2024 Alpine trip - MRA problems, observations and suggestions…
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Hi all, so I have been driving through the Alps again, similar to last year and have some observations and problems with MRA to report back.
I am driving my car (fast), using MRA on my iPhone on my dashboard, with my stereo head unit running Waze at the same time.
First, the good:
- The latest MRA app interface is very easy to use. I have not really used it since September 2023. So, compliments to Corjan and the team.
Overall, the app has performed very well.
Now, the bad, or slightly bad thing:
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We are driving through the Alps. There have been lots of Alpine pass closures due to snow. We have been monitoring the various websites daily to see what passes have reopened or remained closed. There has been a very annoying problem with MRA (or HERE?) where we have been driving open passes but repeatedly get the ‘Route Violation’ red warning box at the bottom of the screen, covering important information. Clearly MRA or HERE has not been updating the road statuses.
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MRA has repeatedly lost its location. The blue nav arrow repeatedly flailing around in open countryside, nowhere near a road. We have given it time to find its location and work again, but it never does. The only thing you can do is quit MRA and restart it. This is a PITA. Note, that Waze never loses its location, only MRA. They are both running through the same iPhone, so using the same GPS, so why is this happening?
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MRA has repeatedly told me I have missed waypoints. This is incorrect. I was very careful to zoom in on my map and move waypoints exactly on to roads. When I examine my map in the evening, I confirm all those missed waypoints were on the road that we drove. Why is this happening? This is annoying. Should MRA allow maybe 50m proximity to a waypoint to hit it?
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We have come across rock falls and blocked roads on our journey. This has meant we have to alter our route. MRA seems to work well and re-route us, but has skipped important waypoints that it could have easily taken us to. This was annoying and disappointing. I guess we could have selected ‘do not skip waypoints’, but if the road was blocked to waypoint 10, I would have expected it to try to take us to waypoint 11, not skip to 13. I know this is dependent of the map, but it happened.
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Stopping route navigation. Why do we have to confirm that we want to stop navigation? If I select the three dots menu, the top item, in red, is stop navigation. I just want to press this once, but then you get a pop-up asking you to confirm you want to stop navigation. I would like to only press once to stop. Can we be given the option to switch off the confirmation pop-up please?
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And to finish, the old problem - power consumption. My phone is plugged in to the car USB, but if I drive 6-7 hours, my phone starts at 100 percent and is down to 50 percent charge when we finish, and it is very hot.
App interface suggestions:
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Presently, if you press on the waypoint icon it gives you the option to skip this waypoint. Could this present more options, such as switching on/off automatically skipping waypoints?
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My journey started in the UK, in miles. It took me days to remember, and find out, how to change the interface to km. Could we please have this option available on the app interface, not buried in the user profile settings? Maybe click on the speedometer and be given options for miles/km.
Let me clarify though, I LOVE THIS APP. My points above are to help development and make it an even better product.
Thanks,
Tom -
@Tom-Grzelinski very nice recap and write up. I agree with most of your points.
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@Tom-Grzelinski, I have seen most of the issues you encountered also. Great write-up! Most issues are already being worked on.
Concerning the closures, I make it a habit to leave Seasonal closures off, and to disable traffic aware routing in the settings. For scenic routes you don't really need that..
The "route violations" are also a setting that you can disable, but I agree it cab obscure too much of the screen.
Why do we have to confirm that we want to stop navigation?
Handling the menu with motorbike gloves on, a press by mistake is easily made. I think the confirmation is helpful and should stay (come on, it is ONE extra tap! ).
if you press on the waypoint icon it gives you the option to skip this waypoint. Could this present more options, such as switching on/off automatically skipping waypoints?
I think that is much too inviting for getting you distracted from traffic. Changing settings is done through the menu standing still. Skipping a waypoint you missed can safely be done because it is made really easily accessible and non-distracting.
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I can't write it better!!!
I agree with all point exposed, 'cause I experience almost all of them this holidays, also on Alps.I love MRA and Next as navigation (I use it since Beta), but also I confirm than most of these failures are "new" and do not appears on previous versions (lost position, zoom issues when approaching changes, app crashes...)
I'll wait for a new update to correct this bug's... but some people are very angry with lasts updates than seem to go backwards.
Keep pushing dev-team!!! we know your are doing it well .
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@Tom-Grzelinski said in 2024 Alpine trip - MRA problems, observations and suggestions…:
- MRA has repeatedly lost its location. The blue nav arrow repeatedly flailing around in open countryside, nowhere near a road. We have given it time to find its location and work again, but it never does. The only thing you can do is quit MRA and restart it. This is a PITA. Note, that Waze never loses its location, only MRA. They are both running through the same iPhone, so using the same GPS, so why is this happening?
Same here, but I noticed that although the arrow on the screen moves randomly, the voice prompt are fine, and if you manually zoom in or out the arrow goes back to the route. So I guess this is not a location problem, but a visualization problem. Just my 2c for next upgrade.
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@Graziano-0 @Tom-Grzelinski It was reported yesterday that this behaviour might be associated with the 3D elevation difference . Go to Navigation settings > Map layer > Map style and turn off elevation difference. Report back if you see a difference in how the app performs please.