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Open Canal Map ANDROID app Beta testers


reg

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1 hour ago, reg said:

 

E g my  personal experience of Watford locks is that can take between 30 mins and 3 hours, similarly for Foxton locks, Hatton flight etc,. 

 

Cor, your fast Reg! :) My record at Hatton is 2hrs 30mins and usually well over 3 with just me and Mrs Bob. Did it about 10 times this year. Mrs Bob likes locks.

1 hour ago, reg said:

Would it be worth it if another thread, separate from this,  was started specifically asking forum members to Identify what they consider to be the major hot spots where transit times are unpredictable?

Is it worth doing this?

Great idea. Even if its not directly useful for Tom's App, it would be interesting reading as a 'pinned' post. Why dont you go ahead and post it. Probably a good idea if someone (you??) kept a log of the info provided that could then be accessible to anyone who wanted to download it. I will chip in with my very limited experience.

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50 minutes ago, Dr Bob said:
2 hours ago, reg said:

 

Cor, your fast Reg! :) My record at Hatton is 2hrs 30mins and usually well over 3 with just me and Mrs Bob. Did it about 10 times this year. Mrs Bob likes locks.

More a case of bad grammar:)

Just to start the ball rolling any quick thoughts.  I have top of my head 

Hatton flight

Foxton staircase 

Watford staircase

Grindley brook flight

Hureleston flight. 

Napton flight

Possibly useful to identify locks near hire bases on turn around days

 

Will move these obvious ones to the new thread, rather than collate them here. I think it might be useful to ask for potential bottlenecks, any thoughts on how to word the question? 

Edited by reg
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15 hours ago, David Mack said:

On the preferences tab you can select to show  cumulative miles/locks/hours. That makes it easier to work out roughly where you will be in X hours time.

You mean in Canalplan?

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1 hour ago, reg said:

More a case of bad grammar:)

Just to start the ball rolling any quick thoughts.  I have top of my head 

Hatton flight

Foxton staircase 

Watford staircase

Grindley brook flight

Hureleston flight. 

Napton flight

Possibly useful to identify locks near hire bases on turn around days

 

Will move these obvious ones to the new thread, rather than collate them here. I think it might be useful to ask for potential bottlenecks, any thoughts on how to word the question? 

Started thread here

https://canalworld.net/forums/index.php?/topic/94806-known-canal-bottlenecks-where-when-why/

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20 minutes ago, reg said:

I was going to post the following but the internet crashed ....so a bit late.

......................

I would be tempted to try and 'grade' each lock with a 1,2 or 3.

1 means normal, typical lock where you dont usualy get queues . and at most one boat ahead of you waiting

2 means a lock where at busy times you could be 3rd in a queue or more

3 means a lock where there are often queues of 3 or more boat when you arrive.

If you followed this way forward, you could ask for details of why a lock is No 3......and it could be 3 for a period....ie 2 or 3 months as there may be a problem with the paddles which the CRT havent got round to fixing ...ie like one at the top of the Napton flight last summer that caused 4hr delays one saturday. Once the problem fixed it would turn back to a 1.

Therefore I would say that all the locks between Napton and Warwick on the GU would be 1's apart from the Calcutt 3 locks which are No 2's at weekends when all the weekend boats and the calcut hire boats are out. Even the Bascote staircase has not been a problem this year on our 5 trips up and down.

Maybe the map could have a red number 3 on it for the bottleneck locks.

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Tom, I was out yesterday so gave the app a work out on the mobile phone. I was connected to 4G all the time so not using the downloaded maps. All in all very good. A couple of comments. I hope you take this as constructive.

Firstly, it would be useful to have some sort of scale on the display so as you look at the map, you can easily tell how far away something is on the map. Some sort of scale legend would be good in the bottom left ....or right. Secondly, it is good that the locks now show up at a useful level of zoom (and winding holes)  but just wonder what other things we want to be able to see. The other key things I look at maps for are water points and visitor moorings. It may be good to try and see what others would hope to see and look if its possible to show them. Its all going to be a compromise.

It must be quite difficult to design a map App in selecting what you want to show. I do my route planning using a combination of Nicholsons and the 'Waterways Series' paper maps and then when crusing, we use the waterways routes maps on a Kindle fire tablet. We were new to the canals early last year but did a lot of cruising on the north/south oxford and one item that is not fully detailed on the route planning stuff is the piled moorings ...so its useful to have these available on the tablet for those canals where pulling in is more difficult. What I like about your app is the detail of the canal itself (ie the sharp dog leg is clear) and the surrounding areas. Far better than the other maps. The waterways routes maps on the tablet work well, but the 'geographical' detail is not there,  whereas it is on yours. Yesterday, I was trying to compare the two and yours seemed to be lacking the detail of visitor moorings, bridges, water points at the same zoom level and no indication of distance or time.

That raised another question of what type of device are people using. I would use a laptop or tablet for planning and maybe a phone while cruising. It is a big challenge to get it right for all devices.

I will certainly use your app as one of the mapping tools given the geographical accuracy (and maybe in future how up to date it is). Linking it to canal plan output sounds great as well. What are you thinking the USP is?

Again, well done!:)

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8 minutes ago, Dr Bob said:

That raised another question of what type of device are people using. I would use a laptop or tablet for planning and maybe a phone while cruising. It is a big challenge to get it right for all devices.
 

We just tend to use a tethered laptop inside the boat. Steerer tends to just casually glance at a guide book from time to time.

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