Save Total Mileage? for business use

mellojoe · 05-10-06, 08:35 PM

I'm looking into getting a GPS for my Axim x50 (2003 second edition).

I'm curious, though, if these have the features in which they save your total mileage which you can download at a later time. As I will be using this for business purposes, it would be a huge benefit every year at tax time. I can just download my trips (or atleast the mileage) and use this for record keeping (for audit prevention) and to calculate total mileage to deduct each year.

And, if so, what kind of storage solutions am I looking at needing. I have a 128 internal memory plus a 128MB SD card that is dedicated for the PDA. I also have a 1GB, but that is for my digital camera and I don't really want to switch unless I have to.

Thanks for the help!

(And, no. I don't yet know which software I'm going with. I've decided on Bluetooth receiver of the latest generation, but not sure on software yet.)

Pocketbrain · 05-10-06, 08:42 PM

I have Mapopolis, and it keeps track of total Miles in a trip. I need 72.6 MB to store the maps for the state of Florida.

(X)

mellojoe · 05-10-06, 08:57 PM

Oooh. Quick clarification:

I'm looking to see if it saves total mileage for ALL trips, not just the current one.

If I visit 10 retaillers in one week, will I be able to download the total mileage for the whole week to my PC?

If I spend 200 days out of a year travelling, will I be able to retrieve a total mileage calcualtion for all 200 trips?

Bill_Todd · 05-10-06, 09:18 PM

That would be a useful utility.

Perhaps you should ask in the developement forum, someone might take up the challenge

WM5 is supposed to be able to share GPS data, so it should be possible to get it to work with other GPS Mapping app's. If I were fluent in any PPC programming language, I'm have a go myself.

{edit} Sorry just spotted that you have 2003, but it still might be possible to share GPS data.

RobMan · 05-10-06, 10:01 PM

OCN keeps a running log in an excel file. You can sum the column at the end of the week and then start a new log for the next week.

clienterror · 05-11-06, 01:40 AM

If you had to you could make a spread sheet or just write each down in Pocket Word after you reach every destination. I know it isnt what your looking for but its a start.

JakeRich · 05-11-06, 09:01 AM

Mapopolis will keep a leg-by-leg log for you. A "leg" is defined as a moving stretch, so if you stop in a location for more than about 10 minutes it starts a new "leg" of the journey. It also starts/stops legs when you open and close Mapopolis. You can download the log to a text file in either second-by-second fixes or in a leg-by-leg file. I used it for exactly what you are asking about myself when I was a road warrior.

EDIT: Here is an image of Mapopolis showing what it reports. As I said, you can export this to a text file.

Bill_Todd · 05-11-06, 10:17 AM

Hmm! Having a Max Speed figure might cause some embarrassment :)

mellojoe · 05-11-06, 03:15 PM

Originally Posted by JakeRich

Mapopolis will keep a leg-by-leg log for you. A "leg" is defined as a moving stretch, so if you stop in a location for more than about 10 minutes it starts a new "leg" of the journey. It also starts/stops legs when you open and close Mapopolis. You can download the log to a text file in either second-by-second fixes or in a leg-by-leg file. I used it for exactly what you are asking about myself when I was a road warrior.

EDIT: Here is an image of Mapopolis showing what it reports. As I said, you can export this to a text file.

Excellent!

This is exactly what I was looking for. How much storage does this require? I can zap it over to my laptop each morning (of the previous day's journey) to free up room on the PDA, but I'd need it to be able to hold a maximum of 7 legs per day or up to a maximum of 30 per week.

Do you think I'd need to look at large SD cards? I have a 128MB SD card, but I can get a 1GB card for fairly cheap, I know.

JakeRich · 05-11-06, 10:33 PM

The log file is configurable. I have mine set for 256K. The log is binary, so it packs a lot of data in a small space. The text export gets bigger. My largest, at over 30,000 points, was a couple of meg. 30,000 points is about 8.3 hours of fixes at one per second. So if you are actually moving less than that, you can easily keep a day's worth. I think the new beta is now, or will soon, remove the current 256k limit on the log and make it whatever you want. They have an active forum at www.gpspassion.com. As for cards, Mapopolis itself takes about 17 meg of storage. Maps are very small, because Mapolis goes county by county. You pick the counties you want to keep in the Axim. If you do most of your driving in a small area, the 128M card should do nicely.