Route Planning Software - which one?
 

Well, the sub-forum title is Route Planning and it appears to be the case that there are increasing amounts of software on the WWW to plan routes.

Occasionally, the subject of route planning software has been mentioned elsewhere (such as the linked thread below) but not in any particular detail or structured manner.
http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...in-et-63191-26

It goes beyond software to plan routes, with the availability of software to access routes planned and recorded by others.
e.g. Wikiloc
http://www.wikiloc.com/wikiloc/home....s of the World

from which we can all get something like this with a few clicks:
url=http://www.wikiloc.com/wikiloc/view.do?id=8999452]Wikiloc - All road Pyrenees east to west 1060km (France/Spain) trail - la Guinella, R
(No link directly, but it is a route across all of the pyrenees; about 600 miles)

Or there is viewranger that does a similar job.
http://www.viewranger.com/en-gb


So, which one is best for you?

ps
Oh, yes, and why?

Fsatest or shortest ? Neither! One with views.
 

Source of information?
Route planning software is based on vector information. This can be some commercial based information (Garmin, Tom Tom, Google etc) or free (Open Street Maps).
Whatever the information it is bound to include errors and omissions.

Manipulation of that information?
This would be the program/application.
This too may include errors and omissions.

Available options?
Some software has the ability to try and avoid or select things - like toll roads, motorways, smaller roads. It may also have the options of fastest route or shortest route.

--------------------
I'm yet to find the options I'd like;

least traffic
scenic
natural beauty spots ( UN listed + others).

Windy roads tend to follow the landscape - making for views. They tend to be slow and long - the opposite of what routing software looks for. So for me, the routing software gives the way most commuters would go, not a tourist route.

I would presume that your list is part of the factors by which people choose to use one or other of the various offerings in preference to another.
At present I don't use them at all, which is the reason for my question(s).

Tom tom has such a facility within their GPS I believe; never used it or even seen it in use.

Maybe such a product exists and no one has publicised it on here?

Maybe UNESCO sites are listed as POIs for anyone who wants them?


Apart from the couple that I identify in my OP above there seem to be a load more on the market; most I have come across are written by Spanish or German software authors.

Motogoloco.com is a very useful route planer, and it's free

There are loads of them around, but does anyone use one of them?
 

I've yet to come across one that is not free so that just makes it harder to differentiate between them, perhaps.

Motogoloco has been mentioned somewhere in here previously I think.
I have looked at it, briefly, and it does appear to be simple to use.
It also seems to have a business model based on advertising of "places to stay" - that is not unique as a business model of course.


MotoPlaner - Motorrad Touren Planung leicht gemacht is another one I have found online.
I get the feeling that a number of german and spanish nationals are active in such software development.

Or there is TyreToTravel - which, reputedly, started life in association with Tom Tom GPS hardware but has now branched out to a wider audience; it is reputed to be available only for the Windows operating system.

(note, I haven't mentioned the software associated with the main GPS hardware competitor to Tom Tom).

Certainly, the algorithms in the basic GPS unit may do this, but I had in mind the softwares that are manipulated by the end user.


Come to think of it, searching for such specifics in route planning software could be achieved by the imagery that is made available, freely, to view in some versions of the software.

The link above does not seem to work correctly for whatever reason.
But it does show a link to another link, if you get my drift:-
Wikiloc - GPS trails and waypoints of the World

I came upon this planning software, sometime or other (I happened upon it recently and it turned out to be already contained within my favourites, so memory is really failing!):-
bikehike.co.uk - Home

It's interesting in that it has some pretty good FAQs and help pages which describe how the software operates and aspects of its' limitations while, along the way, referring to such basics as vector and raster maps.
bikehike.co.uk - FAQ

bikehike.co.uk - Help

In this case the software is produced by a Brit with emphasis on British mapping but it can deal with other countries via use of Google mapping.

Via Michelin - Long time experience, tracks most scenic routes per region.
For sure inspired by gastronome restaurant but not only. Great planner I find.
ViaMichelin: Michelin route planner and maps, restaurants, traffic news and hotel booking

Edit: Of course mainly for Europe inland, but not only and expanding.

I had pretty much forgotten about ViaMichelin.
I have used it, quite a few years ago, and it doesn't seem to have changed much since then - I can't see a means of downloading data other than the capability for printing maps and directions (nothing wrong with the latter as such - I first used such a facility at a tourist information centre in Florida over 20 years ago).

ps I see that they do have an app.
Are you using that?

pps
Just found this, kind of hidden away in the "share" button.
"Send to GPS
- Select your GPS brand"
That allows for downloading to a choice of about 8 branded GPS, but it doesn't show downloading as "raw" files such as in .GPX format.

After selecting the type of GPS device the file "ViaMichelin.gpx" is then automatically downloaded to my "download folder". I'm using an iMac but I assume it works fine on a PC as well.

For my own route planning I normally use BaseCamp and transfer my files to the device.

That's the one I didn't mention earlier.
:innocent:

GPS Exchange Format
 

I have come across articles elsewhere that assume the .GPX protocol is "owned" by Garmin.
Perhaps because there are other file formats that are closely associated with the likes of Google Earth (.KML iirc).

This is not the case:-
GPX: the GPS Exchange Format

Therein lies a subset to my original posting.
The matter of what route planning software works on what operating system.

I avoided referring to this in my OP, because the future probably lies with, IMO, portable devices (both smartphones and tablets) which will be operating on Android or iOS.

UK Ordnance Survey
 

I am finding that there are a number of British developers of websites that bring up the UK Ordnance Survey (OS) maps of the UK.
(Somewhat in contrast to my earlier statement that there are many Spanish and German sites of this nature, the Brits are not being left out!).

One factor to this is that the OS appear to have lost their copyright on 1:25000 mapping (my understanding from reading elsewhere) and they are providing a limited form of access to their, still in copyright, 1:50000 map products.
This is referenced as "OS Openspace" and the 3rd party websites give full credit to the OS for this service - in fact the downloads are limited to a certain number of tiles per day.

Thus, in summary, there are sites which can bring up on screen zoomable OS maps that are free to access.
What the 3rd parties do thereafter with the mapping rather depends on their own interests - some have route planning capability while others concentrate on simple displays of the maps. Many combine the maps with others, typically Open Street Map (OSM) and similar, specialist maps (Open Cycle Map, Open Ski Map, Open Transport Map etc etc).

An example:- Maps showing rights of way
Yet others of these sites have a wide variety of maps available making them useful outside of the UK - Bing, Google, Yahoo maps to name a few.