Let me start right off by stating that this is a rather anticlimactic 2.0 release. Honestly, I only bumped the major version because I ran out of numbers in the 1.x range!
Anyway, what’s new for this version which is actually 1.9 + 0.1?
Mainly, I added an export to MapMyFitness. EasyRoute already had the ability to send a route pretty much anywhere using the GPX format, but now it has a direct export to a major player in the fitness planning and tracking world.
I added this to address one of the biggest questions/feature requests I get from users: how to actually follow the route after creating it. As a result, I’ve been asked to add tracking to EasyRoute, but I’ve been hesitant to do this with so many activity tracking apps out there already.
The easiest way I know to use the route during an activity is to use Cyclemeter or Runmeter from Abvio. These are terrific free apps that will seamlessly accept routes from EasyRoute and track you while you follow the route. I’ve heard from numerous users who employ this solution and are very happy with it. Also, I’ve exchanged some e-mails with the folks at Abvio and they seem like great people, so I don’t mind sending potential customers their way.
However, I still wanted an easy way to export the route into a major service and MapMyFitness came to the top of the list for a few reasons.
Obviously, they’re popular and well-known, but they also have a great API which made them the easiest service to export to. MapMyFitness also indirectly gives EasyRoute another feature I have been wanting which is to post the route to the web somewhere where it could be seen by anyone. If you export to MapMyFitness, you can mark the route as public, link it, e-mail it around, etc. I figure this could be useful for races where the official website does not have a course map or possibly even for race directors themselves to use to create a link to a course map.
What’s more, I now have a fairly extensible mechanism to add an export to any fitness tracking service out there. MapMyFitness was the first but I hope to include more. As always, your feedback counts, so feel free to contact me to let me know which of your favorite fitness-tracking sites you’d like EasyRoute to export to.
I hope you enjoy the new version and thanks for using EasyRoute!
