Bunch of observations from newbie

[Shohreh]

Hello,

I just used GP to slice a GPX into multiple files for a trip, and have the following constructive suggestions (it's clearly not meant as criticism):

SLICING

• File > Export GPX: Doesn't check "Just selection" option automatically, even when a range is currently selected. It also keeps previous Name + Description data (= should be emptied); Could use Name field to then generate default filename (eg. Name=Day1, filename=Day1.gpx) → currently, user must type twice
• File > Export GPX: Before opening, empty Name + Description (currently: Carries over from previous use)
• File > Export GPX: In Description, could include distance + climb (I copy/paste from View > Full, and edit manually)
• After selecting a range, right-click on it in the bottom pane > "Save selection as…" in popup menu after "Vertical speed"
• To make slicing easier, it'd be nice if GP saved each sliced section into a tree on the left à la GPS Track Editor

GENERAL

• won't lookup and replace elevation data if file already contains data: User must first remove through eg. sed, and try again
• Doesn't show elevation + distance from track start when clicking on any point: Must select range
• Provide more accurate elevation source than SRTM (same route: 2x higher elevation than reality)
• Track bar at bottom: Add +/- buttons to zoom in/out (and zoom in/out on map accordingly)

MENU

• File > Open: Doesn't trim path, and fails if trailing space "Cannot read file"
• File > Close not available : Must File > Exit and restart
• Point : Copy current point index into memory, so can paste later into Point > Enter point coordinates
• Help dialog: About sub-item should be the last item in the Help menu (standard feature in Windows); Check update should be above; Include clickable link to open browser to web site

KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS

• while range is selected, Home/End to jump to range start/end (currently: CTRL+ Home/End to jump to whole track start/end)
• CTRL + left/right : Jump by 10km
• Add Escape to close all dialogs (doesn't alway work)
• long press left mouse to select range (currently: must use SHIFT). Clicking elsewhere or hitting Escape should unselect the range

Cheers,

[activityworkshop]

Thanks for the feedback - and yes, all suggestions, observations and also criticism are very welcome :) You raised far too many points for me to address them all in one go, but I'll pick out a few which I can answer easily - this doesn't mean I will ignore the other points you raise.

File > Export GPX: Before opening, empty Name + Description (currently: Carries over from previous use)

This was deliberately added for the following use cases:

• Export a file (entering name and description), make further edits, export again and want the same name and description
• Load a file (which already contains a name and description), make edit, export again with the same name and description For your "split" use case where you want to enter different names and descriptions, you just need to overtype.

File > Open: Doesn't trim path, and fails if trailing space "Cannot read file"

I've never had the need to trim the path, I usually click or ctrl-click what's presented in the dialog. Although I agree that leading and trailing spaces on filenames should be rare.

File > Close not available : Must File > Exit and restart

No, you don't have to exit and restart. You want to load a different file? just load it and select "replace", then you just have the data from the second file. You want to start again without any data? just select all and delete range, then you have no data loaded any more (but you haven't edited any files).

Point : Copy current point index into memory, so can paste later into Point > Enter point coordinates

This would only give you the lat/long, elevation and name. Better is to use the "Duplicate point" option to get all the fields, then edit the new point as you wish.

Provide more accurate elevation source than SRTM (same route: 2x higher elevation than reality)

You have the choice of SRTM 3" or SRTM 1", these are often (I know, not everywhere) accurate. If you have examples of coordinates which give you twice the elevation than reality, I'd say that must be somewhere very unusual (for example, extremely steep cliffs by the sea). If you mean that GpsPrune reports twice the "climb" than other sources for a given range, that's probably your altitude tolerance setting. Comparing with "reality" it's probably track quality.

won't lookup and replace elevation data if file already contains data: User must first remove through eg. sed, and try again

Not replacing your carefully measured or entered data without asking you is a very deliberate design. You don't need sed though, just use Range -> Delete field values. Then you can selectively delete the values you want to replace, rather than being unable to prevent replacement.

File > Export GPX: In Description, could include distance + climb (I copy/paste from View > Full, and edit manually)

That might be what you (currently) want in your description field, but seems a strange assumption to make that everyone wants exactly the same information as you do. I'm glad you've found an easy way to fill it in though.

Clicking elsewhere or hitting Escape should unselect the range

Really? Clicking anywhere should deselect the current range? What if I'm just moving the map around or looking at a point's details, while wanting to keep the current range selected? How could I use the "cut/move range" function?

Again, please don't take my feedback on your feedback negatively - you raise some good points, but for some of them there are good reasons for the way those features work right now.

[activityworkshop]

File - Export GPX: Could use Name field to then generate default filename (eg. Name=Day1, filename=Day1.gpx)

That's a good suggestion - even though many people won't want the filename to be the same as the name field (the name could be really long with spaces in, for example), a suggestion would be better than nothing.

After selecting a range, right-click on it in the bottom pane > "Save selection as…" in popup menu after "Vertical speed"

That's a bit of a weird place to have a save function, because that popup menu is for selecting the source of the data, not to perform file operations.

To make slicing easier, it'd be nice if GP saved each sliced section into a tree on the left à la GPS Track Editor

It seems that the concepts used by GpsPrune (always a single track with multiple segments) are not the same as those used by "GPS Track Editor" (each file held separately with separate tree structures). Personally I think that if I wanted such a complicated tree structure I'd use a real GIS program.

Doesn't show elevation + distance from track start when clicking on any point: Must select range

That makes sense to me, doesn't it to you? If I select the range I want, then it shows me the distance and climb/descent, if I don't select a range then it doesn't. Are you suggesting that I always have two ranges selected, the one I selected myself and also a second range from the start of the track (not the start of the segment or the current day) to the current point? I'd find that confusing.

Using shift-click to expand the current range is an easy way to do this, just Ctrl-Home and then shift-click on any point.

Track bar at bottom: Add +/- buttons to zoom in/out (and zoom in/out on map accordingly)

There isn't a way to "zoom" the altitude panel, if that's what you mean, and there isn't a way to pan a zoomed altitude panel to show the bits which are now beyond the screen. You can stretch it vertically by moving the separator, and stretch it horizontally by making the window bigger.

File - Open: Doesn't trim path, and fails if trailing space "Cannot read file"

If you're manually typing filenames in, you may prefer to use the tab-autocomplete from the console when launching GpsPrune.

Include clickable link to open browser to web site

You mean like the button "Show webpage" in the Help -> Help ?

jump to start/end of track through Home/End keys or option in Track menu. Currently, must use CTRL+PageUp/Down or Home/End

I don't find Ctrl-Home much more inconvenient than Home. And certainly more convenient than going to the Track menu and searching for a menu item in there. You can also use the slider right underneath the "Track details".

while range is selected, Home/End to jump to range start/end (and CTRL+ to jump to whole track start/end)

That seems inconsistent with the previous suggestion that just "Home" always goes to the track start. But it's an interesting suggestion, I'll try it out.

CTRL + left/right : Jump by 10km

Ctrl + left/right jumps by a single point, as you know, which I find really convenient.

Add Escape to close all dialogs (doesn't alway work)

It should do, if there's one in particular which bothers you then just post which one.

long press left mouse to select range (currently: must use SHIFT).

That seems inconsistent to me, I haven't seen other programs do this so it's definitely not what I would expect to happen. Clicking to mark the start of a selection and shift-clicking to set the end of the selection is something done elsewhere in lots of places (even Notepad).

You can use Range > Set range end to select track from beginning.

Yes, if the start of the selection isn't already defined then it will take the start of the track.

Clicking elsewhere or hitting Escape should unselect the range

Hitting "Escape" shouldn't unselect the range, because as you noted above that's not its usual function. Range -> Select none does that.