Cooperating programs on iPhone

[+user13371]

Drifting off topic in someone els's thread, I meandered into a feature different enough to merit it's own thread.

 

So here it is... I mentioned using Groundspeak Geocaching app and Phil Endecott's Topo Maps app on my iPhone to load maps to use in the field when I had no cellular data connection. In turn someone asked:

...those maps are different (iPhone) apps and you can't have the topo maps open when in geocaching mode or the other way around, right?

His was a reasonable guess, but not entirely accurate. The GC app and Topo Map apps are separate programs -- but switching between them on the iPhone takes just a few touches of the screen. And...

 

- The GC app can save logs, street maps, topo maps, and aerial photos

- The Topo Map app can load GPX files to show the cache waypoints

- Once loaded, all of the saved maps and data are available even if you don't have a cellular data connection.

 

Here's what it looks like on the iPhone, using one cache as an example: pictures

Notice in those picture I have purposely turned off my data connection to show that the map data is loaded on the phone. The maps and aerial photod saved into the GC app are from Bing and OpenCycle Maps; the higher-res map in the Topo app is from NRC (Canadian counterpart to USGS). No problem at all using both of these (and other) apps in the field...