Bug fixes

There’s a new version of the site up today – a few minor bug-fixes, a couple of new features, and hopefully a speed improvement when searching for trains at a location.

The iPhone bug – where it was impossible to switch to Detailed mode on an iOS device – should now be fixed. If you’re still having problems switching to detailed mode and you’re on an iPhone, please drop me a mail.

Today's website slowdown

I’m sorry for the poor performance of the website today – from about 7am to mid-afternoon, the site was really slow to load.

The problem has been fixed now. The root cause was really slow disk throughput on the database server. The hosting provider knows why and has taken steps to stop it happening again in future.

More real-time maps

I’ve been wrestling with map data this evening – it’s incredibly exciting to be able to grab data from completely different sources and plot it on a map.

Here’s what I’m up to at the moment – 1F69 is the 1930 service from London St Pancras to Derby, shown here just outside Leicester:

Real-time map

It’s going to be a few more weeks before I release this on to the site, but I wanted to give you all a taster of some of the things I’m planning. I might even colour the ‘blob’ in a different colour according to whether the train’s on time or not…

Real-time maps

One of the things I’ve been working quite hard on over the past week is representing the position of a train on a map, and I’ve finally had success.

I have several ideas up my sleeve, but I’ve started with the simplest – replicating the signalling system and overlaying train identities on parts of the track. And here’s the result – click the image for a larger version:

This is still very much in-development, inefficient and not scalable – all the best ideas start off like that!

And in answer to the question on everybody’s lips – “when?” – well, just as soon as Network Rail finish off their Open Data platform and I can move this in to Open Train Times properly!

As always, do email me – peter.hicks@poggs.co.uk – with all your comments. They brighten up an otherwise unexciting journey on an 450HC 🙂