Is this project dead or what?

[+GeoTectives]

No builder since 29:th of may last year. What´s going on???!!!!

[matejcik]

not much.

Groundspeak either stopped caring, has too much other work, or is working on Something Big and doesn't want to release half-baked product again.

also, jeremmy didn't post on the Wherigo forums since summer... and apparently nobody is any wiser.

 

but there's an alternate builder (and an alternate player) in development, so i'd say that the project is alive and well. just not really supported

[+MickEMT]

Don't forget, Groundspeak has been working in the Iphone caching app, I bet that's been taking up resources.

I wouldn't call this dead, in fact I think it's about to take off in my area.

One of the best things I think we as "early adopters" can do, is to put out some beginner level cartridges and leave them open to running on the emulator. I put one out at the museum where the GPS MAze Exhibit is being held, and it's gotten a good bit of action, and pretty much universal "that's really neat" reviews. I've also gotten emails asking for more info on building cartridges, so word is spreading. I even set up one as a temp event cache, and everyone loved it.

Put them out there and DEMONSTRATE them! The more cachers we get doing the type, the more likely GC is to put more resources into it.

[Ranger Fox]

Groundspeak is indeed working on something for Wherigo. While I'd love to share what little I have come across, I cannot do so because I learned it through my moderator role. I haven't known Groundspeak to be open with their plans, so I wouldn't worry about a lack of communication in the forum. We've shown we can answer our own community's questions, so I believe Groundspeak has left that responsibility to us. I do agree, though, it would be nice for someone to pop in every once in a while.

 

It took a few years for geocaching to gain significant popularity and GPS technology to improve; I doubt Wherigo's timeline will be any different since the Player application has to be readily available to more people. It'll take some time. Keep making cartridges and your area will eventually reach a tipping point where more people will be interested. When I started caching in 2006, I wouldn't have been as interested if my area had less than two dozen caches. Not worth the monetary investment of a GPSr. Since it had a little more than a hundred, I bought a GPSr and tried it out. Almost three years later, here I am, approaching the 10K milestone. Same thing with getting others interested. It would help, too, if more people could understand the Builder. I've gotten requests to teach classes and work with individual people.

 

As long as the next version of Wherigo runs the cartridges we have developed (and especially the custom code some of us have written for our cartridges), I'll be happy.

[+MickEMT]

I wonder if Shauna would be able to answer the question, she's going to be at a meet & greet Friday.

[+charlenni]

Hello,

 

anyway it would be very nice, if someone from Groundspeak would issue a statement on the future of Wherigo. I can bear a lot of things: a faulty builder, different players. But I am NOT willing to invest in a dying product. I suppose we all would be grateful (and patient) if there is a simple and short announcement like: "YES, we have plans, YES we are working seriously on it, YES there will be something new/modified and YES, Groundspeak backs that project.

 

Do I ask for the impossible?

 

Best regards,

Dirk (who loved creating his first Wherigo and would like to start a second one , if...)

[a_snail]

There is a definate interest in Wherigos, with 3rd parties developing their own builders (sorry I've forgotten the link to the other builder) and players (e.g. http://code.google.com/p/openwig/).

 

Like Ranger Fox, I do hope existing stuff will continue to work and its a case of getting new facilites or at the very least a way to convert existing stuff over to the new system. I also hope that what ever is in development, uses the same code on all devices so that if it works on one device, its likely to work on another (assuming the users of both devices do the same thing - users so unpredictable) unlike currently when you need to be aware of bugs in devices you don't have access to never mind own.

 

Fingers crossed Garmin will provide updates to support the new stuff as I don't really want to buy another Garmin just yet.

[+ptiki]

Fingers crossed Garmin will provide updates to support the new stuff as I don't really want to buy another Garmin just yet.

 

Same here. I just purchased an Oregon 400t because it had a Wherigo player among other options. I downloaded the latest builder from 2008, but it doesn't support building play anywhere cartridges (that feature is grayed out). Does anyone know a workaround?

[+DeRock & The Psychic Cacher]

I've got my eye on an Oregon when it comes time to upgrade my GPSr.

 

But you can add me to the list of folks who won't be buying either a Colorado or Oregon until Garmin shows some good faith in updating the Wherigo player more often.

 

Deane

AKA: DeRock & the Psychic Cacher - Grattan MI

[+Tequila]

I doubt Wherigo is very high on Garmin's list of To Do's. After the fiasco with the Colorado I would think they are concentrating on product quality. And everytime I call support, I wait 25 - 40 minutes before I talk to a front line support rep. So they have lots of things to fix before Wherigo.

 

However, you should not delay getting an Oregon (stay away from the CO) just because they haven't issued an improved Wherigo player. The current play does have bugs but they are manageable and there are lots of good cartridges to play.

 

And the OR has other great features for regular caching.

 

My 2 cents.

[+sTeamTraen]

Same here. I just purchased an Oregon 400t because it had a Wherigo player among other options. I downloaded the latest builder from 2008, but it doesn't support building play anywhere cartridges (that feature is grayed out). Does anyone know a workaround?

The Wherigo Web Builder which Jeremy mentioned here, has two levels of play-anywhere support:

1) Genuine play-anywhere: two seconds after the cartridge starts, everything gets relocated relative to where you are. (For strange player-related reasons, it seems that the only reasonable way to do this is on a short timer. When the cartridge Start event runs, not everything is in place.)

2) Alternative starting point: this is a "light" version of play-anywhere. You build your cartridge with a given starting point, fixed zones, etc. Then you specify an "alternative starting point" and tell the builder to use that as the "datum point" when it generates the Lua file. Then when you start the cartridge, everything else is already relocated relative to that point. This is useful, for example, for testing a cartridge which is played some way from your home; you can have everything run in your back yard or local park.

 

The two are complementary; although "genuine play-anywhere" might seem to make "alternative starting point" obsolete, it doesn't, because play-anywhere involves some runtime hacks on the player which are not 100% free of side-effects.