The Windows Phone 8 update is finally here! Thanks to the new OS capabilities you can now use other applications while Marathon continues to record your data in the background.
This version also adds a few other features that’s been made possible thanks to WP8:
- The new Nokia Maps, including a 3D mode.
- A new wide Live Tile with information about your latest result.
- The ability to open GPX files and save them on the device or share to marathon-mobile.net, Twitter and Facebook.
- The first and currently only app on the Store that can open KML files and view the route on a map.
Got a Windows Phone 7 device? Don’t worry; the app is still available and packed with features. You can read more about them
here.
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Premium with trial ($1.99):
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Free:
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I've been working on an update for Marathon to add many of the new features of Windows Phone 8, such as background execution, the new Nokia Maps and a large Live Tile. Thanks to the new maps there’s also a 3D mode showing your current location:
If you'd like to try out the new features, simply drop me a message containing your Windows Live ID and I'll add you as a beta tester.
The full version is available from the Store, see links in the next post.
Now that Microsoft is shutting down the Marketplace for Windows Mobile, I've decided to release the full version of Marathon for free. You can grab it from here:
Marathon 1.4.0.3 Full (WM 6.X)
Marathon for Windows Phone 7.x is still available in a free and a premium version, and will continue to be so. If you haven't tried it out yet you can grab it here.
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The latest version of Marathon contains a new Live Tile where you can see your achievements, total distance and your latest result directly on the home screen of your device. There’s also a new voice announcement telling you how many minutes and seconds the last kilometer or mile took. Here's the full list of changes:
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- A Live Tile containing achievements, total distance and latest result.
- A new pace announcement for the last km or mile.
- A percentage modifier for when your goal is based on track average or a previous result.
- Pace is written as 5:10 for "5 minutes and 10 seconds" rather than 5.16 (5 minutes and 16/100 minutes).
- Any link from the app to www.marathon-mobile.net will include your credentials (so you’ll be logged in automatically).
- Updated a few announcement translations.
- Changed so the system tray (the signal/battery/time bar at the top) is visible.
- Changed the buttons for "Start" and "Resume" to make them more intuitive.
- A few minor bug fixes.
- Performance optimization (increased battery life).
Premium with trial ($1.49):
Free:
I've added a new feature to the Marathon web site, namely the ability to manually enter results. From now on you can add your treadmill results to Marathon and keep all your statistics in the same place. All you have to do is logging on to the webpage and select "Personal -> Manually add result".
As of today a total of 366 372km has been recorded and uploaded to the Marathon website. Quite a large number, isn't it? To put it into context I've calculated the progress in percentage of the average distance between the earth and the moon. You can see it here.
Uploading data to the webpage is optional, about 17% of the users who have downloaded the Windows Phone 7 app have also registered and uploaded at least 1 result. The most active users are more likely to register and utilize the webpage, but I think it's safe to say that we would be back on earth by now if we count every recording ever made.
Recordings by platform
The Windows Mobile app still beats Windows Phone 7 in number of recordings with a total of 64%. If we only count results from 2011 Windows Phone is ahead by a total of 59%. We can also see that Mango is spreading quickly, over the past month 68% of Windows Phone 7 results were recorded using Marathon 3.0 (which requires Mango).
A positive trend
The number of Marathon users is continuing to grow; as are the amount of data uploaded to the website. Our speed is currently at about 20 000 km/month, but I suspect it'll slow down a bit during the winter in the northern hemisphere. Mars is at its closest point about 55 million km away from earth, so for our next mission we need all the help we can get :).
It’s now been one year since Marathon was made available in the Windows Phone 7 Marketplace; and over two years since the first public release on Windows Mobile! As of today you can also grab the Mango update and enjoy an even smoother user experience with fast app switching and 32bit colors. A lot of features have been added, bugs fixed and performance tuned over the past year. Here are some of the most significant additions:
- Live Tracking - Let your friends follow your progress online in (almost) real time.
- Achievements – A little reward for your hard work.
- Bing Maps – See how you’ve been running on an interactive map.
- Statistics on a km (or mile) basis.
- Backup and restore data using http://www.marathon-mobile.net.
- Voice announcements in all supported languages.
- Automatically pause a recording when you’re standing still.
- A lot of other minor features and tweaks.
The website hosting Marathon has also been updated with a new design and had a few features added. Together the users of Marathon have uploaded more than 29 000 results with a total of over 340 000 km, or 8.7 laps around the world!
So if you still haven’t tried Marathon, now is the time. It’s available in both a free and a full version with trial, so there’s no excuse not to try it out :).
Premium with trial ($1.49):
Free: