While I've not been blogging of late, I have been working on other projects. Several months ago, I introduced Hermes, my open source accessible GPS.

While there's still not an official site, the project has seen lots of active development, inspired heavily by my commercial GPS deteriorating at a rapid rate and my inability to afford a replacement. In April, the web interface got a REST-based web service layer. June saw the beginnings of my work on an Android app to communicate with the web service, and in late August, I'm very close to having something that I might wish to use on a daily basis.

It is currently possible to move around and receive real-time feedback about your current street, nearest intersection and nearby points of interest. All of these announcements appear on the notification bar, making it possible to run the app in the background and do other things while receiving real-time feedback. I also recently implemented voice commands. It is currently possible to request accuracy, direction and speed of travel, your current road/path/stream and the nearest intersection via voice commands. As more functionality is added, I hope to make the entire app usable in this way, so you might still have access to location services even in situations where pressing buttons and using gestures is impractical or impossible.

The web service and underlying library have also undergone a variety of changes. Live use has revealed a number of bugs and design deficiencies which are being addressed at a rapid rate. Often I'll find a bug while out and about, swing back by the apartment to try implementing a quick fix only to head back out again a few minutes later.

Another development about which I'm excited is the ability to navigate any network of ways described in OpenStreetMap. The most obvious use for this of course is street navigation, but there's no reason that Hermes couldn't work just as well on a mapped trail or river, speaking the intersection of streams with each other, the boundaries of lakes and other larger bodies of water, etc. While I haven't used the mobile version in these scenarios, I've used the web service to explore some of Austin's creeks and lakes, and am hoping to hit a camping store sometime soon to investigate waterproof phone cases. There are currently issues when non-vehicular paths parallel roads–sometimes Hermes will assume that the bus I'm on is cruising down a bike trail which I assume is alongside the current street–but hopefully this should be an easy bug to fix once others have been resolved.

I'm still not certain when I'll have something to demo. Since this is all volunteer, with my time split up between numerous projects, there just aren't any guarantees.

I have, however, tentatively volunteered to participate in this SXSW panel, which in theory should steadily encourage me to blow people away with something cool in March. If you'd like to help make that happen, vote for the panel so it's more likely to be chosen. Regardless, progress will continue. The ability to navigate unfamiliar environments without having to wrangle two separate devices in addition to my phone and anything else I may carry is such a huge benefit, and I look forward to the day when a fully capable smartphone is all I'll need.