There are so many map-based apps that should be pretty simple to implement and yet haven't been (afaik)
- Chances of rain along your bike route for different start times
- Given a route, best rated restaurants that don't take you far away from that route, for pick up orders
- Best restaurant to meet up for two parties, that requires them to travel a roughly equal amount
You can hack all this stuff, and I know because I frequently do, but it's all more of a pain in the ass than it can and should be
This is kind of why I have a hunch that most applications of chatbots are a weak cop out solution for problems where the real solution would be good UX.
@misc There’s a Dutch app doing this.
https://androidworld.nl/android-apps/weermeister
@misc not only UX, the amount of different questions you might have answers to, like 'restaurants that allow charging bike batteries', 'cafes or bakeries along the path', support for different surfaces, slopes, boring vs scenic, and a long list of etcs. Each type of question requires not only different UX and algorithms, some also require different data structures, multiplying the amount of CPU to generate then and disk and RAM to use them. And you can also require offline support.
@mdione @misc Like Overpass with human-oriented interface.
Similar to what Bellingcat did with https://www.bellingcat.com/resources/how-tos/2023/05/08/finding-geolocation-leads-with-bellingcats-openstreetmap-search-tool/ .
@misc I recently saw a map somewhere that showed where you could drive within 2 hours from a specific location. That would be an extremely handy feature.
@misc definitely like the last
@misc See also: walking route with highest probability of shoveled sidewalks (in blizzard); biking route with lowest traffic noise at given time of day; driving route with fewest billboards.
@misc I would love for an app that can provide me with random routes for an X amount of minutes walk
(I tried to do something like this in iOS but my MapKit skills are not good enough yet and gave up)
@anco @misc There are many wonderful OSM based projects - https://trailrouter.com/ seems to be close to what you wanted.
@richlv Thanks! I will give this a try!
@misc @irenes On iOS there's an "Epic Ride Weather" app that will show you forecast weather for a route for a particular time, I think including relatively granular rain chances. The drawback with it is that apparently all weather API sources are paid, so it has to charge you to cover its back-end access costs. (I haven't played with it because of that so I'm not sure how readily you can vary the start times and so on.)
@misc when I teach my UX class I ask students to add features like these to an exiting app. And they’re so used to shitty apps it’s hard for them to comprehend useful additions. It’s like pulling teeth to get them to pitch a useful new feature.
@misc The lack of wiring up of predictive weather radar to specific (meter-scale) locations for ETA or path avoidance purposes is so infuriating. The data is all there but enclosed and the apps are all trying to exploit you not help you.
@misc “given a route, find a well-rated x not too far from your route” is supported by Google and Apple via “add a stop”. Neither is perfect but they both have some features that are nice and some that are annoying.
@misc Just yesterday I wished Google Maps, via Android Auto, would show me the realtime weather radar on top of my map, so I could avoid the heaviest rain as I drove.
@misc I use regenampel.de, but I don't know if it's usable in other countries
@misc https://www.meetways.com/ is one that I have used. I 100% agree with your larger point though. My want list is "Yelp-ish but only for things that are along the route you are already on and will require no more than X miles detour" (kind of like your #2 but a little different) and I'd even settle for "Anywhere I can get protein in the direction I am already heading, starting now"
@misc I recently found this cool little website that lets you put in a bike ride (from strava or rwgps), average riding pace, and start time and it gives you a forecast along the route. Even lets you add breaks along the way.
Clearly someone's cool personal project, so I wouldn't expect the rest of the features you are asking for, but totally an awesome project to stumble upon.
@misc Feels like there could be a cool self-hosted open source project opportunity here