Tuesday, March 31, 2009

SportTracks Plugin for BuckeyeOutdoors.com

Hot off the Press!
The BuckeyeOutdoors.com Plugin for SportTracks is now available for download!

This was a project that Ben (the BuckeyeOutdoors.com admin) and I started almost a year ago. It started off as a cool concept that Ben's online users wanted. Ben posted a message on his forums asking for help, I then found his post requesting a .NET geek and responded... the rest is history. We quickly realized we both went to the same school, we graduated a year apart. We've been developing this plugin at various bars and coffee shops all over Columbus ever since. :) What a small world!

Here is a quick video that I put together to show you how it works:


[Full Screen]

Who Should Download this Plugin?
Here are some bullet points that may help you decide if you are a good candidate for this plugin:
  • Do you have a GPS watch (ie. Timex, Garmin, Suunto, etc..)?
  • Do you like to share your workouts and/or routes with your friends?
  • Do you hate entering the same information twice?
  • Are you tired of dealing with the canned applications that ship with your GPS watch?
If you answered yes to ANY of the above, then you should check it out. If you use SportTracks for your training application, or if you use BuckeyeOutdoors.com as your online training log, then you should absolutely checkout this plugin.

What is SportTracks?
SportTracks is the one stop shop for everything about training (whether you're a cyclist, swimmer, runner, etc..). If you don't use SportTracks then I highly recommend that you check it out. I found out about this application from my blogging buddy, Jamie (the MaineRunner). Since he turned me on to it, I've never looked back. One of the key features of this application that I discovered very quickly was that it offered the ability to install plugins for it. The app was written in .NET and the creator of this application was brilliant enough to open up the API to allow geeks (like myself) to interface with every aspect of the data. The result is literally a framework for interacting with anything and everything about your workouts and outdoor activities.

What is BuckeyeOutdoors.com?
BuckeyeOutdoors.com is an online social networking site and a FREE training log site that is creatively designed to help you:
  • Be flexible by supporting all types of Endurance sports and methods of training.
  • Track your progress with precise reports and graphs.
  • Track your diet and hydration with our database of foods.
  • Design your own INTERACTIVE Training Plan or import others.
  • Form your own Community TEAM and stay in touch with fellow trainees no mater where they are
  • Create and share your own favorite training routes or easily confirm your distances.
  • Meet online within our Forum or use the Find a Friend Feature to see who is training at your level.
  • Post your training and race data on your favorite Blog site with Sidebars.
There are no catches or strings attached! BuckeyeOutdoors.com is just a site that was built to give back to the online community!

Conclusion
Please check the BuckeyeOutdoors.com Plugin that we've created. If you do download it and use it, please provide feedback (good or bad)!

4 comments:

Jamie Anderson said...

I had no idea really of the internal workings of sporttracks. I gotta checkout that buckeyeoutdoors next!

Lesley Looper said...

Haven't looked into sporttracks yet, but buckeyeoutdoors.com rocks! Thanks for working on the plugin.

Frank Mélotte said...

I am unable to use the plugin. It seems to install okay, but when I start it I get the message "unknown category" at the first try to upload to Buckeyeoutdoors. No info is uploaded.

Luc said...

Melotte, please install the latest plugin, for that problem has since been fixed. :)