Wish: Routing along Tracks

[hundertvolt]

Hello,

I am using Locus Pro for some time now, and I have a feature wish: The possibility to route / guide along a recorded or imported track - neither me nor Google found such a feature!

Background of this is that I do much cycling, and on the one hand, I commonly record the track when we are driving in a group, so that I can lateron find it alone, and on the other hand, there are websites like gpsies.com or similar that offer GPX track downloads for hiking and biking.

Before I found Locus Pro, I had TrekBuddy for this purpose, but Locus Pro is WAY better    only yet I could not find this feature.

The way how they treat the routing there is as follows:
- you manually select the direction of how the track shall be followed (forward / backwards). Then the GPX track is treated as a simple ordered list.
- on the screen a direction and distance to the closest point is shown.
- as soon as you get close to the point (trigger distance can be set), the next point out of the list is selected; like this a point-to-point navigation is made.
- if you skip points (e.g. if a route is blocked and you go around), it continues routing as soon as you get close to some arbitrary point of the route from this point on.

As far as I can estimate, for Locus Pro this would simply (?) mean the possibility that not only a calculated track, but an imported / recorded track can be used in the navigation feature - correct me if I am wrong!

Again, I want to thank you for the great work you made with Locus Pro, the UI and the map import feature is absolutely lovely!!!  

[wvb]

I would really like to use Locus for "in-pocket-guiding" when walking or cycling a gpx.

Ideally a sound when I have to take a turn and another sound when I am too far off track.
This is already partially possible.

Locus needs specific points to know when to warn you.
I don't really know what sort of points and it seems that imported gpx may have different sorts of points.

Perhaps a great feature that could help here is that we can import a gpx and let Locus do a recalc with its routing engine so it is the same route but with points only on turns.

I think this will help out OP and me
Or if menion has another idea or tips.

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk

[Menion]

oki guys, this is something I was thinking about a little. Maybe you can help me with this.

main question for me is format of data that can be imported to locus and that will contain some directions info. If you import GPX file that contain trk point, there is no space for directions data. On other side, rte data usually contains only direction points. So what are common solutions on other devices? Don't you have some sample for this or at least something where to start?

[wvb]

thanks for considering this!!

sadly I have no experience with this as it is a functionality I have been looking for for quite some time now and have not found it

I downloaded some gpx files from various walking and cycling websites and they all seem to contain "trkpt" and one "wpt" that marks the start
they don't seem to contain any data by which Locus can know where a turn is.

A function in Locus to "convert" the imported gpx with the routing engine so Locus knows where the turn are could help for roads that are know by the routing engine but it might be a problem when the gpx is offroad...

[qki]

Hello.

I just found this on the web ... it´s an iphone app with navigation ... maybe its inspiring:
//http://www.upmove.eu/de/magazin/news/iphone-app/deine-upmove-gps-app-als-navigationsgeraet/886d13e179.html
//http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZSSmSNoQHc

I´m really looking forward for a working "Routing along tracks" ...

Greetings from Germany ... qki

[hundertvolt]

In Trekbuddy, the app I mentioned, they just played a beep when the trigger distance to a point was reached. I could live with this, but for 'in pocket nav' it won't be sufficient...

I have a suggestion for a basic algorithm: Set Locus to look forward in the routing direction for a certain, user-settable distance - no matter how many waypoints are within. If the direction (calculated in routing order of two points by differentiation) within this distance (entry direction vs. exit direction) changes for more than a certain amount of degrees (should also be user settable), Locus announces a turn. If no waypoints are within this prediction distance, the next following waypoint will be used. So for example, if within a 10 meters radius direction turns for more than 25 degrees, it will notify the user.

Examples of typical GPX files can be obtained from http://www.gpsies.com (a biker/hiker community) and a German service called 'Radroutenplaner Hessen' where you can set a starting point and a destination, and it will calculate a cycling route and output it as a GPX.

Best regards from Germany, looking forward! :-)

[gorch]

oki guys, this is something I was thinking about a little. Maybe you can help me with this.
main question for me is format of data that can be imported to locus and that will contain some directions info. If you import GPX file that contain trk point, there is no space for directions data. On other side, rte data usually contains only direction points. So what are common solutions on other devices? Don't you have some sample for this or at least something where to start?

I don't know the algorithm, but OsmAnd does it perfectly. It can navigate along any GPX file. Maybe sources can help in such an investigating? Or asking an author?

[hundertvolt]

Hi all,

Just a quick question - are there any news about this topic? It became so quiet here recently ;-)

Best wishes,
Hundertvolt

[CycleKev]

Hello guys,

I am also a very happy user of Locus Pro and at first many thanks to the author for this great software!
I love the navigation feature and I also created routes via outdooractive.com or gpsies.com. After importing them into Locus a have the same problem like others. I can use the "guide to" function but for ciclying its not the best to navigate in unknown areas/cities (I don't like to drive slower than 20kmh). For walking in the field it should be perfect, but during cycling it can be very stressful and the navigation feature is the best you can have. I also realised that osmand and for example run.gps trainer can handle every gpx-file and the apps recalculate the navigation route themselve, but never leave the imported track. Seems, that they take a look into the file and looking for useful navigation points so that the user gets the instruction "in 45m turn left" or "go ahead 1254m".

Also my question is, if this feature in Locus is planned or if you work on it, how the progress is? If this feature will be added in Locus, this app will be the perfect outdoor navigator!

At the last point I want to let you know, why i have the other apps but why I don't want to use them. I like a professional look and feel, clear user interface without ugly colours and logos (i like a good contrast, love the night view mode!) and Locus has everything I like.

So for now, I look forward for a reply and thanks very much.

Best regards from Germany!

[Jurlui]

Would be really great to have simple audio navigation for these kind of offroad tracks and routes. :-)

[Menion]

Hi Guys,
  glad you like Locus

  what features will be added is based on two facts. First is what I want. Currently main features for me is better GUI, more simple and intuitive and better content. So in next weeks I'll be improving Locus Shop and will try to add some new maps. Second fact is You as an users and voting on Getsatisfaction here https://getsatisfaction.com/locus , so I suggest search there a little (because such feature is already there for sure) and vote for it. I'm slowly adding some of most wanted features so if there will be big interest, there is big chance, feature will be added

[CycleKev]

Thanks menion,

just voted!