Navigon, TomTom, the iGPS360 and... debugging GPSSerial

Link for iPhone and iPod Touch users here

This is a post that describes how GPSSerial was debugged to fix the heading bug that appeared in Navigon and TomTom.

As you can imagine, it is very time-consuming to get on the road and do real-life GPS testing every time the code for GPSSerial is updated. As such I decided to record the output of the iGPS360 module to a file while driving my car on a route that was known to have heading problems in Navigon.

What you see in the above video is an in-door setup where the iPod Touch is connected through an interface board to my desktop computer. The desktop computer in turn plays back the on-the-road recorded GPS trace through the interface board. This setup is a huge time-saver when it comes to testing bug-fixes in the GPSSerial source code.

In the course of the debugging process, I also updated the iPhone Toolchain on the desktop PC (running cygwin) to firmware version 3.1.x as I first thought that the bug was related to the Toolchain version. This was quite an experience in itself: not without problem; although the instructions at Saurik's page are very good, they are not complete, and neither up-to-date (yet) for the 3.1.x firmware.

After having spent a lot of time on testing and debugging the code, all the work has finally paid off: the latest GPSSerial version is finally working correctly with Navigon. The incorrect-heading bug is now fixed and the red GPS bar does no longer appear when you are not moving.

You can download and install the latest GPSSerial version by following the instructions on the Orange Gadgets site here.

The new version should hopefully be available through Cydia soon as well.

Try it out and feel free to leave your feedback in the comments.

Enjoy! PmgR

Some more AppStore apps for the iGPS360

Today a post with a variety of things: an update on three AppStore applications that quite a few people have asked about.

1. The first application is the marine navigation software from Navionics. Navionics currently has a free application on the AppStore called Navionics Viewer.
   
   
   
   I can confirm that this application works with the iGPS360 module and GPSSerial 1.1 installed on an iPhone 2G (first generation) running 3.0 firmware as well as on an iPod Touch 1G (first generation) running 2.2.1 firmware.
   
   Navionics currently has various maps for a good price on the AppStore:
   
   • Navionics Viewer (free)
     
   • Navionics Marine: US East ($6.99)
     
   • Navionics Marine: US West ($6.99)
     
   • Navionics Marine: US Central ($6.99)
     
   • Navionics Lakes: US South ($4.99)
     
   
   Hopefully this will make a lot of the nautical GPS users very happy!
   
   
2. Then the second application that has been confirmed to work with the iGPS360 module and GPSSerial 1.1 installed is Geocaching.
   
   Credit goes to Katie who has an iPod Touch 2G (second generation) and she says:
   
   "I saw one your website that you didn't know if your GPS unit worked with geocaching. I tried it out yesterday and it does work! The only reason I got the GPS was for geocaching so I was very happy to see that it works great! I just wanted to let you know so you can advertise that it does work! The app is called Geocaching. It's the official Geocaching app that sells for $9.99. I had to download GPSSerial for it to work, but once I did that it works great! I am so happy with the GPS unit!"
   
   Groundspeak Inc.'s Geocaching app can be downloaded from iTunes here.
   
   Have fun Geocachers!
   
   
3. Then lastly, let's talk a bit about Navigon. The results seem to be mixed among people. Some people can get it to work with the iGPS360 module and GPSSerial 1.1, while others can't. Even from the reviews on the AppStore, it seems that this is the same for people with a 3G iPhone with built-in GPS: some get it to work, others can't.
   
   Unfortunately, I haven't been able to get Navigon North America to work on my iPhone 2G (first generation) running 3.0 firmware with the iGPS360 and GPSSerial 1.1 installed. I get this picture...
   
   
   
   Feel free to leave your own findings as feedback in the comments. Make sure you mention what edition of Navigon (Europe or North America) you are using, as well as the version and what country you are in.
   
   There could be a few possible reasons:
   
   
   1. It could be a serious bug on Navigon's part, not polling the CoreLocation framework correctly.
      
   2. Or it could be a GPSSerial bug (the software is still in beta)
      
   3. A bug in Apple's 3.0 firmware.
      
   
   Hopefully Mathieu from Xwaves will be able to take a look at it soon and make the final verdict. I wouldn't be surprised if it is a bug on Navigon's part. But either way, maybe Mathieu can make a workaround for it in the next version of GPSSerial!