Jan 29 2013

GPS Insight Mobile App for Android Released

The GPS Insight Mobile App for Android is here! Current customers can download the app from the Google Play Store.

A link to it is also available from the main menu under Mapping: Mobile Maps: Mobile App

New GPS Insight Android App

New GPS Insight Android App

Here is a screen shot which shows a list of vehicles with their status and a color-coded status icon:

GPS Insight Mobile App for Android

GPS Insight Mobile App for Android

 

 

With GPS Insight Mobile, you don’t need to be at your desk in order to stay up to date with your fleet. The Android app allows you to quickly view vehicle location, status, driver, odometer, and more.

GPS Insight Mobile is designed to be easier to use and more efficient than using your mobile device’s browser to load www.gpsinsight.com

GPS Insight Mobile for Android

GPS Insight Mobile (Map of all Vehicles)

GPS Insight Mobile for Android

GPS Insight Mobile (Slide out Menu)

You can expect more features to be released soon.

Please Note: You must be a GPS Insight customer to use this app. Not a GPS Insight customer? Contact us: 866-477-4321

Thanks,

Rob

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Mar 26 2012

Getting to my kids’ Flag Football Game using GPS Insight

I knew my boys had flag football practice this evening and that my wife was bringing them, but didn’t know where, and didn’t want to have to ask her for directions.

A few text messages (while parked) later and I was on my way to meet them.

Here’s what I did using GPS Insight to get going within a minute (less than asking my wife for detailed directions or an address): [note that 477-477 is "GPS-GPS" and our 6 digit short code]

Using GPS Insight SMS text messaging

Using GPS Insight SMS text messaging

 

 

  • Texted “gps nav2″ to get my wife’s location (she was just pulling in when I talked to her)
  • Texted “gps nav2 landmark flagfootball” to create a landmark named “flagfootball” within GPS Insight, corresponding to her location
  • Texted “gps rubi dis flagfootball” which told GPS Insight to dispatch my Garmin in my vehicle (Rubi is short for Rubicon) to the “flagfootball” location

At that point my Garmin showed a “flag” in the top right corner indicating I had a dispatch item:

Garmin Dispatch Item to my kids' flag football field

Garmin Dispatch Item to my kids' flag football field

Clicking it I see the item at the bottom of my dispatch items (many show a green check indicating they are complete):

Dispatch items in GPS Insight's Garmin integration

Dispatch items in GPS Insight's Garmin integration

Clicking that item (which shows I need to go 7.2 miles SouthEast to get there), I am given a choice to “Edit Stop” or “Go.”

Choosing to "Go" to "flagfootball"

Choosing to "Go" to "flagfootball"

Note that GPS Insight receives exact timestamps for when we send the dispatch, when the Garmin receives it, when the driver views it, then chooses to go there, when they arrive, and when they mark the stop as “complete.”  I’ll show that later.

Choosing Go, I’m now given visual and turn-by-turn directions on how to get to the destination:

Garmin takes me to "flagfootball"

Garmin takes me to "flagfootball"

So as I’m driving there, I was stuck at a light and decided to take a picture to show what it looked like on the way there:

Almost there

Almost there

And as I arrived at the site where I “landmarked” my wife’s Navigator (nav2) the Garmin shows my location, even though it’s technically in a parking lot:

Arriving at flagfootball

Arriving at flagfootball

So when I ultimately got home, and put this blog article together, I logged in and was able to show my path and 3D map history (with pins for just this trip, but a progressively darker/thicker blue line indicating my vehicle’s entire day’s route):

My route from Best Buy to Flag Football

My route from Best Buy to Flag Football

And clicking on the detail area of the Garmin Dispatch & Messaging Dashlet on our main interface shows the times I received/arrived/cleared the “stop” :

Timestamps for Garmin Dispatch Statuses

Timestamps for Garmin Dispatch Statuses

The stop report shows what time I left and what time I arrived (as well as the fact that I dropped my car off in the AM to get it washed and left it there all day so they needed to move it a few times):

GPS Insight stop report with details on trip to flagfootball

GPS Insight stop report with details on trip to flagfootball

And since the default landmark definition is simply a 750′ radius circle, I decided to go in and modify it quickly (under Mapping->Landmarks -> Manage Landmarks)

Manage (Edit) GPS Insight landmarks

Manage (Edit) GPS Insight landmarks

Loading the “flagfootball” landmark, I can change the type from Circle to Polygon, change the “address pin” to the actual entrance address, and re-draw it more precisely to match the parking lot:

Change a circular landmark

Change a circular landmark

And here’s the end-result: [note that the address changes to reflect the new pin location -- this allows for more accurate dispatch directions]

Accurate Polygon "flagfootball" landmark

Accurate Polygon "flagfootball" landmark

So now the next time I need to get to that park I can just dispatch myself with a simple SMS text message to “GPS GPS” (477-477) of “gps rubi dis flagf” (note that since rubi and flagf are “unique enough” for rubicon and flagfootball I can shorten the SMS string).

It took me 1 minute to dispatch myself, 23 minutes to get there, and probably 30 minutes or so to put this article together.  It’s really intended to show you how just a minute’s worth of “interaction” with GPS Insight can make your drivers’ (and my) life easier, and how much information you can get derive from their driving, automatically, should you need to go back and get more in-depth information about it.

As for my boys’ flag football team, well, I think they need to practice more…  They have practice twice a week, and in a month I’ll run a landmark report to show you how frequently I attended.

Rob.

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Mar 12 2012

Do your drivers have a TV in their vehicle?

For $29.95, they could!

While I think this is really cool technology, I’m guessing it’s being used by drivers across the country and costing companies in terms of both lost productivity and safety due to distracted driving.

I just hooked up a “slingbox” to my TV at home and it allows me to control and watch that TV ANYWHERE that I have WiFi or even Cellular access on my iPhone or iPad (or Android phone, which I don’t have).

This means I can literally watch live TV ANYWHERE at ANYTIME.  I can even watch programs I’ve recorded in the past.

Here’s a quick video of how it works on my iPad:



And here are some screenshots of my watching TV, choosing a Spongebob Squarepants episode my kids have got taped, and streaming it to my iPhone.

Going through the live TV guide

Going through the live TV guide

After looking at the guide, I can press “Menu” from the Keypad option and get a list of taped shows:

Watching a Spongebob Squarepants on my iPhone

Watching a Spongebob Squarepants on my iPhone

Choose an episode next:

Watching a Spongebob Squarepants on my iPhone

Watching a Spongebob Squarepants on my iPhone

Press “Play”:

Watching a Spongebob Squarepants on my iPhone

Watching a Spongebob Squarepants on my iPhone

And now it’s like you’re in your living room watching TV:

Watching a Spongebob Squarepants on my iPhone

Watching a Spongebob Squarepants on my iPhone

I think this is fantastic technology, since I can watch the occasional taped TV show when I’m traveling without waiting until I get home.

But I can’t imagine how this will affect both driver productivity and safety.  I hope drivers know enough to keep from wasting time on the job by watching TV shows, and certainly hope they don’t have them on while driving.  However, I would certainly check productivity between your drivers to get a feel for who may be utilizing this new TV capability.

GPS Tracking services are a great way to monitor stop times as well other metrics which may help to pinpoint trouble with drivers who are using applications such as this.  And it’s not just Slingbox — it’s Angry Birds, and just about any iPhone/iPad/Android app which might suck the productivity or safety right out of them.  An example of a report which might show one driver vs. another

Here’s just the newest example I’ve seen.

Rob.

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Dec 12 2011

Android App coming soon

Category: cell phone capabilities,New Features,New Featuresrdonat @ 10:22 pm

We finally have an Android App under development.

Here’s a very simple preview:

GPS Insight Android Application

GPS Insight Android Application

We’ll let you know when it’s available in Beta.

Thanks,

Rob.

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Aug 06 2011

Waiting (shortly…) for the Trolley in Branson MO in 111 degree heat!

So I didn’t want to wait very long in the 111 degree humid, sunny, disgusting weather for the Branson Trolley (which we happen to track using GPS Insight).  so I pulled up their location on my phone and was able to wait inside Bass Pro Shop (stop #3) until it was close, then go out and get on:

Waiting for the Branson Trolley

Waiting for the Branson Trolley

I had some pictures of it closer on the map, and of my kids and I waiting as it pulled up, along with the stops map.  I deleted them rather than sending them from my iPhone.  One wrong push…  You’ll just have to trust me.

Anyway, it’s nice to have GPS tracking on public transportation vehicles and be able to pull them up on Smart Phones.  I’m not sure if Branson makes this available or not.  They should, & we will let them know about that capability so they can advertise it to their riders.

They claim the trolley makes it around all stops every 15 minutes.  I may investigate that and make that a future blog article.  With the kind of traffic I experienced in Branson (worse than LA !!!), I am not sure I believe that claim.  We’ll see, and GPS Insight has all the data to prove (or disprove) that claim.

Rob.

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Aug 06 2011

GPS Tracking (and using) the Branson MO “Downtown Trolleys”

I am on a Summer trip with my 2 boys for their vacation to Branson, MO.  It’s like Disneyland for kids in the Ozarks in Missouri.

As we were getting onto the Trolley which shuttles you around “Old Town” Branson, I realized they were a customer of GPS Insight’s, and asked a support person to send me the GPS Mobile Map link to their vehicles so I could “track myself” and see how close the trolley was later when it was time to get back on. [Mobile Mapping is a free capability within GPS Insight under the "Mapping/Mobile Mapping" menu.  You just need to retrieve the unique, secure link and you can view your vehicles from any smart phone or tablet]

Here is a picture of the boys on the Trolley:

 

My boys on the Branson Downtown Trolley

My boys on the Branson Downtown Trolley

So within a minute or so my support person was able to text me the link to use from my smartphone to see the Trolley position:

Where the Trolley is according to GPS Insight

Where the Trolley is according to GPS Tracking

Then quickly I clicked on Street View to see where Google thinks it looks like out my Trolley Window:

Google street View from Trolley Location

Google street View from Trolley Location

And quickly I took a picture with my iPhone to show it was EXACTLY like that at the moment:

Actual picture I took from the Trolley window

Actual picture I took from the Trolley window

Not bad, Google (or GPS Insight)!

The Branson "Downtown Trolley"

The Branson "Downtown Trolley"

I got off at the Bass Pro Shop stop so my kids could look around in advance of their big fishing trip the next morning.  I’ll talk about how I was able to minimize my wait for the Trolley (it was 111 degrees and HUMID) in the next article.

I’m glad we’re able to help Branson with their GPS tracking initiative.  Great town to visit with your family.  For more information click here!

Thanks,

Rob.

 

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Jun 30 2011

You can attach pictures to stops now in GPS Insight

Using your smart phone, you can now attach a picture from the field to any stop’s detail.

Here’s how it works:

Take a picture that you want associated with your stop (or someone else’s stop, if you’re a supervisor in the field) — this can even be a screen shot from a dispatch system, etc.

Send that picture to our GPS Insight notes email address [you generate this in the system here under User Management:]

Add an inbound email address for GPS Insight queries/notes

Add an inbound email address for GPS Insight queries/notes

You want to use our “gps [vehicle] note here is my note detail” format to annotate the note and minimally let us know which vehicle the picture should be associated with.

 

send a picture to GPS Insight to attach to a vehicle's activity

send a picture to GPS Insight to attach to a vehicle's activity

Once we receive the photo and note, it becomes available on our mapping and on the stop notes report:

 

Picture under the "notes" tab of the vehicle detail in mapping

Picture under the "notes" tab of the vehicle detail in mapping

When you “hover over” the note, the picture pops up to give you more information — this could be a picture proving service, showing a problem which justifies further time/billing, or just a reference photo to remind you later on about your customer.

 

Field pictures show up in Stop Notes Report

Field pictures show up in Stop Notes Report

Adding pictures from the field into our mapping and reports will help better document (and verify) working conditions as well as pick-ups/drop-offs from stop to stop.

 

Close up of added Photo

Close up of added Photo

 

Give us a call if you have any questions regarding this functionality.  There is a “wizard” which is launched when you choose the option at the top from the Admin->User tab.  It asks you to choose a user and a vehicle group, then provides you the email to use (and store in your phone for easy access in the future).  For your convenience, you can click on that email to send to it, cc’ing yourself or your drivers so that they can just save it as a contact for future use.

Then all they need to do is email photos to that address in order to have them associated with their GPS tracking records for the day, available in both mapping and reports.

This is included in basic GPS Insight functionality, and available for all users at this time.

Enjoy!

Rob.

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Oct 25 2010

New SMS and Email Messaging capabilities added to GPS Tracking System

We just added a few new features to our SMS text messaging dashlet in our GPS tracking system.

First, now it auto-refreshes so you don’t need to press “refresh” to get new messages which have come in.

More importantly, to get your eye, new messages show up in RED:

New Messages show in Red

New Messages show in Red

Once you click them, they are turned back to white:

New Messages turn white when clicked

New Messages turn white when clicked

Last, you can now send EMAIL to your drivers as well from the SMS text messaging dashlet (now called the SMS/Email Messaging dashlet):

Send an email to your drivers from GPS Insight

Send an email to your drivers from GPS Insight

Received Email from GPS Insight Dashboard

Received Email from GPS Insight Dashboard

In order to edit your drivers’ SMS & Email addresses, choose the following option:

Edit your drivers' SMS & Email Addresses

Edit your drivers' SMS & Email Addresses

Now we allow up to 50 SMS text messages for free per vehicle per month with our GPS tracking system, so please make sure to use this useful and valuable service, and let your salesperson know if you will require more than that if you’re not already subscribing to it.

Thanks,

Rob.

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Oct 02 2010

How to use Cell-Based GPS Insight capabilities

GPS Insight’s cell-based capabilities are now a part of our baseline offering  for customers.

There are 3 capabilities:

  • Cell Phone Maps (Mobile Mapping)
  • SMS Messaging (to and from Dispatch)
  • SMS Queries (using a text message to do things with your fleet)

Here are VERY basic overviews, followed by 3 more detailed instructional links.

These are very powerful capabilities within GPS Insight, and we want to ensure all of our customers know to use them.

Cell Phone Maps:

Set up a link which you can input (once) into your Smart Phone (e.g. iPhone, Android, etc.) and you can see your vehicles or just a group of them on the phone map (you may need to load Google Mobile Maps first):

Mobile Mapping in GPS Insight

Mobile Mapping in GPS Insight

For detailed instructions, click here.

SMS Text Messaging (free access limited to 50 messages per vehicle per month, aggregated — for more, speak to your salesperson)

You can set up associations between your vehicles/drivers and their cell phone numbers.

Then you can text your drivers and receive their response from within GPS Insight’s interface:

Use GPS Insight to send and receive messages between drivers and dispatch

Use GPS Insight to send and receive messages between drivers and dispatch

For detailed information, click here: Bear in mind there is also a messaging page under “Custom/Messaging.”  There is also a training topic at http://training.gpsinsight.com.

SMS Queries [free access limited to 50 messages per vehicle per month, aggregated]:

Last, you can send text messages from your phone to find out a vehicle’s location, see which vehicles are closest to others, set movement alerts, create landmarks, and much more:

Use SMS text to find manage your fleet

Use SMS text to find manage your fleet

For basic and detailed capabilities and instructions, click here and here.

Please start using these capabilities, as they are now included with the basic GPS Insight offering.

Thanks,
Rob.

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Sep 24 2010

New SMS message sending capabilities from the Dashboard

We just added the ability to select a vehicle group and send an SMS message to all those drivers from the dashboard.

Simple stuff, here are a couple screen shots:

Send a message to all/some of a group (only those with cell #’s assigned show up):

Here is where you send the message

Here is where you send the message

And look at outbound/inbound messages

here's where you see the past messages in & out

here's where you see the past messages in & out

And here’s what I sent earlier/just now on my iPhone:

here is what it looks like on your phone (my iPhone)

here is what it looks like on your phone (my iPhone)

Easy stuff — send messages to your drivers, and when they reply, you get it.

You don’t need to do anything except enter their cell # once, either by driver or by vehicle.

And they can send SMS to you at 477-477 (GPS-GPS).

Rob.

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