Smart Phones

The i-Tree community plays a significant role in improving and defining the future capabilities of the i-Tree suite of tools. Therefore, your ideas and comments are important. This forum will serve as a place where i-Tree users can make suggestions on ways to improve all aspects of i-Tree from functionality to the website. The i-Tree executive committee will periodically review suggestions for feasibility and future implementation.

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treeruyak
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Joined: Thu Nov 11, 2010 3:32 pm

Smart Phones

Post by treeruyak » Thu Nov 11, 2010 3:39 pm

I had a question, but never got to ask it while attending the discussion at the Partners for Community Trees Conference. Is there going to be any way to easily collect and transfer data using a smart phone (blackberry, iphone, android, etc.) or is it only going to ever be via paper, computer, or pda?

I also didn't know if anybody has experimented with using the Excel apps (like I have on my bb) to collect data and transfer it back to their pc or laptop. Any thoughts?
azelaya
i-Tree Team
Posts: 372
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 10:50 am

smart phones for i-Tree

Post by azelaya » Fri Nov 12, 2010 8:35 am

Hello,

First thanks for attending the user's group discussion at the Partners Conference in Philly.

Basically, the i-Tree data collection programs are developed to run on a specific operating system which is the Windows Mobile 2003 or greater at this time. I believe that most of the PDAs on the market are running Window Mobile 6.1 or 6.5. We have not tested Windows Mobile 7 yet but will need to in the near future.

Therefore devices that are not strictly PDAs such as smartphones and Trimble dataloggers can be used if they too are running the more recent Windows Mobile operating systems. I have heard from users who have run i-Tree on an HTC smart phone, Trimble Nomad & Trimble Juno for data collection. Blackberry and iPhones use completely different operating systems and are not compatible.

There may be issues that we have to resolve with various smart phones running the WM o/s as we learn about these from users because of the variety of devices available. I have heard from a consultant who ran i-Tree on his smart phone but the small phone screen made it difficult to use productively for data collection. So, the program ran fine but it was hard to use because of the device size.
Current requirements for PDAs & smartphones are listed in the following document
http://www.itreetools.org/resources/con ... ements.pdf

Information below has more recent version 5 details added on Nov28, 2012

i-Tree version 5 will allow users to collect data for i-Tree Streets & Eco using online forms. This will enable users to use devices such as more recent smartphones or tablets to collect data if they have internet connectivity.

The mobile webform page has more information http://www.itreetools.org/mobile/index.php

Best regards,
Al
Last edited by azelaya on Wed Nov 28, 2012 10:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Dubby14
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Joined: Tue Jan 25, 2011 6:21 pm

Post by Dubby14 » Tue Jan 25, 2011 6:29 pm

i-Tree seems to be community-driven, so it only makes sense that i-Tree should be an easy to use App (perhaps with social capabilities). I would love to see something like this on my iPhone, and highly encourage its development.
azelaya
i-Tree Team
Posts: 372
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 10:50 am

i-Phone app for i-Tree

Post by azelaya » Thu Jan 27, 2011 12:38 am

We appreciate your suggestion and are currently evaluating future directions for hand held compatibility to try to provide more or improved options for users. Thanks, Al
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AGH
Posts: 17
Joined: Thu Jun 11, 2009 3:04 pm

Smartphone apps for v.4?

Post by AGH » Sun Mar 13, 2011 11:19 pm

I'm ready for my 2yr phone upgrade, but before I pull the trigger on an Iphone I thought I would read through the I-tree newsletter and see that the new version will work with either the DroidX or Apple's popular 4G device. Device cost isnt as much a factor to me as functionality, I will end up purchasing whatever they have that doubles as a datalogger, otherwise I guess I'm buying a used PDA to conduct inventories with.
Has anyone reported useful apps or any success inputing and transfering Streets data with newer smart phones? I was able to use the program fine on Samsung's Omnia up through WM 6.5, but I had to remove it when I installed v7.0. That phone didnt last past a few hundred trees before the stylus, and many other issues surfaced with the product, which ruined it for use w/Itree. I'd really like to find a smartphone that works well with the i-tree software suite and I'm curious if anyone else has found a good option.
azelaya
i-Tree Team
Posts: 372
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 10:50 am

smart phone for iTree v4

Post by azelaya » Tue Mar 15, 2011 8:05 pm

Thanks for sharing your experience working with the Samsung Omnia. I recently spoke with a user in Nevada who was having good luck working with the HTC Touch smartphone to collect i-Tree Streets data. The device was running the Windows Mobile 6.5 O/S and he was also using it to capture GPS coordinates.

You also brought up a good point about device durability which is also something to considering with a potential device especially if you will be using it frequently or for multiple projects. We don't have good information from users regarding durability and reliability.

Unfortunately, trying to keep up with evolving operating systems has been challenging and the recent change from Windows Mobile 6.5 to Windows Phone 7 will require a complete re-write of existing code. Thus, the Development Team is at a crossroad with considering new directions.

We are considering developing a web based application for data collection in the future which would then allow any device, netbook or tablet to be used for data collection that can access the internet. However, there are limitations with that method also such as connectivity & data storage issues to consider. Anyway, I would be curious to hear your thoughts on that option as an i-Tree user.

Thanks,
Al
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TQuinn
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Joined: Fri Mar 18, 2011 10:35 pm

Post by TQuinn » Fri Mar 18, 2011 11:25 pm

It would seem to me that an application for smartphones & tablets is the way to develop for the future. But what OS do you develop for? The OS market share is going to be interesting to watch. Windows 7 has been abandoned by HP with their Palm series now using their own webOS as well as, I believe, Dell also now using google’s Android OS.

Bloomberg has posted that Apple iOS market share at 75%, Android at 22%. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-01-3 ... -says.html

ESRI mobile GIS is also developed for windows 6.5 and 7 but they have an iphone ArcGIS application which I would guess is for development testing.

It’s going to be interesting to see what happens with mobile operating systems, that’s for sure.

Also, I’m wondering if data speed would be an issue with web based data collection.
Jerry
Posts: 100
Joined: Wed Nov 28, 2007 8:11 pm

Post by Jerry » Tue Jun 14, 2011 1:04 pm

Agreed. Android-based phones have been matching iPhones in sales for almost a year now, I believe, and high-quality Palm devices are again available. it would not seem to me like a good investment of iTree time and money to develop for a single mobile platform.

That said, it might be interesting to look into developing some sort of (open-source) spreadsheet that could easily be used on any mobile device. Data entry would have to be easy, though--a floating number pad?--as would field and record navigation. No text entry if possible, as that is always a killer in terms of production, and even more so on these devices.
azelaya
i-Tree Team
Posts: 372
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 10:50 am

open source smart phone application

Post by azelaya » Thu Dec 08, 2011 11:27 pm

Thanks to Jerry for sharing this information. The original post was accidentally deleted when removing a spam post in the thread. Al

Author: Jerry
Posted: Thu Dec 08, 2011 8:04 am (GMT -5)
Topic Replies: 9

Don't know if this topic is still alive for the iTree Team, but I wanted to mention some interesting open-source data collection software called Open Data Kit. It is a fascinating project to use cellphones to collect health data in 3rd World countries, but now expanding in application. It is being developed for Android, but is being ported to iOS with talk of including Windows Phone as well.

I am using it to develop a cross-platform app for phone use to collect tree health data, and it is pretty interesting. When I have some time, I will try to do up a simple Streets template and post it for an example. I have attached an image of the basic form as it appears on the phone from somebody's health project. http://opendatakit.org/
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Jerry
Posts: 100
Joined: Wed Nov 28, 2007 8:11 pm

Post by Jerry » Fri Dec 09, 2011 7:28 am

Ha! I've done that...

Attached is the exampe image I had posted, in case anybody is interested in this stuff.

I will post the Streets form in a couple of days in a dedicated thread.
Attachments
ODKcollect.jpeg
ODKcollect.jpeg (17.37 KiB) Viewed 51096 times
chrismyr
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Jul 05, 2012 12:13 pm

i-tree pda smartfone tablet

Post by chrismyr » Thu Jul 05, 2012 12:23 pm

Hello everybody
1. I would like to know about the pda or the smartphones that are
tested with i-tree software and if there waw any problem
2. Is there any tablet pc that ican used with i-tree software?

Thanks truly!
azelaya
i-Tree Team
Posts: 372
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 10:50 am

i-tree pda smartfone tablet

Post by azelaya » Mon Jul 09, 2012 7:12 am

Current requirements for PDAs & smartphones are listed in the following document
http://www.itreetools.org/resources/con ... ements.pdf

i-Tree version 5 will allow users to collect data for i-Tree Streets & Eco using online forms. This will enable users to use devices such as more recent smartphones or tablets to collect data if they have internet connectivity.

The mobile webform page has more information http://www.itreetools.org/mobile/index.php
Last edited by azelaya on Wed Nov 28, 2012 10:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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athompson
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Joined: Fri Oct 19, 2012 4:00 pm

Post by athompson » Fri Oct 19, 2012 4:50 pm

Azavea is running our own open source project for public, wiki-style urban tree inventories, based on i-Tree, called OpenTreeMap (http://www.azavea.com/opentreemap/). We've recently launched iPhone apps in Philadelphia and San Francisco, the code for those is also open source. Azavea is working on releasing an Android app soon.

PhillyTreeMap iOS: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/phillyt ... 81447?mt=8
UrbanForestMap (San Fran) iOS: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/urbanfo ... 56669?mt=8

OpenTreeMap server code: https://github.com/azavea/OpenTreeMap
iOS app code and skin: https://github.com/azavea/OpenTreeMap-iOS , and https://github.com/azavea/OpenTreeMap-iOS-skin
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