Monday, October 4, 2010

Bookmarking APRS views!

I've just upgraded aprs.fi with a generic view bookmark feature. It allows you to save a real-time map view, together with all of it's settings (tracked callsigns, map type, time range, map center, zoom level...) to a named bookmark, and then recall that same view using the bookmarks (star) button. You can even save a bookmark when tracking multiple stations, or when the "show all" mode is activated while tracking.

Bookmarks are stored together with your aprs.fi user account, so you need to be a registered user and logged in to use this feature. The upside of this is that the bookmarks are shared across all the web browsers and computers you use, as long as you are logged in using the same user account.

The feature is especially handy on mobile devices such as the iPhone and the Androids, because it can be a little tricky to navigate to a specific location or enter a bunch of callsigns on the road.

As a little additional fix, most views now have the primary search input field in focus when the page is opened, so that the searched callsign can be entered without first selecting the input field using the mouse.

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