Talkin’ TeeShot

TeeShotLive.com was unavailable from yesterday afternoon until a few minutes ago. Apparently, our hosting facility moved to a new data center so it took a little time to get it all set up again. Everything should be fine now!

-Chris

While TeeShot has supported GPS distance tracking since version 1.5, there have always been a few things that made it tough to use and even when you did use the GPS to track your shots, users often wondered where the extra goodness was that GPS should offer.  TeeShot 2.0 has several enhancements to make it easier and faster to use the GPS features on the iPhone 3G as well as a couple of new views that make it much more useful (and fun!) to track your shot locations.

First, the speed issue.  While it still takes a while for the iPhone to figure out your location when you turn on the GPS tracker,  it is much better at getting an accurate reading if you keep the GPS on for a longer period of time.  TeeShot 2.0 now has the ability to turn on the GPS tracking and to keep it on as you move about the application.  You can enable or disable GPS tracking on the home page as well as any page that lets you use a GPS location, such as the hole and group scoring page (for seeing your distance to the green) or the shot scoring page.  Just tap the target button on the left side to toggle the GPS tracking on or off.

The button to enable or disable GPS in TeeShot 2.0

The best time to do this is at the start of a hole when you want to set the tee box’s location.  You can turn GPS on at and then let it get an accurate location and save that location.  Before TeeShot 2.0, TeeShot would turn off the GPS as soon as you saved the location, but in 2.0 it stays on so you can hit your shot and start walking towards your ball.  When you get to the ball, TeeShot has been tracking you as you were walking so it already has a much better idea of where you are and you can see that as the distance to the green has been going down and the distance from your last shot is going up.

The Shot Scoring screen in TeeShot 2.0 featuring updated GPS shot distance tracking. In this case, GPS is not currently tracking your location but you can see where you are relative to the tee, green and your last shot.

So now TeeShot is much easier to use for tracking your shot locations with GPS on an iPhone 3G.  But what else can you do now that you have set these locations?  Well, now you can tap the Display shot map option on the hole scoring page to see a map of exactly where each shot went from the tee to the green, overlayed on a Google Map of your course, all right within TeeShot.

The TeeShot 2.0 shot map shows you the location of each shot on a hole, right from the tee to the green.

Similarly, you can see the hole location and an overview of this hole by tapping the distance to green button on the group or hole scoring page.

So what about the folks who don’t have GPS and yet want easier measuring of shot distance?  TeeShot 2.0 has something for you too.  Just change the new Shot Distance Calculation setting from “GPS” to “markers” and you can enter the distance remaining to the green at the start of each shot and TeeShot will calculate the distance of your last shot.  You can figure this out by looking at nearby yardage markers and then entering it in the new Shot Measurement feature on the shot by shot page which takes the place of the GPS features when you change this setting.

Tap the distance to green button to enter your remaining distance to the green before this shot and TeeShot 2.0 will calculate how long your previous shot was. This is great for anyone who can't or doesn't want to use GPS to mark each shot location.

So there you have it.  A few more updates to make it much easier and more satisfying to track your shots in TeeShot 2.0.

But hmmm… someone who is looking closely at the screenshots above may notice something different in the shot tracking page.  The next button is sometimes an arrow and sometimes a plus.  What could that mean?  It means that the previews are not yet done and there are still more interesting things to post about TeeShot 2.0.  I’ll try to get the next post out quicker than I got this one out.

In the meantime, I’ll see you on the first tee!

-Chris

Hi Everyone,

Shortly after TeeShot 1.7.3 hit the store, I got a few reports that people’s handicaps were not showing up even though they had enough rounds.  Sure enough, when I added the ability to specify the type of round you played, I forgot to load it correctly for the calculations so no rounds would be included.  Oops!

TeeShot 1.7.4 fixes that issue and has been uploaded and released by Apple (first time!) so that issue should be fixed once you download this fix.

As always, you should back up your data to the TeeShotLive before installing the patch because there is a small chance it could get lost during the upgrade.  Better to be safe than sorry!

-Chris

I just got the notification from Apple that they have approved and released version 1.7.2.  Now, only seven weeks after it was originally uploaded, TeeShot 1.7.2 will soon be available for you to download.  

Hoping to make any change that would push this through, I changed the version number in the application to 1.7.3, so if you check the version in the about page, it will say 1.7.3 and that is correct.  

And now, for those of us in the US, it is football time!

-Chris

I want to take this opportunity to wish you all the happiest of holidays and a safe and prosperous new year.  It has been a ton of fun getting to know the TeeShot users and I hope you enjoy what we have scheduled for the coming months.

Hit ‘em straight and I’ll see you on the first tee!

-Chris

TeeShot version 1.7.2 has been uploaded to the iTunes application store and should be available within the next week.  Here’s what’s new:

• Fixed a couple of bugs with iPhone OS 2.2 including a drawing issues in the scorecard and making tapping fairway, up & down and sand save work in group scoring again
• Fixed a calculation in scorecard that would make your net score off by one.
• Added scrambling percentage to both round and global statistics
• Added a round type so you can say if the round is a standard round, tournament, scramble,  practice, off season.  Only tournament and standard rounds are used in handicap calculation and the default is standard.  You can change this in the Round Details page for existing rounds
• Added the ability to lock a round to prevent accidental editing while you’re looking at previous rounds.  Locking is available in the Round Details page as well.
• When going to the Round Scoring page, it will automatically scroll to the first un-scored hole
• Changed the keyboard in the group scoring page to be the number keypad.  The top right corner button is now Done when the keypad is available
• Rounds now support up to 5 players.  Warning – fivesomes can slow play time and annoy the group behind you

After this release (assuming no big issues show up) I am going to start working on TeeShot 2.0 which should have a bit of a new look and a bunch of stuff that people have been asking for and I expect it to be ready in time for the spring season.  

Stay tuned and I’ll see ya on the first tee!

-Chris