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simonklitj
In happier news, that house is being demolished: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gqqv17v1vo
SpyCoder77
As a pedometer++ user, it is amazing the attention to detail David has maintained over the years. The evolution is crazy.
Amorymeltzer
He really is such a committed and dedicated developer. This here is of course a perfect example—"So… I commissioned a custom map" aka hiring a cartographer—but it was really cool how he blew up with Widgetsmith because he put in the effort with Watchsmith before, and was basically the world's expert on widgets? Couldn't happen to a better guy.
tomduncalf
I have been using the app for years but literally just because I like the step counter widget. I had no idea it did all this! Will try it for sure. Cool read.
monk_grilla
I’m interested since it’s clear this is a passionate and talented developer, but it seems the primary feature is step tracking, which iPhone already does by default. Is Pedometer++’s step counting somehow more accurate?
SpyCoder77
Yes, the primary feature that is being marketed is step tracking, but the app in general is much more than that. It's like how flighty just is a wrapper for the flights API that you could access through Google, yet flighty is the best app for flight tracking nonetheless and is a really cool app.
tomaskafka
I think it is long overdue for rebrand, as right now the marketing is "it's a simple utility to show the daily step counts Apple is already collecting anyway, oh and by the way it has awesome offline maps almost no other apps offer", which is a bit of a weird sell.
apt-apt-apt-apt
For others curious like I was, it seems he hired a cartographer to render essentially a set of huge, nice-looking, custom map images with details like hiking trails that Apple Maps doesn't have.
So unlike Apple Maps, which is dynamically rendered, it basically shows image tiles. It allows for a nicer-looking, more detailed map, but affects things like needing separate downloads for different zoom levels, rotation, updatability.
n8cpdx
The use of the cartographer to generate separate designs and the technology used to render/deliver those designs are two entirely separate concerns.
His original map provider offers both vector and raster tile services: https://www.thunderforest.com/maps/outdoors/
A common pattern is to use a vector tile service + style definition directly or to generate raster tiles if those are desired.
apt-apt-apt-apt
Good point, I assumed he was using images because his screenshots show text perfectly following the curves of rivers, which seems hard to do with dynamic rendering.
agilek
That’s the point of a vector (not raster) tiles. Wh do you say it is hard to do with dynamic rendering? With Maplibre or any modern map SDK this this is standard…
simsla
I'm afraid you're mistaken. He hired a cartographer to iterate over the design, but from the images, he likely used that feedback to create a map style.
For example https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Map_style
However, you're also kind of correct in that the rendered tiles are typically cached server-side (presumably also for Apple Maps).
dzogchen
I think this may not even be possible because Apple does not give access to the Metal graphics API on Apple Watch to third-party developers.
bcraven
I appreciate this comes from an outside perspective as I've not heard of this before, but "Pedometer++ 8" sounds like "Dissertation_final_final_v8.docx" to me.
aucisson_masque
Yeah, I'd rather have pedometer pro max ++ or something like that. Make it more apple like.
AbuAssar
It is just Pedometer++
The 8 is the version number that launched yesterday with this feature
ndr42
I don't know if anybody else is so petty like me regarding installing new apps but while I can't say anything about the app itself, I just wanted to know how much it would cost, if it is an subscription and so on.
But it was not possible from the app store page itself. Have a look, how confusing it is:
https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@ndr/116483475865871622
It shows a lot of price points from 1€ all up to 45€ without saying if its a subscription or a one-time payment.
Maybe the author should include the pricing clearly somewhere else on the app store page as apple is not able to do so.
edit: spelling
tomaskafka
This is Apple's work - they show all enabled purchases/subscriptions author have enabled for price testing. And once you add one, removing it would mean the user's subscriptions auto-renew would get canceled, so they stay and accumulate.
And there is no way for the app to mark "this is the current pricing".
ndr42
Does that mean if I subscribed for 22.99€ it would stay that way year after year?
What could be the reason that Apple designed it this way? The only reason I can think of is customer protection (say 1€ a month changes to 100€ a month and you user does not pay attention).
toasty228
Your question implies someone "designs" things and given the state of the apple app store I'm not sure any form of conscious life is in charge of it
valzevul
Generally it means that yes, the price will stay as-is. When the developer increases the price (versus introducing a different payment tier), they have two options: either keep all existing subscribers at the current price, or offer them to agree with the price bump (users can decline though). Reducing the price affects all existing users automatically.
raylad
The Pedometer functionality is free, and I’ve been using it for many years just because its display is pleasant.
The map tracking features cost $29.95 a year.
MattRix
When I look at the in app purchase prices on the App Store page, it tells me what they’re for? (1 month vs 1 year). You can usually assume that if you see a different price for the same name item, that it’s a sale price.
ndr42
Good to know: My screenshot was from the web version of the app store page (see link in my first post), the iOS-version shows month or year as you said.
The premium yearly subscription has 3 price points shown (22.99, 34.99 and 44.99€) - I feel really bad for the developer as their customers are reminded that they have to pay more than others have paid before. I don't get why Apple is showing the old prices.
necovek
What I find curious is that the entire article seems to be framed in responding to the needs of a single user of the app — the author themselves.
Yet the app is published and has a great App Store review score of 4.8 with 170k+ reviews, and same score with 35k+ reviews for the Watch.
How does the author get feedback and respond to other customers? Or is this simply scratching one's own itch demonstrating its usefulness for others once again?
bwb
Most likely both :)
thrownawaysz
The fact that there is no 1st party Apple made hiking and topography map on the Apple Watch is such a failure, not even on the most expensive “made for explorers” Watch Ultra. And things like gpx import is just a mere dream
It’s a lifestyle device after all but still
kumarvvr
> there is no 1st party Apple made hiking and topography map on the Apple Watch is such a failure
I remember a time when Apple was chided for integrating functionalities of popular apps into its OS.
Apple created an incredibly awesome device, and its up to the market to make full use of its potential. Why would it be a failure for Apple to not make such an app?
interstice
Because they don't allow deeper integrations maybe? I still don't have a watch face layout I like.
gcanyon
But in this case at least, the third-party developer has produced exactly the wonderful result they're looking for. The screen shot at the end showing the difference between Apple's map and theirs is so stark and compelling. If I were hiking I'd pay $20+ for their version.
Edit to add: throwing out a price like that made me go check to see what they actually charge, and either Apple's presentation of in-app purchases or their use of it is sad: it gives the same "premium" item like eight times, with different prices. Maybe that's per month and then longer periods with bulk discounts? Maybe they have a lifetime option for $40? If I were a regular hiker, I'd go for that.
yreg
When Apple uses private APIs that are forbidden to developers on the App Store to compete with them it's not exactly fair.
So I wouldn't say it's a failure that they don't do that even more often.
interstice
Oh and while I'm here the single layer non editable menu / weird grid is also the worst. I grew up texting under the desk on a nine key and only checking after I'd selected the contact to send to. Give me that level of muscle memory again someone, anyone, please.
rjzzleep
That is quite literally how every part of Cocoa was polished. Things such as sidebars, notifications, came from third party libraries, Growl, etc. were all design patterns from the community. Isn't that also how iTunes came to be? Apple trying to acquire the best music players to integrate into its ecosystem? It's somewhat sad to observe what become of apple.
joshstrange
And jailbreaking was a creative source as well until jailbreaking (full, surviving reboots) went away. Yes there is still a sideloading community but nothing like what we were doing with Summer/Winterboard or the hundreds of random tweaks I applied to my phone back then. So many hours spent scrolling through new packages on Cydia.
I wish Apple would see that opening up their platforms actually leads to a better core OS as Apple borrows/steals from the community.
caycep
maybe the culture should be for them to contract with popular app makers to be "The" default app for x amount of years or such, vs sherlocking.
refulgentis
That’s a somewhat obvious flattening of perspective. While it’s clever we can make both positions sound silly, it illuminates nothing while throwing shade.
Centigonal
I trust people like David Smith and companies like onX more than Apple when it comes to creating and supporting a top tier outdoor mapping app.
dylan604
Maybe some people are too young to remember Apple's Maps v1. Even Tim Apple recently mentioned that debacle in what was essentially an exit interview.
SllX
I recently switched back to Google Maps after Apple announced ads were coming to Apple Maps, since if the default Maps app is going to be saddled with ads on my thousands of dollars worth of Apple hardware anyway, I may as well use the best. And yeah, let’s be honest, Apple Maps is good enough for most use cases, but Google Maps blows it out of the fucking water.
In that light, I may be hard pressed to call it a debacle, but it’s still third-rate.
jsbisviewtiful
Apple is so intent on making the Apple Watch a catch-all that it doesn’t necessarily do any specific activity amazingly. After three Apple Watches over many years I finally sold my 10 last year and won’t be buying another. I bought a Coros and am pretty pleased with it, would consider a Garmin in the future. Coros and Garmin devices are built with activity in mind and not unneeded apps, like Uber. Garmin and Coros both have maps too.
microtonal
With Garmin you have to pay attention to the model though. E.g. cheaper Forerunners, Instinct, etc. do not support maps, though some support breadcrumb trail navigation. Then there are some models that do not support it, but have third party apps that add maps. For the models that do (e.g. Fenix, Venu X1, high-end forerunners), it is glorious though. There is a large community making specialized maps (typically based on OpenStreetMap) for Garmin Watches and GPSr units. Installation is typically as easy as dropping an .img file in the right folder on the Watch/GPSr.
Also Garmin's own maps are based on OpenStreetMap and have become pretty good.
Also worth mentioning (probably the same with Coros) that these are offline maps, so they always work, and you typically install them for a whole continent.
ulfw
And I am happy with my Huawei GT-6 41mm. Looks like an actual real watch unlike the Apple ones, does everything Apple does, just no third party apps. Guess what, never needed one. Battery lasts a week instead of a day. Very refreshing to end the day with 91% battery left rather than 11%.
ymolodtsov
But we can have apps and developers like David on the Apple Watch. This is what makes it different from Garmin, where you need the company to build pretty much everything.
astafrig
> no 1st party Apple made hiking and topography map on the Apple Watch
I regularly use hiking and topography maps on my Apple Watch with the first party maps app, so it sure what you’re talking about
thrownawaysz
That's a regional feature not available everywhere
astafrig
Everything involving geography is a regional feature because it takes time to create things for physical stuff across the physical world; its not just some arbitrary limitation like streaming media.
throwaway27448
Tbf there is no such app for the iphone either
coldtea
Is it? They have a platform you can run other apps on, and this one in TFA and others provides this functionality.
cromka
Honestly, the less Apple made apps, the better for the ecosystem and the quality of the apps in general. Apple's recent "sherlocked" apps are not good quality at all, but they make it substantially more difficult for 3rd parties to compete with the now default offerings.
Sir_Twist
Not a developer, but I feel like Apple improving the defaults has been good for the ecosystem. The Reminders app is an example of this, because as it has gotten better over the years, the baseline for a good iOS to-do app has been raised, without reducing the market.
Schiendelman
I agree 100%. I ended up building myself a utility to wrangle my reminders (like keep them from getting missed/lost) instead of using a third-party app.
djfdat
One issue is: when the Reminders app was simple, making a better reminders app just had to be a little more complex that a single developer could improve upon it and charge for it once and make a living. Now, the bar is so high, that it takes significantly more work/time to make a better app, and thus we have to pay subscription pricing in order to use it.
Instead of: let me buy this app for a few bucks and give it a spin, its now: even if I like this app, do I want to pay for it a few bucks a month for forever?
SllX
Generally speaking, Apple should be improving and adding to the base operating system all the time, including new apps. It is better for their users including new users if the phone itself is capable of more out of the box.
Where they fall short though, the App Store is right there. There’s almost always a better alternative for those who value having something better.
ileonichwiesz
> There’s almost always a better alternative for those who value having something better.
That alternative comes with a $60/year subscription these days, though.
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arjie
Apple Maps on WatchOS is pretty good but the usual routine is that I get on my bike with a route set and 3 minutes in the “are you working out?” screen takes over and I can’t see the maps without stopping to turn it off. Surely that screen should turn into a notification or silently record after some time without taking over the screen.
I’m surprised to hear people at Apple work on this because surely they must encounter this issue.
If this guys maps can somehow take the screen and hold it, I think he’s got a killer feature for me. Though I glanced at the App Store page and it wasn’t clear to me which features are subscription gated and which ones aren’t and I despise apps that won’t tell me till I’ve set everything up (it just feels so frustrating that it wasn’t clear ahead of time) so I’ll probably just endure and try to remember to start a workout manually so it won’t take over.
Dork_Sider
You can also turn off the "are you working out" feature. It's in the settings of the workout part. Just turn off "Check In Reminders"
NetMageSCW
That’s a bad name.
arjie
That is one functionality, but there is also the "Start Workout" reminder / "Pause Workout" reminder / "End Workout" reminder. These are the ones that I'd have to change, particularly the "Start Workout" reminder. However, I do want that, I just don't want it to be a persistent screen takeover.
sobjornstad
I was looking to see if someone had commented on this. For me it sometimes even happens if I start the workout before starting navigation – it will start off in the right configuration but then suddenly switch back to workout data in the middle of the ride.
Google Maps on the iPhone has a similar problem where a banner notification can block the section at the top that shows the next turn. If it's persistent (e.g., a calendar reminder), you have to try to swipe it away while driving without clicking on it by mistake. I guarantee multiple people have crashed because of this.
Whoever at Apple thinks that anything at all should override navigation for more than a couple of seconds without explicit user action is an idiot.
arjie
Hahaha the Google Maps thing is so annoying. “You have Astra’s appointment in 30 min”. Yeah, genius, that’s what I’m driving to. Infuriating.
maz1b
Really enjoyed reading this. A lot. Reminds me when I was a teenager reading technical blogs in the earlier days of the internet.
BTW, that last line about hiring/commissioning a cartographer, very rad and cool :~)
kweiza
Static tiles on a watch is the right call. Tried dynamic rendering on a constrained device once and pan/zoom got eaten by GC pauses every frame.
tomaskafka
That might be right - Garmin is doing the best they can with vector maps, but in Apple land, 3 fps rendering wouldn't fly.
timojaask
There’s no GC on watchOS, it uses ARC
hyraki
I have been using WorkOutDoors for awhile. I’ll check this out.
Razengan
While traveling in another country, I once forgot my iPhone passcode (don't ask, I'm autistic like that)
After a few retries it put me on a 2 hour timeout.
I had to get back to my room. I knew the way back on foot well enough, about 30 minutes away, but I wanted to take a look at the map anyway.
I thought I'd try it on my Apple Watch Ultra 3. It was a few months ago so it was the latest OS.
There were a few bugs in trying to do that simple task, like when typing out the name of a location the keyboard kept disappearing as if the UI was crashing or something.
I sighed, muttered a few curses at the state of things and the people in charge who let it get this way, and lowered my wrist and just enjoyed the stroll.
Like so many things in Apple software since the past 5 or so years, so much shit just doesn't work when you REALLY need it. F'n hell
NetMageSCW
On the watch it can be better to dictate than type anyway.
Razengan
Dictation like Siri is another one of those Apple things that you know will suck so you never try using it.
Certainly not going to hold my wrist up to my mouth on a noisy street and yell at my watch until it gets the names of foreign streets right lol
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Great evolution story. Also love seeing what can be achieved by stepping outside design lines, re. centred, symmetrical UIs. Makes me want an apple watch ;)
As an aside there's a screenshot in the article showing the Hidden Valley at Glen Coe, which happens to be one of my favourite short walks in Scotland.
A less happy aside of that aside is the house at the base of the valley. I used to look at it dreamily as we drove past, always closed up, nestled by itself in a remote nook between the mountains. What an extraordinary place it would be to live. The park for the hike was only a couple of hundred metres up the road. A few years later I recognised the house in a Louis Theroux doco, when he travelled there with its owner - TV personality Jimmy Saville. Wow. And then a few years later again, after I'd returned to Australia, it came out, posthumous, that Saville was one of the UK's most prolific child and sexual predators. Horrific stuff. The name and outline of the cottage structure can actually be seen at the top of the map in the screenshot.