Mobile Tools for Tracking your Travel

In my last post, I quickly mentioned some of the tools I was using to track my journey across the country. A somewhat self-serving quick-and-dirty post I could give to friends and family that were interested in where I was at the time and what I had been doing. The cross-country journey was not just for travel; I was on my way to a new job. I already knew a couple people at the new company and sent them links to the live tracking before I left. In meetings, they showed other colleagues who were quite impressed by the mobile tech employed in my travels. This article aims to let you know exactly the tools used, why I chose them, and how I used them to fully document my travels, much in the way the Guru listed his travel tools. Tools

• Nokia N82 Smartphone (Unlocked)
• Nokia Maps (voice-guided navigation)
• SportsTracker (automatically creates a log of my route)
• Shozu (automatic uploading of photos)
• Jaiku (social networking)
• Nokia Email (beta)
• Sunpak VersiPod Tripod
• Ovi (online photo hosting)
• iGo Auto charger (to keep everything running)
• Yelp (for finding interesting places to eat)

Description of Tools used Nokia N82: I think the Nokia N82 is the ultimate device for what I call lifetracking. That is, creating an interesting and usable log of anything from a specific activity to a daily account of your life. It is not inexpensive, and if you want something with similar features but a very reasonable price, look at the Nokia N78 with 3.2 MP Camera. This affordable handset will knock your socks off, with a very stylish and minimalistic exterior, but a massive number of features, including one the N82 does not have: an FM transmitter to listen to all your music and podcasts in the car, sans wires!

Nokia Sportstracker: At the heart of my technological journey across the United States lay the Sportstracker on my mobile phone. Utilizing both GPS and mapping technology, this would tell me my actual speed (As a resuly, I no longer trust my spedometer), the exact route taken, and where I took a given picture.

Check out my personal Sportstracker page. You can click on a given leg of the journey, seeing the highest altitude for the day, the spot I drove the slowest, and clicking on one of the little camera icons will bring up the picture took in that exact location.

Nokia Maps: Unless you know exactly where you are headed or have a talented navigator in the passenger seat, some sort of GPS-based guide is invaluable. NokiaMaps -brought to you by the mapsters, one of whom is featured in many of my pictures- was and has been an invaluable tool for my trip.

Combined with looking up eateries in Yelp (see below) I was able to navigate directly to so many places I would never have found. And all that without stopping. In fact, my only real out-of-the-way turn (through the Mojave desert) occured because I did not have Nokia Maps running. But it is good to sometimes let yourself get lost, and you can feel safe knowing that the Mapsters will get you back on track when you are ready to continue along your journey.

My parents even told me not to use the GPS to get to their place. all their friends with Garmin or Tom-Toms get lost as they near the house. Nokia Maps guided me directly to their alley. And, when I left, both Google and Yahoo! Maps gave me different paths to get back to Interstate 10. My parents did not like either and gave me a backwoods route that would avoid lights and cut cross-country. This was the path Nokia Maps decided to take.

Yelp: Yelp.com is a combination social media and restaurant review site. The primary purpose is to give you, the user a venue in which to comment on and rate your best, worst, and everything-in-between dining and service experiences. The secondary service is a social networking one in which you connect with other Yelpers, read their reviews, and get an idea of what's good and what isn't. Their motto is "real people, real reviews", and (full disclosure) I am a Yelp elite member which means I have written a number of reviews and used yelp for various purposes in the past.

Recent reviews by Kevin N.

What's this?

One of my favourite features of Yelp and one that is especially pertinent here is the ability to create lists of reviews. So, for this project, I created the DestinationCA list. As I wrote reviews, I added them to the list and the little Yelp application you see on the right gets automatically updated with the new reviews. So, while I was able to knock out a few in the evening before I went to bed, I have been able to add a lot more since arriving in San Jose, and once I add them to the list, the pages on which they appear are automatically updated with no extra work from me.

Shozu: Personally, there are two major obstacles for me to take pictures: 1) having the camera with me when I want to take a pic, and 2) getting the pictures to a place where others can see them. The incredible 5megapixel camera on the N82 is not the only reason I use it to take pictures. The other reason that powered with Shozu, the pictures I take can be automatically uploaded to my web photo album, without any further intervention. Point, click, and you are done! That's convenience, and convenience is the name of the game on a 3,000 mile roadtrip.

In addition to the configured auto-upload channel. Shozu can do all sorts of things for you, like peruse your friends' facebook uploads, or blog photos and text to your configured blog. Very versatile, very convenient, a must-have!

Jaiku: There are many different ways to keep up with one's friends and contacts while on six day trek across the country. My preferred application is Jaiku. This is a social networking, microblog type site with threaded conversations and location, so people could follow my movements, and I could easily check up on whatever they were talking about. Other options might be to check the m.facebook or twitter pages. I do not find these as easy to use because their mobile sites are not clean and easy to use, but to each his own is the beauty of the Internet.

Nokia Email: And, of course, my second favourite way to keep track of my email is via the new Nokia Email application. No big deal about this one, except that it pushes my mail to me like a blackberry service, at no extra charge. I could catch up while pumping gas, having lunch, or (shhhh) even while driving.

Sunpak Tripod: The downside of my N82 as camera is that it has no screw hole for a tripod (like many small digital cameras). But fear not, sturdy mobile traveler! Check out the Sunpak Versipod tripod. The Guru turned me on to this one, and the clamp can be unscrewed and then placed on any standard tripod out there, is worth the $12 price of admission.

iGo Universal Auto Charger: The MVP of my trip. Without the iGo Auto charger, everything above would have been for naught. If you want to run multiple GPS-enabled applications, talk on the phone, use the phone for music, and send/receive text messages and email, you are going to kill your battery. A charger in the car is essential to your success. One that can charge virtually any device you have just by changing a tip is even better. Get one of these, you won't regret it.

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