Palm Pre Offline Gps Maps Working Perfectly !

[ami1 237]

Offline GPS maps in Palm Pre is working perfectly through the following process:- No more missing calls if using GPS w/ Google Maps !

Download MapTool (available free in the app catalog) or download ipk from precentral or attached here: de.metaviewsoft.maptool_1.0.1_all.zip

Download Mobile Atlas Creator from this site: mobile atlas creator, or attached here: Mobile Atlas Creator 1.7.zip

Install Maptool (MT) IPK on Pre. Then Unzip the Mobile Atlas Creator (MAC) on your PC in any folder and run the exe (or jar if in linux)

Move around to the city you want the maps for (use cursor keys to move around; click on the map once if cursor keys are doing zoom in/out instead of panning)

Mark a rectangular area for the whole city after zooming to appropriate level (11 works for me).

Click on left panel to 'select entered coords' for the area marked.

Select 'Google Maps' as the source

Select appropriate zoom levels which you want to use (16 works best for me, so i usually select 15,16,17 - initially just select 16 to try out as higher numbers have zillions of map tile files. After selecting these levels it'll show you the no of tiles to download.

Give some name if you want in 'Atlas Content' section and click 'add selection'

Select 'OSMTracker Tile Storage' as the output format

Give a output folder by clicking on 'settings' and going to the 2nd last tab. Then you can give proxy etc if required. Pl note that the default no of threads is set to 4 and some ISPs restrict the no of requests/sec so you may need to reduce it if you get failures or a message in your browser (while MAC is downloading tiles) that no of requests per second exceeded.

Now click Create Atlas and it'll download the map tiles. If MAC gives a dialog box that downloading of some tiles failed you can click retry a few times (you've click pause/resume after retry as it remains in paused mode after clicking retry) or click ignore/continue or just tick the 'ignore all errors box'

Once done, open the output folder & browse inside 2-3 levels till you find the folder Google Maps. Copy this folder to the Pre USB Drive / (root - top level) as .MapTool

This folder will have subfolders like 15, 16,17 etc. Download other cities you want and copy them also over the same folders.

Run the MT on your PRE and go into preferences and select 'offline' as the renderer.

You will now be able to see you GPS location on the Map w/o turning on the data (provided you are in the same city for which you downloaded the maps !).GPS will take a minute to get first fix. MT will also show the GPS error (for eg if you are inside a building with bad GPS signal reception) and elevation etc.

Here's a screenshot of maptool on pre and mobile atlas creator on windows:

I've got Mumbai & Delhi (NCR) downloaded and can upload the zip files somewhere if someone has problems and needs them.

[ami1 237]

Sharing MMR (mumbai) & NCR (delhi) downloaded maps (googlemaps) in case someone wants (around 100 MB - zoom levels 11 to 17)

link

Edited June 7, 2010 by ami1

[parin 857]

Hope this will work on PIXI too

DOwnloading maps Takes lot of time

Even with high Speed connection it is downloading at 4.9 to 9kpbs dont know why

[ami1 237]

^^ Works on pixie too. Read the linked forum posts for any problems.

Surprisingly, Maps download (in Mobile Atlas Creator) is quite fast for me - in fact i had to restrict the no of threads to 1 as i was getting messages that my office proxy's per user limit for number of requests/second is being exceeded.

Which city do you want ? I'll see if i can download and upload it to 4shared etc.

Alternatively just download a low zoom level like 14 or so and try it first and then download the higher zoom levels

[mihirf2003 7]

good work mate...getting a pre soon... so this would help....

[ami1 237]

Some Info on saving space while using downloaded maps:

Although the downloaded maps size is only around 50 MB per city, the number of files is huge (around 25,000 +) so on FAT32 systems - like the PRE's USB driver (/media/internal) - the overhead of files is very large and 100 MB on NTFS or EXT3 becomes 700 MB.

While this doesn't create any problems, if you want more free space on the PRE then do the following :

(needs some linux commandline/shell awareness)

Essentially, just create an ext3 filesystem on a file of around 100-200 MB and copy the files inside it. Then loop mount it on the pre on the .MapTool folder, as below:

Create an ext3 filesystem on a file:

cd /media/internal

dd if=/dev/zero of=maptool.img bs=1024 count=X

(where X =200000 for approx 200 MB or 100000 for approx 100 MB etc.)

mkfs.ext3 -F maptool.img

Loop Mount it:

mkdir .MapTool

(if it doesn't already exist. If it does, then either delete everything inside or mv .MapTool .MapTool2)

mount -o loop maptool.img .MapTool

Now copy all map folders like 12,13---17 etc inside the .MapTool folder.

Check that offline gps maps are working.

To automate the loop mounting after every reboot you can add the following line to /etc/fstab:

/media/internal/maptool.img /media/internal/.MapTool ext3 loop,noatime 1 2

Either by following command:

echo /media/internal/maptool.img /media/internal/.MapTool ext3 loop,noatime 1 2 >> /etc/fstab

(DO NOT PUT one > instead of two >> else your /etc/fstab will be overwritten with this single line.)

Alternatively, use vi to edit or copy to your windows machine and use wordpad or write to add the line at the end

If your / is not mounted writeable then do the following first before editing /etc/fstab:

mount -o remount,rw /

Then you can delete the .MapTool2 folder if you have it. Now maps will only take up 100-200 MB as they are inside an ext3 filesystem on a file.

I tried if pre could loop mount an iso, but it doesn't. Otherwise one could create the filesystem in windows also using poweriso etc.

[vikram_101 0]

Hi

Can somebody upload maps for Pune city.

I tried the same and put them inside .MapTool directoy, but I am not able to see anything.

I always get "No Location Fix" in the MapTool

Steps :

1. Dowloaded all the maps from Atlas Creator

2. Created a directory through DOS prompt in USB mode on Palm Pre

3. Copied all the files into .MapTool

Is there any difference apart from the file sizes if I create .MapTool through the DOS prompt ?

Also, can you post a link for the app which can give me the linux prompt on Pre ? As then I can create the file system and reduce the size

But first I need the maps to Run on my Phone

[ami1 237]

^^

Check that your 'location services' (ie GPS) on the pre is set to ON ?

Are you able to get GPS location when you run the Google Maps application on Palm Pre ?

Have you selected the 'renderer' as 'offline' in preferences in MapTool application ?

It doesn't matter whether you use windows/dos/linux to create and copy the maps. Just remember that the name of the folder has to be .MapTool and it should have subfolders like 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 etc

Also did you download maps in the correct format i.e. OSM as mentioned earlier.

Will upload pune maps for you later tonight.

[vikram_101 0]

^^

Check that your 'location services' (ie GPS) on the pre is set to ON ?

Are you able to get GPS location when you run the Google Maps application on Palm Pre ?

Have you selected the 'renderer' as 'offline' in preferences in MapTool application ?

It doesn't matter whether you use windows/dos/linux to create and copy the maps. Just remember that the name of the folder has to be .MapTool and it should have subfolders like 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 etc

Also did you download maps in the correct format i.e. OSM as mentioned earlier.

Will upload pune maps for you later tonight.

Yes my GPS is ON and I am abl to get my location on the Google Maps.

Also I have followed all the steps as written in the above description

Can you please post the Pune maps ? i would be able to check whether something was wrong with the way I have saved the maps

[vikram_101 0]

.... and forgot to thank you for all the support :)

[ami1 237]

Sorry, forgot to upload Pune maps. Have started downloading them now. Give me an hour and i'll upload them and post link here.

EDIT:

Ok, here's the link (http://www.4shared.com/file/EbT1yBBX/MapTool.html)

unzip the .MapTool.zip file (it will have folders called: 11,12,13,14,15,16)

Connect you pre in USB Drive mode and make a folder called .MapTool and put the above folders inside it.

Edited June 20, 2010 by ami1

[vikram_101 0]

Thanks a lot Amitabh.

I have got the maps. But I have a new problem

Before putting the maps I thought I would follow the steps which you had mentioned to save space and to mount .MapTool on ext3 filesystem:

cd /media/internal

dd if=/dev/zero of=maptool.img bs=1024 count=200000

mkfs.ext3 -F maptool.img

mkdir .MapTool

mount -o remount,rw /

echo /media/internal/maptool.img /media/internal/.MapTool ext3 loop,noatime 1 2 >> /etc/fstab

But After these steps I put my phone in the USB mode, so it enters the USB mode and then it comes back to charginf automatically in 5 seconds.

So I am not able to access the phone in USB mode

Can you help me in this as I could not find anyone with this problem. Is it because of the above steps or because I have pulled out the cable without proper eject.

I tried to access the USB mode on another computer as well but with no luck. Can you please tell me what I have done wrong and how to correct it ?

Thanks a lot in advance.

Vikram

[vikram_101 0]

So not I tried to delete everything.

I was able to delete the maptool.img

but when I am trying to delete the empty .MapTool directory I get : Device or Resource busy.

Can you suggest something ?

also how do i remove the entry from /etc/fstab as i know vi commands but its not possible in pre

[ami1 237]

Just checked on my Pre and yes loop mounting does seem to disable the USB drive mode as pre needs to unmount some filesystems before allowing usb drive.

Am trying to put in a command to unmount it in the script that pre runs before it goes into usb drive mode but let me doublecheck first. Use the normal folder method till then.

TO REMOVE the .MapTool FOLDER:

Before you can remove the folder you need to unmount it: umount /media/internal/.MapTool

If it doesn't unmount then do: umount -f /media/internal.Maptool

If it still doesn't unmount then reboot the PRE and since the img file is deleted it won't mount anything on .MapTool (i did this and there's no problem in booting etc and folder is free to delete)

TO REVERT BACK TO ORIG FSTAB:

use cat & grep & > to create a new file without the .MapTool line, as given below:

first check fstab contents: cat /etc/fstab

then use inverse grep to remove .MapTool line and check the output: cat /etc/fstab | grep -v .MapTool

If its ok then: cat /etc/fstab |grep -v .MapTool >/etc/fstab

Keep a backup of fstab just in case you misstype something above.

OR

Copy the /etc/fstab file to your PC: cp /etc/fstab /media/internal

then in usb drive mode copy to PC

then edit it in Write or Wordpad (notepad will not show newlines)

Copy it back to usb drive & then copy to etc: cp /media/internal/fstab /etc/

Its best to first get the MapTool running before trying out advanced things. Tell me if the maps i uploaded are working for you & i'll upload a higher zoom level.

[vikram_101 0]

Thanks a lot Amitabh.

The maps are working fine and I have also reverted the fstab.

It would be great if you could give me a more detailed zoom level maps as well. Thanks a ton for all your help

Vikram

[vikram_101 0]

Hello Amitabh,

Was wondering if you have had the time to download Pune maps with a greater zoom level

Thanks in advance

[vikram_101 0]

Hello Amitabh,

It would be great if you could give me higher detailed Pune Maps

Sorry for troubling you all the time

[ami1 237]

^^

EDIT:

here it is (pune 17)

[vikram_101 0]

Thank you so much :)

[Jason174 0]

Can someone provide a map of New York city? please

[ami1 237]

Can someone provide a map of New York city? please

here : Levels 8-15. (around 115mb zipped)

Level 16 is 200 MB ! so 4shared didn't allow upload. Size seems too large, maybe I am selecting too large an area - have no idea of actual NY city limits, so...

Edited July 5, 2010 by ami1

[::Hitesh:: 1,763]

^^^

My net is little slow from few days,  so can u make and upload All india map ?

[nrupesh1 0]

Hi Amitabh... I have followed the instructions given by you.....unfortunately my google maps app shows location not found......and MapTool is always blank....Will highly appreciate if you could help me out here....thanks a ton in advance.

PS. I live in hyd....AT&T palm pre plus unlocked

[ami1 237]

^^^

My net is little slow from few days, so can u make and upload All india map ?

Will do that, but the zoom levels will have to be low since with high zoom levels each city is over 200mb. So all india would be many GBs. Will try if i can get upto 14 zoom level.

Maybe it'll be better if you get some selected cities with 17-18 zoom levels.

[ami1 237]

Hi Amitabh... I have followed the instructions given by you.....unfortunately my google maps app shows location not found......and MapTool is always blank....Will highly appreciate if you could help me out here....thanks a ton in advance.

PS. I live in hyd....AT&T palm pre plus unlocked

Is your GPS working ? Check in location services and switch it on.

Then have you selected offline as map renderer in MapTool

After switching on your data see if google maps works (it takes a few tries before it'll work due to slow data speeds etc) If google maps is showing location that means gps is working so we can then troubleshoot the maptool thing.

Also ensure that you have hyderabad maps downloaded since maptool will locate you there and if hyderabad maps are not present in the required folder (as per instructions) then it'll show white screen.