TFI Live - potential new Transport Planner App

p_haugh

So happened to come across this today when checking the play store for what the TFI Go app update entailed.

There is a new app called TFI Live UAT currently in public early access testing (not sure if it was intentionally made public or not).

Seems to be a combined replacement for the TFI Journey Planner & TFI Realtime apps.

Seems to be a much nicer experience overall compared to the Journey Planner app, however it is clearly still in its testing stages - it's missing certain features present in the other apps (i.e. live bus positioning) and funnily enough, the about page still shows dummy text!

devnull

The NTA are currently working with Trapeze Group, who designed the iBus system in London and provide the technology that powers other TFL related systems in that city.

This app is part of that partnership, but it's not finished yet and is in testing and some things are not finished. It does however distinguish between live and scheduled buses, as the later are now flagged.

Live bus positioning does appear you'll need to look for a green bus like below. May need to zoom in for it to appea.

p_haugh

"Live bus positioning does appear you'll need to look for a green bus like below. May need to zoom in for it to appear.”

Ah, must have just not been appearing on my end for some reason.

devnull

It's not terribly intuitive to be honest, when I was at default zoom level I couldn't see it, just a load of bus stops, but when I zoomed in a little bit to roughly where I felt the selected departure might be, it appeared like above

p_haugh

Yeah I see it now when you show a specific service on the map. Doesn't seem to show all buses on the main map from what I can see though.

bk

BTW UAT means User Acceptance Testing

And Lorem Ipsum is common dummy text used as a placeholder until the client sends you the final copy text.

devnull

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118715767#Comment_118715767

If you go to timetable section for a route you can see all buses on a route. Might need to zoom in though as previously stated.

dublinman1990

I notice that this app had been updated on Google Play on the 23rd of March 2022. Was there any major changes done to the app UI since that date.

Also how long does the UAT last for this app?

p_haugh

Thread bump here - just after getting this notification to sign up for the beta version of this app, so some progress at least.

D8 boy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118957526#Comment_118957526

I got that notification too and emailed them but heard nothing back. Did you hear back from them ?

p_haugh

I haven't heard anything either as of yet

Peregrine

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119034522#Comment_119034522

Did you get an email there?

embraer170

The TFI app is quite a disaster compared to similar apps available in the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland.

p_haugh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119084259#Comment_119084259

I have not, no

D8 boy

I got an email from the NTA on Thursday about Beta Testing of the TFI Live app. It said that testing had been delayed but they would be in touch shortly with details.

coylemj

I've found that RTPI info is completely unreliable these days so that new app (which I have installled) and the TFI 'Real Time Ireland' app are currently giving info which is completely unreliable.

I was at the bus stop at Donnybrook church the other day at about 11 p.m. Three buses shown on the RTPI display (39A, 46A and 145) which were originally coming in 3, 7 and 12 minutes just never showed up.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119102438#Comment_119102438

Again, as I mentioned in another thread there was a serious with the Dublin Bus RTPI system for several weeks recently as, due to a software glitch, it was only displaying the scheduled times rather than applying the predictive times to the GPS position of the bus.

It was resolved last week and appears to be working normally once again.

p_haugh

Had reason to use the 133 today. Checked the TFI Live app out of interest and it shows vehicle location along with direction, nice to see! The current realtime app doesnt have this functionality for bus Eireann services. Also shows for expressway services (at least it does for the 2). However, on my version of the app, the timetables for the 133 are very disorganised. Hopefully that's something which will be fixed for the official release.

As an aside, I also gave the TFI Go app a try for my ticket, since I rarely get Bus Eireann, and it also worked great.

LXFlyer

When did they send out the Beta app for testing?

Didn’t see any emails about it.

p_haugh

I never got the email about the beta, I'm still using the UAT version. The "early access" version is the one available on the play store now.

LXFlyer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119405345#Comment_119405345

Ah it’s the Android version! No bother.

Nothing in the iPhone App Store yet.

dublinman1990

I came across a small bug on this app when I got an update from Google Play Store today.

If I click on the option for Rail in the favourites list. It comes up as an invalid request. This issue does not occur when searching for live real time info for the bus routes. Ironically if I click for real time info for Rail on the timetables list. The live info for the DART times comes up as normal.

If I click on GAI's Dublin City Routes in the favourites list. I get an orange triangle with an exclamation mark to say it is for UAT.

I do not get that orange exclamation mark when viewing the live info for Dublin Bus.

That particular issue has been there for the past few months. Very strange.

p_haugh

Update on this, app is going live soon (I assume on the 22nd given the Realtime Ireland app is discontinued then 😅). Seems it's happening in tandem with the NTA GTFS API upgrade, which makes sense.

https://twitter.com/TFIupdates/status/1626476749050593288?t=z79qoOxmT0_H3ubtdTQyRw&s=19

thomasj

Looks like it's released

LXFlyer

One would hope that the DB app will continue for the moment, given the ongoing reliability of information issues with the TFI apps.

Even this morning they were giving incorrect information for the route I was on, displaying the scheduled arrival for certain buses instead of the actual live times. Meanwhile the DB app was correct.

This is still a real problem with the TFI app.

p_haugh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120252920#Comment_120252920

The "early access" version of the app has been available for a while now on android, I've been using it for a good few months now. Seems it was updated on the 11th to "release" standard so that there isn't any issues on launch day?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120252923#Comment_120252923

Yes I still see some issues present in the app myself.

Sometimes the map screen refuses to pan, or if it does it's very miniscule movements no matter how much you swipe.

Also, the stop realtime seems a bit of a downgrade... It doesn't show if a service is delayed and the text is all one colour, so for e.g. if a service is cancelled, on the old app it'd show in red, but here it's the same colour as all the other text.

The app seems to be fixing some issues with the old app, but then reintroducing various different issues!

LXFlyer

That’s a downgrade if the delay isn’t shown. The iPhone version is live now too on the App Store so I will try it out later

They do have a list of things they’re working on:

https://www.transportforireland.ie/available-apps/tfi-live-comingsoon/

p_haugh

As per usual, some mixed messaging... The in-app announcement says the new app is available now, whereas the official announcement says coming soon!

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120252939#Comment_120252939

The old app never showed "delayed" time in Limerick.

One trick I noticed on the new one is (scheduled). On the old app any bus route I use without the GPS symbol was not to be trusted. On the new app any bus that says (scheduled) is probably cancelled.

The new app from the limited time I have used it is the exact same. Doesn't address any of the problems I had with the old one.

p_haugh

Pretty much yeah, added some new features (that are indeed welcome) but didn't address all the issues with the old one

LXFlyer

A lot of those issues would likely be down to the actual systems used by the bus companies, and won’t be addressed until completely new systems are implemented.