PeakTap

Showing a nice mountain panorama and lets you search for anything in view:

• calculates the panorama and displays it (currently with a flat earth :)
• lets you click in the panorama to link to the map and see what is there
• lets you click in the map to change the viewpoint - visit other places

Why is this better than other panorama apps?

• Allows you to see all the mountains around you, not only those the app thinks are interesting
• Also shows very far mountains (like the Mont Blanc as seen from Morges in Switzerland), which are often omitted in other apps
• You can also zoom in on mountains in the foreground, or villages
• Choose the place from which you want to see the panorama

It uses worldwide elevation data from https://srtm.csi.cgiar.org/

Example screenshot of showing the horizon in the map and as a panorama:

Example screenshot of zooming in on Mont Blanc:

Next steps

I would like to implement the following:

• remove unused tiles from the cache to decrease memory usage
• display updates
  • add a 360-degree view on the bottom and let the user scroll fast using it
  • increase OpenStreetMap fonts
  • add translations for more than just the intro screen
• more progress-info needs:
  • show precision on GPS-lock
  • when downloading map, show that it’s decompressing instead of sticking to “99%”
• having some buttons to enable/disable features:
  • make mountains higher (if they’re far away) / lower (if you’re in the Valais)
  • enable / disable earth curvature
  • showing the panorama in the direction the phone points
  • height above current point (standard is 10m)
• load tiles from https://map.ineiti.ch for faster loading
• skip “Searching for GPS” by allowing the user to choose the standing point

Bugs

• In telescope mode, when panning down, it wraps around. Should stop instead.
• correctly place pin (currently it’s a bit off)

Before release

• add paying voting option for next version

Other ideas are welcome…

Privacy Policy

The app owner is Linus Gasser, and the app is copyrighted 2023. The following data is collected by version 1.0.0:

• the SRTM website has access to the tiles you download from their site. Here is their Disclaimer
• openStreetMap has access to all the places you are connecting to. Here is their Privacy Policy
• no other data is collected by the app

CHANGELOG

• 2023-12-20 - v1.0.8+13
  • add an “info” button to replay intro and “Buy me a coffee”
  • add French and German translation
• 2023-11-17 - v1.0.7+12
  • Fix bug where the direction of the view is always initialized to 240˚
• 2023-11-15 - v1.0.6+11
  • Apple-store complaint fixed: when the GPS doesn’t give a fix in a reasonable time, show the Matterhorn
• 2023-11-13 - v1.0.5+10
  • BUG: when first started up, the panorama cannot be scrolled
• 2023-11-12 - v1.0.4+9
  • updated screenshots for first startup
  • add lightning to rendering
• 2023-10-17 - v1.0.3+8
  • interpolate heights from other points
  • paint according to inclination of tile
• 2023-10-15 - v1.0.2+7
  • GPS request info update for passing apple-store
  • added intro screen
• 2023-09-07 - rc5 (waiting for iOS approval)
  • display updates
    • when zooming in the panorama view, switch to goggle view
• 2023-08-19 - rc4
  • Added blue sky
  • Even faster drawing of panorama
• 2023-08-10 - rc2
  • Some speed improvements while painting the panorama
  • Showing progress while downloading tiles
  • Showing exceptions in the progress screen
  • Adding INTERNET permission
• 2023-08-09
  • added progress-info for locking to GPS, downloading, and painting
• 2023-08-04
  • changed name to PeakTap
• 2023-08-03
  • add a cross to the binoculars and some info:
    • heading
    • distance
    • height
  • add a button to update GPS
  • make working iOS version
• 2023-07-13
  • when starting up, there is often a moment when the polygon seems to have two points: this is because it still shows the old, pre-defined POI
  • when choosing a new POI on the map, also show “creating panorama”
• 2023-07-11
  • avoid loading twice the same tile
  • show “loading” texts
  • when clicking on the panorama, zoom in the top of the chosen area, put a cross in the middle, and let the user pan around
• 2023-07-09
  • using another dataset which covers the whole earth
  • scrolling also adds the POI
  • tapping for a POI also scrolls, and thus hides the zoom