Best iPad App(s)?

Correction, it says for A/FD and Canadian plates. Still there were "retina iPad" changes in the previous dot release also. Dunno yet.
 
Henning said:
Pilot nor any other app on an iPad or other non sunlight viewable screen and dedicated operations will not compete with their 696 or 796 units that people who want a proper unit will buy. They are like me, they will not settle for a iPad product because it's just not quite good enough to be a reliable emergency IFR back up. The iPad stuff is great as an EFB, and for planning but nothing I want for an emergency IFR back up or as a primary VFR GPS moving map. For that it is a failure not only IMO but many others as well. That is why they offer a proper unit which doesn't really compete with the iPad apps and now they are seeing if there is any money they can pick up on iPad supplement products.

The products are marketed to two different pilots, the ones that want the best thing for the job, and the ones that want the cheapest thing for the job. Thing is they already had one market and now they want to see if it's worth going for the other especially since group one also has a group 2 product as well.
Click to expand...

Garmin offers, as you call them, "proper" products because they've been using that product model for more than a decade. The iPad didn't exist prior to 2 years ago, and before to the iPad, there was no product with similar capabilities. Garmin isn't going to suddenly abandon its own hardware products because they now have an app, but any business will take a recurring revenue model over a one time hardware sale. "Pro" pilots may do the annual subscriptions to Garmin's portable products, but I'm guessing that most users don't. The app model is a great way to get there without all the R&D expense for dedicated hardware.

The market is the same, the technology has evolved, and Garmin is apparently evolving their product line along with it.



JKG
 
Henning said:
Not just glare but brightness as well. Clear legibility is the primary, user interface is the other, then there is system stability. I don't know, maybe mine is the only iPad that messes up and blinks out of the app to home screen and various other fun crap like losing the charts and requiring internet access to get them back.
Click to expand...

Never heard of chronic stability issues with the iPad, although unlike dedicated GPS units which are shut down and booted with virtually every flight, most iPads run for days or weeks without a reboot. I've had some apps crash, including ForeFlight, but NEVER have I lost data in ForeFlight. When apps start to crash, it's probably time for a reboot; or just reboot before each flight if you want to stack the odds in your favor.

I don't agree with you assertion that the iPad is a poor platform for avation GPS, but I do agree that the apps aren't up to the task quite yet. If Garmin's app had the features of WingX, I think that my opinion would be different.


JKG
 
Reboot doesn't fully close Apps in Current iOS.

See Foreflight's iPad preflight notes for real instructions.
 
denverpilot said:
I probably should, but the marginal value of return is low. It's a crap shoot as to whether they'll fix it or not... There's no bounty for bug hunting, and they might not even consider it a bug anyway.

And now that I know it happens at exactly 100nm, it's easy to work around it.

It's not causing me a safety issue, other than thinking I suddenly need better glasses, and I know the only real solution is everything being converted to vector graphics which is expen$ive.

For less than $200 a year including charts, it kinda "is what it is"...

They've got some stiff competition in feature-set from WingX right now. I'd kinda rather see them work on that stuff. Split-screen for example. Terrain. Etc.

They're all amazing tools for very little money.

Kinda looking forward to seeing the ADS-B toys, but not holding my breath for flyover-State coverage from FAA for a while. Those receivers are DOA here right now.

Another minor pet peeve... Neither is great at landscape mode support. I'd like to see FF move the GPS data bar at the bottom and the flight plan at the top, over to the sides when the device is rotated. Better use of space. With both turned on, you'd better hope your route is east-west and not north-south. Not much screen real estate in the vertical.

The layout is very portrait-mode centric. On my yoke mount, landscape orientation leaves nothing blocked on my panel. Portrait can block my suction gauge, even offset to one side with the RAM mount arm cockeyed.
Click to expand...

For the Garmin Pilot App.
I reported 2 bugs, within a day they responded and acknowledged them, one they were aware of, the other they were not. Promised the one they were aware of was already fixed and in the pipeline awaiting Apple's blessing before being released (TRUE). And promised to have the other one fixed in the release after that (TRUE).

The fact that they acknowledged they were bugs within 24 hours, committed to a time frame and met it. Is respectable to me. Most of the time genuine bug reports, get put in a phone/email loop of "have you tried rebooting?" questions.
 
According to the new July 2012 Flying magazine, page 57, Jesse's WnB Pro is one of the Top 8 iPad apps for aviators.

I'd agree! :thumbsup:

Congrats, Jesse!
 
denverpilot said:
Reboot doesn't fully close Apps in Current iOS.

See Foreflight's iPad preflight notes for real instructions.
Click to expand...

Not quite sure to what you are referring. If you power down the iPad and then reboot it, that should be sufficient. I believe that current iOS will relaunch all of your opened apps after the reboot (Mac OS X, annoyingly, does this also), but that action alone shouldn't be an issue. I usually close all apps before the reboot.


JKG
 
bartmc said:
For the Garmin Pilot App.
I reported 2 bugs, within a day they responded and acknowledged them, one they were aware of, the other they were not. Promised the one they were aware of was already fixed and in the pipeline awaiting Apple's blessing before being released (TRUE). And promised to have the other one fixed in the release after that (TRUE).

The fact that they acknowledged they were bugs within 24 hours, committed to a time frame and met it. Is respectable to me. Most of the time genuine bug reports, get put in a phone/email loop of "have you tried rebooting?" questions.
Click to expand...

Interesting. I submitted multiple bugs, along with some questions, about a month ago to Garmin. I received an auto-reply saying that an "agent" would respond within two business days, but that follow-up response never happened. I suppose that's marginally better than the response I've received from Hilton Software (WingX), which has been zip, but it isn't any more helpful.

ForeFlight's support is incredible, but I fear that they are rapidly falling behind the competition in the aviation apps market. They seem to be really, really slow at major releases, and when releases happen, they include only minor feature enhancements. ForeFlight has perhaps the most pleasing UI, but that alone isn't going to bridge the growing feature gap.


JKG
 
JGoodish said:
Not quite sure to what you are referring. If you power down the iPad and then reboot it, that should be sufficient. I believe that current iOS will relaunch all of your opened apps after the reboot (Mac OS X, annoyingly, does this also), but that action alone shouldn't be an issue. I usually close all apps before the reboot.


JKG
Click to expand...

I reboot and everything on the 'double tap' bar at the bottom is still there.
 
Hmmm, I had some issues with WingX, when I called the man himself got on the phone and talked me through it.
 
Henning said:
I reboot and everything on the 'double tap' bar at the bottom is still there.
Click to expand...

I believe there is also a "reset" that involves holding the home and sleep buttons until it actually resets (the Apple logo appears). This may be what Nate is referring to above, but I don't know that I've ever had to use it.


JKG
 
Henning said:
Hmmm, I had some issues with WingX, when I called the man himself got on the phone and talked me through it.
Click to expand...

That may be the solution with them, but I've only tried email so far. I will probably try a phone call next, but phone calls are less convenient for me. Wish they (and Garmin) did better with the email support.


JKG
 
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JGoodish said:
I believe there is also a "reset" that involves holding the home and sleep buttons until it actually resets (the Apple logo appears). This may be what Nate is referring to above, but I don't know that I've ever had to use it.


JKG
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, I've had a few of those occur spontaneously! Luckily, not while flying!
 
bartmc said:
For the Garmin Pilot App.
I reported 2 bugs, within a day they responded and acknowledged them, one they were aware of, the other they were not. Promised the one they were aware of was already fixed and in the pipeline awaiting Apple's blessing before being released (TRUE). And promised to have the other one fixed in the release after that (TRUE).

The fact that they acknowledged they were bugs within 24 hours, committed to a time frame and met it. Is respectable to me. Most of the time genuine bug reports, get put in a phone/email loop of "have you tried rebooting?" questions.
Click to expand...

I've had the same experience with numerous other iPad software vendors. Same issues with releases already done and working their way through Apple's approval process.

Good to hear Garmin plans to keep up to the customer service standards, set long before they arrived on-scene. ;)

I sent an e-mail once about a problem to Coradyne Systems, makers of LogTen Pro around 2AM thinking they'd get back to me the next day. Or days later. I had no only a reply in my inbox in five minutes, but an offer to have them manually fix my database and e-mail it back to me.

Similar (but not quite THAT fast) from Foreflight.

Good on Garmin. Keep it up. It's expected in this niche.
 
JGoodish said:
I believe there is also a "reset" that involves holding the home and sleep buttons until it actually resets (the Apple logo appears). This may be what Nate is referring to above, but I don't know that I've ever had to use it.
Click to expand...

It's a full restart. Hold down Home key and Power button simultaneously. "slide to power off" will appear. Keep holding. iPad will turn all the way off in another few seconds, suddenly.

Wait a second or two after releasing buttons and press and hold power button. iPad will boot.

What I was talking about is that in later versions of iOS 5, even this will not completely kill all running Apps. They are in a suspended state when not on screen, and to truly stop them completely, you must...

Double-tap the Home button.

Press and HOLD one of the running App icons from the switching menu at the bottom until they all start wiggling and have red X"s in the top left corner. Tap the X. App shuts down. Tap all the X's and all Apps are now shut-down.

Some Apps are allowed to stay running in the background. (Example, Foreflight can hold the GPS turned on when minimized. Some Apps go into a deep hibernation state, but they're still in memory. Think like the old DOS widgets that did a "Terminate and stay resident, or TSR.".

If you really want the absolute best stability running any App, kill all the others. Make sure the double-tap switching menu is cleared of all Apps then launch your desired App.

I'm sure the whiz kids at Apple think they've got the background/foreground thing right. But I've seen badly written Apps that male things unstable when backgrounded.

Things that access the GPS data seem to be big culprits (little pointed arrow next to the rotation lock indication icon at the far top-right of the screen indicates that some App somewhere in the device is requesting GPS location data.

You can block all Apps or individual ones from using GPS data altogether by going into
Settings->Location Services, scrolling down, and disabling individual Apps or Location Services altogether.

The reboot used to clear all Apps from running a while back. Now it resets them only.
 
gprellwitz said:
Unfortunately, I've had a few of those occur spontaneously! Luckily, not while flying!
Click to expand...

I have as well. Not sure why but my machine is no where near as stable as others say. Mine crashes multiple times a week.
 
I can't even remember the last time something has crashed on my iPad -- but then again I don't have much on it and I only use it in the cockpit.
 
denverpilot said:
little pointed arrow next to the rotation lock indication icon at the far top-right of the screen indicates that some App somewhere in the device is requesting GPS location data.
Click to expand...

Are you sure about that? Have a reference?

I think it just means that Location services are enabled, not that an app is accessing them. If I have all apps killed via the double-tap home, that icon is on. If I turn off Location Services in Settings, the arrow goes away. When I turn Location Services back on, the arrow comes back, even if no apps are running in the tray.

See: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4995

Note: When Location Services is active, a purple or white arrow icon appears in the status bar.
Click to expand...

And, they can use more than GPS:

Depending on your device and available services, Location Services uses a combination of cellular, Wi-Fi, and GPS to determine your location. If you're not within a clear line of sight to GPS satellites, your device can determine your location using crowd-sourced Wi-Fi3 and cell tower locations.
Click to expand...
 
Henning said:
I reboot and everything on the 'double tap' bar at the bottom is still there.
Click to expand...

That doesn't necessarily mean it's running - Think of the "double tap" bar as a "recently used apps" list, not a "running apps" list - Plenty of stuff in there that's not running any more. (It's easier to tell on apps that have a splash screen when they're first launched but not when you switch back to them.)
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Are you sure about that? Have a reference?

I think it just means that Location services are enabled, not that an app is accessing them. If I have all apps killed via the double-tap home, that icon is on. If I turn off Location Services in Settings, the arrow goes away. When I turn Location Services back on, the arrow comes back, even if no apps are running in the tray.
Click to expand...

Troy,

The arrow should mean "actively being used," not "enabled." They even said that when they first announced multitasking support, so that you'd know if something was using your location.

I have Location Services enabled all the time, but the arrow isn't there unless/until I launch ForeFlight, Maps, etc.

Also, if yours is using Location Services constantly, it's probably eating up your battery a lot faster than it should be.

Go to Settings -> Location Services and disable the apps one by one until the arrow goes away. That should let you know which app is the culprit! In fact, there may be individual arrows next to the on-off switches for currently running apps - See the very bottom of that screen for a legend as to what those arrows mean (there are three different possibilities - Purple, Gray, Outline.) Also, check the System Services at the way bottom as well, it may be something there that's causing yours to be "lit up" all the time. You can turn those all on or off at once as well.

I'm curious to see what you find...
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Are you sure about that? Have a reference?

I think it just means that Location services are enabled, not that an app is accessing them. If I have all apps killed via the double-tap home, that icon is on. If I turn off Location Services in Settings, the arrow goes away. When I turn Location Services back on, the arrow comes back, even if no apps are running in the tray.

See: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4995
Click to expand...

If no Apps have used Location Services in a while (with "a while being undefined in Apple's documentation) it will disappear. I've seen it. So you're right, it's a timer-based indicator.

Most of the time though, if you go into Location Services, you'll see Apps you thought were sleeping we're the ones accessing it within the last 24 hours. Even if you haven't launched them.

Which also disproves Kent's comment. If an App is in the bottom menu it can wake up and request things from the OS without being brought to the foreground.

Apps now can also do that without being in the bar, for things like NWS and news alerts. They have to ask you for access to Location Services once, but do not have to ask to register to run completely in the background. A good example would be the "Storm Shield" App which gives you a menu slider in its configuration to tell it how often to get your current location for NWS weather alerts. It does not have to be running or even visible in the bottom strip to do this.

Most Apps however, "honor" not being running... If you kill them out of the bar, they stop requesting data from the OS immediately. All depends on how they were written.

I have "caught" a couple of social media Apps that asked for access to Location Services ostensibly for geotagging posts, that were actually asking for Location Services information at other times.

They were either immediately banned from Location Services or deleted from my device for their bad social behavior.

Two things I wish the OS had... A setting on an App by App basis that says "Always Ask" for Location Services, and a secondary request for "Location Services while minimized?" and "Location Services while not running?".

Make it three. I want to know exactly when the App asked for Location Services. 24 hours is way too big a window and shows the push-pull between Apple acting like they're respecting my privacy but helping the Apps to hide their requests. Since I do run other Apps like the weather thing and Foreflight that access my location often enough to keep the indicator on the top right pretty much constantly lit, it's useless as a privacy monitoring tool. Even if I kill all the Apps.

Apple is just barely towing the line here on privacy. These Ad-based Apps want data. As much of it as they can get.

TangoWhiskey said:
And, they can use more than GPS:
Click to expand...

Yeah, I avoided explaining that Location Services is a composite of GPS and other sources. Seemed irrelevant to the point I was making. Apps ask for a location, the OS goes and gets it and provides it back via the API with accuracy information included so the App can choose whether or not to use it, or to wait for better data.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
Troy,

The arrow should mean "actively being used," not "enabled." They even said that when they first announced multitasking support, so that you'd know if something was using your location.

I have Location Services enabled all the time, but the arrow isn't there unless/until I launch ForeFlight, Maps, etc.

Also, if yours is using Location Services constantly, it's probably eating up your battery a lot faster than it should be.

Go to Settings -> Location Services and disable the apps one by one until the arrow goes away. That should let you know which app is the culprit! In fact, there may be individual arrows next to the on-off switches for currently running apps - See the very bottom of that screen for a legend as to what those arrows mean (there are three different possibilities - Purple, Gray, Outline.) Also, check the System Services at the way bottom as well, it may be something there that's causing yours to be "lit up" all the time. You can turn those all on or off at once as well.

I'm curious to see what you find...
Click to expand...

Thanks! That was useful. An app (AirportZoom) that wasn't running was listed as still accessing my location (purple icon). I turned it off and the indicator at the top went away.

Can an app that isn't even listed in the double-tap-home list be running in the background???
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Thanks! That was useful. An app (AirportZoom) that wasn't running was listed as still accessing my location (purple icon). I turned it off and the indicator at the top went away.

Can an app that isn't even listed in the double-tap-home list be running in the background???
Click to expand...

Theoretically, maybe, I think... Had you had it running since your last reboot?
 
denverpilot said:
Which also disproves Kent's comment. If an App is in the bottom menu it can wake up and request things from the OS without being brought to the foreground.
Click to expand...

It may appear to be so, but technically that's not what's going on. When you switch out of an app, it has a chance to say "Hey! I know you're not gonna let me run full-on any more, but I need to know where the user is" in various forms. The OS pays attention and when the conditions the app requested are met, the OS quick-launches the app and there you are.

Disproves nothing. ;)
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Yeah, under the Location Services > System Services you'll find Geo-based iAds; by default, enabled.
Click to expand...

And those items by default are not going to turn on the indicator, see the bottom slider. It has to be on to indicate when anything using those APIs accesses your location.

4b94241c-306e-407d.jpg


(And if you have another App that is allowed to access the information that does turn the indicator on, as mentioned above... The indicator is worthless as a privacy check. It's on all the time.)
 
flyingcheesehead said:
It may appear to be so, but technically that's not what's going on. When you switch out of an app, it has a chance to say "Hey! I know you're not gonna let me run full-on any more, but I need to know where the user is" in various forms. The OS pays attention and when the conditions the app requested are met, the OS quick-launches the app and there you are.

Disproves nothing. ;)
Click to expand...

You argued that those applications were completely shut down. They only partially are. They're dormant but a number of things can wake them up and give them data as long as they're in the bottom menu. You said it was just a "recently run" list. Recently run can't be woken up in all other OSs.

In my opinion, there's so many ways to wake them up, they're essentially running.

So, back to the topic at hand... Shut down other Apps before flying with Foreflight... I suspect this is the majority of Henning's "instability". Something is being woken up and misbehaving. There are definitely some OS hang bugs when the OS assumes it has data/cellular network (as one example) and it really doesn't (data doesn't flow...). I see this daily in an area where the cellular network is four-bars, but the backhaul from that cell site is either broken or very constricted. It can lock up the entire UI.

(And yes, it's been reported to Verizon, and they don't care. First report was last Spring. Multiple reports that the problem continues...
 
flyingcheesehead said:
It may appear to be so, but technically that's not what's going on. When you switch out of an app, it has a chance to say "Hey! I know you're not gonna let me run full-on any more, but I need to know where the user is" in various forms. The OS pays attention and when the conditions the app requested are met, the OS quick-launches the app and there you are.

Disproves nothing. ;)
Click to expand...

Did some more research on this.

You are describing "geofencing" which is a distinctly different thing than continuous location data.

In fact, the document Troy referenced at Apple didn't even mention it in the User documentation, but here it is on an iPhone 4...

aee8cd5d-03ad-8c6e.jpg


So we're both correct... Apps can stay awake "enough" to receive continuous data or be coded to go to sleep and awakened by the OS when you cross their requested geo-fence line.

And of course Apps that can be completely shut down like the NWS warning App... What it does is set an internal timer to wake up, grab location as often as the user requests it to, and drop back to sleep, all while never showing up at all in the bottom running-Apps items.

Another nit-pick. On iPhone, when the bottom list is open, the geo indicator is scrolled up and off the top of the screen. You have to kill one App, exit, return, kill another, etc... If you're actually trying to utilize the geo-location indicator to find the culprit.

Of course, you can just go into Location Services and look there, but I bet people rarely do.

Apple has made it just as difficult as they can to find out what and when your location data was requested -- they're the masters of graphical interfaces, so I'm sure this was not by accident.

Love my Apple gadgets, but their agenda does show... User privacy is not it.
 
Nate: Whether it's a geofence (which is what I described) or a continuous location type thing, the app itself is still not awake... It merely sets some hooks in the OS to do what it's appearing to still do on its own. The apps only appear to still be running - But that's kind of the genius of the whole system, though it certainly ticks some people off who'd rather be able to do x silly thing and eat up their whole battery in an hour.

Also, I disagree WRT user privacy. If they didn't care about that, there would be no location indicator in the first place. Your example about the indicator being off-screen while switching apps is kind of silly - Where else on the screen would you put it? Would you add another bar at the bottom just for that, and make all your developers re-jigger their apps to support the now-slightly-smaller available resolution? Or just put it in that handy little bar that happens to already be there?
 
jesse said:
I can't even remember the last time something has crashed on my iPad -- but then again I don't have much on it and I only use it in the cockpit.
Click to expand...

Then for you I can't imagine the advantage of an iPad for the job. For cockpit only a dedicated unit will come in cheaper and better.
 
Henning said:
Then for you I can't imagine the advantage of an iPad for the job. For cockpit only a dedicated unit will come in cheaper and better.
Click to expand...
Please show me an equivalent cockpit unit that has the same feature set as Foreflight for less money.
 
Henning said:
You can get 696s for $1500 and you aren't limited to using it in the US.
Click to expand...
You aren't limited to the US with iPad, either. Jeppesen Mobile FliteDeck appears to have international coverage available, and there may be others too. Not saying that there aren't other advantages for the aviation-specific devices, but this doesn't appear to be one of them.
 
gprellwitz said:
You aren't limited to the US with iPad, either. Jeppesen Mobile FliteDeck appears to have international coverage available, and there may be others too. Not saying that there aren't other advantages for the aviation-specific devices, but this doesn't appear to be one of them.
Click to expand...

Foreflight works internationally too - you just won't get much in the way of maps other than a download-on-the-fly street map. But you can plug in VFR routes airport to airport.
 
Sac Arrow said:
Foreflight "works" internationally too - you just won't get much in the way of maps other than a download-on-the-fly street map. But you can plug in VFR routes airport to airport.
Click to expand...
FTFY. Really wouldn't call that "working" if it doesn't have significant chart coverage outside the US. Not sure what either Foreflight or 696 provide in terms of weather products, etc. outside the U.S.
 
Agreed. The best news I've heard is the new 7.85" screen IPad coming out this Oct.
This has been my only issue with the iPad, just a bit to big.

jesse said:
Please show me an equivalent cockpit unit that has the same feature set as Foreflight for less money.
Click to expand...
 
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