Jump to content

Dead?


Team Texas Flash

Recommended Posts

Is Wherigo dead?

 

I just got an Oregon 300 for Christmas and got really interested when I read up on this game. Then I found out that you can’t use the maps or compass in the game-play, well that was a bummer but surely someone can find a workaround or get a software update. Then I find only a few games out there … another bummer. Then I thought it would be good to download the builder and build a great game in this area, but only to be let down again to find out that you cannot publish the game for the Oregon …

 

Is there any hope? Or, is this game dead? It’s a shame because the idea was good, but without any updates in 6 months … well … maybe I’m way off base

Link to comment

You might look at this thread

 

I own 2 Wherigo geocaches. The older, and slightly more complex cartridge has run successfully on Oregon, Colorado and on assorted PDAs. The newer cartridge, very simple, has crashed the 3 Oregons that have tried it.

 

There's absolutely nothing I can see in that cart that ought to crash anything. I dunno what to say.

I did read here somewhere that the Oregon may be trying to process simple punctuation in a screen (periods, commas, semi-colons) as "code" - but that should all be wrapped in some kind of "no code" buffer. In any case, both of my carts have a few simple sentences, very similar.

 

I reverted to the first cart builder that I had installed when I built my first cart, and rebuilt my second cart in it. Doing that allowed Colorados to run it - built on the last updated cartridge builder, it both crashed Colorados and Oregons. I changed absolutely nothing in the cart itself, just used the older cartridge builder and now it will run on the Colorado.. but still not on Oregon.

 

I assume GSP support is working on this, but they can't do anything much about Garmin. I doubt if supporting Wherigo is a big issue for Garmin. There are currently only 124 Wherigo geocaches in the entire USA. Not exactly a critical mass for their support folks.

Link to comment

It's not dead. It's just taking a while to rewrite the software. Groundspeak has learned a lot since Wherigo was released and they're taking their time to do more right with the next release. Personally, I'm looking forward to using a version of the Builder that works on my Vista 64-bit laptop.

 

Rushing a version release would be a very bad idea.

Link to comment

It's not dead. It's just taking a while to rewrite the software. Groundspeak has learned a lot since Wherigo was released and they're taking their time to do more right with the next release. Personally, I'm looking forward to using a version of the Builder that works on my Vista 64-bit laptop.

 

Rushing a version release would be a very bad idea.

 

:unsure::blink::D:):D:D:D:D:D:D

So is "alpha" software...........

Link to comment

It's not dead. It's just taking a while to rewrite the software. Groundspeak has learned a lot since Wherigo was released and they're taking their time to do more right with the next release. Personally, I'm looking forward to using a version of the Builder that works on my Vista 64-bit laptop.

 

Rushing a version release would be a very bad idea.

 

Makes sense, but I think Groundspeak does an average-to-rather-poor job of communication. I can't remember the last time I saw a GS lackey (or honcho, for that matter) post something in this forum. It's been even longer since there was any mention of "the future." Heck, I'd settle for a SOW ("State of Wherigo") message. Just curious, when was/is the official one-year anniversary of Wherigo? Anyone?

 

Bueller? Bueller?? Frye?

Link to comment

I personally did ask this question (is Wherigo dead) many many times.

 

I understand that the development of a new, more powerful builder with a real NLS (national language support (as we need it in Europe)) takes some time.

 

I understand that it takes even more time to roll out new GPS SW versions with a new (enhanced ??) Wherigo player.

 

I have published just one cartridge so far but I have a second one ready to publish since last August. But because of the missing NLS functionality it did not publish it. It’s a nightmare to publish a text without the correct characters (this was possible 20 or 30 years ago. But nobody is used to this funny writing today (someone came up with the following example some time ago: You can read this but you won’t write it in your cartridge: VVherigo)

 

I have rebuild my first published cartridge (outside of the builder (missing functionality, pure performance)) etc. Before I start doing the same work with the unpublished cartridge I would like to know the roadmap of the, lets name it next generation, Wherigo builder and player.

 

I would like to know what will happen to the already published cartridges. Do we need to rebuild them from scratch or????

 

It’s time to release some information about the Wherigo roadmap.

 

 

Thanks for your understanding and please let us Wherigo developers know the roadmap

Link to comment
Makes sense, but I think Groundspeak does an average-to-rather-poor job of communication.
I'd have to agree with your opinion. I wonder why this is.

 

Wherigo was officially released to the public on January 3rd, 2008.

 

I've got to agree as well. GS should at least make it LOOK like they haven't forgotten about Wherigo.

Thanks for the date Ranger Fox.

Link to comment

The short response is that the Wherigo project isn't dead. It isn't, however, getting the attention it deserves for a couple reasons.

 

First, last year was the year of the iPhone and with it came some intense pressure to bring geocaching to the iPhone. Resources that would have gone to Wherigo shifted to the iPhone. This is, on the whole, good, since the iPhone device is one of the most powerful connected devices with GPS out there today. It is also a lot more accessible, particularly with updates, than the Garmin Colorado and Oregon. It is very hard for us to release updates to the Wherigo Player on the Garmin devices by the sheer nature of the best. A disconnected device gets far less updates than a connected one.

 

(the underlying hope is a Wherigo application for iPhone, but that's down the road a bit)

 

Secondly, resources in general have been tough to come by due to the demands of geocaching. The traffic continues to grow and we end up spending more time on geocaching because it has more traction and it pays the bills. It's hard to develop Wherigo with the lights out.

 

Speaking of lights, however, there is a light at the end of the tunnel for Wherigo. We're currently in the process of putting together more support behind the web based building tool, codenamed Earwigo. In addition to supporting a web tool and opening it up to a broader audience, we plan to open source the Wherigo Builder for some brave soul, or souls, to take over. Otherwise we'll focus primarily on the Wherigo web version so we have one place to manage the projects.

 

Our hope is to have something up and running before the beginning of the outdoor season towards the end of May, but the likelihood is we'll open the web tool before then for feedback. What Nick has done with his Earwigo project is pretty great and we hope to expose it to a larger audience.

 

I hope this helps. In the meantime my goal is to get someone at Groundspeak to "man" the forums along with the great work that Ranger Fox is doing here already. That way you'll know you still have the ear of Groundspeak in the Wherigo forums.

Link to comment

...

It is very hard for us to release updates to the Wherigo Player on the Garmin devices by the sheer nature of the best. A disconnected device gets far less updates than a connected one.

...

Please, do not abandon Garmin. With a less buggy Wherigo client in garmin GPSr it will be the best for Wherigo. Because:

  • accurancy, compass - there are only a few PDA that can compare with Garmin sensitive GPSr. Build in compass is important for Wherigo
  • battery - on my WIG catridges, many people have problem with battery in their PDA, for larger cartridges (time > 3h) are mobile phones and PDAs useless
  • resistivity - it is not easy to play Wherigo on PDA while it is raining
  • better control - in winter, I can control my Oregon in the gloves - on iphone it is not possible becuse of capacity display

Updating garmin is really simple from garmin websites, I see no problems here.

 

Opensourcing Wherigo builder will be great, thanks!

Link to comment

I think the problem lies in the fact that Garmin may not be responsive in updating the player. Improvements in the Builder are only useful if the corresponding player is updated to take advantage of them.

 

For PocketPC's, Groundspeak can probably issue both builder and player. They are at the mercy of Garmin for the OR and CO.

 

But I would hope that Garmin supports the game.

Link to comment

As the author of Earwigo (I *will* change that name), I just wanted to thank Jeremy for offering to host it.

 

I'm already starting to get e-mails from people who want to have a sneak preview. For now I'm going to answer "please wait" to those, as I already have a lot of other stuff on my plate with this project.

Link to comment

I think the problem lies in the fact that Garmin may not be responsive in updating the player. Improvements in the Builder are only useful if the corresponding player is updated to take advantage of them.

 

For PocketPC's, Groundspeak can probably issue both builder and player. They are at the mercy of Garmin for the OR and CO.

 

But I would hope that Garmin supports the game.

But now the real question, Is gs doing ANYTHING to work with garmin to resolve these issues? If gs changes the format of the cartridges (and its obvious they have, cartridges made with the newer tool don't work on garmins, yet cartridges built on the older tool do).

 

OR

 

Did gs release a builder that just puts out buggy cartridges, so there is nothing to fix on the Garmin side?

Link to comment

 

But now the real question, Is gs doing ANYTHING to work with garmin to resolve these issues? If gs changes the format of the cartridges (and its obvious they have, cartridges made with the newer tool don't work on garmins, yet cartridges built on the older tool do).

 

OR

 

Did gs release a builder that just puts out buggy cartridges, so there is nothing to fix on the Garmin side?

 

I'm using the newer tool and my cartridges seem to run just fine on the Garmin units. Usually, when someone has a problem with the cartridge not running smoothly, it's due to the GPS owner having loaded extra maps to the units built in memory instead of the SD card, or having well over 1000 waypoints in memory.

Link to comment

 

But now the real question, Is gs doing ANYTHING to work with garmin to resolve these issues? If gs changes the format of the cartridges (and its obvious they have, cartridges made with the newer tool don't work on garmins, yet cartridges built on the older tool do).

 

OR

 

Did gs release a builder that just puts out buggy cartridges, so there is nothing to fix on the Garmin side?

 

I'm using the newer tool and my cartridges seem to run just fine on the Garmin units. Usually, when someone has a problem with the cartridge not running smoothly, it's due to the GPS owner having loaded extra maps to the units built in memory instead of the SD card, or having well over 1000 waypoints in memory.

 

OUCH!! I have never heard of those issues before. Both of those activities (extra maps, lotsa waypoints) are very common occurrences. UGH.

Link to comment
But now the real question, Is gs doing ANYTHING to work with garmin to resolve these issues? If gs changes the format of the cartridges (and its obvious they have, cartridges made with the newer tool don't work on garmins, yet cartridges built on the older tool do).

 

OR

 

Did gs release a builder that just puts out buggy cartridges, so there is nothing to fix on the Garmin side?

1) It's Garmin's responsibility. They approached Groundspeak about it in the first place. I have no other facts on the matter than this, including how code updates are provided.

 

2) The Builder itself isn't that bad, considering the expected audience of non-programmers. There are/were a few problems with it, most notably one I haven't seen mentioned in a while--the Builder not saving the entire cartridge. Lately, I haven't heard of any Builder problems. Yes, I'll agree people do have a hard time understanding it and getting it to do the things they want. It's a learning curve. Eventually, you do tend to figure out which buttons you need to click in which order to get the effect you want.

 

Like anything with software development, I tend to side on the belief it's people that put out buggy code and usually not the tool. For example, my latest cartridge worked exceptionally well when I was testing it in the field with my Colorado, but I received a report that the Oregon just doesn't like it (the GPSr seems to run slower). The same is true of what I heard for Whack-A-Lackey: the Oregon runs slower than the Colorado. The point is, no one can be fully aware of problems even if they test what they make. There could be unexpected differences in device hardware or Player versions (including if the person hasn't updated the GPSr's firmware). If you have an issue with buggy cartridges, I'd advise you to look at how the cartridge was made before blaming the tool itself. If it is the tool, there's usually a way to work around a problem.

 

Which cartridges, specifically, are you saying don't work on Garmin GPSrs unless they're built with an older version of the Builder? What are the bugs? Do they just not run? Can you give specifics? I was under the impression the cartridge compiler underwent relatively fewer changes than the Builder over the course of [the first half of] last year. I'd like to look into that for you.

Link to comment

 

OUCH!! I have never heard of those issues before. Both of those activities (extra maps, lotsa waypoints) are very common occurrences. UGH.

 

Yeah, unfortunately, they are common. I had the problem happen to me when I loaded Topo maps to my CO for the first time. When I was on the phone with Garmin support, they told me that would cause the problem. I also had another Wherigo author post that info to my RMSC Wherigo. You saw a similar problem with your new bike tour cartridge I believe.

 

[

1) It's Garmin's responsibility. They approached Groundspeak about it in the first place. I have no other facts on the matter than this, including how code updates are provided.

 

2) The Builder itself isn't that bad, considering the expected audience of non-programmers. There are/were a few problems with it, most notably one I haven't seen mentioned in a while--the Builder not saving the entire cartridge. Lately, I haven't heard of any Builder problems. Yes, I'll agree people do have a hard time understanding it and getting it to do the things they want. It's a learning curve. Eventually, you do tend to figure out which buttons you need to click in which order to get the effect you want.

 

Like anything with software development, I tend to side on the belief it's people that put out buggy code and usually not the tool. For example, my latest cartridge worked exceptionally well when I was testing it in the field with my Colorado, but I received a report that the Oregon just doesn't like it (the GPSr seems to run slower). The same is true of what I heard for Whack-A-Lackey: the Oregon runs slower than the Colorado. The point is, no one can be fully aware of problems even if they test what they make. There could be unexpected differences in device hardware or Player versions (including if the person hasn't updated the GPSr's firmware). If you have an issue with buggy cartridges, I'd advise you to look at how the cartridge was made before blaming the tool itself. If it is the tool, there's usually a way to work around a problem.

 

Which cartridges, specifically, are you saying don't work on Garmin GPSrs unless they're built with an older version of the Builder? What are the bugs? Do they just not run? Can you give specifics? I was under the impression the cartridge compiler underwent relatively fewer changes than the Builder over the course of [the first half of] last year. I'd like to look into that for you.

 

RF, My only real beef with the builder is that, as you mentioned, it's not very user friendly for authors who are not familiar with the programming language.

Fortunately, we have a pretty great group of people on the forum who are willing to help out those who have problems.

Link to comment

The issue with my bike tour cartridge was too many active zones. I had 19 bridges active in the hope that it would allow users to visit the bridges in whatever order they preferred. However, the OR "froze". I don't actually think it was "frozen" but rather totally consumed by trying to calculate distances to all the zones.

 

On the builder note, I have had less problems with it recently. Since it is the same builder, obviously I am the delta. Practice and knowing what works is a big help. I am not starting to cautiously venture outside the builder with Author Scripts etc.

Link to comment

The issue with my bike tour cartridge was too many active zones. I had 19 bridges active in the hope that it would allow users to visit the bridges in whatever order they preferred. However, the OR "froze". I don't actually think it was "frozen" but rather totally consumed by trying to calculate distances to all the zones.

 

On the builder note, I have had less problems with it recently. Since it is the same builder, obviously I am the delta. Practice and knowing what works is a big help. I am not starting to cautiously venture outside the builder with Author Scripts etc.

 

Yep, same basic issue of too much stuff taking up memory. When I did a rebuild of my first cartridge, I took my zones and turned them off when not needed in stead of juts making them invisible. That resulted in a noticeably faster run time.

Link to comment
Our hope is to have something up and running before the beginning of the outdoor season towards the end of May, but the likelihood is we'll open the web tool before then for feedback. What Nick has done with his Earwigo project is pretty great and we hope to expose it to a larger audience.

Is there any word on this now that it's the end of May and the "outdoor season" is upon us?

Link to comment

Well, personally, I'd rather Groundspeak takes a little more time before "releasing" Earwigo than rush and put out a buggy program. The cross, and backwards compatability issues must be enormous.

As one of the presenters at GW7, I was very impressed with the turnout for the Wherigo seminar, we had people sitting on the floor and standing in the back, a larger crowd than for the seminar before and after ours.

 

The reports of Wherigo's death have been greatly exaggerated.

Link to comment
Well, personally, I'd rather Groundspeak takes a little more time before "releasing" Earwigo than rush and put out a buggy program. The cross, and backwards compatability issues must be enormous.

Actually the compatibility issues are currently fairly simple, at least to explain:

- Earwigo does not read existing cartridges. I designed it to be an alternative builder for my own use, for making cartridges from scratch, and it kind of snowballed from there. It might just be possible to write some code to read existing Lua files and add them to Earwigo's database, but that would be quite a project to do in PHP. OK, you don't need a general-purpose expression parser because the current builder doesn't allow you to write arbitrarily complex arithmetic expressions, but just handling some of the list declarations will be "challenging", to say the least.

- On a brighter note, Earwigo generates Lua files which, provided you don't use any of the "cool" new features (like arbitrary inline Lua statements, or builder-generated functions), can be read by the Groundspeak builder. So you can start with Earwigo and give up and go back to the Groundspeak builder. That was a design goal in case I and the initially envisaged 3 or 4 testers decided to drop the project. I now have 90 test accounts (not all of them active, by any means) and the bugs which they are reporting seem to be becoming further apart and less severe. I hope that's a good sign. :P

Link to comment

Well, personally, I'd rather Groundspeak takes a little more time before "releasing" Earwigo than rush and put out a buggy program.

I dislike web based applications :D , because I can only use them from my home computer.

Now I can take my laptop and work on a cardridge in the field, upload it and test it immediately.

Also I can work on a project during my holidays where there is no internet.

Link to comment
I dislike web based applications :huh: , because I can only use them from my home computer.

Now I can take my laptop and work on a cardridge in the field, upload it and test it immediately.

One possible point of light here is that Earwigo allows you, with a couple of clicks, to temporarily relocate your entire cache. You provide an "alternate start point" and everything is moved relative to the offset between that and the real start point. So you can lay out your zones with Google Maps, test your cache in your local park, and you may only need to visit the actual playing area once in the entire process.

 

However, it's true that Web access is required for Earwigo. Although, if you had your own personal MySQL/PHP setup (I believe that these are available), you could run everything locally, and just use the Groundspeak builder to compile. The limitation there is that the Groundspeak builder's built-in compiler requires (I think) that the builder can open the Lua file. That's not too big a problem but it will stop you from using some of Earwigo's cooler features, including obfuscated strings and accented characters.

Link to comment
The limitation there is that the Groundspeak builder's built-in compiler requires (I think) that the builder can open the Lua file.

wrong, you can compile a cartridge without opening it. when no cartridge is open, there's an item in Tools menu called "compile a cartridge"

 

...on a related note, where can i get Earwigo's source?

Link to comment
...on a related note, where can i get Earwigo's source?

Oops, I just noticed this post.

 

At one point I posted a snapshot of the source code in the Earwigo discussion group. But of course it was obsolete within a week, and I didn't think anyone was interested. Do you want it for anything specific? The code is reasonably well structured (IMO) but I don't spend a lot of time writing comments...

Link to comment

The short response is that the Wherigo project isn't dead. It isn't, however, getting the attention it deserves for a couple reasons.

 

...

 

I hope this helps. In the meantime my goal is to get someone at Groundspeak to "man" the forums along with the great work that Ranger Fox is doing here already. That way you'll know you still have the ear of Groundspeak in the Wherigo forums.

 

As someone who has just built my first cartridge and gone through the frustration of trying to run the GS software on a laptop only to find it wouldn't run with the current Windows OS. To then try the the software being plugged here as the other option to get a response a few days later to say I asked for access via the wrong method (I used PM) It's a wonder I didn't give up there, any sane person would of! I eventually found the third option and battled my way through to create a very basic cartridge.

 

I have since spent a number of hours reading through posts on the forum and was about to start my own post when I found this one, I'd say if it isn't dead then it cant be far off. Jeremy posted the above comments 18 months ago tomorrow (or the day after for those of you on the other side) and there hasn't been a single other post by anyone from GS in this thread since then. So I ask this, what is GS's current position re Wherigo 18 months down the track. I think that the fact that their flagship software is still Alpha software and wont run on the current version of the worlds most popular OS speaks volumes. It's little wonder it hasn't taken off.

 

Guys, you do some things really well and others not so well, unfortunately this falls into the far right of the second one in my mind.

Link to comment

"The world's most popular OS" differs on who you talk to. Joking aside, I assume you mean Windows. As far as I know, no one else is having a problem running the Builder on it. Did you read the Windows 64-bit thread?

 

I'd like to think Groundspeak hasn't participated much in the Wherigo forum because I've been doing an excellent job passing things along to them, but that would be a little too presumptuous of me, don't you think?

 

When I visited Groundspeak in July this year, it was clear they weren't working on Wherigo. Several Lackeys and even the founders expressed a very high intent and desire to get back to it, but there was some unexplained reason they haven't. That's all I can say at the moment.

Link to comment
To then try the the software being plugged here as the other option to get a response a few days later to say I asked for access via the wrong method (I used PM) It's a wonder I didn't give up there, any sane person would of!

I understand some of your frustrations, but to conflate your dissatisfaction with my sign-up process with an overall evaluation of Wherigo is, perhaps, a little unfair to both.

 

Had you taken up my request in the PM and sent me an e-mail via my profile, I would have signed you up. In fact, I will happily do so tomorrow, if you send me that e-mail.

 

The reasons I ask for Earwigo signup requests to be sent by e-mail via my profile are:

/1/ It provides me with an e-mail address to which I can send your account details and your invitation letter to the support group

/2/ I can file your request away, so that when you have a problem with your account, I can find out what went wrong. There are over 400 accounts, so this needs a little bit of structure.

/3/ I get a one-click link to your profile, where I can see if you meet my extremely lenient requirements for using my software and site. In turn, I have those requirements (which I won't list here, but believe me, 98% of people meet them) because I run Earwigo entirely in my free time and at my own expense, so I need to eliminate a certain percentage of timewasters. (Your account comfortable exceeds these requirements.)

 

Nick

 

PS: Hello to Newcastle. I travelled 16000 km to be FTF on GC12NZE. :(

Edited by sTeamTraen
Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...