New 4x4 overland blogging/tracking website

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mike
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New 4x4 overland blogging/tracking website

Postby mike » Mon Aug 01, 2016 2:31 pm

Hi All,

Some of you will know I live on a boat and then sailed it around the pacific and as such built a yacht tracking website. Some of you will also know that Dieselboy tracked his 4x4 adventure around Australia with the yachting site. While this worked, it wasn't quite ideal. Then somebody else I knew wanted their motorbike tracked in much the same adventure but with less detail than DB's. Then a campervan appeared on the yaching site. Btw the site I'm talking about is http://www.yit.nz .

So I copied the yacht tracking site and created https://nomads.world and migrated DB's outback trip over and the motorbike one. Check out DB's page https://nomads.world/nomad/betsie The site is now live and can be used by anyone overlanding or touring, safaring or what ever you want to call it. Doing a big trip around the north island like NJV6 then this is perfect. I'm going to add in automated updates from the mobile phone app which will record them offline when out of coverage and send them all in when back in, perfect for 4wds as we have our phones in the dash on the whole time.

I'll be using it for the QB2017 trip.

If you've got any suggestions, don't be shy post them here. Some of the best features of the yachting site came from suggestions and feedback.
1973 SWB Land Rover V8 Hybrid
1994 Toyota Surf

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NJV6
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Re: New 4x4 overland blogging/tracking website

Postby NJV6 » Mon Aug 01, 2016 3:49 pm

Looks cool, I'll have a play around later. That sort of thing I would have used, family were interested in where we were as well and they could have looked it up.
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Re: New 4x4 overland blogging/tracking website

Postby mike » Mon Aug 01, 2016 4:14 pm

NJV6 wrote:Looks cool, I'll have a play around later. That sort of thing I would have used, family were interested in where we were as well and they could have looked it up.


Your trip and Albundy's would have been cool as it is quite good to see where you go as well as photos and text. But your trips were just a bit too early and the site was pretty rough at that stage.

With that chrome app you can set the date to backdate the posts if you want, then it gives you an idea of your whole trip. I still need to do some work with the distance stats and stuff as it is still in yachting terms, but that is all minor.
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Re: New 4x4 overland blogging/tracking website

Postby NJV6 » Tue Aug 02, 2016 10:39 pm

I have had a good look around but I feel I am missing something - is it designed to be uploaded by an app (such as from my iphone) and then able to be read by anyone (such as family many miles away) on a desktop/laptop through a normal web browser?
[Edit - I downloaded Chrome and the Nomads 'app' on PC and it worked ok - not sure if my Mum would manage though] - does the page need a 'how to'?

A couple of mistakes I found

I am guessing you will change 'Yacht information' (My Account) to something else - It took me while to find the editing area.
Vehichle description is a spelling error.
I played around with creating an entry and once created, went back to the desktop home page and clicked delete (button under GPS coordinates) on the entry I created thinking it would delete the co ordinates (it said I was in Auckland but Im not...!) and the whole post vanished. Maybe a "are you sure you want to delete update"? However I see it is still on the 'app', didn't see somewhere to 're-submit'

Could the map have the ability to type in much the same as google maps, ie type Gor... and the options start coming up for Gore, Southland, NZ if you just want to enter a blog?

I would look forward to an apple app and would definitely use the site, I hope others do to (except all the best tracks that we like to keep to ourselves :D)

Clear as mud?
Glen
SWB V6 Paj with one or two mods ;)

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mike
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Re: New 4x4 overland blogging/tracking website

Postby mike » Tue Aug 02, 2016 10:58 pm

NJV6 wrote:I have had a good look around but I feel I am missing something - is it designed to be uploaded by an app (such as from my iphone) and then able to be read by anyone (such as family many miles away) on a desktop/laptop through a normal web browser?
[Edit - I downloaded Chrome and the Nomads 'app' on PC and it worked ok - not sure if my Mum would manage though] - does the page need a 'how to'?

A couple of mistakes I found

I am guessing you will change 'Yacht information' (My Account) to something else - It took me while to find the editing area.
Vehichle description is a spelling error.
I played around with creating an entry and once created, went back to the desktop home page and clicked delete (button under GPS coordinates) on the entry I created thinking it would delete the co ordinates (it said I was in Auckland but Im not...!) and the whole post vanished. Maybe a "are you sure you want to delete update"? However I see it is still on the 'app', didn't see somewhere to 're-submit'

Could the map have the ability to type in much the same as google maps, ie type Gor... and the options start coming up for Gore, Southland, NZ if you just want to enter a blog?

I would look forward to an apple app and would definitely use the site, I hope others do to (except all the best tracks that we like to keep to ourselves :D)

Clear as mud?
Glen


Oops was meant to remove the quick delete. That was a hang over from the yachting site where 100's of updates would be posted. It actually needs to go from both sites and I will do it now while I remember.

Thanks heaps for the feedback. It is a lot of work getting this up and running and naturally I'll miss stuff and it is good to point it out no matter how small.

I'll have a look into the address search and see how easy it is to add it. You can click on the map to get the position auto filled into the boxes on the web. Nothing like that on the app at this stage though. I will investigate it though.

I'm just working on the auto updates from the mobile app so we can have it on the dashboard and set and leave. It should save into the app when cell reception is lost and send again once it is regained.

Hopefully, the good thing is, this is not really a track database so people hopefully wont be going to it to find tracks, its more family and friends coming along for the ride from home.

I think I will make a couple of howto short video clips as well as a text howto.

I'll get on and get that app released so you can be the chief tester :mrgreen:
1973 SWB Land Rover V8 Hybrid
1994 Toyota Surf

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Re: New 4x4 overland blogging/tracking website

Postby mike » Sun Aug 07, 2016 11:32 am

I made a few changes to the app and had it mounted on the dashboard where I usually have my speedo app running. I added in a speedo and heading function in. I made it so you can choose the update frequency. I had it running every 2mins and sometimes 5 mins. The default is 10mins. Offroad you want it updating more so you can see the track pretty much.

The app would go in and out of reception and when out would store up the updates. Once it hit reception again it would send the backlog.

You can see my track around the south coast of wellington. There are a couple of manual updates where I took some photos. Those were taken when there wasnt reception.

https://nomads.world/nomad/mike
1973 SWB Land Rover V8 Hybrid
1994 Toyota Surf

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mike
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Re: New 4x4 overland blogging/tracking website

Postby mike » Tue Aug 23, 2016 8:32 pm

So the tracking website is fully live now. (still have a couple of minor text and icon changes) but it is completely usable.

I have Android and Apple apps in the store. The site is completely free. The apps have a minor charge to joe public. But to ORE members I have a heap of codes available so you can get the apps for free.

I did some testing of the app at Rallywoods (where the barry crump commercial was filmed with the cruiser at the green hut) and mapped out some of the tracks. This was on a pretty buggy version but it has shown some potential new loop tracks already.

I have a driving mode with a digital speedo and direction (incase you speedo breaks down for some reason like a tree stump hitting the sender unit) and with night mode so it's not like a torch in your face. The app can send updates from 1 mintue to 2 hours or just have it in speedo setting.

If the speedo stops working (usually when you leave the app or get a phone call, the gps goes into caching mode), just turn your gps off and then on and it kicks the gps into life again. Otherwise 10minutes it will start again (It's internal cache seems to be this period)

So PM me for a code and what type of phone you have ie Android or Iphone. windows users can bugger off.

Check out the site at https://nomads.world
1973 SWB Land Rover V8 Hybrid
1994 Toyota Surf

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