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Garmin Explore | Web & App | Multiple Issues

Colin Southern
3 months ago

Hi folks,

As I explore more, I'm wanting a navigation "eco-system" that I can use to plan activities - record activities - and help with situational awareness whilst out and about. As I already own a Garmin InReach Mini 2 ("IM2"), the Garmin Explore functionality would be perfect for this - so this is what I've started to use - but I'm coming across so many frustrating issues that I'm now at a "crunch time" decision point. I apologise in advance for what if likely to be a lengthy post, but I would be immensly grateful if someone could give me some honest feedback regarding the following. In particular I'm interested in learning (a) is this a known/common issue that others are also facing and (b) are there any hints / tips / workarounds.

1. I'm in Google Chrome on explore dot gamin dot com slash map. I'm signed in to my account. I've clicked "clear filters". My ad blockers are disabled for this page. I've tried signing out and back in again along with refreshing the page. Currently I have 8 tracks in my library and the "eye" to make them visible on the map is there. None of the tracks are visible on the map anymore. They were there until I tried to use the Bookmark functionality. Initially I named a bookmark set to appropriate filter dates - tried to click OK but nothing happened repeatedly - after trying several times it eventually created something twice but it didn't work. Currently I've deleted all bookmarks - reloaded the page - and still can't see any of my tracks on the map. All of my waypoints appear just fine though. The tracks are still listed under tracks in the library - visibility eye is on and there are no filters. Any suggestions on how to get my tracks showing again?

2. Speaking of tracks, the Tracks section under Library has an "eye" to control visibility of the entire tracks section, but no "eyes" to control the visibility of individual tracks - so when I'm starting to explore different tracks in the same general area the map is quickly getting cluttered as track visibility is an all-or-nothing thing unless I set up a filter by date and time range ... which doesn't work well if I want to compare an older track with a newer one but not display some that I've hiked in-between. Is this the expected functionality as it stands or am I missing something here? It seems that the obvious thing would be for Garmin to have a selectable visibility indicator for each track with the "master" control for tracks toggling all of those contained within it.

3. Still speaking of tracks - on the web version of the map I have a total of 8; 2 as the result of uploading GPX files created by AllTrails, and 6 created from actual hikes using my IM2. On the Explore app however - that's signed in to the same account - and synced - under tracks it only shows me the 2 tracks that have been imported. Why don't the other 6 show?

4. When out for a hike the IM2 sends tracking points at 10 minute intervals that are correctly recorded in the Explore app - show correctly on the web map - and show correctly on the shared map too. The app connects these with straight lines. Often though I'm hiking an area with a clear and unobstructed view of the sky and was somewhat surprised that the app still only displays the tracking points that are 10 minutes apart. I don't expect it to transmit every few seconds given that it's designed for satellite connectivity but I did expect it to plot a hundred fold more tracking info on the map like every other navigation app appears to do (eg AllTrails & WorkOutdoors apps) so it displays a far more nuanced trail and not one that shos me taking shortcuts across a lake (etc). I tried both options with the "prefer device GPS", but no change. So is this "as good as it gets" with the app or is something going horribly wrong for me?

5. When I go for a hike the app always records the event on the web version accessable under library -> tracks, but on the mobile app it sometimes also records it as an activity (but sometimes not). Just wondering if anyone knows why it does this inconsistantly?

Many thanks for any info anyone can offer.

  • 0 3 months ago

    Garmin Explore Web is unfortunately a bit of a buggy mess with quite bad user experience. And Garmin doesn't seem to be inclined to fix and improve it.

    For your first issue, check the Track Visibility setting as describes in Showing and Hiding Items on the Garmin Explore Website Map, under Toggling Track Visibility. It could be that all tracks are hidden because track visibility is toggled off inadvertently.

    Hiding individual items is not possible (afaik), but you could use collections and toggle collection visibility as a workaround. Quite a sub optimal user experience imho.

    As for question 3, this could also be related to the track visibility toggle, so be sure to check that.

    For question 4 and 5, it's good to understand the difference between Tracking and Activity Recording, as explained in Getting Started With Tracking on an inReach Mini 2. In summary, Tracking is periodically sending your current location via the satellite network. Activity Recording is where the Mini 2 keeps a more detailed log of your locations on the device itself. This Activity Recording is then synced with Garmin Explore afterwards.

    If you have further questions on Tracking and Activity Recording, there's also the inReach Mini 2 forum where others may be able to help you.

  • 0 3 months ago in reply to JungleJim

    Thanks for the reply Jim - much appreciated.

    Much progress has been made in the past 24 hours.

    1. The track viewing issue is sorted, but remains mostly a mystery. I ended up following the instructions in the article you linked to (on my phone) and to my surprise it worked. When I later tried the same instructions on my PC, the only track it showed was the most recent one (I got the same result yesterday with a different track when it was the most recent one).

    Initially I thought "something is broken and I'll only be able to see new tracks going forward" but after this morning's experience it was almost like a map filter was set to only show the most recent track ... regardless of what the control was set to. I thought that the persistance of any control is probably saved in a cookie so I cleared all Garmin-related cookies and reloaded the page - it didn't appear to make any difference.

    I then moved on by clicking on a recently created activity and that showed on the map - followed by another one (same result) so I then tried clicking on a saved track and all tracks instantly appeared -- and have remained so even after a restart.

    So "problem solved" ... and I still have no idea what the issue was. I'm 100% certain that filters were indicating clear and visibility was indicating on. It appeared to occur when I was trying to create a bookmark; the process didn't complete successfully and I suspect that part of what I was attempting got applied to the view but the rest of the control object wasn't created - and with persistence it became a "can't go forward / can't go back" thing.

    2. I'll look into using collections to manage track / activity visibility. It would be fantastic if Garmin simply gave us more granular control over this though.

    3. From my reading of several posts made in the IR2 forum that you kindly pointed me to I read that the iR2 stores activity data in FIT format - this is probably why events are recorded as activities and not tracks in the Explore app. The web seems to treat them differently; so it's clunky, but something I can live with.

    4. Also sorted. In all fairness to me and others, Garmin really should have done a much better job of making this clear in the app and in the documentation (some of which is actually wrong even though it's for the mini 2).

    Prior to digging in to previous posts, I had a poor understanding of how activity recording was accomplished; In the Explore app there is of course the infamous "Prefer Device Location" toggle, but absolutely no explanation of whether they're meaning "my phone device" or "my inReach device" - THEY'RE BOTH DEVICES!

    I assumed that the GPS chip in both ran all the time and it was merely a minor convenience thing that allowed the user to select what they thought was the best GPS for their current situation with little consequence if both have a good view of the sky.

    I've subsequently learned that by "device" it's referring to the inReach - NOT the phone - and if "Prefer Device Location" is turned on then what it gets from the inReach Mini depends completely on what the activity tracking detail is set to. If it's set to normal then the GPS receiver only gets turned on when it's time to send a tracking point (ie every 10 minutes); if one wants map detail that contains detail at approx 10 second intervals then one must set tracking detail to high (and presumably take some kind of battery hit). For the love of chocolate and hiking I'm at a complete loss to understand why Garmin can't mention this in a note associated with the control in the Explore app.

    Even in referenced documentation for the Mini 2 it's still incorrectly referring to high or normal detail setting as activity log setting, and referring to "settings" as "setup" (so their instructions to change the activity recording interval don't work because they refer to menu items that don't exist anymore). Until now I'd assumed that setting the tracking detail to "high" just sent more information with a normal tracking ping - not the frequency of activity log entries.

    I really wish there was a central point people could be pointed to (or find by searching) that explains the impact of some of these settings; I work in IT for a living and from what I can tell I'm certainly not the first to get tripped up by this (I spent several hours yesterday evaluating Gaia GPS in the hope of finding something that was (a) cloud integrated and (b) actually worked -- so I think Garmin are doing themselves a great disservice to existing and potential inReach Mini customers here).

    End rant. Thanks again for your help -- it got me on the right track (no pun intended).

  • 0 3 months ago in reply to Colin Southern
    Colin Southern said:
    I read that the iR2 stores activity data in FIT format - this is probably why events are recorded as activities and not tracks in the Explore app

    Yes that’s correct, modern Garmin devices record activities in FIT format and these are called activities. Contrast to tracks, which are mostly stored in GPX format. Both Explore web and app will show the recorded activities (after a sync between Mini 2 and Explore app).

    Colin Southern said:
    In the Explore app there is of course the infamous "Prefer Device Location" toggle

    Yes this setting is not really well explained, but basically it does only one thing: when set to on, Explore app will use the current location info of the Mini 2 connected via Bluetooth to show your current location on the map in Explore app. When Off the location info from your phone will be used.

    All tracking and activity recording is done on the Mini 2, the Explore app is used for syncing that data to the app and to Explore web.

    As for the manual, the terminology is correct in there, are you sure you are looking at the correct manual? It’s located at https://www8.garmin.com/manuals/webhelp/GUID-802DEF62-EBB2-463C-8C51-C58FB29F89E3/EN-US/inReach_Mini_2_OM_EN-US.pdf

    And the Settings > Tracking > Activity Recording options configure how detailed the activity recording while be. The frequency of the Tracking points being sent (via satellite) is configured with the Send Interval option, but be aware the max frequency depends on your inReach plan.

  • 0 3 months ago in reply to JungleJim
    JungleJim said:
    As for the manual, the terminology is correct in there, are you sure you are looking at the correct manual? It’s located at https://www8.garmin.com/manuals/webhelp/GUID-802DEF62-EBB2-463C-8C51-C58FB29F89E3/EN-US/inReach_Mini_2_OM_EN-US.pdf

    I've had a look through the forum posts, but I can't immediately find it (and to be honest, my head is starting to spin a bit). Off memory it was linked to in a post by Garmin Leslie. In one place of the linked document it gave instructions for going into "setup" (not settings) on the Mini 2 and under the tracking section it had a setting that explicitly mentioned the activity logging interval (I was following along on my device to try to change it).

    I've never owned a mini 1 but I think this may have been how it was coded for that device.

    From memory it was a post that was a couple of years old so I'm guessing in hindsight that it was (a) either an existing link to an old version of the document or (b) an inadvertant link to the Mini 1 document.

    It wasn't a link to the full manual - just a relatively short document dealing with activity / tracking.

    I've even searched my browser history, but still can't find it so I'm going to have to give up on finding it; it's pretty moot at this point anyway.

    Now that I've got the right settings and understand what's going on a lot better I think I'm "good to go". I contemplated using a 2 minute tracking interval for a while, but I don't have the option on my unit - I'm assuming that it's something that appears once one is on the expedition plan. (pity, because on some occasions I'd like to be able to turn it on and just live with the cost of the extra pings - but I don't have that option without going to the expedition plan which is a bit too expensive for me).

    Thanks again for your help - much appreciated!

  • 0 3 months ago in reply to Colin Southern

    2 min tracking is indeed only available on the expedition plan.

    When you consider that tracking is more or less meant to let others view where you are (via the MapShare page), and depending on the kind of activities you do, 10 min tracking interval might be just fine.

  • 0 2 months ago in reply to 5662697

    Thanks. Yes, I use AllTrails, and I've tried Gaia. Both are fantastic for what they do; the problem is that they don't do all that I want them to do.

    Currently I'm using Garmin Explorer for planning, AllTrails for cumulative activity recording, and WorkOutdoors for comprehensive personal metric analysis.

     I wouldn't say that Garmin Explorer and I are "friends"; I dearly wish it had more tracking resolution - and better aerial mapping resolution, but at least using Collections has helped me get track/activity visibility under control.

    AllTrails is great for recording what I've done, but hopeless at allowing me to overlap and compare tracks that have segments in common.

    Google Earth has by far the best aerial resolution, but exporting a track is "not fun" (and doesn't include elevation data). And none of the maps are completely up to date (eg still showing forest many years after its been cleared).

    All in all I'm finding all the tools about 70% useful - for the other 30% I just have to physically go there and see what the real story is.

    We're getting there ...

    2 minute tracking intervals for the inReach would also help, but its not worth the extra plan cost to me.