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Is anyone currently using the new Android App for geocaching that GS put out? I’d be grateful if someone that has would give a brief review.
Do you currently use c:geo? It’s free whereas the groundspeak app is $9.99. So I went the cheap route and am very happy with c:geo. Everything is live and I can log online, not just upload field notes. Only complaint is that the app is comparatively slow to other applications.
On the Left Side of the Road...I have no geocacing app on my phone. Part of the reason for my post is to find out if it’s worth it or not and how ell it works (accuracy). Guess I didn’t see the part where it told it was $9.99! Is that per month???
I don’t know if it’s per month or one time–I just pointed the handy dandy barcode scanner app 8) at the QR code and that’s what it said it would cost so I said “no thanks.”
Instead, I’ve been using the c:geo app for a few weeks now and it’s worked very well. I think the only thing it does not allow you to do that the grounspeak app does is to use a PQ. However for my purposes it works fine because if I’m going to plan a PQ I’ll use the Oregon. I use the phone mainly for on-the-fly caching when I don’t have the Oregon, to check for log/status updates if we get stuck, and to occasionally do some logging from the field.
On the Left Side of the Road...Regarding accuracy, that would be tied to the phone’s GPS and not the app (right?). I’ve found the GPS to be pretty good but not to the consistent performance of a dedicated GPS unit, which is pretty much what I expected.
On the Left Side of the Road...According to mtn-man (a long time GC admin and reviewer)
c:geo breaks the terms of use. You are violating the Terms of Use for the site if you use it. Please stop using it. The app pulls data automatically from the site without permission from Groundspeak. You in turn are violating the Terms of Use for the site by using the application. The author has been asked to take the app down but refuses.
Well that explains why I couldn’t find it on the groundspeak forums when I looked initially. Thought that was odd. Apparently not only is the app “banned,” but they delete any references to it that pop up in the forums, so that e’splains it.
Looks like there might be some other free ones out there that don’t violate the TOS…geobeagle & geohunter? I honestly don’t know how you’re supposed to vet all these. Buy the $9.99 app I suppose.
On the Left Side of the Road...GeoBeagle is fine and does not violate their terms of use.
Yep, c:geo is a banned word on GC and any reference gets deleted immediatly. They really don’t like that app…
So how is the average user who just goes to the android app store and downloads this great little gadget supposed to know it is a “banned” app? They don’t know what goes on behind the lines of programming code so how would they know it supposedly violates the TOS? (And how many really care?) And if that big of a “back door” is there on groundspeak’s part, don’t they have some responsibility to lock it down on their end? Is groundspeak going to–or even able to–determine what app a user is using to access a site? And then take some action?…if so, what?
All interesting issues, that we won’t see discussed, seeing that they delete any reference to the app name. Seems pretty self-defeating to me.
On the Left Side of the Road...The programer of c;geo has repeatedly said that groundspeak will not tell him exactly what part of the tos he is violating so he can change the programing on it What it really comes down too is his app does everything the groundspeak app does but it is $9.99 cheaper.
Oh and that is a one time fee.
@gotta run wrote:
So how is the average user who just goes to the android app store and downloads this great little gadget supposed to know it is a “banned” app?
You are very correct that most users won’t know that there is a problem with the app. I would guess that the average user who doesn’t visit the GC forums regularly won’t know it’s a banned app until GC sends them a nastygram telling them to stop using it or be banned.
As far as the programmer not knowing what part of the TOU is being violated… I would say that he might want to read the part thay says
You agree that you will not use any robot, spider, scraper or other automated means to access the Site for any purpose without our express written permission.
Thanks, TBC. I started to write a response to this and had a bit of trouble reconciling my roles of board member and reviewer on this topic. It is pretty easy to tell an illegal program. If you have to load the program with caches from a query (like you would load a Palm), it is ok. If it just displays the gc.com page in a browser window, that is ok. If it is sold by Groundspeak, that is obviously ok. If it has its own database of caches which were obviously downloaded from the site, well, that is pretty much guaranteed to be against the TOU.
And yes, the programmer knows exactly what the issues are. Rather than comply or buy a license for the data, it is more profitable to try to skirt the issue and claim ignorance, hoping to find “customers” among those who don’t know better. In this case, GS has a tough position, where they would like to let people know it is “illegal” but any communication would just give the data thieves more publicity. (This kind of stuff is why the PQs are limited to 1000 caches, to make it more difficult to build an external database.)
@Team Deejay wrote:
It is pretty easy to tell an illegal program. If you have to load the program with caches from a query (like you would load a Palm), it is ok. If it just displays the gc.com page in a browser window, that is ok. If it is sold by Groundspeak, that is obviously ok. If it has its own database of caches which were obviously downloaded from the site, well, that is pretty much guaranteed to be against the TOU.
I strongly disagree with the “easy to tell” part of this, Deejay, as it relates to the END USER of this app. It’s not clear at all (or at least not clear to me) how the app loads the data, and there is the option to load cache information through a standard web browser, or thorugh the c:geo display. So as far as I can tell without tearing the program apart, it’s just a snazzy UI that includes a nice integration to maps and navigation–just like my Oregon redisplays everything in its own format, except the c:geo app does it in real time…somehow.
I’m not a programmer myself but I like to think I’m pretty tech-savvy. But when I looked into this app (and I don’t just install things that look interesting without looking into them), the info looked solid, reviews were great, and nothing came up on the gc.com forums (now I know why). I suppose the second part might have been a red flag, but…
My point is, unless you have an insider’s knowledge on this, you are not going to figure it out or probably even try to figure it out.
gc.com is doing themselves no favors by pretending this app doesn’t exist. If gc.com doesn’t like this app, they’re going to have to do something about it with the app provider itself from a licencing agreement or intellectual property perspective, which perhaps they are. If they try to attack it from the user level, they better at least give people some warning before they start “banning accounts” as I’ve seen rumored on the forums. Because I can guarantee you that the vast majority of users are “violating” TOS unwittingly by using this app.
On the Left Side of the Road...The app market has this really neat feature that lets you buy an app and if you don’t like it and uninstall it in 24 hours they refund the price of the app. So with that in mind I went ahead and bought the app yesterday and used it some during the west bend cache bash.
I am using an HTC droid Incredible and had no issues with it force closing and it seemed to run as fast as other apps I have used. There might be a little bit more battery drain then I am use too having.
Over all the program works greats. The accuracy was even with the other cache apps that are available in locating a cache. I did not get a chance to download a pq to it but looking at how everything else worked good on it I assume there wouldn’t be any issues with it.
It is good for impromptu caching or needing additional info while in the field but a cell phone still does not beat a hand held gps for accuarcy.
Over all a good program but I did uninstall it at the end of the day because the $9.99 is to high compared to several other apps that are on the market that are free or a few dollars and work just as well or better.
So what is the latest and greatest Droid APP?
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