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Having read this thread I couldn't resist quoting the following from the Aberdeen MRC website:   :nono:  :nono:  :nono:

 

"So why iOS and not Android? If you know me, you may be forgiven for thinking its because I hate the fact Android was stolen from Apple while there was a Google Exec on the Apple board. However, much as the previous statement is true, it is not the case. The simple reason is that Android, being an 'open' platform, is very fragmented. What this means is that each licensee of Android (phone manufacturer) can make their own little tweaks to the software. Also hardware is never the same even within the same manufacturer. This makes App development difficult, and for a niche so small as ours, it become hardly worth writing an App for Android. That is not to say there is not an Apps - there may well be, however it adds complications into the mix for end users which is why I suggest to stay clear of Android to control your layout. The last thing we want in our hobby is more frustration! With iOS your App is virtually guaranteed to work out the box, first time, every time."

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I weakened today, bad back (genuine!) overcome to get into the loft. IPhones 4S, 6 and wife's new SE (a bargain phone, 6s with 5 size body) all worked great. Couldn't stand long enough to do much testing but all seems well, back doesn't agree....

 

Syd

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Having read this thread I couldn't resist quoting the following from the Aberdeen MRC website: :nono: :nono: :nono:

 

"So why iOS and not Android? If you know me, you may be forgiven for thinking its because I hate the fact Android was stolen from Apple while there was a Google Exec on the Apple board. However, much as the previous statement is true, it is not the case. The simple reason is that Android, being an 'open' platform, is very fragmented. What this means is that each licensee of Android (phone manufacturer) can make their own little tweaks to the software. Also hardware is never the same even within the same manufacturer. This makes App development difficult, and for a niche so small as ours, it become hardly worth writing an App for Android. That is not to say there is not an Apps - there may well be, however it adds complications into the mix for end users which is why I suggest to stay clear of Android to control your layout. The last thing we want in our hobby is more frustration! With iOS your App is virtually guaranteed to work out the box, first time, every time."

Hehe I wrote this article a long time ago.

 

To be fair, it is all true. But it is also a piece written for the club website. AMRC has nothing to do with TouchCab other than they use it.

 

Android is being looked at, but all those points still stand, even more so today, so we need to weigh up the time versus the return. TouchCab is so simple to use because it’s so complex behind the user interface!

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Hehe I wrote this article a long time ago.

 

To be fair, it is all true. But it is also a piece written for the club website.

 

I could write something highly critical of Apple iOS devices.  But that just descends to the playground arguments of "your dad's car isn't as good as my dad's car".

The reality is that both the main smartphone/tablet platforms (Apple and Android) have issues, particularly for railway modellers who often work on decade+ long timeframes when the smartphone device makers are working on a handful of years for the device to be obsolete-scrap.

 

ESU's own wireless MC2 throttle runs Android.   There are folks who successfully produce throttle Apps for Android. Some work via an intermediate computer (which could be a cheap tiny Raspberry Pi), but some can go direct without computer, including Apps advertised for the ECoS.

 

 

 

 

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I could write something highly critical of Apple iOS devices.  But that just descends to the playground arguments of "your dad's car isn't as good as my dad's car".

The reality is that both the main smartphone/tablet platforms (Apple and Android) have issues, particularly for railway modellers who often work on decade+ long timeframes when the smartphone device makers are working on a handful of years for the device to be obsolete-scrap.

 

ESU's own wireless MC2 throttle runs Android.   There are folks who successfully produce throttle Apps for Android. Some work via an intermediate computer (which could be a cheap tiny Raspberry Pi), but some can go direct without computer, including Apps advertised for the ECoS.

 

 

 

 

 

Let's not get into an argument here, but iOS is simply better to develop for. There is just no argument to that. I do this as a hobby. So to spend the time to develop for thousands of different makes and models, and even the same models but with different chips inside, is going to take time away from my family. I'm not saying that I'm not going to do it...

 

ESU do indeed have an android app, but they also have a team of employees who do that for a living! It's not really a comparison :P

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The reality is that both the main smartphone/tablet platforms (Apple and Android) have issues, particularly for railway modellers who often work on decade+ long timeframes when the smartphone device makers are working on a handful of years for the device to be obsolete-scrap.

 

Hi

 

Couldn't agree more.

 

I bought an iPod Touch purely to control my layout using TouchCab around five or six years ago. This iPod will only support IOS 6 so this means I can no longer upgrade TouchCab to the latest version. Buying a new iPod wouldn't be cost effective so I am stuck with the older version.

 

Hopefully I will still be able to use this old version until the iPod no longer works.

 

Cheers

 

Paul

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Hi

 

Couldn't agree more.

 

I bought an iPod Touch purely to control my layout using TouchCab around five or six years ago. This iPod will only support IOS 6 so this means I can no longer upgrade TouchCab to the latest version. Buying a new iPod wouldn't be cost effective so I am stuck with the older version.

 

Hopefully I will still be able to use this old version until the iPod no longer works.

 

Cheers

 

Paul

 

5th Gen iPods (2014 model year) can be purchased 2nd hand from £45. A DCC throttle is considerably more than this!

 

On the other hand, if your iPod still works, then you have no need to upgrade. TouchCab 1.8.3 won't just stop working because the new version is launched :D. You may not get some new features as we add them to TouchCab, but would you get new features from an old dcc throttle? Or would an android phone get any better updates?

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Let's not get into an argument here, but iOS is simply better to develop for. There is just no argument to that. I do this as a hobby. So to spend the time to develop for thousands of different makes and models, and even the same models but with different chips inside, is going to take time away from my family. I'm not saying that I'm not going to do it...

 

ESU do indeed have an android app, but they also have a team of employees who do that for a living! It's not really a comparison :P

The half-dozen developers whom I know from many years in the industry would totally agree about the issues of developing for Android. It's a load of hurt and is why they have to a man given up on Android and now do only iOS Apps. It is not a question of "my toy is better than yours", but as Mike rightly says, the issues of developing for a platform that has developed many different nuances and complications.

 

Yes, ESU do have an App running on Android, but on their choice of hardware in a closed situation, so they have control of both hardware and software, just like iOS in effect, which makes the job of developing their App a little easier.

 

John

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5th Gen iPods (2014 model year) can be purchased 2nd hand from £45. A DCC throttle is considerably more than this!

 

On the other hand, if your iPod still works, then you have no need to upgrade. TouchCab 1.8.3 won't just stop working because the new version is launched :D. You may not get some new features as we add them to TouchCab, but would you get new features from an old dcc throttle? Or would an android phone get any better updates?

Hi

 

Yes I could buy a model that is currently three years old but how long before Apple drop support for that one?

 

Thanks for the clarification that the old version will still continue working and my post was not meant to be a criticism of you so apologies if you thought it was.

 

Cheers

 

Paul

Edited by PaulCheffus
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Hi

 

Yes I could buy a model that is currently three years old but how long before Apple drop support for that one?

 

Thanks for the clarification that the old version will still continue working and my post was not meant to be a criticism of you so apologies if you thought it was.

 

Cheers

 

Paul

 

No need to apologise :D I didn't take it as a criticism...

 

Reading my post back, I may have come across in the wrong way - sorry. 

 

It was meant to be informative. Just for info, the 2014 iPod was only updated in 2017 to the 6th gen as far as I remember, so it should be good for a few years yet :D

 

Thanks

Mike

Edited by AberdeenMRC - Mike
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  • 2 weeks later...

 

IT IS HERE!

 

After a year and a half of work in the background, we have now launched TouchCab V1.8.4 to the App Store! :)

 

While it may seem like not a lot has changed, we've been working on things in the background, and are already testing V1.8.5 with Beta Testers, and even later versions privately!

 

So, what's new in 1.8.4?

 

  • Updated UI to be more inline with the current iOS versions
  • Built for iOS 8 and above, on 32 and 64 Bit devices
  • Adapts to all iPhone/iPod screen sizes automagically
  • ECoS is now discovered AutoMagically

 

What's Next?

  • 1.8.5 is already being tested with additional Language support
  • 1.8.6 is being tested internally with some nice new additions  :sungum: 
  • 1.9.0 is in development with new features planned
  • 2.0.0 is, erm, shhh - it's a secret  :onthequiet:

 

Hi Mike

 

Just a request for a bit of clarity about your announcement. I have an iPad2 iOS 9.3.5 and with the imminent demise of 32 bit apps I bought TouchCab, the version that downloaded was 1.8.4 which is both 32 bit and 64 bit compatible. Will the subsequent versions in the pipeline be equally compatible or will they be purely 64 bit versions? If 1.8.4 is the last version to support 32 bit hardware will it still be available from the app store? Currently when I go to my purchased apps TouchCab does not appear in the list.

 

The reason I ask is that my iPad seems to have a few gremlins occasionally and I feel it would benefit from a factory reset and rather than restore everything from a back up I would like to do a clean reinstall of apps just in case using a backup reintroduces some of the gremlins back.

 

Richard

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Hi Mike

 

Just a request for a bit of clarity about your announcement. I have an iPad2 iOS 9.3.5 and with the imminent demise of 32 bit apps I bought TouchCab, the version that downloaded was 1.8.4 which is both 32 bit and 64 bit compatible. Will the subsequent versions in the pipeline be equally compatible or will they be purely 64 bit versions? If 1.8.4 is the last version to support 32 bit hardware will it still be available from the app store? Currently when I go to my purchased apps TouchCab does not appear in the list.

 

The reason I ask is that my iPad seems to have a few gremlins occasionally and I feel it would benefit from a factory reset and rather than restore everything from a back up I would like to do a clean reinstall of apps just in case using a backup reintroduces some of the gremlins back.

 

Richard

 

 

When checking for "Purchased" Apps, make sure you are looking for iPhone Apps, as TouchCab is formatted for iPhone.

 

John

 

Edited to correct spelling

Edited by JJGraphics
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Hi Mike

 

Just a request for a bit of clarity about your announcement. I have an iPad2 iOS 9.3.5 and with the imminent demise of 32 bit apps I bought TouchCab, the version that downloaded was 1.8.4 which is both 32 bit and 64 bit compatible. Will the subsequent versions in the pipeline be equally compatible or will they be purely 64 bit versions? If 1.8.4 is the last version to support 32 bit hardware will it still be available from the app store? Currently when I go to my purchased apps TouchCab does not appear in the list.

 

The reason I ask is that my iPad seems to have a few gremlins occasionally and I feel it would benefit from a factory reset and rather than restore everything from a back up I would like to do a clean reinstall of apps just in case using a backup reintroduces some of the gremlins back.

 

Richard

 

 

As John says, make sure and look for iPhone Apps when checking history.

 

There is a little confusion surrounding 32 bit apps! I'll try to clear it up...

 

iOS 11 does not run 32 Bit apps. This means that Apple is no longer allowing 32 Bit ONLY apps on the App Store. However, as long as we are developing for an iOS that 32 Bit devices still run on, then Apple will upload 32 AND 64 Bit versions. As your iPad 2 is 32 bit, and on iOS 9, this means, as long as we keep developing for a minimum iOS version of iOS 9, then there will be BOTH 32 AND 64 Bit updates coming. Given there is no real reason for us to develop for iOS 11 exclusively, (there is no new technologies we need between iOS 8 and 11), we will be developing for the minimum iOS supported by the current Xcode, (which is iOS 8 right now, and will be 9 next year and so on), for some time to come.

 

Also, unless a developer specifically makes an old version no longer available to re-download, you will always be able to download the "latest version that works with your device", meaning even if we launch TouchCab 4.2.3 for iOS 20, you'll still be able to download TouchCab 1.8.4 for your iPad 2.

 

So, TouchCab will have 64 AND 32 Bit support for some time to come. After that, you'll still be able to re-download or purchase the last good version for your device, regardless of whether it is 32 or 64 Bit.

 

The confusion is because of the panic "Apple are stopping 32 Bit support!" In reality, they are not allowing 32 Bit apps to work on iOS 11 and beyond. This is good, because it is forcing old apps to be updated. But it doesn't mean that 32 Bit apps will suddenly stop working on 32 Bit devices.

 

I hope this helps?

 

Mike

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