Ski Tracks Help |
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Welcome to Ski Tracks - Recording your day on the mountain. Thank you for supporting Ski Tracks. We have a dedicated support email address at the bottom of this document. If you experience any difficulties please contact us.
Introduction |
Ski Tracks has been specifically designed to make it simple to track your day on the mountain whether you are a Skier or Snowboarder. Ski Tracks has the following features:
Ski Tracks is an advanced location tracking application and has taken many years to develop. It was designed to provide skiers and snowboarders a simple way to track and review their day on the mountain. However, although we have developed sophisticated filtering and mathematical alogorithms to calculate your days statistics, we rely on the Global Positioning System (GPS) to get a location and this system can sometimes produce errors. It is for this reason that you should not rely on the location for safety reasons.
This application is designed to be used for recording your day on the mountain, most of the time it should be in a pocket - Never Ski with the phone in your hand or in a way that may injure other mountain users. Ski Responsibly.
Once you finish your day take your phone out, stop the track recording and save your track.
Recording a Track |
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The first thing you will want to do when you get to your mountain start point is to press the "START" button in the top bar of the Tracking view. When you press the "START" button several things will happen:
Ski Tracks will not record low quality location information and it may take a number of minutes on some phones to get a valid location - this is normal.
The GPS indicator in the status bar at the top of your screen lets you know if it has a fix or not. If its solid, it has a fix.
Place your phone in your pocket - we suggest that an inside jacket pocket that has no metal obstructions is best as it will keep the phone warmer and increase battery life.
From time to time you can get your phone out and check your ski stats. If you press the Profile button you can see your altitude profile and speed.
Once you have finished simply press the "PAUSE" button and select the "SAVE option when it presents itself. Note: once you save your track you can not alter or record more data.
Battery Life
While every care has been taken to improve the performance of this application, GPS and Location Services require more power. Whilst we can't test every phone on the android market we haven't yet found a phone that can't track a 9 hour day without dying. Some phones we have test have even finished a days tracking with 80% or more battery!
Taking Photographs |
Taking photographs is done by pressing the CAMERA button in the top action bar whilst in the Tracking view - if this button is disabled then the phone does not have a valid location fix - wait a few minutes until the phone has a valid location fix.
Photographs are added to tracks as they are taken, however if you delete a track or clear the current track the photograph will remain in the Photo's view.
To delete a photo go to the Photo view and select the photo.
If you tap the photo once its being viewed, you will be presented with a toolbar with 2 options.
Saving a Track |
When you have finished make sure you save the track by pressing the "PAUSE" button first (if you are still recording) followed by the SAVE button. Your track can now be found in the History view.
If you have already paused the track, you can press the "SAVE" button located in the action bar (only available if previously paused)
Deleting a Track |
Once you have Saved a track, you may want to delete it from your History. To do so, navigate to the History List where all your past tracks are shown. Once there hold your finger on the track and you will be presented with two options: View and Delete. Remember, once you delete a track it is gone for good.
If you want to remove a recording track without saving it, pause the track and select "Clear". If it is already paused just select the icon which looks like an "X" and confirm.
Renaming a Track |
You may want to modify your tracks name along with its activity, weather conditions, snow conditions and give it a rating out of 5. You can do this by selecting the icon which represents your activity in the top right of the Tracking view (Skiiing,Snowboarding,XC Skiing, Snowmobiling).
You can also edit the tracks details by doing the same when viewing it in the History.
Sharing a Track |
Once you have saved your track you may share your track with friends. There are a number of ways to share your track:
File Types: (for Email and Exporting to SD Card only)
KMZ - Use this format for sharing and previewing the track in 3D on Google Earth or other KMZ/KML views. This is best for showing your friends.
GPX - Use this format for transferring to other web services or GPS devices.
SKIZ - Our native file format that can be used between other Ski Tracks users on other phones - both on Android & iPhone.
Importing a Track/Tracks |
There are two different ways to import SKIZ files into Ski Tracks.
Via Email Attachment
Via File Transfer - You can use file transfer when your device is connected to your computer to import multiple SKIZ files at a time.
Settings |
There are two separate sections for settings.
Defaults
Located in here are your default settings for your Ski Tracks application.
Sharing
This is where the social preferences are located.
This is where Ski Tracks Tools are located.
Troubleshooting |
First of all is Ski Tracks in record mode? The duration counter should be increasing and there should be a PAUSE button displayed in the top bar
Does the GPS have a fix on you? Make sure you are outside with a clear view of sky. GPS does not work in doors.
Different phones take varying times to get a fix. Please be patient.
Once the phone has a fix you should see a solid GPS status icon in the top status bar.
If for some reason your phone won't get a fix (some devices struggle due to the GPS hardware), there are a few things you can try.
You may have the GPS Services disabled. This option is located in the Settings. Without GPS being enabled, Ski Tracks will be unable to record your location.
You need to run the Settings application on your phone and find where the Location settings are. They vary between device but it could be in "Location & Security" or "Location Services". Make sure the GPS option is set to Enabled (again the wording varies between device).
Now Ski Tracks should work.
We have tested 3 separate devices, all of which survived 9 hours of snowboarding with at least 40% of their battery left. Sony Xperia U > 60%. Samsung Galaxy Ace > 65%. Samsung Galaxy S3 > 40%. This was with the device being started at the start of the day, checked now and then for the Profile Display and map features as well as a few photographs, kept running whilst having stops and saved at the end of the day.
Ski Track Accuracy
How accurate is Ski Tracks?
Each version of Ski Tracks we try to improve both the GPS processing, ski algorithms and filtering techniques. We also calibrate our software for different phone types to improve the final results. The processing, algorithms and filtering systems provide a degree of accuracy that works best for mountain users. Generally for mountain users Ski Tracks provides accurate results given GPS and the environmental factors that the phone is working in. Generally most Ski data is accurate to around 5-10%. Plots and graphs use filtering techniques to improve the user experience so these can vary in accuracy over the plot but generally altitude is 5-10% and speed is 10-15%. These figures are based on our test data and cannot not be guaranteed as many other factors can cause accuracy issues. For more information please checkout the user guide available on our web site.
For more information please download the User Guide from our website.
Ski Track Troubleshooting and Manual
If you have any difficulties or problems please do not hesitate to contact Core Coders with our dedicated Android Ski Tracks support email:
skitracks-android@corecoders.com