Help Fund Development!

The GPS Route Planner seems to have been well received by a LOT of people… but to date I’ve had TWO donations for this… not a lot of beer, people!  If you haven’t seen it, there’s a “donate” link up in the top right of the main screen to this blog.  If you don’t feel that the GPS Route Planner is worth buying me a beer or two, at least get clicking on the Google advertisements littered around this site.  I get a few pennies each time you do.

Go on, motivate me to add the exciting new ideas I have!

Logitech V20 Notebook Speakers

I recently bought an M-Audio Keystation 88es MIDI keyboard (I’ve wanted to learn to play piano for years, but strangely have always been drawn to strings – electric guitar, acoustic guitar, bass, violin, and, for a short while, cello).

It works brilliantly with Garage Band, but the speakers in the Macbook are small and tinny.  So I plugged it through the hi-fi.  It sounds fantastic.  However, I really wanted to leave the keyboard set up in the spare room, where there’s no hi-fi.  So I started to think about getting some computer speakers…

Continue reading “Logitech V20 Notebook Speakers”

The Outage – and a Rant

We’ve had record heatwaves here in London, apparently even beating the droughted summer of ’76. This sparked some pretty ferocious thunderstorms on Thursday evening, which caused me to get soaked to the skin on my 26km ride home from work (I was also worried about getting hit by lightning in Richmond Park). When I got home there were house alarms going off all over, and in my house half the circuits were blown. And worst of all my ADSL modem was fried. No internet! Continue reading “The Outage – and a Rant”

Route Planner – New Features

The feedback for the Route Planner has been very, very positive.  I’ve also had a few suggestions for additional functionality.  Here’s what will be on the cards once I get the time for the next release:

  • User selectable miles/kilometers main display (although did you know if you hover over the miles figure with your mouse, you get a metric “tool tip”?)
  • Configurable waypoint name length
  • Ability to save the route to the web server’s database – this would give you the ability to save a route and share it with other people via a simple URL

Does anybody have any other ideas?  Please let me know here if you do.

The Marengo GPS Route Planner

I recently built a Javascript application, based around Google Maps, which enables a user to plot a cycle route online, and then upload it to their GPS unit to allow them to be directed en route. I designed a 72-mile route on it when I first built it, and then rode it. I wasn’t familiar with the route, but at each junction the GPS told me which way to turn. Fantastic. No stopping to consult the map, just a good training ride.

Continue reading “The Marengo GPS Route Planner”

First Post!

Welcome to this new forum. I have set this up primarily to allow me to publish new updates regarding the Marengo GPS Route Planner, but I’ll be using it as a means to muse about anything else that takes my fancy. It’ll mainly be open source-related stuff.