Filed under: iPhone, iPad, iOS
Three iOS apps to automatically track your location
My friend Mike wrote to ask:
"A year or so ago you posted updates about your location during a trip from New England to home. Do you remember which tracking tool or website you used? A friend of mine is planning to bike across the country next summer and something like that would make his wife feel a lot better."
First I'm going to answer the question that he asked, and then I'm going to give some "better" answers.
Each year on Christmas Eve, I drive overnight for about 12 hours to my mother's house. I wanted to give people some way to track my progress so that they'd know where I was without me having to call (which would either wake up my family and/or require me to talk on the phone while driving) or text (even worse while driving).
Last year I used GPS Tracker by InstaMapper, which is completely free; you can setup a website that will show people your progress. It's a great solution, and the app worked really well, but there were just a few shortcomings. First, due to limitations of iOS at the time, the app had to be running in the foreground for it to work. Also, the process of setting it up was a little convoluted. If you look at the reviews on iTunes, you'll also see a whole lot of iPod touch users who don't seem to understand that location detection works much better on iPhones and 3G iPads than it does on the iPod touch.
Sadly, the app has not been updated since November 2008, meaning that there is no iOS 4 compatibility to use the background API for GPS updates, and there's also no iPad app.
The good news is that there are at least two other options, and both are free. Click "Read More" to check them out.
The first is Find My iPhone. The Find My iPhone service was previously restricted to MobileMe subscribers, but Apple recently made the service free to anyone who has an iOS 4 capable device. (The name, as you might have guessed, is a bit of a misnomer, since it can find your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. Then again "iTunes" does a lot more than "tunes" now, doesn't it?)
Every iOS user should have Find My iPhone enabled on all of their iOS devices, if for no other reason than the fact that most people will misplace their iOS device at some point or another, whether it's just slipped between the couch cushions or you left it in that cab that you took to the airport. There is another advantage for spouses, significant others or anyone else you're willing to trust with your MobileMe password: they can use the MobileMe website to track your location.
Adam Engst wrote about using Find My iPhone to track his wife (with her knowledge!) during her training rides. (Adam's article was written before Find My iPhone was free, and before there was an iOS app, but the principle is still relevant.) I've used it to track my wife's progress when she's on a car trip, especially in bad weather when I don't want to distract her by calling her to ask where she is.
Find My iPhone has lots of advantages. Once the iPhone is properly configured, which is fairly simple, nothing else is required. The information can be accessed at anytime, with no background processing required, so there's no battery drain. You can even send a message to the iOS device (sort of like an SMS, except there's no way to respond). Of course there are also advantages even when he's not biking across the country: if lost it can be remotely locked or even wiped if needed. The disadvantages are clear: you have to trust someone else with your MobileMe login information, which probably isn't a big deal when it's your significant other, but it's not something you're going to want to share with many people. There's no way to have the information sent to a web page, meaning that she'll have to log in every time she wants to check on him, which isn't onerous, but it's still a little less convenient than the last option I'll mention.
Google Latitude is a free service that allows you to share location information with others. Until recently, there has been no way to update it automatically. Back in early 2009, Google created a native iPhone app, but according to Google Mobile's blog, Apple "suggested" that Google make it a web app instead. A web app doesn't have access to the new iOS APIs, so it can't access the background GPS information. Fortunately, a free third-party app called Ladidude has recently been released for iPhone and iPad. It will update your Google Latitude information automatically in the background.
The advantages of using Google Latitude and Ladidude are that you don't have to give your MobileMe information to anyone, you can publish your location via a "badge" to any website, or you can simply share it via the Google Latitude service with anyone who has a Google account. The disadvantage is mainly one of battery life. If you set the app to update automatically (it won't by default), you have to choose between three modes: Cellular, Hybrid or GPS. In my experience, "Cellular" gave completely wrong information, locating me about 3 hours north of my actual location. However, this mode uses the least battery in exchange for the least accurate results. GPS mode gives you great accuracy, but it's terrible for battery life. That leaves "Hybrid" as the only logical choice. As the name implies, Hybrid uses both cellular data and GPS to give you a fairly accurate location with less battery usage. In my testing, it has been as accurate as I'd generally want or need. You can also set a minimum time between updates (0 minutes to 1 hour) and even be notified when Ladidude updates your location.
Of course, there are any number of services like Foursquare or Gowalla that will let you manually "check-in" and report your location, but that will require things like "remembering to launch the app and check-in" unlike the more "passive" options above. I much prefer to use Ladidude, set to "Hybrid" and updating no more than every 30 minutes, which seems to have a minimal effect on my iPad's battery life.
Update: there are lots more choices than just these 3 apps I mentioned. Check the comments for some other great suggestions from our readers - TjL.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Graham J said 11:09AM on 12-10-2010
I'd also add Glympse to the list, it's free, easy to use and works well.
Reply
christopher Patnoe said 1:05PM on 12-10-2010
I totally agree about Glympse. I use it several times a week. My wife loves it (perhaps I should use it less? :-)....)
Trisnadi Kurniawan said 6:47PM on 12-10-2010
+1 for Glympse. The app is designed to share your location without any of the social network stuff.
Rudi said 11:11AM on 12-10-2010
What about, "i'm right here" app????
http://itunes.apple.com/app/im-right-here-easily-send/id400480549
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emil said 11:11AM on 12-10-2010
Not the most user-friendly option, but there's a great script called "PlayNice" (https://github.com/ablyler/playnice) that you can install on a Mac or web server that will log into your MobileMe account, find your iPhone, and use the coordinates to update your Google Latitude location. To have it run automatically, you'd set it up as a cron job.
I wouldn't recommend setting it to run more than once every 15 minutes, or your battery life will be noticeably affected.
It works really well, though.
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Serenity Integration said 11:13AM on 12-10-2010
Twitdar also works for updating your location automatically via Twitter.
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Mark Hanley said 11:17AM on 12-10-2010
PlaceTrack is another real-time/background app that will maintain your Latitude location. But it reportedly uses a more passive method of determining when you have moved, so it doesn't maintain a constant GPS fix. It only checks the GPS fix and updates location when the phone thinks you have moved significantly, based on cell tower triangulation, or something.
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vic.healey said 11:35AM on 12-10-2010
Why is that everyone misses Waze? Is it because it is a top app for 2010 invented by the Israel programmers? Is it because it is a direct competitor to Google Maps and increasingly more popular in all countries?
Is it because it operates on every significant mobile platform now, it is to be ignored since it is not iOS only?
There can not be that many Apple iPad users that haven't discovered the iPad version of Waze.
Maybe it is because we are all having too much fun with it to bother letting others in on the secret?
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Ross said 12:36PM on 12-10-2010
Ive tried it, didn't see the point
vic.healey said 12:38PM on 12-10-2010
Anyone can see your location and follow you in real time if allowed.
They can do it from a web app or in Waze itself. Waze has their own social network too.
Saxon said 1:57PM on 12-10-2010
Waze is so awful for routing around Atlanta. I *really* wanted to like it but it couldn't connect to the server to find where I'm going half the time, then sends me the wrong way the other half.
Griffon said 3:32AM on 12-12-2010
Or it could have to to with some of the worst routing AI ever, even after weeks of use, waiting for that magic learning curve to kick in.
The free map quest app is a better gps tool (and it's not very good either). Everybody wants to like Waz but it's just barely usable at the best of time. Yes it has some nice sharing features, but if the core function is not there you don't get a pass for that.
Randy said 4:38PM on 12-13-2010
I think you're confused. There's no way to track in real-time, an individual Waze user. correct me if I'm wrong. I just looked through website and the iPhone app and didn't see any indication of this being possible.
What the OP wants is a way for people to see the status of one's location in transit. To my knowledge, Waze does not do this (currently).
aj_robins said 11:56AM on 12-10-2010
For families, "Whereoscope" works well for automatic tracking and location history keeping. (It's only for families because everyone in your family can see the location of everyone else, and a person can only be in one family.)
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Scott Goldman said 12:06PM on 12-10-2010
I recommend DeviceLocator. Very simple, runs in the background, easy to access web site, shows tracking information and much more. Very nicely done. $5 in the iTunes store and well worth it:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/device-locator-track-locate/id380395093?mt=8
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mark zillberg said 12:09PM on 12-10-2010
Here is an another app
itms://itunes.apple.com/us/app/pug-mark/id377582244?mt=8
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knewsom said 12:21PM on 12-10-2010
They're all apps made by the GOVERNMENT, man!!! They're keeping track of you, watching your every move... read my blog to learn how to disable any location-services on your devies to keep yourself safe!!!!!
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;)
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Kevin said 12:22PM on 12-10-2010
I use uTrackMe (http://www.fusionsoda.com/utrackme/). You still have trade offs between accuracy and battery life but it's very customizable. It "allows you to publish your location to any web server that supports server side scripting. No third party tracking service required."
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F-Bonet said 12:31PM on 12-10-2010
My two cents is that this would be great feature to integrate with a turn by turn app. The gps is already on so more than likely it is running of a charger anyways. Also what I am really interested in like most folks is how a long on the trip is the person and how much longer will they be on the road. Which come to think it would work well for my long runs if I had a battery attachment. Most people want to know where the person but in relation to the overall trip the actual place is not as important.
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Osti said 12:31PM on 12-10-2010
"The Find My iPhone service was previously restricted to MobileMe subscribers, but Apple recently made the service free to anyone who has an iOS 4 capable device"
Actually, that's not true. That only made it free for people who have the latest iOS devices. iPhone 3GS and bellow still have to pay for MobleMe, which I think is wrong.
I mean, I can walk into an Apple store today and buy an brand new iPhone 3GS but apparently it is not good enough for Apple to still support it with things like free Find My iPhone, HDR photos, new text alerts, etc etc.
I bought my 3GS just over a year ago on a two year contract. I think it's reasonable to expect that Apple would support the phone for *at least* those two years.
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