Piratewalla incorrectly reporting items...

Hi, my username isn't really important. After speaking to a few people it seems to be an issue with iOS4.2. The folks I spoke to didnt know what I was on about as they never encountered it but that was because I was the only one out of us all running 4.2.

The scenario, I was searching my local area under a friends username because I know he wanted red mittens and I knew I had dropped some nearby so I used the app. 3 different times it reported that it had found them, which is correct, except that when I clicked "okay" it took me to a different location each time, none of which had the mittens there.

I have tried it for lots and lots. When I clicked the spot it showed the item listing and it was just wrong, none of the items I searched for were on it. It's not just red mittens, it's the torch and incase items to name a few which leads me to deduce that it's a ios4.2 issue.

I know Colin Chorley had trouble too and he just posted a review on itunes for you.

It's a good app, you just need to fix this minor issue.

Hi Stuart, I sure hope it's not a universal thing happening after 4.2. I will begin testing with that version tonight. Thanks for your help and understanding. Also, you can tell your friend Colin, that if he wants to make the app better (or any app in the store better), giving someone a low review is not the way to do it (Lower reviews = Lower Revenue = Less developer interest in spending time on that particular app). Especially with applications like this one where there are plenty of other venues to report bugs, or ask for new features. Hope you keep finding everything you need on GoWalla, and expect a fix soon!

Kevin

Hi Stuart,

I updated to 4.2 and didn't have any problems. Perhaps your inventory cache is corrupted. Please try this:

1. Launch PirateWalla
2. Hit the back button to reenter your username
3. Enter your username again, but use a different capitalization (ex. "badPirate" instead of "BadPirate")

This will cause the inventory cache to be reloaded (caches are tied to usernames and are case sensitive). If this fixes your issue let me know, and I'll put in a proper reset button to the next version. Thanks!

Ok, I tried recaching the inventory and I still have the same issue. My username is all lowercase anyway so I tried upper case and mixed case and it still threw back the same issues except that it said it found items I was missing EVEN THOUGH I had one in my vault. It popped up a Tazo Brambleberry Tea which I already have.

As for universal, I don't know about that but the 4 people I have spoken to all have the same issue now and they said it worked fine before the update.

Colin DIDN'T leave you any kind of negative comment or feedback, in fact, your only 4 star rating is from him and he was complimentary.

All experiments are done on the ipad, going to try the iphone shortly.

Ok, more testing done.

iPhone is working fine, locations showing correctly as it should. iPhone 4 is running 4.1. I'm now going to update to 4.2 and will be back to you shortly.

I've come to the conclusion that it's DEFINATELY iOS4.2 related. iPhone 4 and iPad were showing everything fine when running 4.1 and 3.2 respectively. Once they were both updated to 4.2 neither of them worked correctly. They showed correct missing items but the location is incorrect.

DEFINATELY 4.2 related.

Okay, thank you Stuart. I'll get to working on this tomorrow.

Any feedback Kevin?

I've upgraded my phone to 4.2 and I'm still unable to recreate this situation. Can you share your GoWalla user id? Also, if you are interested, I can put you on a beta testers list, and start sending you betas too. badpirate@logichigh.com

Hi, I will e-mail you my gowalla ID and I will also take a short video of me using piratewalla on the iPad and to show you the error.

Hello Kevin. I too have exactly the same issue as Stuart is describing. I saw the comment about retyping your username differently by mixing upper and lowercase and can confirm that resolved another problem I was having with items I had recently vaulted but still showing as missing (so thanks for that) but the problem of PirateWalla navigating me to a spot it thinks has an item I'm missing when in fact it doesn't is still happening.

With only a few missing items left it's tricky to locate places now but have used Disney World in Florida as an example. As I'm missing all the Disney items I get a continuous flow of Missing Item Found messages popping up when searching around here but on each occasion I get redirected to the wrong spot where it has found these items, in most cases it's the same spot over and over again. All worked fine for me until updating to 4.2.

I would also recommend using Colin as a beta tester too. He is a big Gowalla player and could be a great addition to your team.

Thanks for all the hard work. I think what may be happening is that there is indeed the item you are looking for out there, however it is selecting the wrong location when it stops. While I work on this issue, you might try looking at locations near the selected location for the item.

Yeah, thats all well and good when your find what you want when there are like, 10 pins on the map, as soon as you start searching a greater area then it becomes increasingly harder to find it.

As for the item, yes, the item is definately out there. I tried it locally for someone and after checking about 30 spots, I found what it showed me was there. Whilst it works that way, it's not what it says on the tin :D

That being the case then I think I have a good idea where the issue lies. Thanks again for your help, I'll try and put out a fix soon.

Did you get the e-mail, pictures and video?

Sure did. Thanks Stuart.

Hi Stuart, Did you get the beta e-mail? I would appreciate it if you could check that my fix was successful.

Just following this post to keep track of updates :)