RunSaturday updates

There's still so much happening on runsaturday - our latest toys include a player for your activities - e.g. check out this example:

Example Player

RunSaturday update

It's been a while since I've updated what's new on RunSaturday. And there is so much new functionality since I last posted.

Here's a brief update:

• OpenStreetMap integration - your runs and cycles can help create the world map :)
• Complete GPX and TCX integration - plus upload a route direct to your Garmin from our Course Mapper.
• More linking of courses with activities - you can now map out your Nike+ runs.
  
• More advances in our Polar integration - including detailed RS800CX integration with the training log.
• Link direct to your user profile - e.g. http://www.runsaturday.com/athlete/hollywoof
• New today! Automated weather and location added when you upload
  
• New today! New advanced analysis of Gradient, Cadence, Heart Rate and Pace - see what effect does Cadence have on Pace? What effect does Gradient have on Heart Rate.

RunSaturday just keeps on growing - and we have even more on the way - check it out!

Here we grow again!

Have I mentioned RunSaturday recently?

:)

It just keeps getting better and better.

You probably remember that RunSaturday was already working with Garmin, SportTracks, Nike+, Nokia, Facebook and with some Fetch functionality.

Well since then we've added: GPX, Running Ahead and Twitter!

And integration isn't the only thing we've added:

• we've got superb training analysis features - lots of charts and lots of options to help you understand and improve your training.
• we've got superb run analysis features - especially heat map plotting of speed, elevation and heart rate in easy to interpret form on Google Maps.
• we've got some innovative new social training competitions - come over and check out our challenges - right now we have teams running round the M25, running and cycling across Australia and tri-ing from London to Paris.
• we've got the most advanced run/walk/cycle course mapping tool that I've ever seen - if you don't believe me then come over and try it out - here
• we've got BIG plans for even more

All sound too good to be true?

Check it out for yourself www.runsaturday.com - I hope you arrive in time for BIG RUN SATURDAY :)

RunSaturday's new Course/Route Mapping tool - with elevation profile!

RunSaturday just keeps getting better and better.

Check out the new coursemapper - including:

• Draggable, editable course markers
• Lots of icons and text elements to allow you to add extra information to your course - e.g. where toilets are, where drinks are, where busses go, where the pub is, etc.
• Simple iframe support - you can put a complete RunSaturday course map inside an iframe on your site or blog
• Elevation support - shows you a simple plot of the up and downs of your course.
  

Check out this example:
http://www.runsaturday.com/tabId/99/Course/4/default.aspx


Or just go create a route yourself:
http://www.runsaturday.com/People/Courses/Mapper/tabid/99/Default.aspx

Here's an iframe example: http://lodge.stuart.googlepages.com/examplepage

Google are just soooooooo good

Over on RunSaturday we've just added Google Earth support.

I'm so impressed with this plugin from Google - what they've made it's just so stunningly beautiful and it's integration within the site is pretty smooth too - you finish your run, plug in your Garmin, upload the route, then get to fly round the route in 3D.

Come take a look - e.g. come for a 3d run in Germany.

Don't stop me now

I'm having such a good time....

After a teeny weeny bit of work, I'm really pleased to announce that RunSaturday.com now has SportTracks integration.

I want to say a huge thanks to the ZoneFiveSoftware team - their product is superb and their friendly and collaborative approach is really refreshing.

If you are an existing SportTracks user and want to use the plugin, then come to RunSaturday for instructions.

If you aren't an existing SportTracks user, then go download it today!

More soon - there are some even more exciting things in the pipeline :)

Just in case you haven't seen www.RunSaturday.com

Want to analyse your GPS training logs? Then runSaturday is the place to be...

Do it! :)

Ode to Hollybar

Hi All

This may well be the last post on this blog... well, the last post about Hollybar itself anyway

I think it's time to move on from Hollybar and to concentrate on www.runsaturday.com - which now has some really, really cool charting and mapping functions :)

For those of you who aren't aware, I talked with Fetch about run saturday last week and he seemed very excited about it and suggested I write a note so he could publicise it... but instead of publicising it, he seems to have spent his time since trying to copy it and today announced his plans for functionality and a prototype... much to everyone's excitement...

Maybe I should have just published the note myself?

Like I say, I guess I learned a lesson...

No sour grapes though - it's obviously a big bad world out there at the moment - obviously a time for "business is business" - so I'll respect the hard competitive approach and get on with some kicking @rse functionality instead - HTFU :)

Besides, www.runSaturday.com is clearly way cool :)

Finally!

After far too long... I've finally got something up and running under Firefox...

It's a bit different to before... and I kind of like it...

Thanks to those of you who've volunteered test files and/or test services. I've emailed all of you (I hope) with links to the "son of hollybar".

It's still growing and changing - sadly, there's plenty more to do!

***Update - any 405 users who want to test out the new functions please try http://www.runsaturday.com - it appears to work***

Son of Hollybar - testers needed (soon)

As some of you know, works not entirely booming - so I've got a bit more free time than I anticipated having at the moment....

Anyways, the good news is I'm finally updating hollybar - and hopefully this will include hollyfox and hollymac too - but not hollylinux...

It's taking some strange (but kind of wonderful) directions - you'll either love it or hate it! I hope it's the former, but marmite is marmite....

I'm currently only testing with my Vista and XP PCs, with Firefox and with IE7, and I'm only using my beaten up 301... if anyone's got some different setups, then I might have something for you to play with soon - so email me (hollyfox [at] slodge [dot] com) and/or leave some feedback here.

Forwards motion? (Well, sideways!)

OK... so after a long long time in the wilderness, I've got things up and running again :)

Briefly:

• I've got code up and running here under IE8
• I've got imports working in Firefox for Windows
• I've got a plugin inside Firefox (lots of XPCOM stuff)

However, I've also had a different thought...

• because of requests for things like Mac and Linux support, because of requests for 405 and 50 support, because of requests for things like Chrome support.... would people rather I actually worked on integrating the Garmin Communicator toy instead? I think I could get this working quite quickly...

What do you reckon? Has anyone been using the Garmin Connect type functionality within web browsers - does it seem to work OK so far? Let me know what you think - I'll put something together...

(also - very cheekily - if anyone thinks that they may have a 405 spare at some point - just for a week or so - then please let me know - it'll help me to try testing with it)

Quick fix

No.... Hollyfox hasn't been released yet (sorry - been v v v v busy at work and play) - but here's a new small fix for the latest "R_General" problem - just a tweak needed because of some new changes in Fetchland.

Hollyfox anyone?

I know a few people have asked occasionally for a firefox version of the Hollybar and I've been looking at this in a little more depth recently.

The good news is that on Windows at least it's definitely possible and, indeed, ultimately it could be a better - at least much more flexible - tool.

The bad news it that there's lots and lots of fiddly stuff to do first involving such delightful things as XUL, XPI and XPCOM.

So far I've got to the state where I can get Firefox to show the GPS software version number. Hoorah! That only took a week...

If enough people are interested I will push this through as it'll be an interesting experience if nothing else!

So I wonder if enough people are interested....

New test version - heart rate fix?

For anyone who wants to use fetch's latest heart rate uploading, I've put a version up for test on
http://lodge.stuart.googlepages.com/Hollybar.msi

This version will allow people to upload their max and avg session heart rates - I don't insert anything into the resting and actual max boxes - I leave these for manual entry.

Let me know if it works!

Update - apparently it does work :-)

Mapping updated!

Updated version here works with Fetch's latest changes on the add training run page AND allows you to upload map routes to Fetch's new map database.

Things work right now but they might change as Fetch keeps adding new things :-)

I also plan to add some Google mapping stuff soon - and maybe some Yahoo! mapping too - I really like the look of Yahoo's mapping stuff - especially in Flash.

305 version 2.60

The latest firmware release from Garmin seems to have broken something.

Thanks to Andrew65 for letting me know about this.

I don't know what the changes are exactly, but using some debug output it seems Garmin may have added a new protocol - D1014.

Looking at this, I think it is a new Run Type, possibly something to do with the new Auto Lap functionality? Sadly it's not documented anywhere yet - so I've had to guess the new D1014_Run_Type structure - this invention is currently under test with Andrew65.

Sorry about the disruption - I'll look at it and see if there's any way to avoid it in the future.... I'll also see if I can make some of those changes I've been promising!

205 support!

Thanks to "Slow" for letting me know the latest code definitely works with the Garmin 205 too!

Now... on all those features I was going to add this month... I've just not found time for it. If I am lucky I may find some in January but my current workload and some other hobby projects (?!) are getting in the way at the moment. Sorry!

305 support :-)

Yes... I've finally borrowed a Forerunner 305 (thanks Paul!) and got the Hollybar working with it :-)

The new installer is at : http://lodge.stuart.googlepages.com/Hollybar.msi

I've also:
- put in a small fix for the split times (splits over 59 minutes are now shown)
- put in a fix for the code that had the problem when Garmin Training Center was also talking to the 305.
- put in a small fix for the 301 (no-one ever noticed though!)
- put in a small fix for the error reporting if you try to upload a gmap and pedometer javascript has a problem.
- put in a small fix to the installer - it should now remove the previous software version on its own (but the user will need to make sure Internet Explorer is shutdown for this to work).

On new issues...

I've seen that there is an issue on gmap pedometer with IE7 - basically in order to get the map upload to work you currently have to:
- go to gmap-pedometer
- answer "no" to the Hollybar question first time (because the pedometer page hasn't fully loaded)
- hit the gmap-pedometer button on the toolbar
- answer "yes" to the Hollybar question second time.

I don't know why this is (or whether the problem now exists on IE6 too) - I'll look into it some more "soon"! Not this coming week though - I've gotta get some proper work in!

If anyone spots any problems with the 305 support (or with the 301 support) then please let me know and I'll fix it!)

Back in development

OK - lots of people have asked me about this again recently...

And it's true I've been neglecting it (been busy on soooooo many other things), but I promise I'll look at some of the fixes, changes and additions real soon :-)

Here's a TODO list:

• make it so that you can customise (including turn off) the comments.
• fix the bug that it "hangs" when you have Training Center downloading.
• fix the bug that splits over 60 minutes don't get recorded correctly.
• maybe add support for the other map websites requested (if people want them)
• maybe add some additional customisable toolbar buttons (I use them too)
• borrow a 205/305 and check that it works or make it work! (if anyone has a 201 then I can try to work with that too)
• cache the list of runs/laps between "Add Training Run" hits (it's silly to keep downloading them)
• let people change the buttons
• consider adding some extra special buttons - I could (for example) track the last ten Fetch and RW forum pages that the user has been to - if anyone's any ideas then let me know!
• consider changing the default buttons (anyone got any preferences?)

P.S. If anyone's interested I've now tested it on IE7 and it works just fine :-)

Integration with Gmap-Pedometer

! THIS POST IS NOW OUT OF DATE - for integration with GoogleMaps see www.runsaturday.com including the super new mapper - DO IT!

OK... So it may seem a bit odd... You may ask why would I want to integrate my GPS with a pedometer... but actually this is about me finding a way to quickly share my GPS routes with other peeps.

With the latest version of the code, whenever I browse to the excellent GMAP Pedometer site then the toolbar asks me if I want to insert a GPS run onto the google map - then once I've done that I can use the "normal" pedometer facilities in order to save the route and share it with others :-)

Overall it seems to work quite well at present. There are a few problems I've seen:

• It can be a bit slow - I wish there was a quicker way of getting hold of the track information from the Garmin but currently the only way is to get hold of all the track information (which can take quite a lot of time!).
• You can only upload the last 32 "runs" - that's all that the Garmin seems to store.
  
• Google maps does cause Internet Exploder to explode occasionally (which is particularly bad in this current heat)
• I'm currently not uploading all the details to the map - there are just too many data points - instead I upload about one point every half minute of exercise - I might work on this later!

An example uploaded route is my half marathon jaunt in Cheshire last weekend - http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=308635

Also in the latest installer (available on http://lodge.stuart.googlepages.com/HollywoodInstall.msi) is:
- small fix to missing value (fastest speed) in summary info for Fetch
- some small speed improvements for collecting information from the 301.
- the addition of a few extra UI feedback features (including the requested double-clicking within the select run dialog).

Please note that all testing is currently being done only on the Forerunner 301 v 3.20 talking over USB to a PC running Windows XP SP2.

I have looked at some prototype code for the 201 connected via RS232, but haven't yet tested it (due to lack of hardware and time).