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Some observations about scenic
hi everybody. I’d like to share my iOS review of scenic in the hope it can be useful to the developers.
Title: impressive
Hi Miros,
Thanks for the detailed feedback. Really appreciate you taking the time. If you like, I could use some more good beta testers for Scenic 3 (beta has not yet started). You can register here as a beta tester if you like: https://scenicapp.space/blog/knowledge-base/scenic-3-info/ (almost at the bottom you'll find a 'register as a Scenic 3 beta tester' link)
Below I've added reactions to all your feedback points. Thanks again and cheers,
Guido
1. No word completion in text boxes, this can be annoying when you’re searching for something in your favourites or looking for a place. Mostly is unusual, as one expects word completion anywhere nowadays.
OK. Let me add that to the list for Scenic 3.
2. Sometimes in calculating a route, scenic comes up with purposeless loops which can be quite clumsy to remove. When the app presents you with waypoints, you can try and remove some of them to remove the loops, eventually works, but is rather hit and miss. I suspect the responsibility for the loops may be with kurvinger, but...
Yes. This can happen with Curvy Route and Round Trip generation. The problem is not so much with Kurviger, but more that Kurviger and Scenic have different sources for their map data. Here's a support article on 'strange loops' that explains this and gives some tips. It mentions route import, but for Curvy Route and Round Trip generation the same things apply. This will get a lot better with Scenic 3 though.
3. The offer to recalculate a route in case of detour is very small on the phone screen and hard to hit when riding and wearing thick gloves. What’d be very good is that while the notification is on the screen, any touch anywhere on the screen is taken to mean yes, recalculate. Ideally, the time the notification stays on screen should be user configurable.
I like this suggestion! Will keep this into account when working on the detour behaviour for Scenic 3.
4. When you edit a route in progress, eg to add a stop, the route is recalculated entirely, which means losing any “curvy route” you might have previously set. Observe that after this it is not possible to apply the “generate curvy route” to the new route. This can be quite annoying, if you’re half way through a ride and you lose it just because you want directions for a minor detour. Perhaps it is not hard to add to the set of actions already available while navigating (like skip next stop/via etc) one to recalculate the route changing its type (fast, efficient, curvy etc)
5. Distances in feet are unfamiliar to most, I suggest to also add an option to use fractions of miles instead. Better 0.2mi than 1056 feet.
6. It would be nice if consecutive rides could be merged.
7. Importing tracks ideally requires adding sufficiently many and strategically located waypoints to force scenic to calculate exactly the track you’re importing. This can be quite laborious and frustrating by the hit and miss experience. Sometimes the route loops and it becomes so messy that it is hard to correct it, for instance when the same roads are traveled several times in both directions it can be hard to tell which way the route goes, where the unwanted loops may arise from and, therefore, how to attempt to fix them. It would help to have an animation of the track from the start, so as to clarify it and try to understand on which waypoints to act in order to clean things up.
8. Either a bug or a limitation, there seems to be a limit of 200 waypoints when editing a(n imported) route. If a bug, please fix it, if a limitation, why?
9. It seems to me that the app behaviour in case of detour needs some serious thinking. If you miss a waypoint the app takes you back or recalculates a way to get back to the original route. Now if you detour again, it tries to take you back to the route that takes you back to the original route. And if you detour again it takes you back to the route that takes you back to the route that takes you back... and so on recursively. Yes, It did happen to me... almost an hour trying to make the app happy and eventually get home (as I didn’t want to lose the ride or split it, but in the end I had to). now I don’t think there’s no easy fix to this, and i do appreciate that the app is trying to do the right thing. Yet, perhaps it can do better. Also sometimes you *want* all of a sudden to skip a section of your route (perhaps you’re tired of twisty road, or your pillion refuses a to come on a narrow track 😅), and the app doesn’t make it easy.
PS. perhaps besides “recalculate” a way to get back to the original route, the app should also offer a way to recalculate the route to a given waypoint, the way it does with stops in the “pro” mode, or more simply to skip n waypoints. Not sure how this would work practically though, as complex manipulations aren’t really suitable while riding (as I said, I already struggle to click the “recalculate” button before it goes off, imagine clicking on minuscule waypoints icons...). Perhaps voice commands? Is that a possibility? I imagine the simple answer is to stop, take off helmet and gloves, enter in edit mode, and remove waypoints manually.
Agreed that this is definitely not ideal for now. I'm planning to revise this entire behaviour for Scenic 3. Not only because it needs revising, but also because the new routing/mapping framework has some other options and configurations around detour behaviour.
Yes, I’m in the uk, and this is a strange place for measures. We fill thanks in litres it measure fuel efficiency in miles per gallon (😜) and nobody knows what a gallon is. We measure car distances in miles, but to the best of my understanding we don’t say “go straight 100 feet, then left”. Rather, we use metres. But we use feet to measure people’s height (🤪). Also google and apple maps would say 0.4mi, rather than using feet or yards.
anyway, very happy to help with beta testing. I registered. It’s the beta out yet?
Concerning point 4: so with “via pro mode” off only stops are taken into account, with it on also the via points. Seems clear. Thanks.
Point 7: yes I mean some form of animation or even colour shadowing that helps me follow a route in the right direction/order when things become messy. Imagine a situation (using a contrived example to try and explain in words what a picture would show immediately) when the route takes you to an intersection from where it then goes into a loop, and then back to the intersection, it takes back around the loop in the opposite sense. And that point, it is very hard to see whether when first reaching the intersection, the route goes left or it goes right: there are arrows in all directions.
Point 9: is the new algorithm confidential or public? I think it’s an interesting problem, I might try to give it w thought, will let you know if I have any suitable idea.
PS. Looking back at my notes, I had a further observation that I forgot to make. Here it is.
10. At least in the uk several A roads may be indistinguishable from motorways in having miles and miles and miles of dual carriageway. they are terribly boring. So perhaps it would be useful to include those in “avoid motorways” or add a new option “avoid dual carriageways”. I’m not sure whether this is possible, ie if the scenic has enough information to distinguish a long stretch of dual carriageway on an A road from a motorway, but if it is, it would be nice.
Also google and apple maps would say 0.4mi, rather than using feet or yards.
OK. I'll look into this for Scenic 3.
It’s the beta out yet?
Not yet. Will be a little while longer. You'll get an email.
Point 9: is the new algorithm confidential or public? I think it’s an interesting problem, I might try to give it w thought, will let you know if I have any suitable idea.
The algorithm is private. I don't even have that deep access myself. It's part of the 3rd party mapping and routing framework.
10. At least in the uk several A roads may be indistinguishable from motorways in having miles and miles and miles of dual carriageway. they are terribly boring. So perhaps it would be useful to include those in “avoid motorways” or add a new option “avoid dual carriageways”. I’m not sure whether this is possible, ie if the scenic has enough information to distinguish a long stretch of dual carriageway on an A road from a motorway, but if it is, it would be nice.
The possible routing mode and avoidances are also determined by the 3rd party map/routing framework. I can them to add features and configuration options. Will add this one to the list for them.
PPS. I looked again at the mi/ft issues. While it remains that in the UK people use meters for short distance indications (100 meters ahead, then left), and not feet or yards, I’ve verified that Apple maps and I suppose google maps use fraction of miles and then yards (not feet, not meters) when the distance gets below 0.1mi. So I stand corrected.
I have always found the distance countdown in feet, yards or metres confuses me at times and I miss turns. Maybe there could be an alternative that doesn't relay on units, I'm thinking a visual countdown. So when the distance goes below 0.5 mile then visual clue pops up for example a row of squares that countdown to the turn. The advantage would be the number of squares would represent the same distance regardless of unit settings. After awhile you would know what the visual clue represents on the road regardless of where in the world you are and what units you are used to.
When parking an aircraft on a stand with a jetty nose in there is a guidance system that helps the pilot stopped the aircraft in the right place. Part of that system is a row of countdown lights. Worked very well. One of many different systems.
Example
Quote from miros on May 1, 2021, 02:15PPS. I looked again at the mi/ft issues. While it remains that in the UK people use meters for short distance indications (100 meters ahead, then left), and not feet or yards, I’ve verified that Apple maps and I suppose google maps use fraction of miles and then yards (not feet, not meters) when the distance gets below 0.1mi. So I stand corrected.
OK. Did some more research on this. There are three common measurement systems in the automotive navigation space.
Metric system (meters / km): The cut is at 1000 meters. Anything lower it will be indicated in meters (e.g. "In 750 meters turn right"), anything higher will be km's. Originally from Netherlands this is also what I'm used to and what I can estimate on the road).
Imperial system US (feet / miles): The cut is at 500 feet. Anything lower it will be indicated in feet (e.g. "In 300 feet turn right"). Anything higher will be (fractions of) miles. This is how Google Maps does it.
Imperial system UK (yards / miles): The cut is at 0.1 miles / 175 yards. Anything lower it will be indicated in yards (e.g. "In 100 yards turn right"), anything higher will be (fractions of) miles. This is more or less your conclusions from Apple Maps too if I'm not mistaken.
I will adjust Scenic to work this way too. Since a yard is just about the same as a meter I guess this could work for you.
Regarding Apple Maps using yards... Apple Maps derives the measurement system from the region as set in the iOS Settings App > General > Language & Region. So, assuming you have that set to UK, according to Apple, the typical measurement system is also yards and miles, I guess ?!?!. As you said... UK is a strange place for measurements 🙂.
Quote from PeteRT on May 1, 2021, 04:52I have always found the distance countdown in feet, yards or metres confuses me at times and I miss turns. Maybe there could be an alternative that doesn't relay on units, I'm thinking a visual countdown. So when the distance goes below 0.5 mile then visual clue pops up for example a row of squares that countdown to the turn. The advantage would be the number of squares would represent the same distance regardless of unit settings. After awhile you would know what the visual clue represents on the road regardless of where in the world you are and what units you are used to.
When parking an aircraft on a stand with a jetty nose in there is a guidance system that helps the pilot stopped the aircraft in the right place. Part of that system is a row of countdown lights. Worked very well. One of many different systems.
Example
I like this suggestion. Thanks!!! I'll keep this in mind when working on this part for Scenic 3.