iOS road trip planner app idea

[furcalchick]

i've noticed that the mac is really lacking a road trip planner app (like tripmaker) even though google earth is a bit of a start. i had an idea a while back to make a google earth plug-in for a road trip app, where it would work with google earth to plan stops for food, gas and routing for a comparable app to tripmaker and the such. the idea could extend to the iphone, but i'm not sure about that. does this sound like a good app idea, or does it need work? btw, i don't know much of anything when it comes to programming. thanks.

 

[danny_w]

Practically anything would be better than what's out there (very little). I used the Knapsack trial and it was good for organization, but sorely lacking in any kind of mapping capabilities. I like the ida of Knapsack but also want the ability to easily calculate distances between town, map out a route, find lodgings/poi's/etc, and easily add these to the trip plan.

 

[furcalchick]

i think google earth is a good basis for the road trip app. the map is already there for us, and you can already calculate a route on google earth. what would be improved would be the ability to route to multiple destinations, calculate in rest stops, nights at hotels, the ability to find a mcdonalds, etc. within 1 mile or so from your route near designated rest times, the ability to set speed limits for more accurate drive times and a budget planner based on the trip. i think an extra feature would be that you can pull out local gas prices to see what would be the cheapest.

if possible, i would want to see this extend on the iphone so someone can alter their road trip plan on the go. this is what i want for a mac road trip planner.

 

[Darkroom]

sounds like a good idea to me... google are always working on something, so check their labs to find out if it's something they're working on...

if you do make it and if it's strong app, you could present it to them - maybe they'll buy it from you... ka ching!

 

[furcalchick]

sounds like a good idea to me... google are always working on something, so check their labs to find out if it's something they're working on...

if you do make it and if it's strong app, you could present it to them - maybe they'll buy it from you... ka ching!

one problem with making the app...i don't know much about making an app. i was hoping to see if someone was interested in helping me out in this aspect.

 

[ChrisA]

i've noticed that the mac is really lacking a road trip planner app (like tripmaker) even though google earth is a bit of a start. i had an idea a while back to make a google earth plug-in for a road trip app, where it would work with google earth to plan stops for food, gas and routing for a comparable app to tripmaker and the such. the idea could extend to the iphone, but i'm not sure about that. does this sound like a good app idea, or does it need work? btw, i don't know much of anything when it comes to programming. thanks.

With gas going to $5 per galon soon trip planning is going to help.

Already the long haul truckers are using very sophisticated software that tells them when to drive and what routes and even computes the best speed to drive by balancing the price to get per haul wit the extra fuel used to get there quickly.

what I would like to see it real-time trafic reports. If you have thousands of gps enabled iPhones in cars on the freeway why can't they report their current speed to a central server some place and then the server and broadcast trafic flow speeds back to those iphones. the iPhone could then use this data to plan a route that gives either best speed ot lowest drive time, lowest total cost or whatever. The key here is not to be stuck in traffic burring gas going 5 MPH. You can get lots of god data from all those GPS enabled phones out there. they don't even need to be iPhones The central server could use other sorces of data, even listing to APRS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_Position_Reporting_System
and various traffic reporting web pages

The router could look at the current traffic speed, A value in dolars per hour you place on yur time, the current price of fueland your car's MPG and then comput a best route and keep that route updated as conditions change. Peole would pay for that level of service. I think a taxi cab driver or divlivery truck driver would pay quite a bit.

 

[furcalchick]

i never thought about making a more local aspect to the app. something to consider. anyone want to help me out on this app?

 

[furcalchick]

i've been thinking over the past week or so. i think it's probably better to do this app in stages.

stage 1: "service strip": this is my main selling point of the app, where you enter in your start and end points (and google will plot you a course). on that route, the app will find gas stations within a certain distance from this main route (up to 10 miles away from the main route). how do you know how much you can drive before you have to fill up? you enter your mpg and gallons in the tank, and how much gas left in the tank (for shorter trips). it will tell you how much you can go before you run out of gas with red lines on the route past the empty line. plus, with online integration with gas.com, you can see who has the lowest gas, avoid certain stations, etc. same concept applies to hotel rooms and food.

stage 2: traffic: in stage two, we insert the abilities to detect traffic updates from most cities, construction trouble spots and the ability to reroute based on these factors.

stage 3: iphone: integrate and sync all of this into the iphone so those with the iphone can change their route on the fly.

i'm starting to think the road trip-speific aspects such as budgeting and syncing with travel web sites will do better on another app, as this is more about using the powers of google maps to another level instead of travel planning. i also want this app to be usable worldwide instead of just one country, so these features will be best done elsewhere, and there will be a choice to use metric or english measurements.

and i found that photoinfoeditor found at this site http://www.mmisoftware.co.uk/, has already used google apps in another way, and this could be a start.

comments on this?

 

[Cromulent]

Great ideas but you need to find out where you are going to get the data from and how you are going to access it. It sounds like some parts of it are straying into the territory of requiring a GPS device.

 

[furcalchick]

Great ideas but you need to find out where you are going to get the data from and how you are going to access it. It sounds like some parts of it are straying into the territory of requiring a GPS device.

most of this can be done on google earth (as in finding gas stations and restaurants), and i'm hoping i can use that as a base. this app is more of a google earth on roids in a sense. the construction data could be pulled from various areas across the internet, with the hard part being how to transcribe it to the app. the traffic updates will probably be the biggest challenge, and not that big of a deal, unless we're talking about major road closures due to a crash or other mishap. the part about the gas prices will be from gas.com. so expect for traffic, most of this is doable.

 

[LouTreize]

I'd be really interested in this app. You got my support and my wallet

I'm planning a trip to Japan for next summer and i started searching a trip planner for the mac...didn't find anything but hope (your idea).

One more thing...an app for the iPhone and iPod Touch would be fantastic! Man, i wish i had the time to learn and make apps, i'd help you out.

Good luck! Keep us posted!