Drift Diary: An app for Continuous Cruisers to log and prove their distance travelled

[ditchcrawler]

But CRT don't have the problem, it's the boaters who challenge CRT's view that they haven't travelled far enough who have the problem.

[rogeriko]

The black box in the car is permanently on, it uses negligable power, just enough to make a data transmission every 30 seconds or so. You wouldnt need a camera system that was just an idea to stop fraudulent use of the transmitters. A couple of mobile recievers/cameras on bikes could cover the system. As far as paranoid tin foil hat wearing if you want to CC at a discounted licence rate you will have a black box,  just the same as insurance.

You cannot challenge the insurance company if they drop you for dangerous driving in their opinion.

 

Google dosnt lie.

Edited July 31, 2023 by rogeriko

[TheBiscuits]

5 minutes ago, rogeriko said:

A couple of mobile recievers/cameras on bikes could cover the system.

 

You mean like the spotters currently do?  They just log the boats, saving the faff of fitting the black boxes ...

[MtB]

I'm astounded that the OP only has two greenies so far for such a laudable and community-minded project. We all (or most of us anyway) try to help others and this is just the most excellent example in my opinion.

 

So if anyone here agrees with me get back to Post 1 and award him big fat greenie! 

 

 

[rogeriko]

The logging would all be done electronically as the olympic future hopefull cyclists speed by at 30mph.

[magnetman]

I would have thought transponders like they use for automatic barrier opening on toll motorways would work. Seems a lot less hardware than cameras and GPS. 

 

You pass through an arch (a bridge for example) and the system logs it. 

 

Given the rather astute comment from @ditchcrawler it seems people may end up in a position of wanting to comply rather than the CRT wanting them to comply. 

 

Big difference. 

 

Satisfy the Board. 

 

 

[enigmatic]

5 hours ago, David Mack said:

The app could also be used by boaters taking part in the IWA Silver Propeller scheme or on the BCN Marathon Challenge and similar events, or indeed boaters who just want a personal online log of their travels, rather than keeping a paper version.

This is a really good idea

 

One thing I considered building for myself was a little map that showed places I'd been on the waterways. The ability to generate that from image location tags would be really cool (as would the ability to export the data in a format that could be embedded on a web page)

 

Can also imagine the IWA liking the idea of people recording their Silver Propeller destinations on an app that encouraged them to visit more, and they do of course have a few members to suggest apps to!

 

-

 

@Tasemu does your app have the [planned] ability to bulk upload photos selected from the phone's album

I'd be interested in seeing/testing the results of that for the last 3 years

(though my cruising days will be coming to an end shortly, so not sure how much help I'll be long term)

 

 

 

[Tasemu]

9 hours ago, enigmatic said:

This is a really good idea

 

One thing I considered building for myself was a little map that showed places I'd been on the waterways. The ability to generate that from image location tags would be really cool (as would the ability to export the data in a format that could be embedded on a web page)

 

Can also imagine the IWA liking the idea of people recording their Silver Propeller destinations on an app that encouraged them to visit more, and they do of course have a few members to suggest apps to!

 

-

 

@Tasemu does your app have the [planned] ability to bulk upload photos selected from the phone's album

I'd be interested in seeing/testing the results of that for the last 3 years

(though my cruising days will be coming to an end shortly, so not sure how much help I'll be long term)

 

 

 

 

It currently only allows photos to be logged one at a time, but i can't see why i couldn't add that in. The current bottleneck is that i need to filter out any photos without geotag data attached to stop people getting loads of errors when they select pictures with no lat/lng. This means i can't open the native gallery and have had to make my own version inbuilt. Food for thought 🤔

[Hudds Lad]

16 hours ago, rusty69 said:

Probably written by Roger Waters. 

Sadly, it's by Russell Brand

 

"People do this a lot. They don't seem to realise that the future is just like now, but in a little while, so they say they're going to do things in anticipation of some kind of seismic shift in their worldview that never actually materializes. But everything's not going to be made of leather, the world won't stink of sherbet. Tomorrow is not some mythical kingdom where you'll grow butterfly wings and be able to talk to animals -- you'll basically feel pretty much the same way you do at the moment.

RUSSELL BRAND

My Booky Wook"

[IanD]

10 hours ago, enigmatic said:

This is a really good idea

 

One thing I considered building for myself was a little map that showed places I'd been on the waterways. The ability to generate that from image location tags would be really cool (as would the ability to export the data in a format that could be embedded on a web page)

 

Can also imagine the IWA liking the idea of people recording their Silver Propeller destinations on an app that encouraged them to visit more, and they do of course have a few members to suggest apps to!

 

-

 

@Tasemu does your app have the [planned] ability to bulk upload photos selected from the phone's album

I'd be interested in seeing/testing the results of that for the last 3 years

(though my cruising days will be coming to an end shortly, so not sure how much help I'll be long term)

 

 

If it's being used to verify where the boat has been (e.g. for CCers "satisfying the board") this is a *very* bad idea, if there's any way to import photos (rather than the app taking/logging them) it makes faking where the boat has been far too easy. I can imagine a "CMers black market" swapping photos of different locations with edited geotagged data to prove their boats have been roaming round the system when they haven't moved at all... 😞

 

As a warning to @Tasemu , some people who look for the worst in everything and/or hidden motives might think that somebody on the K&A offering a free app to provide evidence of where boats have been might have exactly this as an ulterior motive... 😉

 

Which is why I keep asking all these awkward questions about how the data is acquired/accessed/secured, because unless this is addressed from the start the results will have no credibility as far as CCer boat logging is concerned... 😞

 

I still think it's an excellent idea if these issues are addressed though 🙂

Edited August 1, 2023 by IanD

[Higgs]

Take a photo with your boat in it. ??

 

 

 

[Tasemu]

3 minutes ago, Higgs said:

Take a photo with your boat in it. ??

 

 

 

 

Yeah i was thinking the same, if i were CRT and someone gave me a picture of an empty bit of canal without the boat and number registered to their account in the actual picture, i'd be very confused. 

[Higgs]

2 minutes ago, Tasemu said:

 

Yeah i was thinking the same, if i were CRT and someone gave me a picture of an empty bit of canal without the boat and number registered to their account in the actual picture, i'd be very confused. 

 

Better still, if you could have a CRT checker glued to it.

 

 

[Higgs]

 

.

 

 

Edited August 1, 2023 by Higgs

[Tasemu]

Not sure if this helps at all, but here is a PDF report i recently exported from the app. Its early stages at the moment but you can see i've made sure to at least try to ensure my boat is recognisable, with the number showing wherever possible and in an area that the local spotters will recognise matches to the geolocation data presented.

bea91ef6-4a3d-49d7-9407-c21036d6f37d.pdf

Edited August 1, 2023 by Tasemu

[Higgs]

This coming year's solution, for me - to record journeys and keep a log with a dashcam, with some identifiable part of the boat in it. 

 

 

 

 

[IanD]

18 minutes ago, Tasemu said:

 

Yeah i was thinking the same, if i were CRT and someone gave me a picture of an empty bit of canal without the boat and number registered to their account in the actual picture, i'd be very confused. 

Exactly what I suggested recently in the other thread... 😉

[enigmatic]

35 minutes ago, IanD said:

If it's being used to verify where the boat has been (e.g. for CCers "satisfying the board") this is a *very* bad idea, if there's any way to import photos (rather than the app taking/logging them) it makes faking where the boat has been far too easy. I can imagine a "CMers black market" swapping photos of different locations with edited geotagged data to prove their boats have been roaming round the system when they haven't moved at all... 😞

If you're determined to fake the geotags for your images you can do it with images imported individually as well as in bulk.

 

If I import 500 pictures of my boat with accurate EXIF data in different locations (which also overlap with where CRT thinks I was), the chances of that being down to me being a Photoshop wizard are pretty slim

 

I can't imagine images of someone else's boats in completely different parts of the system from the ones their enforcement team recorded you in being a more successful strategy than excuses, never mind enough to warrant a black market. If you've obviously faked cruising, that'd make court enforcement more of a rubber stamp process too...

Edited August 1, 2023 by enigmatic

[Tasemu]

31 minutes ago, IanD said:

 

If it's being used to verify where the boat has been (e.g. for CCers "satisfying the board") this is a *very* bad idea, if there's any way to import photos (rather than the app taking/logging them) it makes faking where the boat has been far too easy. I can imagine a "CMers black market" swapping photos of different locations with edited geotagged data to prove their boats have been roaming round the system when they haven't moved at all... 😞

 

Regarding this, i'm not entirely sure how a counterfeit market could operate assuming that the picture of the boat with the number is actually included. As the picture in question would be handled by the local crt representatives for the area, if it was a picture of the boat somewhere else with spoofed geodata, then they should be able to tell this easily from a brief visual inspection of the image.

For example when someone sends me a picture of their boat on the K&A anywhere between devizes and bath, i can tell where that boat is from the surroundings? And if i were CRT and felt as though the image was too vague to be able to recognise the area, and i was suspicious of the person in question already then i'd just deny the picture. In the end its CRT's decision at the end of the day, this is just supporting evidence that might help.

I've used geotagged images to avoid a 6 month licence once before, and it was just a simple mistake with the spotters and all worked out fine.

[IanD]

12 minutes ago, Tasemu said:

Not sure if this helps at all, but here is a PDF report i recently exported from the app. Its early stages at the moment but you can see i've made sure to at least try to ensure my boat is recognisable, with the number showing wherever possible and in an area that the local spotters will recognise matches to the geolocation data presented.

bea91ef6-4a3d-49d7-9407-c21036d6f37d.pdf 637.18 kB · 2 downloads

 

Pretty much what I suggested -- though I'd suggest that having the registration number/boat name in the shot together with the geotagged GPS location is much more important for logging than a "recognisable location" which needs far more human analysis... 😉

 

There are two possible uses for an app like this; the first is a "cruise diary" for the benefit of the boater, the second is location verification which can be used to prove to CART that you're following the CC rules. They have two different needs -- the first one might need a lot of pretty pictures, maybe with the ability for the boater to annotate them with helpful information/comments. The second one needs fewer pictures but these need to verify where the boat was and when, preferably in a way that can be automatically checked -- for example a photo of the side of the boat with the reg. number and name which can be automatically matched by software (woo hoo, AI!!!) to the boater's license data.

 

Maybe it needs two classes of photo to deal with this, an open editable one (even including imported photos?) for the diary and a closed secure one for location logging?

[Arthur Marshall]

12 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

You mean like the spotters currently do?  They just log the boats, saving the faff of fitting the black boxes ...

They could carry portable welding units and weld one onto every boat not showing a licence...

[IanD]

8 minutes ago, Tasemu said:

 

Regarding this, i'm not entirely sure how a counterfeit market could operate assuming that the picture of the boat with the number is actually included. As the picture in question would be handled by the local crt representatives for the area, if it was a picture of the boat somewhere else with spoofed geodata, then they should be able to tell this easily from a brief visual inspection of the image.

For example when someone sends me a picture of their boat on the K&A anywhere between devizes and bath, i can tell where that boat is from the surroundings? And if i were CRT and felt as though the image was too vague to be able to recognise the area, and i was suspicious of the person in question already then i'd just deny the picture. In the end its CRT's decision at the end of the day, this is just supporting evidence that might help.

I've used geotagged images to avoid a 6 month licence once before, and it was just a simple mistake with the spotters and all worked out fine.

Have you actually looked into what AI image generation/deepfaking can do nowadays? 😉

 

Trying to identify where a picture was taken *from the picture* is not only relatively difficult (maybe needing locals who recognise the area -- but this isn't easy...) but pointless for location logging, since the GPS data says *exactly* where the photo was taken.

 

I was proposing that an app like this could make it no longer necessary to have manual boat spotters roaming most of the system, or trying to recognise where photos were taken, so the money saved could be spent on better things like fixing locks. That could mean using modern image recognition technology (yes, AI again!) to match the photo with a stored database for that boat, and read the registration number. No manual intervention needed except in the case of a dispute, which would be only a tiny fraction of cases -- for the vast majority of CCers software can check and verify their travels.

Edited August 1, 2023 by IanD

[magnetman]

It would appear to be an easier strategy to take out continuous cruising as an option somehow or make the requirements much more difficult to follow. 

 

Tracking everyone isn't easy. 

 

 

 

 

[Higgs]

6 minutes ago, Arthur Marshall said:

They could carry portable welding units and weld one onto every boat not showing a licence...

 

The kind of welder you can plug into a tree for power.

 

 

[magnetman]

Just now, Higgs said:

 

The kind of welder you can plug into a tree for power.

 

 

You can do limited welding with a battery these days.