Time Flies

Wow things seem to move fast.

I updated my stat page today.  With many of the stats that I have tracked for the last sixteen months.  I am a stat junkie.  Things of note..

For me.

• Publishing 33% more this year than last.
• It appears I am contacting many more of you than last year as well

For Utah

• We are up nearly 4000 caches from a year ago.
• Most categories are seeing little change, up or down
• Traditionals are up 24%
• Mystery (sorry I labeled as puzzles) are up 17%
• Earthcaches up 15%
• Letterboxes up by 78%

It will be interesting to see if Letterboxes keep up the rise and match the numbers of Earthcaches in the future. 

I wonder if we will keep up the growth, we seem to keep growing faster and faster.  Will we have 2300 by next year?  Will we slow down?

Well no more boring stats today.

New Attributes

In trying to find a way to make Geocaching more helpful, a week or more ago, Geocaching added a few more attributes to the mix.  I wish more would use them (Including myself)  this allows people to filter their Pocket queries.  Many of the new geocaching GPS units are also allowing the use of the attributes.

Most of them are self explanatory. 

Night Cache.. woo hoo. many wanted it as its own separate category, but this is where it ended up. 

Park and Grab.  For all those pesky ones on the side of the road, and the emergence of power trails.

Abandoned Structure.  For all those people that like old buildings, bridges, and other such items (like me)

The hike distance. Nice to let someone know how far they will need to hike to actually get the cache. 

Dangerous animals.  I am sure this is because in many parts of the world snakes are not the animal that you need to worry about.

UV Light Required. Though this is not common around here.  It is very common in Europe.

Snowshoes.  Obvious.  I am trying to figure out when this one would be used.  10 feet of snow and it is waist high with snowshoes?

Cross country Skis.  Woo Hoo Cervine girls winter ski event will have its own attribute.

Special tool Required.  HAHAHA  I love this one. For some strange reason.

Well that is all for this small installment.  I will be posting some stories of events coming up, along with some stories that I have gathered.

Android Geocaching App - Part 5

Final thoughts

I use it more an more now as time goes by.  I do not think I would have been this kind had I written the review a week ago, but as I use it more and more and take the time to play with it, I am really pleased with how it works. 

The biggest drawback for me was loading a gpx file.  When I spent 15 mins for a small 500 cache GPX I was starting to worry about the program.  I liked everything else.  But i was really disliking that one thing.  I decided that I was rarely going to use it.  Then when 1.0.1 came out I decided that I would take the time to do it again.  2 mins or a little less. 

Apparently there was a crash on the droid systems.  I am guessing that the UI was interfering with the phone.  Until Google gets a handle on those kind of issues it will plague all android devices.  If they let every phone manufacturer tinker with their own version of the UI you are just asking for disaster. That was a good example.

I think the biggest failing now is with those from other countries.  Once again Google strikes.  There is no market to pay for apps in other countries.  This means that people in most of the non North American market will not be getting a paid app for some time.  Time to get on the ball Google.

Geocaching could do something on their own, but it requires that the owner of the phone turn off a security feature that keeps a bad program from being loaded on the phone.  Phones are set by default to only be allowed to download apps from the app market.  Anything else is trudging in grey areas. You do not know what you could get.  They may have to play on the workaround.

After playing with 4-5 software suits  c:geo, geobeagle, geohunter, columbus, and another that I cannot remember.  This is my favorite so far.  There are features of others that I liked but this appears to be the best considering that it is a 1.0 version.  It is fast and easy once I got the hang of it.  The others seemed kind of messy. 

I will be more happy when you can pick up and drop off trackables. It will let me pick them up in the field and that is something i want now.  I was playing with an app that would do that, but gave up after a little bit.

I have not had a crash since 1.0.1  so hopefully that luck will continue. I find myself using my Oregon less and less.  I do not field note on my Oregon at all now.  I log directly from my phone.  I sometimes will post a note when I want more than a line to the cache owner.  If I want to post a bigger story I will wait until I get home.

Love my phone, love my android, love my caching.  It all seems to come together.

Android Geocaching App - Part 1- Initial Impressions

Android Geocaching App - Part 2 - Searches, Trackables, and Settings

Android Geocaching App - Part 3 - Geocache Navigation

Android Geocaching App - Part 4 - Loading Saved Files

Android Geocaching App - Part 5 - Final thoughts

Android Geocaching App - Part 4

I was looking for as much information as I could.   There was not a lot that I could find but I can take the time to help you figure out how to load information into your geocaching app.

First you need a gpx file.  This is most easily done with one of two options.  The two options require a premium memberships, and some understanding of pocket queries.

You need to create a pocket query for what you are looking for.  There are a number of options to do that.  If you go to your profile page and select the "pocket queries".  Take the time to create a pocket query for the area that you want. There are a number of options to make a query, I will not go through them all here.  You want your file to be available for download.

The other would be to create one through another program through GSAK.  Then upload that file to GSAK. In that case you can go to your 'my profile' page, and and to your saved gpx files.  Upload the file there.

When you are ready to download the file go to your application and go to the first screen titled "Search" at the top.  Select menu and click on your saved caches button.

You can then go to a screen with Download Pocket Queries, you will get a menu of all the pocket queries that you are able to download.  Select the one that you want to download. It will give you some information on the file, and you can compete the download.  It will just take a while do download, and then transfer the information into the program.  Into a format that can be used. 

You can also take the time to load a file from your computer.  This should allow larger files. I am not sure how yet.. but it is coming.

It took about 15 minute to process a 500 count file.  With the new 1.01 update it took only a minute or two to do the same amount.

Once you have it down you select your saved caches (from the menu) it will open all of those files.  Voila.. you have a lot you can use as your drive around and offline.

Android Geocaching App - Part 1- Initial Impressions

Android Geocaching App - Part 2 - Searches, Trackables, and Settings

Android Geocaching App - Part 3 - Geocache Navigation

Android Geocaching App - Part 4 - Loading Saved Files

Android Geocaching App - Part 5 - Final thoughts

Android Geocaching App - Part 3

We are on to finding and heading to the local geocaches.  In part 2 we looked at the setting and some of the different ways to search .. now we will move on to the search.

If we select the Find Nearby Geocaches that we mentioned before a screen pops up with a number of options.  In general I have searched for 20 unfound traditional caches.  I do not spend much time with many of the others, If I do I will have searched on my Oregon GPS

Understanding the Found Caches

When your list of caches comes up there is a lot of info that will pop up right away.

• There is a Symbol that shows the cache type (from GC.com) If you have found it the type will show with a large check box.
• Name of cache
• Terrain/Difficulty
• Size
• GC #
• Distance and Bearing
• There are also three bars.  The three bars will show you disabled, premium and found.
• Bugs - with the number that are inside.

Geocache Details

When you select the cache that you are looking for you will jump to the next screen with more info.  The menu at the top will show you the previous info, but will also include who placed the cache, and the date hidden.

Following down are the following menus

Navigate to Geocache

I will cover it lower on the page. 

Save for offline use

Saves the cache for when you are out of cell area.. or loose signal.

Description

Pulls the description from the cache page

Recent Logs

This will show you the recent logs on the cache.  If you are looking at a saved file that list will be 5 caches (or whatever you downloaded on a custom file)  If you are using live, it gives you get the last 10, there is also a handy button to show you the next 10.  You have access to a number of logs if you need them

Hint

Who could not use a hint now and then.

Attributes

This will show you the attributes that you can use on the cache page.

Inventory

A list of the trackables in the cache.  Clicking on them give you the symbol art, name, tag/coin and #.  It will take you to the trackable page so that you can review the description and see the goal of the trackable. It will even take you to the trackable cache page if you wish.

Photos

This will show all the photos that people have uploaded on the cache page.  I always wanted this to help find a spoiler.  I finally got it.

Post a Log/Field Note

This takes you to the page to log your cache. On that page is

Select log type

Found/DNF/etc

Auto Post Log

This will set it to post when you are done on GC.com or throw it onto your field notes to complete logging offline later.

Save and Dismiss

Save it until later?  I will follow up on this one.

Submit to Geocaching.com

Pretty obvious.

--now jumping back to the previous screen where we left off.

Find Nearby Geocaches.

Do another search from this point as center point

View on Geocaching.com

Jumps to the website so you can see the cache page

View on External map

This lets you pick another location on your android device to look.  In particular you can use this option to take you to the program to use your auto to help you navigate to your cache, giving you turn by turn instructions.

Navigating to a Cache

As mentioned above you can select this to help you jump to your navigation. You will get a green pin for the cache.  a blue dot for you and a line for how far to go.  on the top of the screen in a little black bar is the cache name and how far away you are.  Your blue dot may have a circle around it.  That circle gets bigger or smaller based on the accuracy of the signal.

Map Mode

You can hit your menu button and select map mode to change it to satellite mode (I prefer)

My location

there is also a menu button that will always jump you back to your location, so if you are panning around it can jump you back

Add waypoint

Another vital button is adding a waypoint.  This will take you to a point where you can enter the location.  This is ideals for some puzzles and mutlis.

Compass

This will let you jump to the compass.  It will point you in the direction you are heading.. give you the coords at your location, and where you are going. and your gps accuracy. 

Thoughts

I am getting better at this, I have started to really enjoy using this, and writing this has helped me find a number of little hints tricks.  but is is very responsive to me, and is easy to use.

next - Part 4 - Loading Saved Files

Android Geocaching App - Part 1- Initial Impressions

Android Geocaching App - Part 2 - Searches, Trackables, and Settings

Android Geocaching App - Part 3 - Geocache Navigation

Android Geocaching App - Part 4 - Loading Saved Files

Android Geocaching App - Part 5 - Final thoughts