I'm a cyclist and runner. I can name a dozen GPS apps that actively track my distance, speed, and location, to about 10m accuracy, with the app closed, full time. Hell, my favorite tracking app actually uses bluetooth-low energy (BTLE) to shoot the current and totalized data that it is tracking to a remote display mounted on my bike's steerer, while at the same time monitoring my heart rate (via a BTLE sensor on my chest) and my pedaling cadence (using a separate BTLE sensor on my bike frame) while the phone is sleeping in my pocket.
We're not talking about high-dollar, expensive stuff here. My HMR is a $50 Wahoo TICKR, the cadence sensor is a $60 Bontrager DuoTrap S, and the display is a $50 Wahoo RFLKT. There are literally a dozen free apps that communicate with all of this stuff wirelessly and without the app needing to be open and tracking.
This isn't anything new, innovative, or particularly difficult.
Edit: Also keep in mind, Niantic is made up of former Google employees so they should be really familiar with the API and what is possible
I realize that they are former Google employees, but that doesn't mean they can do OS level changes.
HOWEVER I think I now understand what you mean. I thought you meant you didn't want to have to launch the app at any time for it to track your distance. MapMyRun, for example, allows you to launch it and then put it to sleep and track your distances. Forgive my brain as I've been running on no sleep lately.
I'm a cyclist and runner. I can name a dozen GPS apps that actively track my distance, speed, and location, to about 10m accuracy, with the app closed, full time. Hell, my favorite tracking app actually uses bluetooth-low energy (BTLE) to shoot the current and totalized data that it is tracking to a remote display mounted on my bike's steerer, while at the same time monitoring my heart rate (via a BTLE sensor on my chest) and my pedaling cadence (using a separate BTLE sensor on my bike frame) while the phone is sleeping in my pocket.
We're not talking about high-dollar, expensive stuff here. My HMR is a $50 Wahoo TICKR, the cadence sensor is a $60 Bontrager DuoTrap S, and the display is a $50 Wahoo RFLKT. There are literally a dozen free apps that communicate with all of this stuff wirelessly and without the app needing to be open and tracking.
This isn't anything new, innovative, or particularly difficult.
Accuracy isn't what I'm talking about. Those mapping tools store all of their data locally and only upload to the network at the very end. It's a very passive experience. It's very different from what we're doing on Pokemon Go.
Also you still need a hardware device for those things to actually begin tracking right? You can't just be walking around and it tracking your movements, right?
And the battery life comment is baloney. Want proof? America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride - total elapsed time 8:45:08. Admittedly, this one used an ENTIRE full charge of the battery to make it, but clearly the app was tracking the entire time, in a remote area, plus I took a few photos during the ride.
Also you still need a hardware device for those things to actually begin tracking right? You can't just be walking around and it tracking your movements, right?
Negative. You need a phone and an app. There is no additional hardware needed for GPS tracking. Download the strava app and test it yourself and then tell me how it can't be done.
EDIT: a better example is probably the ridewithgps app as it has actual interactive GPS tracking within the app, which seems to be what you think can't be done.
Stupid on
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Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
Edit: Also keep in mind, Niantic is made up of former Google employees so they should be really familiar with the API and what is possible
I realize that they are former Google employees, but that doesn't mean they can do OS level changes.
HOWEVER I think I now understand what you mean. I thought you meant you didn't want to have to launch the app at any time for it to track your distance. MapMyRun, for example, allows you to launch it and then put it to sleep and track your distances. Forgive my brain as I've been running on no sleep lately.
Hehe it's ok My point with the former Google thing is I think they specifically left to explore this type of stuff (augmented reality) after having worked on the Google Maps team. Which means they *should* know their own API super well. So it's weird they have such a clunky implementation
And the battery life comment is baloney. Want proof? America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride - total elapsed time 8:45:08. Admittedly, this one used an ENTIRE full charge of the battery to make it, but clearly the app was tracking the entire time, in a remote area, plus I took a few photos during the ride.
The big difference is needing to reach back to Niantic's servers for pokemon location information. So this will drain some. But I think the bulk of the drain is having the graphics card firing. If running in background it should be using much less. And theoretically they should only need to reach back every so often to grab nearby Pokemon (if new spawns are consistantly timed)
Also you still need a hardware device for those things to actually begin tracking right? You can't just be walking around and it tracking your movements, right?
Negative. You need a phone and an app. There is no additional hardware needed for GPS tracking. Download the strava app and test it yourself and then tell me how it can't be done.
EDIT: a better example is probably the ridewithgps app as it has actual interactive GPS tracking within the app, which seems to be what you think can't be done.
That's the same thing as the MapMy apps, right? You launch it, set your coordinates, and go. It doesn't necessarily run as a service in the background. I think that they could easily create a separate app that runs in the background similar to how these work so you can track your distance without actually having to stare at the map. It'd save a lot of battery life. @Warlock82 mentioned the ping for nearby Pokemon but I think that if you set it in this mode it wouldn't even need to grab nearby Pokemon. You could just run it in "Pokewalk Mode" or something and it only tracks your GPS steps.
I'd love it if they could just let you run these GPS things in the background and when you're down with a Walk/Ride then it uploads it to the server but I can't imagine the algorithm necessary to check the speed/distance for something like an 8 hour ride (as @Stupid mentioned above).
With the Pokémon GO Plus device, you can accumulate distance walked for egg hatching with your phone asleep in your pocket.
My assumption is that if you set your phone in Airplane mode then it won't track any of your distance.
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Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
Oh yeah, I continue to forget Pokémon GO Plus is a thing (because I refuse to pay that much for it). That band is all functionality the app *should* have on its own. I wouldn't be surprised if it was left out to make money off the band
Well, yes, it does keep an active data connection open while using it. If you auto join wifi networks it sometimes hiccups when you move from wifi to cell data and back.
The problem with keeping Pokemon Go running in the background all the time is that you'd have to suspend/shutdown and wake up/start up the graphical component every single time you'd want to check whether that vibration is a pokemon you'd actually want. That would take a LOT of power. And given streamlined modern smartphone designs, you couldn't incorporate the push button, get pokemon system Pokemon Go Plus has.
That said I'd love an option that JUST tracked how far you walked, since 90% of why I'm still playing is to get Dratini candy and hope I finally hatch that goddamn Aerodactyl.
The problem with keeping Pokemon Go running in the background all the time is that you'd have to suspend/shutdown and wake up/start up the graphical component every single time you'd want to check whether that vibration is a pokemon you'd actually want. That would take a LOT of power. And given streamlined modern smartphone designs, you couldn't incorporate the push button, get pokemon system Pokemon Go Plus has.
That said I'd love an option that JUST tracked how far you walked, since 90% of why I'm still playing is to get Dratini candy and hope I finally hatch that goddamn Aerodactyl.
They could mitigate this with smart filters. Like "Only vibrate for pokemon I don't have" or "Exclude these pokemon ____"
But yes, if it was only for eggs/buddies, even that would be a huge improvement
I continue to think they're so concerned with cheating that they don't care if the kludgy fixes bork the experience of regular users. Which is dumb.
Maybe but letting cheaters run rampant will also harm regular users.
Plus they're a company so their money is the priority.
Which they won't see another dime of (mine at least) until they fix the tracker, the GPS, and a couple other things that have been broken or done away with.
I continue to think they're so concerned with cheating that they don't care if the kludgy fixes bork the experience of regular users. Which is dumb.
Maybe but letting cheaters run rampant will also harm regular users.
Plus they're a company so their money is the priority.
Which they won't see another dime of (mine at least) until they fix the tracker, the GPS, and a couple other things that have been broken or done away with.
The tracker is gone man. At this point I don't see it coming back. I was holding out hope but it's clear it's not a priority anymore.
At this point I'll be mildly surprised if trading ever becomes a thing.
Yeah they haven't mentioned it since release, have they?
Niantic has mentioned very little in general, which is part of the problem.
Switch: 3947-4890-9293
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Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
The problem with trading is that it literally renders their game pointless the second it's implemented. Because you could just trade for whatever you were missing, which leaves no reason to catch more pokemon since the gym system is dumb and terrible and not fun
The problem with trading is that it literally renders their game pointless the second it's implemented. Because you could just trade for whatever you were missing, which leaves no reason to catch more pokemon since the gym system is dumb and terrible and not fun
^ THIS so so much this
I am at the point where I catch one thing a day and spin one Pokestop. At work, I basically walk around at lunch and hatch eggs. Sometimes I will take a level 3 gym and get 10 cents, but anything higher than that gets ignored. If I could trade, I wouldn't bother doing any of that. I will never find a Snorlax or Hitmonlee, but I have a 4 or 5 Aerodactlys and some other stuff no one else seems to find and deals would happen. Once you get them all, you are done. I talked to a guy who has them all (he travels for a living) and he hasn't touched the game since getting a Farfetched in Hong Kong.
Fortunately/Unfortunately there aren't any other walking games on my phone or I would switch over.
Dirk2112 on
NNID = Zepp914
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Warlock82Never pet a burning dogRegistered Userregular
Yeah pretty much. I would have been done if not for the holiday events giving me reasons to log in (Santa Pikachus, Babies, incubators, increased starters). But those are nearly over now and even the starter spawns feel nerfed since last night (Silph Road people saying it seems the same).
Oh, speaking of which, I discovered at lunch today the tracker lies. By which I mean, it said there was an Charmeleon at a pokestop so I clicked it and drove there. As I was parking it said it "ran away." Then, surprise, it was actually still there. Same thing a min later with a Charmander at a different one.
If I caught them all I'd likely never really login either. I'd probably still go on walks, but listen to an audio book instead or something else like that.
The winter has really strained my playtime. Do I want to freeze my ass off on the off chance that I get something decent or stay warm and watch youtube videos?
This cold weather isn't going to do me any good, though. It's ~15F today and I could only do a single lap around the skatepark. Even with my gloves on I couldn't feel my fingers.
At McCallum park by me, we all play pokemon in our cars. There is a round loop through the park past stops and through a park and ride. You can do the loop in your car, hit almost all the stops, and get the rare spawn from your car.
I gave up trying to not cheat the game. I'm sorry if I get out and freeze and walk 5 miles, I better get 5 miles on pokemon. Rather, I can get in my car, do laps at 5 miles an hour, get rares, and spin stops while warm? Sometimes it thinks I'm in a car, but I hatched a lot of 5 k's that way this last month.
If I caught them all I'd likely never really login either. I'd probably still go on walks, but listen to an audio book instead or something else like that.
The winter has really strained my playtime. Do I want to freeze my ass off on the off chance that I get something decent or stay warm and watch youtube videos?
I went for a run the other night at 7:30pm at night and it was still 98F.
Wow, I never thought I'd be happy to live in a place that had a high in 1F today...
Needless to say, pokewalks are out of the question for me right now, but I've always hatched most of my eggs through sheer GPS ping pong while sitting at my desk anyway.
I went for a run the other night at 7:30pm at night and it was still 98F.
You also had to fend off the wild animals too, right? Australia scares me.
I'm kidding about the wild animals part. Not about Australia scaring me.
Hah yea, deadly spiders everywhere! Not to mention all those kangaskhans!
I finally caught 2 snorlaxes this weekend! First time I had ever seen them too. First one was 900 with zen headbutt earthquake and the second 400 with lick hyperbeam. Not great IVs on either. I'm quite low on dust so itll be an effort but these guys are worth it right?
Posts
I'm a cyclist and runner. I can name a dozen GPS apps that actively track my distance, speed, and location, to about 10m accuracy, with the app closed, full time. Hell, my favorite tracking app actually uses bluetooth-low energy (BTLE) to shoot the current and totalized data that it is tracking to a remote display mounted on my bike's steerer, while at the same time monitoring my heart rate (via a BTLE sensor on my chest) and my pedaling cadence (using a separate BTLE sensor on my bike frame) while the phone is sleeping in my pocket.
We're not talking about high-dollar, expensive stuff here. My HMR is a $50 Wahoo TICKR, the cadence sensor is a $60 Bontrager DuoTrap S, and the display is a $50 Wahoo RFLKT. There are literally a dozen free apps that communicate with all of this stuff wirelessly and without the app needing to be open and tracking.
This isn't anything new, innovative, or particularly difficult.
I realize that they are former Google employees, but that doesn't mean they can do OS level changes.
HOWEVER I think I now understand what you mean. I thought you meant you didn't want to have to launch the app at any time for it to track your distance. MapMyRun, for example, allows you to launch it and then put it to sleep and track your distances. Forgive my brain as I've been running on no sleep lately.
Accuracy isn't what I'm talking about. Those mapping tools store all of their data locally and only upload to the network at the very end. It's a very passive experience. It's very different from what we're doing on Pokemon Go.
EDIT: a better example is probably the ridewithgps app as it has actual interactive GPS tracking within the app, which seems to be what you think can't be done.
Hehe it's ok
The big difference is needing to reach back to Niantic's servers for pokemon location information. So this will drain some. But I think the bulk of the drain is having the graphics card firing. If running in background it should be using much less. And theoretically they should only need to reach back every so often to grab nearby Pokemon (if new spawns are consistantly timed)
Sadly this seems to be true
That's the same thing as the MapMy apps, right? You launch it, set your coordinates, and go. It doesn't necessarily run as a service in the background. I think that they could easily create a separate app that runs in the background similar to how these work so you can track your distance without actually having to stare at the map. It'd save a lot of battery life. @Warlock82 mentioned the ping for nearby Pokemon but I think that if you set it in this mode it wouldn't even need to grab nearby Pokemon. You could just run it in "Pokewalk Mode" or something and it only tracks your GPS steps.
I'd love it if they could just let you run these GPS things in the background and when you're down with a Walk/Ride then it uploads it to the server but I can't imagine the algorithm necessary to check the speed/distance for something like an 8 hour ride (as @Stupid mentioned above).
My assumption is that if you set your phone in Airplane mode then it won't track any of your distance.
That said I'd love an option that JUST tracked how far you walked, since 90% of why I'm still playing is to get Dratini candy and hope I finally hatch that goddamn Aerodactyl.
But, again, not paying that fucking much. That's absurd.
They could mitigate this with smart filters. Like "Only vibrate for pokemon I don't have" or "Exclude these pokemon ____"
But yes, if it was only for eggs/buddies, even that would be a huge improvement
Maybe but letting cheaters run rampant will also harm regular users.
Plus they're a company so their money is the priority.
Which they won't see another dime of (mine at least) until they fix the tracker, the GPS, and a couple other things that have been broken or done away with.
The tracker is gone man. At this point I don't see it coming back. I was holding out hope but it's clear it's not a priority anymore.
Or maybe I'll hold off until Spring and continue to take gyms and collect coins.
Yeah they haven't mentioned it since release, have they?
Niantic has mentioned very little in general, which is part of the problem.
I'm guessing it'll cut into their profits too much so they won't do it.
^ THIS so so much this
I am at the point where I catch one thing a day and spin one Pokestop. At work, I basically walk around at lunch and hatch eggs. Sometimes I will take a level 3 gym and get 10 cents, but anything higher than that gets ignored. If I could trade, I wouldn't bother doing any of that. I will never find a Snorlax or Hitmonlee, but I have a 4 or 5 Aerodactlys and some other stuff no one else seems to find and deals would happen. Once you get them all, you are done. I talked to a guy who has them all (he travels for a living) and he hasn't touched the game since getting a Farfetched in Hong Kong.
Fortunately/Unfortunately there aren't any other walking games on my phone or I would switch over.
Oh, speaking of which, I discovered at lunch today the tracker lies. By which I mean, it said there was an Charmeleon at a pokestop so I clicked it and drove there. As I was parking it said it "ran away." Then, surprise, it was actually still there. Same thing a min later with a Charmander at a different one.
The winter has really strained my playtime. Do I want to freeze my ass off on the off chance that I get something decent or stay warm and watch youtube videos?
At McCallum park by me, we all play pokemon in our cars. There is a round loop through the park past stops and through a park and ride. You can do the loop in your car, hit almost all the stops, and get the rare spawn from your car.
I gave up trying to not cheat the game. I'm sorry if I get out and freeze and walk 5 miles, I better get 5 miles on pokemon. Rather, I can get in my car, do laps at 5 miles an hour, get rares, and spin stops while warm? Sometimes it thinks I'm in a car, but I hatched a lot of 5 k's that way this last month.
Origin: KafkaAU B-Net: Kafka#1778
Wow, I never thought I'd be happy to live in a place that had a high in 1F today...
Needless to say, pokewalks are out of the question for me right now, but I've always hatched most of my eggs through sheer GPS ping pong while sitting at my desk anyway.
You also had to fend off the wild animals too, right? Australia scares me.
I got one of those randomly a couple weeks back. I wasn't even logging in or anything.
Hah yea, deadly spiders everywhere! Not to mention all those kangaskhans!
I finally caught 2 snorlaxes this weekend! First time I had ever seen them too. First one was 900 with zen headbutt earthquake and the second 400 with lick hyperbeam. Not great IVs on either. I'm quite low on dust so itll be an effort but these guys are worth it right?
Origin: KafkaAU B-Net: Kafka#1778