between the two ticks at the left. When aligned properly, the background behind the spinning top will be green; incorrect, the background is red. Press the top when you’re ready. Why a top? See the movie to find out …

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Figure 2: You’ll get the bending music/sound effects from the movie, then an image from Google Maps (georeferenced using your GPS) will bend upwards from the horizon line, duplicating the movie effect.

Other issues: As you can see from the picture above, the app isn’t perfect. It tries to discriminated foreground objects from the background, and isn’t always successful. And for some reason, it uses the hybrid Google Maps view with streets/labels displayed, which ruins the effect somewhat. You’ll get better results with a view that has foreground objects clearly distinguishable from the background sky, and I’d guess the best result will come using urban landscapes rather than the natural landscape near my house.

Final thoughts: Use it with the right view, and it’s a cool show-off app for your phone. No useful functions, just a fun demo app.




3D Augmented Reality Compass

Published in augmented reality and compass. 0 Comments

Application Name: Compass3D

Description: Displays a 3D compass rose in the camera view.

Publisher’s website: None

Cost: Free; claims to be ad-supported, but no ads showed up while I was using it.

Version/date reviewed: v.1.4  /  12-20-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

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Android Market link (mobile app only)
Android Market link (browser)

This is a one-function app; it creates a floating 3D compass rose in your phone’s camera view, with magnetic north indicated by the red color:

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The red North arrow can sometimes be obscured by the other direction arrows; however, the rose stays “horizontal” in augmented reality as you tilt the camera, so that you can see the direction arrows more clearly:

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Other issues: On my Droid X, the arrow sometimes doesn’t show up. Exiting the program and starting it again usually fixes this issue.

Final thoughts: This is pretty much a demo app, to impress those unfamiliar with smartphones or augmented reality apps. Might prove useful in a few instances where you need to find the relative direction between objects in your field of view. In any case, the price is right.




Measure Object Lengths With Smart Ruler

Published in angle, distance, level and measurement. 0 Comments

Application Name: Smart Ruler

Description: Measure lengths of objects placed on the Android unit’s screen

Publisher’s website: Android Boy

Cost: Free basic version; $0.99 Smart Ruler Pro version adds protractor, level, goniometer; $1.99 Smart Tools version combines apps from pro versions of Smart Measure, Smart Compass and Smart Ruler.

Version/date reviewed: v.1.1.3  /  12-21-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

sr_qr

Android Market link (mobile app only)
Android Market link (browser)

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Figure 1: This is a simple app that displays a scale on the screen, measurements increasing left to right; tap or tap/draganywhere on the screen to put a red marker line, and display the distance at that point. You can change units, font sizes and colors from the Settings menu. On my phone, distances were perfectly calibrated, but if you have a problem, you can manually enter a phone calibration distance into the Settings as well.

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Figure 2: Place an object flush against the left side, and tap/drag the red marker to the end of the object to measure its length.

Other issues: If you don’t have a screen protector, you run the risk of scratching the screen with the object. Even with tough Gorilla Glass, there are some objects (like rocks) that can scratch a screen.

Final thoughts:

Not much to say; does what it’s supposed to. The entire Smart line is pretty good (I’ve already reviewed a few others), and the $1.99 Smart Tools package, containing all these Smart measuring apps, is a bargain.




Coordinate Conversion And Waypoint Distances With Lat Long Calc

Published in coordinates, distance, GPS and GPX. 0 Comments

Application Name: Lat Long Calc

Description: Converts decimal latitude/longitude to UTM/DM/DMS; calculates distances and headings between points.

Publisher’s website: Cruthu Services

Cost: Free; $1 Pro version adds more features.

Version/date reviewed: v.1.52  /  12-19-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

llc_qr

Android Market link (mobile app only)
Android Market link (browser)

Lat Long Calc can convert a decimal latitude/longitude position into degrees/minutes, degrees/minutes/seconds, or UTM coordinates. Enter a second position, and it can calculate the distance and heading towards that position.

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Figure 1: You can type in coordinates to either the top or bottom position, with the top (A) being the starting point and bottom (B) being the destination. If you enable GPS with the bottom checkbox, you also have the option of copying your current GPS position into A.

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Figure 2: If you have a GPX file with waypoints online, you can upload them into the program’s database by accessing the DB Manager from the main menu. Once loaded in, you can edit the coordinates of an individual waypoint, or delete it. Unfortunately, you can’t change the name, or manually add a waypoint, which is a major drawback.

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Figure 3: Once waypoints are in the database, you can load them into either the origin (A) or destination (B) using the Get from DB button in the main screen.

Other issues: Distance units are in miles only; no option to change that to metric units. And if you turn the GPS on with the checkbox, be sure to turn it off, or exit the program with the official Exit command from the menu; using the back button to get out of the program screen will leave the GPS on, draining the batter.

Final thoughts: Nice conversion function, importing GPX files online is useful, and the distance/bearing info can come in handy. It really needs the ability to add waypoints to the database on the fly, and metric units would be useful as well.




Find Your "Tunnel Destination" With Dig Planet!

Published in cartography, coordinates, education, local data and photos. 0 Comments

Application Name: Dig The Planet

Description: Shows where you’d come out on the Earth if you started digging a hole in the direction you’re pointing your phone.

Publisher’s website: Eagle Keeper Programming

Cost: Free ad-supported version; $1.36 paid ad-free version

Version/date reviewed: v. 0.2RC1 /  12-19-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

dtp_qr

Android market link
Android Market link (browser)

Not too long ago, I reviewed the AntipodalPoint app for Android, which locates the spot on the Earth exactly opposite your current location, or another location of your choice. The Dig The Planet app is a similar idea, but more general: point your phone down in any direction, not just straight down, and find out where you’d come out if you dug a tunnel in that direction until you came out the other side.

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Figure 1: Point your phone down in any direction, and the app shows the tilt and heading of your phone, as well as the geographical coordinates where you will emerge. If you point the phone up, the app will flip the direction around 180 degrees so that it is actually going down. The section at top is part of the “game” aspect of the app, where you score “stars” by coming out near the location of a number of world cities. Once you’re pointing in the desired location, press the “Dig Here! button …

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Figure 2: … and get the location where you’d come out if you dug a tunnel at your chosen tilt and heading angles displayed on a static map (not scrollable or zoomable; no choice of map type). If there are any Panoramio photos geotagged near the location you come out, they will show up in a slide viewer below the map

Other issues: Yeah, I’ve got a few quibbles with the app:

  • Be prepared to turn down the media volume on your phone; the app plays a really annoying background jingle in a continuous loop
  • Pointing towards the location of a city to score points is virtually impossible at the default accuracy settings. The help file implies that there’s a way to adjust that accuracy setting to be more forgiving, but damned if I could find the settings section.
  • On my Droid X, the GPS remains turned on even after you exit the app; the only way to shut it off permanently is to reboot the phone by turning it off and on, or by uninstalling the app. And having the GPS on can drain the battery very quickly. Toggling the GPS off will disable it momentarily, but it will spring back on again if you re-enable GPS.

Final thoughts: Great idea, and can be a fun learning tool and Android demo app, especially for kids. But it needs to fix the GPS “always on” problem, there needs to be a settings section to adjust the accuracy settings for the “game”, and most of all it needs an option to turn off the really annoying background music.




An Augmented Reality Laser Level Line

Published in level. 0 Comments

Application Name: Laser Level

Description: Displays a horizontal level line, and optionally a vertical line, as an overlay in the camera view.

Publisher’s website: Black Dot Mobile

Cost: Free

Version/date reviewed: v.1.1  /  12-14-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

llevel_qr

Android Market link (mobile app only)
Android Market link (browser)

The Laser Level app displays a red horizontal line in your Android’s camera view, regardless of how the camera is tilted:

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Here, the red line is perfectly horizontal; the “1.7” at lower left indicates that the camera is tilted 1.7 degrees from level. Tapping the “box” at lower right will bring up a green line on-screen that shows the camera orientation:

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By tilting the camera until the green line lines up with the target object, you can measure the tilt angle of the target. The red line will always represent true horizontal.

In settings, you can adjust the picture transparency so that the lines are better highlighted, and you can also add a true vertical line to the display to make a “cross”:

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You can move the red horizontal line or the “cross” to line up exactly with the object in the camera view by tapping and dragging it on-screen.

Other issues: The camera needs to be vertically-oriented for this to be accurate; you can’t tip it up or down. And it can be hard to get things to line up correctly when you’re holding the phone in your hands, as the image may not be steady enough for you to see how level the object is. Bracing yourself against a solid object, or using a tripod, can help with this.

Final thoughts: Bit tricky to use, and not sure how often it will come in necessary. But if you need to level a picture or other object, and don’t have a good level handy, this will do in a pinch.




GPS Essentials : GPS/Orientation Readout And More

Published in augmented reality, compass, Google Maps, GPS, level and waypoints. 5 Comments

Application Name: GPS Essentials

Description: Displays GPS/orientation data, satellites, map; customizable data readout

Publisher’s website: GPS Essentials

Cost: Free; $2.81 donation plugin.

Version/date reviewed: v.1.0.2  /  12-13-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

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Android market link
Android Market link (browser)

Like the previously-reviewed GPS Test and GPS Status, GPS Essentials monitors and displays information from both your GPS signal and compass direction.

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Figure 1: There are six screens available in this app, plus the settings screen (accessible with the menu button) that lets you set options like units and preferred coordinates.

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Figure 2: The Dashboard is the killer function for this app; it displays more information than any other GPS dashboard I’ve seen on any other app. Plus, the items displayed, and their position, is fully configurable. Choose Add from the menu, and select from 30 different data options.

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Figure 3: Press and drag on a data item to move it to a new position, or drop it on the trashcan icon at the bottom to delete it.

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Figure 4: The compass display is pretty basic. What’s more, even though there’s an option to set either true or magnetic north in Settings, that option isn’t functional – the app always uses magnetic north. You’ll need to correct for your local magnetic declination to get the true direction.

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Figure 5: Camera view displays a level horizon line, and the magnetic direction you’re facing at the bottom. Can’t quite figure out the significance (if any) of the central circle.

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Figure 6: Map view displays your current location, with a compass indicator at top left showing which direction you’re facing.  You have the standard Google Map layers to choose from (roads, terrain, aerial, hybrid). You can also plot the local addresses of people on your contact lists, or select a contact and have their address plotted. Finally, you can use the Waypoints menu function to add waypoints either by tapping on the map, or selecting your current location.

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Figure 7: The Satellites screen gives a standard view of the GPS satellites above the horizon, and how many of them are being used to determine your current position.

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Figure 8: Finally, the Waypoints screen gives you a list of saved waypoints. Tapping on one brings up a screen that lets you edit the name or coordinates, geocode it (find the nearest address), change the icon, show it on a map, delete it, or set it as a target to navigate to.  There are also Import/Export buttons available on the Menu button for this screen, but they don’t currently appear to be functional.

Other issues: No problems with crashes or closes.

Final thoughts: The best screen on this app is the dashboard – no other GPS app on Android comes close. For that alone, this app is worth installing. The other screens also offer useful functions, but there are better apps for most of these. The lack of a working option to set true north instead of magnetic north is a big drawback, and I hope a future version will fix that.




Augmented Reality Direction Grid With Compass Ball

Published in augmented reality and compass. 0 Comments

Application Name: Compass Ball

Description: Overlays a compass direction grid on top of a live camera view.

Publisher’s website: jthuniverse

Cost: Free

Version/date reviewed: v.1.3.2  /  12-12-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

compassball_qr

Android Market link (mobile app only)
Android Market link (browser)

compass_ball

Figure 1: Compass Ball is a one-trick pony; it overlays a grid representing compass directions on top of the screen view generated by your camera. The picture at left is from the app page, to give you a general idea of the view it creates; screenshots from my Android phone don’t include the camera view.

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Figure 2: The grid can be viewed in either portrait or landscape view; I think landscape is usually a better choice, because you get a wider view.

Other issues: Generally works well, but there are a couple of quirks.

  • It may take the grid a few seconds to show up on-screen, so be patient.
  • The app uses magnetic direction, rather than true direction; you’ll have to manually/mentally adjust for the magnetic declination in your area, the offset between true north and magnetic north.
  • The display can get stuck in an entirely incorrect direction reading. If you “wobble” the phone around, rocking it both left/right and back/forth at the same time, this seems to get the grid to move to the correct orientation.
  • It can take the grid a few seconds to drift into the right position, especially when you change directions.

Final thoughts: Cool little app, nice for finding the general azimuth angle distance between features. The option to set the grid to true north, rather than just magnetic north, would make it even more useful.




Contribute Points Of Interest (POIs) To The OpenStreetMap Project With Mapzen POI Collector

Published in crowdsourcing, online maps and OpenStreetMap. 0 Comments

Application Name: Mapzen POI Collector

Description: Collect data about local points of interest, and add it to the OpenStreetMap project.

Publisher’s website: CloudMade

Cost: Free

Version/date reviewed: v.0.5.1  /  12-12-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

mapzen_qr

Android Market link (mobile app only)
Android Market link (browser)

The OpenStreetMap Project is a collective, crowdsourcing effort to create a worldwide free map dataset, with both natural and man-made features. It relies mainly on volunteer user contributions of data, although some commercial companies (e.g. Microsoft, ESRI) are also getting involved in contributing data and resources. After registering on the OpenStreetMap site, you can contribute the project using their online editor Potlatch. But CloudMade, the quasi-commercial relative of the OpenStreetMap project, has released Mapzen POI Collector, an Android app that lets you add point-of-interest (POI) data to the OpenStreetMap database directly from your phone. Note: You’ll need to be registered on the OpenStreetMap site to contribute data, as the app will ask for your registration ID and password.

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Figure 1: The app will load in OpenStreetMap map imagery for your general location, or your exact location if you choose “My location” from the menu. The symbols you see on the map are previously-recorded POIs;; to see all of them, zoom in closer, as some of them will only appear at higher zoom levels. You may have to give the app a few seconds to load in all the POIs as you change the zoom level, as it can be a bit slow.

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Figure 2: Zooming in, several additional POIs become visible; these are two that I added recently, a library and a city hall. To identify a POI, tap on it …

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Figure 3: … to bring up an ID tag; tap on the blue arrow to bring up more info …

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Figure 4: … like the name and type. If you want to add more info to this POI listing, you can choose Edit POI from the menu …

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Figure 5: … and add additional info like the address, phone number, hours, etc..

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Figure 6: If I want to add a POI, I need to scroll the map to the desired location, then choose Add POI from the menu.

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Figure 7: An icon appears, which I can press and drag to move to the correct location. A long press on the blue arrow brings up the info screen …

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Figure 8: … where I can add data. This particular location is a post office …

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Figure 9: … and I select the correct PO Type from the Services sublisting, Post office here; there are hundreds of Types grouped by categories like Auto, Education, Entertainment, Government, etc.

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Figure 10: After entering all the data I have, I need to select Save from the menu to submit the data. As I kept learning, pressing the Back button will lose all the data I’ve submitted (d’oh!).

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Figure 11: If the data submission is successful, the POI entry becomes live in the OpenStreetMap database right away, and can be seen in the map view on your app, like the Post Office icon now visible at left.
Other issues: Apart from the slowness of POI display, and occasional slowness in loading OpenStreetMap imagery tiles, seemed to work fine.

Final thoughts: OpenStreetMap data is only as complete as the efforts of volunteers can make it. If you want to join in on the process, this app is a simple and easy way to start.




GPS Trip Recording And Online/Offline Maps With Trimble Outdoors

Published in audio, GPS, GPX, offline maps, online maps, photos, topographic maps and video. 0 Comments

Application Name: Trimble Outdoors

Description: GPS app for trip recording, with online/offline maps

Publisher’s website: Trimble Outdoors

Cost: $9.99

Version/date reviewed: v.4.1.8  /  12-11-10

Phone/OS: Droid X / Android 2.2

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Android Market link (mobile app only)
Android Market link (browser)

Trimble is probably best known for its professional lines of GPS and other measurement hardware. They’re also known for making really crappy software that runs them; you can often locate a Trimble user in the field by listening for curse words, as something else goes wrong with the software. Trimble Outdoors is an unusual foray into the general consumer field for them; do they do any better here?

The general idea behind the software is to create records of various kinds of outdoor activities, and upload them to the Trimble Outdoors website for storage and sharing. So you’ll need to create a free account at Trimble Outdoors to use the software at all.

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Figure 1: After starting up the program, and logging in, you’ll see a list of of activities under which you can record trips. Start up hiking …

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Figure 2: … and the app will fire up the GPS, load in maps for the area using the chosen mapset, and start logging your position as a track. From the list screen, you can also go to a list of previously-saved trips, and load them into the map view as well, either for viewing or for continuation of that trip.

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Figure 3: Here’s a short pair of tracks, along with several waypoints. You can add waypoints, but there’s no on-screen control for that; you need to dive into the menu to find that control.

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Figure 4: The Stats button gives you info about distance traveled, total time, and average speed; the Charts give you the choice of plotting either Elevation or Speed as a function of distance or time.

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Figure 5: When you’re recording a trip, you can also capture photos, audio, or video, tagged with the location they were taken at.

When a trip is complete, you can save it on your Android unit. You can also upload it to your online Trimble Outdoors account, either for personal private storage or to share it with others:

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And you have the option of sharing this trip on either Facebook or Twitter as well.

This all sounds great … in theory. In practice, this app has some major issues:

  • Screens can be slow and non-responsive, especially the start-up list of activities
  • The choice of in-app maps is limited to Bing maps (road, aerial, hybrid, terrain) and MyTopo topo maps; no OpenStreetMap maps, or anything else. Google Map imagery is only available if you export track and waypoint data to a separate screen; it’s not integrated with the app, the way it is with other Android GPS and map apps.
  • The app can be flaky in recording data. It’s supposed to continually record a track, but on several occasions track recording spontaneously stopped.
  • The app will cache maps for offline use, but the only way to do it within the app is to pan the map to the desired area, and then pan/zoom in around to save maps to the cache directory. This is really a crappy way to handle this; other map apps let you define a geographic region, and then automatically download the tiles for that region.
  • The default size setting for the cache is only 10 MB, far too small to save any significant number of maps; you’ll need to set this larger right away.
  • You can generate map caches at the Trimble Outdoors website, but the process isn’t straightforward. You zoom/pan a Google Maps view or MyTopo map view to show your desired area, and then select the maximum zoom level you want tiles for; the web app will then generate a zip file containing these tiles. You then have to manually unzip the zip file, and then copy the files over into the cache directory  on your phone (making sure that the cache is large enough to hold these tiles). And even though you’re viewing Google Map imagery in the app, the downloaded tiles will be in the matching Bing Maps format, not Google Maps!
  • Unlike other apps, you can’t create named mapsets that you can load in at will; you have the cached maps and that’s it.
  • You can’t import GPX track or waypoint files directly; you need to import this data into your online account to create a trip containing these, then upload this trip into the app on your Android unit.
  • You can create trips online using a Trimble Outdoors web app, including tracks/waypoints/audio/video/photos. But I found this web app to be sluggish and erratic in performance. Creating tracks where I wanted them to be was virtually impossible, as the track would stop following my cursor, then jump to an unintended spot.
  • There’s no way to directly export tracks or waypoints created in the app itself; you have to upload the trip to your online account, then export the data from there as a GPX or Google Earth KML/KMZ file.
  • If you load in an earlier trip, then try to exit that trip without saving it again, you can wind up deleting the earlier trip data (as I found out to my regret, several times).
  • There’s no integrated GPS status screen or compass.
  • The app can only really be used in portrait orientation; in landscape orientation, the app’s toolbar takes up so much space that there’s very little left for the actual map.
  • Finding app functions and settings is pretty much hit-and-miss; there doesn’t seem to be any rational layout of functions.
  • And I could go on …

Other issues: While I didn’t have any issues with crashes or force-closes, you might take a look at the Comments section in the Android Market listing for this app; lots of people seem to be having problems. Now that Google is reducing the amount of time you have to uninstall a program for a full refund, from 24 hours to 15 minutes, you really won’t have a lot of time to evaluate how well it will work on your phone.

Final thoughts: For an app that’s already in version 4, and has been around since 2009, it’s still not in very good shape, especially for the price they’re asking. While the ability to create georeferenced multimedia trips sounds pretty cool, the actual program function just isn’t reliable enough to make this worthwhile. And as a GPS mapping app, it’s missing a lot of functionality. If you want MyTopo topo maps, either BackCountry Navigator or Topo Maps would be a better choice; while neither of those is perfect, they have more of the GPS functions you really need to have, are far easier to use, and offer in-app map caching and mapset management. And for a solid general GPS map app, you’d do better with OruxMaps, which has a lot more features, and is free.




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