ViewRanger named “Best Indie App” in the Mobile App World Awards

posted by cw on Thursday, October 28, 2010


We're delighted to say that ViewRanger GPS, our outdoor navigation app, scooped the ‘Best Indie App’ category in the inaugural Mobile App World Awards last week. ViewRanger was declared a winner at the Mobile App World event in London, beating off stiff competition.

Shaun Pinney, Director of Mobile App World, said: “ViewRanger is a great app, it really is a revolutionary outdoor GPS tool, I doubt I’ll never get lost taking the dog for a walk with ViewRanger in my pocket!”

Further accolades came from Belinda Parmar, founder of Lady Geek TV: "The Lady Geek community loves ViewRanger which is why we featured it as our App of the Week on Lady Geek TV - episode 9. ViewRanger is a truly dependable GPS that delivers under the harshest conditions and makes a real difference to women's lives."

Other winners on the night included TweetDeck, OVI maps, HTC Director Jon French, and wonga.com. The full list of award winners can be read here.

Built by outdoor enthusiasts...

posted by cw on Monday, October 25, 2010

As you may have guessed, we're all outdoor enthusiasts here at ViewRanger. We are hillwalkers, sailors, cyclists, glider pilots, mountain bikers, kite-buggy racers, and more!

From time to time, we'll be introducing you to members of the ViewRanger team and welcoming guest blog posts from our team that say "I am ViewRanger". We're also keen to hear stories from ViewRanger users too - and hopefully we'll post some of those to this blog from time to time.

First up, is our cycling champion Eric. Whether it's on the road or in the velodrome, Eric is the fastest thing in the ViewRanger office on two wheels. The only thing he's faster at? Writing code for Android handsets.

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Hello – my name is Eric. I am one of the software engineers here at ViewRanger. I joined the ViewRanger team to help bring the ViewRanger experience to the Android mobile platform. We've taken some big steps forward and every day brings us closer to our goal of providing the full set of features on all our supported platforms.

In updates from me on our blog or Twitter and Facebook feeds, I'll be looking to highlight items of interest on the technical side of engineering ViewRanger GPS for Android, but I'll also try to put some of my other interests under the lamplight.

These include all manner of mobile, location-aware and communications-technology themes. I've been working on location-based software systems since the late 1990's, back when civilian GPS accuracy was measured in hundreds of metres and the Motorola Startac was the epitemy of cool.

But I'm also a competitive road and track racing cyclist and a some-times runner, with a keen interest in the integration of technology with these activities. I grew up hiking in the coastal mountain ranges of western Canada and still manage the odd ramble in the UK.

My 2010 road racing season finished off at the end of September. I had a steady year, with consistent results but no real stand out races. After a couple of weeks off it is time to start preparing for next year's season and aim to improve on that. I'll be planning and starting my 2011 training program in the coming weeks, which will coincide nicely with my ViewRanger development plan as I start to work on some more sports-orientated features. Stay tuned!

Also worth mentioning:

I will be at the Droidcon conference in London this Thursday & Friday (28th & 29th). Let us know if you will be there as well!

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Association with the Prostate Cancer Research Centre (PCRC)

posted by cw on Saturday, October 23, 2010


Building on ViewRanger’s participation in several events with the PCRC over the last year, we are pleased to announce today the commencement of an on-going fundraising and awareness generating association with this important charity.

The PCRC carries out research into the causes of and treatment for the UK’s most frequently diagnosed male cancer. More than 10,000 men die in the UK every year as a direct result of prostate cancer. A man aged 50 has a 1 in 11 chance of being diagnosed with prostate cancer during his lifetime. Last year more than 30,000 men in the UK were told they have prostate cancer

Prostate cancer is curable while it is confined to the prostate, but very difficult to treat once it spreads outside the prostate. The main treatment for prostate cancer that has spread, hormone therapy, was introduced in the 1940s. Survival rates for advanced prostate cancer have improved little in the past 50 years; the objective of PCRC research is to make progress in this area.

From next month, you’ll start to see the PCRC logo featured on our advertising and on our website. The team at ViewRanger will be getting involved in PCRC fundraising events and we will be inviting our customers to participate with us as well.

Come and join us at the PCRC Snowdon 500 in May next year www.snowdon500.co.uk

The Prostate Cancer Research Centre is based at the University College London and is under the leadership of Professor John Masters. It now employs a team of scientists and support staff who need over £1 million every year to fund its highly respected research programme. To find out more go to www.prostate-cancer-research.org.uk

New Updates For Android, iPhone, & Symbian / 1:25 000 BKG German Topo

posted by cw on Wednesday, October 20, 2010

This week sees the release of new software versions across all platforms for ViewRanger GPS with the release of Android V1.2.2, Symbian V2.8.9, and Apple IOS V1.2.1.



In the cases of Apple & Symbian, these releases are of significance primarily to our growing German resident customer base, with an improved German language interface on Symbian and the introduction of a new German language interface on apple IOS. The Apple version also includes a few minor bug fixes in relation to the application running on iPad.

For more information please see:
ViewRanger GPS now fully ready for German Outdoor Enthusiasts with addition of BKG 1:25,000 scale mapping

ViewRanger GPS: Die Nummer eins in UK startet heute in Deutschland

The Android release, as well as including an improved German language interface, also sees the introduction of some important core functionality that will be of benefit to all users of Android handsets. The highlights in the release include the addition of:

- BuddyBeacon watching
- Support for Retrieva Tracking GPS dog collars as BuddyBeacons
- the ability to download mapping by area as well as by tile
- the ability to create a route from a track
- the ability to follow a route in reverse.

We also have incorporated the new French coordinate system and finally we’ve fixed a few issues flagged to us by customer feedback, these include a prompt to record a new track when “record track” option is requested and automatic use of cached online map list, when not connected.

We hope that you are able to upgrade to these new software versions either through your app store update process or via our software download site. We look forward to your continued support and feedback on our products.

BKG 1:25 000 scale Topographic Maps

We've also fully released brand new 1:25 000 topographic maps for Germany. Available to download as 5km x 5km tiles over-the-air, through the MapChooser self-select mapping tool, or as pre-defined areas through our webshop.

Come and meet us at the Kendal Mountain Festival.

posted by cw on Monday, October 18, 2010



ViewRanger is delighted to announce that it has become one of the support sponsors of this year’s Kendal Mountain Festival, which takes place from the 18th to 21st of November.

"Kendal" is one of the leading festivals of its kind in the world. It is an internationally-known event, attracting film premieres from around the globe. Film makers, TV producers, adventurers, climbers and world-class lecturers gather to take part in four packed days of the very best films, speakers, books and exhibitions covering all aspects of mountain and adventure sports culture. It is also the main social event for outdoor enthusiasts in the UK.

As well as finding some time to enjoy the films and speaking events at this year’s festival, the ViewRanger team will be manning a stand in the basecamp marquee on each of the three days of the festival.

We’d love to meet with you at the festival, show you the app running on a range of devices, advise you on any questions you have about the service, and hear your stories about how you use ViewRanger.

You can find details of the programme of films, lectures and other festival events at: http://www.mountainfest.co.uk/programme.cfm

Beta for Android

posted by Mike Brocklehurst on Thursday, October 07, 2010

A new beta version of ViewRanger for Android is available, v1.2.0.

The main change is buddy beacon locating, watching and navigating, so you can see where your friends are using ViewRanger. Buddies can also be Retrieva dog collars.

There are also a number of other changes such as:
- Map tile optimization, to combine individual map tiles
- Download map areas
- Delete/show/edit all options
- Create a route from a track

The wiki contains more details of the changes.

The beta can be installed by using your phone's web browser to visit www.viewranger.com/vranbeta, tapping on the box shown, then tapping on the file downloaded.