Dublin Bus Live - RTPI iPhone App

snappieT

As I frequently do on hangover days, I got hacking around with RTPI today, and have knocked together an iPhone Webapp (that also looks good in Webkit desktop browsers - Chrome & Safari). Of course, data is limited right now, and I'm still working out details of how to best locate your nearest stops, but for now, please go ahead and try it out, let me know what you think, and give me any (constructive) feedback you can think off. As it's a webapp, it's free, and will work in some form on most devices. My goal is probably to make it into a native app - much more user friendly - and charge a nominal sum for it.

You can see it (and bookmark it) here: http://www.DublinBusLive.com/

freeze4real

Nice one mate you actually beat me to it or my brother to it. I have told him to make something like this as there's a need for one. when its completed ill be downloading this.

Tarabuses

What am I doing wrong? It won't let me put in a stop ID.

The_Wrecker

Will this work on the nokia n97 mini?

snappieT

Tarabuses wrote: »

What am I doing wrong? It won't let me put in a stop ID.

You have to tap on the right hand side of the field to input. Working on solving this.

The_Wrecker wrote: »

Will this work on the nokia n97 mini?

No reason why it won't in a basic form - some of the navigation elements are pretty colours are webkit-only though. Try it out, let me know!

smackyB

It's a real shame that the RTPI does not have any API facilitation for developers - there seems to be no way to get the list of stops for a route as each page of stops is called via javascript rather than loading a new page. :mad:

dynamick

You should make it work in Irish too for those of us who can't speak English.

Cookie_Monster

dynamick wrote: »

You should make it work in Irish too for those of us who can't speak English.

LOL, and charge a fortune for it too

Breezer

Hitting Enter doesn't seem to work on an Android browser. A 'go' button would probably fix it.

Also the numbers listed on the stops themselves are 4 digit. The RTPI website seems to have added a 0 at the start of every number to make it 5 digit, and it doesn't seem to work without this. Maybe you could add this automatically?

Nice work

ck_303

Obviously a little rough and ready given the current limitations of the system but this is still outstanding work.

A real case of technology improving people's lives.

Got a thrill when a 128 bus appeared around the corner, just as predicted!

Can't wait for the native iPhone app.

Tarabuses

snappieT wrote: »

You have to tap on the right hand side of the field to input. Working on solving this.

Thanks, that's working now. A great tool to have at the bus stop.

snappieT

dynamick wrote: »

You should make it work in Irish too for those of us who can't speak English.

Absolutely not, can't think of a bigger waste of my time. Stop names and destinations aren't given on RTPI, and I'm certainly not going to translate the

Breezer wrote: »

Hitting Enter doesn't seem to work on an Android browser. A 'go' button would probably fix it.

Also the numbers listed on the stops themselves are 4 digit. The RTPI website seems to have added a 0 at the start of every number to make it 5 digit, and it doesn't seem to work without this. Maybe you could add this automatically?

Nice work

Will do, cheers

markpb

I just tried this out on my WP7 phone (Samsung Omnia 7), it's great stuff, well done! Just a few small issues that you might be able to figure out:

When I click to enter the Stop ID, the number I type appears at the top of the box and not inline with the 'Stop ID' text.

When I enter a stop ID that doesn't exist, the top line is completely messed up. The text 'No data available', 'Dublin Bus Live' and something else are all on the first line so none of them are readable.

When I enter a stop ID that does exist, the top line is messed up again with the top line containing both the first result and the text 'Search' and 'Dublin Bus Live' on top of each other.

hecmail

I couldn't get it to work with any of the IDs I tried. Really nice idea though.

It'd be great to see it expanded to include routes or to use a phones GPS, or IP address.

Is there a link to the full website, or is the RTPI link on your site where all the live info you use is retrieved?

snappieT

markpb wrote: »

I just tried this out on my WP7 phone (Samsung Omnia 7), it's great stuff, well done! Just a few small issues that you might be able to figure out:

When I click to enter the Stop ID, the number I type appears at the top of the box and not inline with the 'Stop ID' text.

When I enter a stop ID that doesn't exist, the top line is completely messed up. The text 'No data available', 'Dublin Bus Live' and something else are all on the first line so none of them are readable.

When I enter a stop ID that does exist, the top line is messed up again with the top line containing both the first result and the text 'Search' and 'Dublin Bus Live' on top of each other.

This is almost expected. This is an iPhone-oriented webapp, it works on any webkit-based browser. Your WP7 uses IE, which doesn't support the CSS used by the framework I built the app on. It's still usable for you though, yes? Just not visually perfect?

hecmail wrote: »

I couldn't get it to work with any of the IDs I tried. Really nice idea though.

It'd be great to see it expanded to include routes or to use a phones GPS, or IP address.

Is there a link to the full website, or is the RTPI link on your site where all the live info you use is retrieved?

Not all IDs work, there's a test link on the home screen if you want to try that. I had an issue with leading zeros that's now resolved, so go ahead and try again. The link on the site (http://www.rtpi.ie) is where all the data comes from. I'm also interested in using the GPS, but there are some potential legal issues I could run into, then again feck it, I might just go for it!

markpb

snappieT wrote: »

This is almost expected. This is an iPhone-oriented webapp, it works on any webkit-based browser. Your WP7 uses IE, which doesn't support the CSS used by the framework I built the app on. It's still usable for you though, yes? Just not visually perfect?

I figured that. Hopefully when IE9 makes it to WP7 later this year things will improve In the meantime the site is more or less useable. You can't read most of the errors and you can't see the next bus at your stop but they're not exactly showstoppers

L1011

snappieT wrote: »

Absolutely not, can't think of a bigger waste of my time. Stop names and destinations aren't given on RTPI, and I'm certainly not going to translate the

Methinks your sarcasm detector isn't tuned enough to the idiocy we had on this forum over RTPI as gaelige. Probably just as well!

Tarabuses

Any further developments with this?

BrianD

I notice that a 4 digit number plate has been attached onto bus stops - also has the number in brail.

I wonder is this so people can input the number into an app or an online interface?

markpb

BrianD wrote: »

I notice that a 4 digit number plate has been attached onto bus stops - also has the number in brail.

I wonder is this so people can input the number into an app or an online interface?

Yes, into this demo site and, in future into a text message or smartphone app. For the moment, the site only works if the bus stop already has an installed and functioning real time display but I presume it will eventually work for all stop.s

BrianD

works on even basic phones with web access e.g, Nokia 6300. Just type in http://www.rpti.ie/text/

kc56

markpb wrote: »

Yes, into this demo site and, in future into a text message or smartphone app. For the moment, the site only works if the bus stop already has an installed and functioning real time display but I presume it will eventually work for all stop.s

Actually it works with any site that has the pole installed; a functioning display is not necessary.

Tarabuses

kc56 wrote: »

Actually it works with any site that has the pole installed; a functioning display is not necessary.

When will all sites be active?

bk

kc56 wrote: »

Actually it works with any site that has the pole installed; a functioning display is not necessary.

It seems to only be active for bus stops which will actually be getting poles.

Which makes me worried that they won't rollout to all stops or that it will take a long time to get to other stops.

Which makes no sense at all, because surely the stops that won't have screens, are the ones that need the website the most.

kc56

bk wrote: »

It seems to only be active for bus stops which will actually be getting poles.

Which makes me worried that they won't rollout to all stops or that it will take a long time to get to other stops.

Which makes no sense at all, because surely the stops that won't have screens, are the ones that need the website the most.

From the http://www.transportforireland.ie/future-plans web site:

SMS text service

Web and text messaging services are scheduled to be available in 2011. These services will cover all 5,000 bus stops served by Dublin Bus. You will then be able to access real time bus arrival information from your phone and the internet for every Dublin Bus stop.

bk

Thanks for the info kc56, but I'm inpatient and what to be able to do it today

I already use my phone to check stops in the city center that have poles but not signs yet. I can't wait for my local stop to also have it, it is so convenient.

ManAboutCouch

Does anybody know who developed the RTPI site?

I'd like to have a word with them about properly attributing the use of OpenStreetMap.

BrianD

Speaking of maps ... one thing I noticed (that I haven't on other maps) is that the borders of the postal districts are marked in. Some of them really meander!

It seems that the web service only works for the stops getting displays. The stop outside my house has a constant "No departures found".

ManAboutCouch

The map base the RTPI are using (unattributed, which is a bit of a no-no) is from www.openstreetmap.org, which is a free, open-source map of the world.

One user has spent a couple of weeks putting the postal district boundaries onto the map, and fair play to him.

You can edit/update the map yourself (no copying from copyrighted data sources mind - that includes Ordnance Survey and Google Maps). If you have any questions just ask - there are a number of boardsies like myself who have been involved in the project for a few years.

n97 mini

Used the webapp last night and it worked great. Pity the RTPI system didn't tho. Said I had 16 mins till my next bus, but when I got to the bus stop 6 mins later and the bus had already gone (and was gone off the system). Next bus was due in 15 mins but it arrived 9 mins later.

lil5

Your 'missing' bus might have been 'regulated' away. If you're close to a terminus I think the system works from the scheduled departure time. It might only realise that there is no bus after the scheduled time and then remove if from the system. I try and check the stops closest to the terminus and closest to me (which have departure info). While walking down to the bus stop I might check again if the bus 'moves'.

Sometimes the bus also disappears off the system for a short while only to be showing up after a minute - bad reception between bus and central unit?

The calculated running times can be wrong too. For example the 4 southbound is calculated slower than the 7 although the 4 moves generally quicker.

You can also give feedback about the new system on http://www.transportforireland.ie/

n97 mini

The buses in question leave from Merrion Sq., and I think they're probably allocated a certain amount of time to get to the quays where I was, but they just got there a lot quicker as the traffic was light as it was late.

IrlJidel

BrianD wrote: »

Speaking of maps ... one thing I noticed (that I haven't on other maps) is that the borders of the postal districts are marked in. Some of them really meander!

Yes the rtpi map uses Openstreetmap.

You can see a clearer view of our stab at postal distrincts here:
http://maps.openstreetmap.ie/?zoom=12&lat=53.35213&lon=-6.24705&layers=B000FFTFFFFTFFFF

There's a few area's that need refining - eg exact boundaries around the Robinhood/Ballymount Ind estates in Walkinstown and how far D24/D16/D18 goes into the Dublin mountains.

Improvements welcome - but better not hijack this thread for that.

snappieT

Hi all,

I've added some updates tonight to make it a bit more usable. Changes are:

• List of 5 most recent stops you used are shown, so you don't need to remember the ID
• Searching for stop by route number
• Indicating when stops are known to be active or not
• Redirecting you to another stop on your route that is active if yours is not yet
• Count of active stops shown on front page

Some new screenshots:

ArmaniJeanss

Good app.
Is there any way you could make a distinction between a timetabled entry and an actual RTPI entry. Maybe by having it display a 'T' or an 'A' after the entry.

Example for the stop on Leeson Street Lower heading towards City Centre you currently display both accurate information from buses which are travelling towards the stop, and potentially inaccurate information on buses (37/38/39/70) which are scheduled to leave the terminus 3 minutes away at a particular time.

Hope that makes sense.

stop

snappieT wrote: »

Hi all,

I've added some updates tonight to make it a bit more usable. Changes are:

• List of 5 most recent stops you used are shown, so you don't need to remember the ID
• Searching for stop by route number
• Indicating when stops are known to be active or not
• Redirecting you to another stop on your route that is active if yours is not yet
• Count of active stops shown on front page

Nice work.
Just noticed that when selecting a route, the alpha suffix is being ignored?

When a route is selected, can the stops be listed in the order that the route follows them? My nearest stop might not have rtpi info active, but the next one might so it would be easier to navigate to rather than having to scroll the entire list a-z. Of course you'd probably then have to have a prompt after the route selection with a from/to choice.

Tarabuses

Those changes help a lot but also highlight how few stops are active.

snappieT

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

Good app.
Is there any way you could make a distinction between a timetabled entry and an actual RTPI entry. Maybe by having it display a 'T' or an 'A' after the entry.

That's a great idea, but I can only really go off the data that RTPI provide, and they don't provide that. Cross-referencing with the timetables myself wouldn't really be worth the effort I'd have to put into achieving that.

stop wrote: »

Just noticed that when selecting a route, the alpha suffix is being ignored?

Good spot, thanks. Fixed now.

stop wrote: »

When a route is selected, can the stops be listed in the order that the route follows them? My nearest stop might not have rtpi info active, but the next one might so it would be easier to navigate to rather than having to scroll the entire list a-z. Of course you'd probably then have to have a prompt after the route selection with a from/to choice.

Another case of "wouldn't it be nice". As of now, RTPI only provides stops in alphabetical order for a given route, so all I can do is go by stop ID or name. For some routes, stop ID makes sense, it looks like these were the 'base' routes that the stop ID numbering came from, but for many many more, there's no sense to the order of stop IDs. Once RTPI expose this information, I'll make sure DublinBusLive does too

ArmaniJeanss

snappieT wrote: »

That's a great idea, but I can only really go off the data that RTPI provide, and they don't provide that. Cross-referencing with the timetables myself wouldn't really be worth the effort I'd have to put into achieving that.

Cheers, thought as much.
*************
One other thing which occured to me was whether you could store and display the data after a bus has left a stop.

It could be useful as follows. I am waiting for the 59X bus at a stop which doesn't have RTPI. But I know there is a stop 3 miles nearer the start of the route which does have it.
Currently I can see whether there is a bus due at that earlier stop but thats of limited use to me.
If instead the app could tell me that a 59X left that stop 11 minutes ago, then I'd know it must be close to me.

jamesbrond

Very good work.
I have a couple of suggestions for improvement though.
Can it be made to auto refresh, say every minute.

In the list of the last stops can the user enter a more descriptive term for them.
like "83 Camden street Northbound"

I would gladly pay for this app if it were in the app store. I think you could make some money here.

dionsiseire

Android have an App called Dublin Bus GPS

It's 79c and it layers the route data of bus's over a google map, you pick a stop and it tells you the time for all buses coming to that stop.

Would reccomend taking a look. Best 79c I've spent on Android

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.dublinbusgps&feature=search_result

smackyB

Shameless plug here, I also made an Android app. Not quite as fancy but it's free! Linky. There's also a thread in the Android forum on it here

podgeandrodge

smacky - great android app - I have a comment on your Android app of this which I will post there thanks

snappieT

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

One other thing which occured to me was whether you could store and display the data after a bus has left a stop.

Very nice idea. However, I only pull data in from RTPI whenever a user requests it. To be able to implement that, I'd need to constantly be monitoring all stops myself, which would generate a huge number of requests to the RTPI system, something I don't want to do.

jamesbrond wrote: »

Can it be made to auto refresh, say every minute.

Done, time list now refreshes every 30 seconds.

jamesbrond wrote: »

In the list of the last stops can the user enter a more descriptive term for them.
like "83 Camden street Northbound"

Again, would be lovely, but I only have what RTPI gives me to go on. The only way of being able to list whether it's northbound or not would be to

• Manually go through each stop and assign a direction myself
• Allow users to tell me the direction (open to abuse)
• Show the destination of the next bus on the stop selection screen (huge number of requests to RTPI)

I'll definitely think it over, it's an interesting one...

stop

snappieT wrote: »

Again, would be lovely, but I only have what RTPI gives me to go on. The only way of being able to list whether it's northbound or not would be to

• Manually go through each stop and assign a direction myself
• Allow users to tell me the direction (open to abuse)
• Show the destination of the next bus on the stop selection screen (huge number of requests to RTPI)

I'll definitely think it over, it's an interesting one...

PM sent!

kirving

It works in Chrome on the PC when I press enter, but not on the N8 with Opera Mobile or Nokia's Browser when I finish entering the route number.

A "go" button would be great help, I'd used this a lot!

Keep up the great work!

bk

snappieT great app, thanks for all the great work.

Might I make a small suggestion, would it be possible to include the stop name and reference number on the result page, like the RTPI text site does.

The reason being if you bookmark a couple of results pages, you might not know which bus stop you are looking at.

Perhaps you could include the bus stop name in the first line above the results. The stop reference number could come at the end of the page.

Tarabuses

Any more developments?

snappieT

bk wrote: »

Might I make a small suggestion, would it be possible to include the stop name and reference number on the result page, like the RTPI text site does.

Stop name is now in the title of the page

Tarabuses wrote: »

Any more developments?

Several!

• The stop names are now a good bit more descriptive, I've pulled them from Dublin Bus directly rather than RTPI (guess what, RTPI know about almost 100 more stops than DB do, and some actually have departures :P).
• "Recent Stops" has been extended to 10 stops (from 5) by request.
• There are many more stops running now - 785, up from 308 when I launched.
• And the big one: "Nearby stops". It grabs your GPS location (with permission) and lists the 5 nearest stops to you:
  

I update the DubBusLive twitter account as I add new features

bk

snappieT wrote: »

Stop name is now in the title of the page

Thanks, but on iPhone it still isn't clear.

With the iPhone safari browser, the title isn't displayed, you only see the title when you click on the tabs button and even then you see:

Dublin Bus Live ::: Upper Dru...

For the Upper Drumcondra Road stop.

Also if you use any of the alternative iPhone browsers which have proper tabs like Atomic Browser, Safari, etc., then you can't see the stop name at all, as they only display the first few characters of the title (e.g. "Dublin Bus..." for the above stop in Atomic Browser).

Ideally I think it should be on the actual page, just below Dublin Bus Live and Refresh button.

BTW this is no criticism, just some friendly feedback from a person who is very happily using your great app every day

dazmetron

snappieT wrote: »

Stop name is now in the title of the page

• The stop names are now a good bit more descriptive, I've pulled them from Dublin Bus directly rather than RTPI (guess what, RTPI know about almost 100 more stops than DB do, and some actually have departures :P).
• "Recent Stops" has been extended to 10 stops (from 5) by request.
• There are many more stops running now - 785, up from 308 when I launched.
• And the big one: "Nearby stops". It grabs your GPS location (with permission) and lists the 5 nearest stops to you:
  
  I update the DubBusLive twitter account as I add new features

I saw the updates yesterday and was delighted. Its a great improvement on what was already a great site. Well done. The stop descriptions were badly needed; the RTPI descriptions were very lacking in detail - eg. Stillorgan Road is not the most helpful of stop locations!
The nearest stop location also works well especially when the code for the stop isn't the most visible. I regularly put in the Adshell 4 digit code for the stop instead of the rtpi code

One additional feature that I would find useful is perhaps if it would be possible to split the stops when searching by route into to and from city centre (or equivalent). I am not sure how easy this would be to do so feel free to ignore it!

Oh and bk, you make a good point although to add to this, the full name of recently viewed stops and nearby stops is shown in full on the dublinbuslive.com home page so this might make it easier to select the right stop. I do agree that repeating the page title at the top of the main body of the page would be a good idea as well though