Workout maps in Windows Mobile, Java and BlackBerry

Some of our users have noticed that they are haven’t been able to view the maps for their newly-made workouts these past few days. This is due to a change in Google’s API that broke compatibility with the Windows Mobile version (this only seems to affect the WM version, be sure to tell us if anything has changed in any of the other versions).

Upgrading to the latest version fixes this.

UPDATE: This also affects the Java version. Download the latest version from here to fix this.

UPDATE: This also affects the BlackBerry version. We’re working on a fix.

Altitude on Windows Mobile devices, revisited

We had an entry a while ago about altitude problems with Windows Mobile devices. While we still haven’t found a definite solution to the problem for everyone, there are two things that we wanted you to know:

1. If you’re having altitude problems, check to see if there are any ROM updates for your device. Updating the device’s firmware has solved this problem for a lot of users.
2. We’re still working on providing everyone with altitude data, as well as the ability to manually choose the COM port for your GPS unit from within SportyPal.

BlackBerry 8330 Curve

A lot of BlackBerry Curve 8330 users are having problems with SportyPal. It seems that the application records data for a while, and then stops and refuses to change any stats aside from the clock.

This sounds an awful lot like the WM sleep bug, but the 8330 doesn’t seem to have a sleep/suspend mode, and the problem doesn’t seem to be linked to the device’s display.

One 8330 even had his BlackBerry freeze while trying to acquire a GPS signal.

Has anyone found a solution to, or does anyone have any idea of what might be causing this?

Motorola Q series

Even though update 1.0.5 enabled Windows Mobile Standard users to run SportyPal, we’re told that some devices still can’t.

Most of the complaints we received were regarding the Motorola Q9c. The Q series phones can’t run SportyPal because they have landscape screens, and we can’t find a way to rotate them (unlike other landscape screen devices).

If you’ve found a way to do this, please let us know, since we don’t have any Motorola Qs to test. We’ll keep a list of what we’ve tried so far and what we think you should try next:

• SportyPal itself – refuses to rotate and displays a warning that it can’t run in landscape mode.
• Our own rotator app – crashes.
• RotateMe 1.0 – crashes.
• AARotate – probably doesn’t work either.

Not tested yet:

• Rotate v1.1
• NYDITOT Virtual Display
  

Also, we’d like to see if you can assign a hardware button to rotate the screen.

BlackBerry connectivity issues

As we’re sure you’ve noticed, the BlackBerry version beta of SportyPal has trouble connecting to the website via GPRS. This was the main reason why we decided to release the beta version: so that we could see if anyone would manage to get it working without WLAN. So far, either no one’s gotten it to work, or they’re keeping to themselves.

Petar suggests that BlackBerry users should try setting up a TCP connection and using that to connect to the Internet. Here are some links with more information on how you can do this:

BlackBerry TCP settings on WikiAnswers
Full Internet access on BlackBerry forums
BlackBerry configuration on QuickIM’s forums

Let us know if any of this works for you.

Verizon VX6800

One of our users has reported a bug with their Verizon VX6800 (branded HTC Titan as far as we know, correct us if we’re wrong). It seems that even though they disabled their power saving mode as described in this post, their GPS signal still stops when the screen goes out. Furthermore, they can’t turn the screen back on using the center button, they have to use the power button instead, which probably means that the device has gone to full sleep mode.

We can’t think of any reason why this would be happening other than the display screen being somehow linked to the power button. This way, when SportyPal turns of the screen, the entire phone goes to sleep mode.

Has anybody else encountered this problem and have you found a way around it?

Sleep mode in Windows Mobile

Early into the developement of the Windows Mobile version of SportyPal, we noticed an interesting feature of the operating system that bugs us to this day: even if there is work actively being done by an application (such as, for example, recording the coordinates of a GPS-tracked workout), the device will go to sleep mode if it’s set to do so and you don’t press any keys in the meantime. Unfortunately for us, sleep mode also kills the GPS signal, and we don’t want this to happen during a workout. To work around this without having to tell the users to change their power settings for every workout, SportyPal disables sleep mode during workouts (where having a constant GPS fix is obviously pretty important) and handles the screen state itself. So far, so good. But there are two problems that remain:

First, if you press the power button to turn the screen off, the device goes to sleep and your signal is lost. Don’t do this during a workout, the screen will turn itself off pretty soon, and you can turn it back on by pushing any button on your device.

Second, unlike the devices that we tested on, some devices completely ignore our attempts to disable sleep mode and sleep anyway. Over the next few CAB updates, we’ll be looking for a way to disable sleep mode for all Windows Mobile devices. However, since we can’t test if this works (we haven’t had any problems with this on our devices to begin with), we’ll need your input to tell us if what we’re doing is any good.

Until we sort this out, users with the auto-sleep problem are going to have to set their power settings manually. To do this, go to Start -> Settings -> System -> Power -> Advanced and uncheck the “turn off device if not used for…” option.

Power Settings

Wrong password?

A few of our users have reported that they are unable to register their devices with the website. Their devices display an error message (usually that the password is wrong) and doesn’t let them upload any workouts, but at the same time you get a “thank you for registering” e-mail and they can access the site with the same account.

If you are experiencing this problem, it is probably due to your mobile device accessing the web through a proxy server. The SportyPal server receives the data from your device and sends an OK signal back to it, but when that signal goes through the proxy, it changes it so that the mobile devices thinks that the site rejected the user data.

We’re trying to work around this, but here’s what you can try in the meantime:

• Ensure that your device is actually connected when you’re trying to send. Test your connection, visit google.com or any website that you know is running at the moment to see if everything is OK with your connection.
• Are you using a GPRS connection to access the Internet? Try Wi-Fi or WLAN if your device supports it.
• Does your mobile network have a filter for undesirable content? If so, they may have blacklisted sportypal.com. Check to see if you can disable this filter and if this fixes the problem. Even better, tell your network provider that sportypal.com is not a harmful website!
• Can you disable the proxy altogether? If you do and you find that you still can’t register or upload workouts, then this is likely another problem completely.

Note that if you do manage to register by temporarily disabling your proxy, you can still upload workouts. The device will report that the upload failed, but check the website, and you’ll see that your workout has been uploaded.

UPDATE: As of today (9.6.2009) we have resolved this problem for some users, mostly with the help of Mike Bearne and Edo Donkers, two members of the SportyPal community who pretty much did everything that we asked of them to help us get to the bottom of this issue. So, if the above workarounds didn’t help, you may want to try registering and/or uploading again.  We’re working on fixing this problem for everyone, and we’ll send you an update as soon as we have something.

We are still interested on hearing from you if you can’t register or upload workouts, so post your problem on http://www.sportypal.com/Support, and be sure to tell us what device you’re using and what network you’re on.

Altitude on Windows Mobile devices

Some of you that are using the Windows Mobile version of SportyPal may have noticed that the altitude graph on the website always shows your altitude as having a value of zero.

This is a known issue with Windows Mobile’s GPS Intermediate Driver and there’s most likely nothing you can do about it. For most Windows Mobile devices, the altitude recorded is always zero. We’ve read about people working around this by manually configuring the GPS driver, but we’ve never had much success with it on our devices.

If you want to give it a go, go to Start -> Settings -> System -> External GPS. In the Access tab, uncheck the “Manage GPS automatically” option, then choose a port and baud rate in the other tabs.

Be sure to write in if this actually works for you.

HTC P3600 users

We received a bug report from a HTC p3600 user who says that, a few seconds into his workout, his display switches off, and when he turns it back on, none of the values on his screen are updated.

The display is supposed to switch off after a few seconds of inactivity in order to save power, but the only thing that’s switched of is the display – everything else is still running, so this should not be happening.

We decided to circumvent the standard Windows Mobile power savings functions on purpose, because when your device goes inactive that way, everything is suspended – including GPS. So, if your power-down interval is set pretty low (less than half a minute) and you are experiencing this sort of problem, you should try disabling the power savings options while using SportyPal (Start -> Settings -> System -> Power -> Advanced -> uncheck the “turn off device if not used for…” options).

We can’t seem to reproduce this bug right now, but we’re interested in hearing from other users that have had the same problem.