App should start recording without GPS signal

Mobile apps
1

Mapillary is losing lots of data, because it doesn’t let users start recording without GPS signal.

I recommend that even without GPS signal, the app should let the user begin the recording mode, and only actually start recording when it finds GPS signal.

When I’m in a underground parking lot, in my garage or in some other place without GPS signal, I can’t start the recording mode. I use a mobile phone in the rear part of my car, and if I can’t start it when I enter the car, I wont stop the car just to start the app…

Anyone else feels the same?

2 Likes
2

Sounds like a good idear.

My biggest problem is, that the app wants a really good signal in order to record. In anything but perfect conditions my app refuses to record. That is if there are trees or from a car og train. The phone can make a perfect GPS track which I can use to geotag images lager - but if I only have the phone, I’m out of luck.

3

I would go even further.
In my opinion it should let you record even no GPS information is available.
When you go through a tunnel the collection of images will stop (Mapillary).
You can only resume capturing after the tunnel exit (Mapillary).
So every data inside the tunnel is lost.

The problem here is of course that the images can’t be placed anywhere usefull on the map. For that we could use eg. OpenStreetMap data to spread all the images evenly across the way. You would have to travel with at a constant speed though which shouldn’t be the end of the world. To avoid haing many useless images that cannot be processed, they could be hidden after upload and be deleted after a certain ammount of time when they are not processed by hand.

4

For the tunnel : there is still the developer mode.
And in a tunnel there are enough distance markers.
But therefore the pictures have to be good.

5

I use the older version 3.27 which allows this. It’s the newer versions that refuse to start unless location is good.

When I’m in an underground car park I press START and then drive out, I don’t have to touch it and it starts taking images automatically once the location icon goes green.

In Australia touching your phone while driving and being caught has massive fines and demerit points. Starting and stopping sequences puts you on the edge… The government thinks if you are slightly distracted at all you will kill a million children :policeman:.

2 Likes
6

I saw that you can move the images on the map one by one. But is there an option that let’s you spread them evenly along a given path?

7

No, even not a nudge.