Review of My Tracks

Normally, you expect a review to focus on ski gear at a ski website. Jackets, skis, boots, poles, goggles, etc. However, this is going to be about a software application entitled My Tracks. My Tracks is a mobile application for Android platformed devices. I turned the application on this weekend to see what it could do.

A Synopsis

From the Appspot website:

My Tracks is an application for your AndroidTM phone that enables you to record GPS tracks and view live statistics – such as time, speed, distance, and elevation – while hiking, biking, running or participating in other outdoor activities. Once recorded, you can share your tracks, upload them to Google Spreadsheets and visualize them on Google My Maps.

The application is free to download, install, and run. However, since it requires constant GPS information it will consumer a lot of battery.

How Did It Perform?

So-so. When the satellite image was put down on the path I took, it had me skiing in and out of the trees, which was wrong. It did not just have me on the edge but deep in them, so there is a mismatch between the actual path when overlaid with the satellite imagery. However, I can tell which lines are going uphill and which are going downhill.

Key Metrics

You can pull up a screen containing overall statistics on your trek. In my case the one I was most interested in was top speed and my top speed was just shy of 40 mph, which is consistent with a radar shot I received some years ago. The stats also contained total distance, average speed (5 mph), distance of total ascent, and max and min elevations.

Other Features

You can save your tracks to your phone and then push them to Google and from there to various social media outlets.If you want, you can check out the map and see what I am talking about.

What I’ld Like to See

The application does give the user a choice to export the maps, but I did not recognize any of the export targets to be one of the common graphics formats. I suppose I could print the map and redirect the printer output to a PS file and then convert that, but most people will not get that.

Overall

I like the application and have no qualms about suggesting its use to others.

Good Stuff!

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