Hermes Site Launch
Last month, I registered my domain name and launched Hermes' website. The reason for the delay in blogging about it is that for the last month or so I've been considering it a soft launch. Early last month, I started playing with a VCS called Fossil. The choice of which VCS to use and whether or not to adopt a non-conventional one is tough, but thus far I'm quite pleased with it.
For one thing, it is cross-platform and self-contained. One single binary is all that is needed, and pre-built versions are available for 32 and 64-bit Linux, OS X and Windows.
The author is also quite responsive to bug reports and feature suggestions. Yesterday, for instance, I identified a bug and provided a repository that exhibited it, and within an hour the fix was available in trunk. Very nice.
The biggest win for Hermes, though, is that cloning the repository gives you everything, not just the code, but the entire website including wiki, documentation and tickets. I can't think of a better tool for a project designed to increase mobility and adventure than one that makes project management possible from anywhere and by anyone.
In semi-related news, Hermes continues improving daily. My four-year-old Trekker didn't turn off recently despite the fact that I pressed and held its power button, so it has once again lost its onboard software which I can't install under Linux. It would appear that Hermes is now my only GPS solution until I can find someone with a Windows PC to help with the re-installation. That isn't the huge deal it may seem to be, though, because way and intersection detection and description have become far more accurate of late.
Also, yesterday I needed to navigate to my leasing office to drop off rent. Finding the office is a PITA for two reasons. First, it is just one suite in a larger building of apartments. Furthermore, if you turn too late then there's a nice flight of stairs, the underside of which faces the street. I've whacked my head on the undersides of those many times because there's simply no way to notice them using a cane on ground level. I'd marked a point in Trekker, but despite doing so at the location, it never seemed to be all that accurate.
Hermes itself doesn't yet support routing, but Google Nav does. Not only did Nav have a point for my leasing office (Trekker didn't), but it happily ran in the background and provided turn-by-turn directions while Hermes provided intersection and way updates. When Nav noted that the location was on my left, well, it pretty much was. No painful collisions with stair risers, just a left turn to the office.
I'm sure that not every experience will be quite so smooth, but I doubt that I'll be rushing to re-install Trekker's software anytime soon either.
Mirrored from TheWordNerd.info.