RaceChrono news

Version v1.43b fixes the Virtual Keyboard issue with Windows Mobile

aol — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 17:14:23 +0000

I’ve just uploaded the v1.43b for WM Professional which fixes the missing Virtual Keyboard bug. Sorry for not fixing this earlier!

Version v1.43 is now available

aol — Sun, 22 May 2011 18:38:20 +0000

Version v1.43 for Symbian is now available, see the download section. New things on v1.43 are:

- Expiration date removed, now you can use it forever for free.
- Landscape mode fixed on Nokia N8/E7
- GPS refresh rate set to 5 Hz automatically on MTK based chipsets (if not already 10 Hz).

UPDATED: Windows versions now available too!

RaceChrono 2.0 (updated)

aol — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 09:48:10 +0000

While taking a break from developing RaceChrono to build my house, it has been good time to think about the future. Truth is that the phones RaceChrono currently supports are either old or otherwise not in par with the competition – so much more can be done with more modern platforms like Android or iPhone.

I announced a Qt/N900 version last spring. Unfortunately Nokia has been unable to execute its Qt strategy (that I thought was great) and today they announced that they will drop it. Nokia will go with Windows Phone 7 and Microsoft developer tools. This means that to support new Nokia phones I would have to write RaceChrono again using proprietary languages like Silverlight and C#, which seems totally unreasonable. Also as Qt is dropped, you can forget me ever announcing Qt/N900 version. It will not happen, sorry!

In April my house will be ready and we can move in. Then I will start to write RaceChrono 2.0 for Android.

Updated: I lifted one of my comments up as I think it adds to my reasoning to abandon Nokia:

All I can say Nokia screwed its developers for umpteenth time and this time rather badly. I’ve spent past two years to become Qt professional and now suddenly Nokia says please learn WP7. That’s fine, but I’m not betting my professional future to something anything as shaky as Nokia’s developer story anymore. Also personally I don’t feel like doing any more favors like RaceChrono for Symbian was to Nokia.

I have history with Microsoft’s platforms and I’ve been generally happy with them, but WP7 seems very immature and no one knows if Nokia will succeed or fail with its new strategy. I certainly hope they will succeed. If they do, I have no problems developing for it as I already know the tools. Meanwhile I’ll go with someone already succeeding.

Lastly, I do RaceChrono to reach the widest possible audience. And guess what, after Symbian, the widest audience is Android!

BTW. Did you know RaceChrono accounted for 1% all Ovi Store downloads during its first 3 months? That was including ring tones etc!

N900 version postponed, sorry!

aol — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 16:45:59 +0000

Bad news for all N900 owners, I’ve decided to postpone the N900 version. First, I planned to port just the existing version to N900. But lately I’ve decided against that as the modern phones allow much nicer looking applications. So due to my personal reasons I’ve decided to rewrite RaceChrono user-interface with Qt framework. It will be very cool and N900 will be the first phone to have it. But unfortunately you’ll have to wait a bit longer, as making the N900 port of current version would have eaten out from the development of the new one. Sorry!

RaceChrono v1.40 released! Official!

aol — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 16:46:21 +0000

I am pleased to announce the new official RaceChrono version 1.40! Compared to previous official version (v1.30) most important new features are better user interface, standing starts in lap timing, NMEA importing and support for RaceLogger hardware. Of course a lot of bugs has been fixed!

As there might be some new bugs, your feedback is valuable! I’ve added a full year to the expiration time and this one will expire in May 31st 2011! See the full change log for details.

Download the new version here!

Change log for RaceChrono v1.40

aol — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 16:29:24 +0000

Here’s the combined change log for RaceChrono version 1.40, since the previous official version 1.30.

Change log for version 1.40:

Much better looking user interface.

Better and simplified touchscreen usage. Non-touchscreen usage remains the same.

Support for RaceLogger hardware product

NMEA and DL-1 importing (+ removed the incomplete G2x import)

Standing start feature for lap timing. New standing start trap type is added for better Hillclimb and Rally starts.

Previous sessions list will now show lap count and best lap time

Key lock can be enabled now in Live Timer too (Symbian Touchscreen phones only).

Separate build for Windows Mobile touchscreen phones with WIDCOMM Bluetooth Stack (for example HTC HD2).

OBD-II time gauge in Live Timer is now relative to the current GPS time. This is to verify that the GPS/OBD clock sync works properly.

Removed “add trap here” in route view (you add traps in “Browse traps” instead).

Slightly modified performance testing standing start algorithm

GPS input file is now selectable when GPS type is set to “Input file”

Improved file selection dialog (for importing)

Sessions recorded with OBD-II reader and be now resumed without OBD-II and vise versa. Remember to turn off “Use OBD speed” in performance testing sessions if you do that.

Removed unmaintained track import feature

Return of support for S60 2nd edition phones

Fixed: Not enough space for selection rows on small resolutions

Fixed: Support for importing NMEA files generated by iBlue 747 data logger.

Fixed: Support for NMEA where RMC or GGA is less frequent than the other.

Fixed: Do not show drive selection in file browsing dialog, if there is only one drive to select from.

Fixed: Windows and Windows Mobile date calculation (lap date and GPX export date calculation was invalid).

Fixed: Various minor export bugs in all formats.

Fixed: Wrong units in .CSV export OBD-II channels

Fixed: Bearing decimals were truncated in Performance Box session import. This made Lateral-G calculation very bad.

Fixed: Lateral G-force calculation from GPS data were wrong. The calculated values were half of the correct value. The new algorithm is now checked against Race Technology and Racelogic software.

Fixed: Time/date was displayed for the composed Optimal Lap

Fixed: GPS and OBD time display stopped when day changed.

Fixed: Sometimes invalid date was imported from Performance Box and VBox files

Fixed: Importing file selection did not work for files with lowercase extension

Fixed Symbian: Crash in data logging mode on some certain phones with certain language pack (Polish E71).

Fixed Symbian: Freeze crash on Samsung symbian phones when backlight turns off.

Fixed Symbian: Left side softkeys bugs (N93, N93i)

Fixed Symbian: Could not enter decimal separator, if it is other than dot in phone’s reginal settings (Atleast Nokia E61 and 5800).

Fixed Symbian: Edit box did not scroll properly

Fixed WM: OBD-II did not work with Internal GPS setting

Fixed WM Professional: Soft Input Panel button was not hidden when switching from another application

Fixed WM Standard: Shortcut keys ‘*’ and ‘#’ did not work

Fixed Windows: Removed Lock keys menu option which was not even supposed to work

Change log for RaceChrono v1.40 beta 1

aol — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 22:13:38 +0000

Change log for RaceChrono v1.40 beta 1:

Change log from version 1.36 beta 1 to 1.40 beta 1:

Support for RaceLogger hardware product
Separate build for Windows Mobile touchscreen phones with WIDCOMM Bluetooth Stack (for example HTC HD2).
Key lock can be enabled now in Live Timer too (Symbian Touchscreen phones only).
OBD-II time gauge in Live Timer is now relative to the current GPS time. This is to verify that the GPS/OBD clock sync works properly.
Fixed: Importing NMEA generated by iBlue 747 did not work
Fixed: Performance testing toolbar problem (from previous beta)
Fixed: Not enough space for selection rows on small resolutions
Fixed Symbian: Crash in data logging mode on some certain phones with certain language pack (Polish E71).
Fixed Symbian: Freeze crash on Samsung symbian phones when backlight turns off.

RaceChrono version 1.36 beta 1 released!

aol — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 21:17:07 +0000

I am very pleased to announce the RaceChrono version 1.36 beta! As you see I decided against releasing the previous beta officially and made significant changes to this one. Most significant improvement in this version is the improved usage with touchscreen phones and the better looking user interface.

As this is a beta version there might be some new bugs, your feedback is valuable! The beta expires 31st of May 2010, so remember to download a new one before that! See the full change log for details.

As before the Symbian (S60) beta is limited by Symbian Signed policies, so it can be installed to the phones on my beta list. If you have not joined it yet, please do and I will include your phone to the next build, which I will create weekly.

Installation files:

S60 3rd edition and 3rd edition feature pack 1 installation package
Phones supported: Nokia 3250, 5500 Sport, 5700, 6120, 6121, 6290, 6110 Navigator, Nokia E51, E60, E61, E61i, E62, E63, E65, E66, E70, E71, E90, Nokia N73, N75, N76, N77, N80, N81, N81 8GB, N82, N91, N93, N93i, N95, N95 8GB,
Samsung SGH-i400, SGH-i450, SGH-i520, SGH-i550, SGH-i560, SGH-G810, LG KT615 KT610, KS10

S60 3rd edition feature pack 2 and 5th edition installation package
Phones suppoorted: Nokia E52, E55, E71x, E72, E75, N78, N79, N85, N86 8MP, N96, N97, N97 Mini, 5230, 5320 XpressMusic, 5530 XpressMusic, 5630 XpressMusic, 5730 XpressMusic, 5800 XpressMusic, 6210 Navigator, 6220 Classic, 6650, 6710 Navigator, 6720 Classic, 6730 Classic, 6760 Slide, 6790 Slide, 6790 Surge, X6, Samsung i8910, Sony-Ericsson Satio

S60 2nd edition installation package is available at download section of this site
Phones supported: All S60 2nd except Nokia 6600

Windows Mobile Professional installation package (touchscreen)
Operating systems suppoorted: Windows Mobile 5.0 PocketPC, Windows Mobile 6.0 Professional, Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional.

Windows Mobile Standard installation package (non-touchscreen)
Operating systems suppoorted: Windows Mobile 5.0 Smartphone, Windows Mobile 6.0 Standard.

Windows Mobile 2003
Operating systems suppoorted: Windows PocketPC 2003 and PocketPC 2003 SE

Windows computers installation package is available at download section of this site
Operating systems supported: Windows XP and Windows 7 (should run fine on Windows Vista as well)

Change log for RaceChrono v1.36 beta 1

aol — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 21:10:16 +0000

Change log for RaceChrono v1.36 beta 1:

Change log from version 1.35 beta 3 to 1.36 beta 1:

Better looking user interface.

Better and simplified touchscreen usage. Non-touchscreen usage remains the same.

Removed “add trap here” in route view (you add traps in “Browse traps” instead).

Fixed: Support for importing NMEA files generated by iBlue 747 data logger.

Fixed: Support for NMEA where RMC or GGA is less frequent than the other (fixes atleast one WM bug).

Fixed: Do not show drive selection in file browsing dialog, if there is only one drive to select from.

Fixed: Windows and Windows Mobile date calculation (lap date and GPX export date calculation was invalid).

Fixed: Various minor export bugs in all formats.

RaceChrono v1.35 beta 3 released! (updated 19.10.2009)

aol — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 19:57:40 +0000

I am very pleased to announce the RaceChrono version 1.35 beta! This beta is not available for all platforms supproted by RaceChrono! This version includes very cool “standing start” feature for Rally and Hillclimb racing, importing for NMEA and Race Tech DL-1 formats, various user-interface improvements and numerous bug fixes!

This beta supports also the S60 2nd edition phones, which I have skipped a few versions, but now it’s back at least for v1.35. As this is a beta version there might be some new bugs, so your feedback is valuable! The beta expires 31st of May 2010, so remember to download a new one before that! See the full change log for details.

Installation files:

S60 2nd edition installation package is available at download section of this site
Phones supported: All S60 2nd except Nokia 6600

Windows Mobile Professional installation package (touchscreen)
Operating systems suppoorted: Windows Mobile 5.0 PocketPC, Windows Mobile 6.0 Professional, Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional.

Windows Mobile Standard installation package (non-touchscreen)
Operating systems suppoorted: Windows Mobile 5.0 Smartphone, Windows Mobile 6.0 Standard.

Windows Mobile 2003
Operating systems suppoorted: Windows PocketPC 2003 and PocketPC 2003 SE

Windows computers installation package is available at download section of this site
Operating systems supported: Windows XP and Windows 7 (should run fine on Windows Vista as well)

UPDATED: Changed to beta 3, added links to WM packages. Fixed few serious bugs from beta 1 and beta 2.