iPhone Apps for geocaching

[Hoojar]

I've tried caching with an iphone on a number of occasions and have to say that the accuracy is absolute carp!!

I've had accuracies ranging from 1200 metres down to 40 metres (but never better)

That has been my experience with caching on the iPhone too. A waste of time!

[shrek4]

I went caching on Sat. Both the Oregon 300 and Iphone 4 had a 5m error margin. Having said that still a DNF

[ausdynamix]

I use the groundspeak app with Vodaphone as my carrier.

The good news is that I have been able to get to within 5mtr satellite range, the bad news is that it is Vodaphone!!!

That means as soon as you are off the beaten track slightly, you will not get a signal, but most larger country towns have phone towers and lots of caches to find. (E.G - Macedon Ranges / Bendigo)

Discussed the pros-and-cons with another geocacher recently using the same app with Telstra as carrier and best satellite pickup he could get was 76mtrs!!!!

Regardless, using the iphone, I was able to pin-point and log very accurate coordinates for my first hide GA2655 - Duck Duck Goose!!!

The coordinate accuracy was confirmed to within 1mtr of hide location with a good quality Garmin handheld GPS.

Summary:
using Groundspeak app and Vodaphone for metro geocaching is good
regional areas - better to have a handheld, but it is a case of choose your own adventures!

[Papa Bear_Left]

Does the iPhone GC app allow you to import PQs for offline caching? (The Android one does, but there's memory card access to make that easier.)

If it does, then you can grab the local caches while you have a data connection, then find them when you're out in the sticks and out of range. The GPSr will still work, although the initial fix will take a little longer without the assistance of a data connection.

[shrek4]

Yes it does allow PQ downloading, this is built into the app. There would be nothing stopping you using the PQ then going 'offline'. The app also caches maps. This means that you could view the maps whilst home on your wifi, this will cache the maps for later use offline.

[bshwckr]

How come the Geocaching App on iTunes in Australia is still $12.99 and yet it is $9.99 on the US iTunes store?

[bshwckr]

Found this while browsing the www last night on the iPhone.

http://iphonecaching.appspot.com/

It is a free web app designed for the iPhone. It has some sweet features such as loading the coordinates into Navigon and a few other programs for navigation to the cache. The other feature I particularly like is the ability to view all logs right back to publishing in one long scrolled page.
If you view this web site on PC, it obviously does not know where you are (edit. Yes it does! How? IP adresses are not that good!) On the iPhone, tapping the location tab loads the nearest caches.
The one thing that concerns me, you do not appear to need to log on to get the location data. Unless it found a cookie from my geocaching app??? Can someone without their geocaching login details on their iPhone please try this?

[CraigRat]

The one thing that concerns me, you do not appear to need to log on to get the location data. Unless it found a cookie from my geocaching app??? Can someone without their geocaching login details on their iPhone please try this?

It's grabbed your location from your phone.
HTML5's geolocation features are nice

[bshwckr]

The one thing that concerns me, you do not appear to need to log on to get the location data. Unless it found a cookie from my geocaching app??? Can someone without their geocaching login details on their iPhone please try this?

It's grabbed your location from your phone.
HTML5's geolocation features are nice

Yes I am aware that the phone is easy to locate using location services and display the nearest caches but then it allows me, or presumably anyone with an iphone, to view the coordinates and navigate to the cache. On the PC, if I do not log in, I do not get to see the coordinates. This would be a great tool for malicious muggles. Perhaps it is a test version and they will secure it with username/password eventually.
AND, I tried this on the desktop PC and it located me and displayed the nearest caches? The co-ordinates it placed my desktop PC at were only about 10m out. I do not have a gps connected to the desktop. It connects to the internet via ADSL2+, NOT 3g which could have explained it. The coordinates are not the same as those I use at GC.com. I have deliberately off-set those to around 40 meters away.
I do connect to the ADSL2+ via wifi. Could it somehow triangulate and be that accurate?

[CraigRat]

I do connect to the ADSL2+ via wifi. Could it somehow triangulate and be that accurate?

Yup, If it can see a wifi router it will try to use that for it's position, which is how it did it with your desktop.

My desktop machine doesn't go via wifi and it reports me being in Hobart, about 200km away, but my laptop does and reports correctly
Part of Google StreetView projects job (and in reality it is the PRIMARY role of streetview) is to correlate GPS and Wifi Router positions. Location based services are the big tjhing right now.

Enjoy the site while you can, I can see it getting a letter from their lawyers soon!

[bshwckr]

So Google knows my wifi's location because it captured this when gathering Streetview data? I feel violated

[CraigRat]

So Google knows my wifi's location because it captured this when gathering Streetview data? I feel violated

You'll get used to the feeling eventually

[bshwckr]

Found this while browsing the www last night on the iPhone.

http://iphonecaching.appspot.com/

Any chance of GCA doing something like this?

[CraigRat]

We are, as time permits.
I have a working prototype, I need to work on formatting and putting in some authentication for logging of caches.
Basically it's the same functionality as the site you've shown there.

Aiming at Q1 2011
The real world has slowed down my abilities to get a lot done on the coding side of late. Things are happenign, just slower than usual

Totally Useless Screenshot(tm):http://dl.dropbox.com/u/4672460/gca_mobile_beta1.png