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Scout: tagging while you ride

Most of what the Commons knows started as something a rider noticed in passing: the tap in the square works, the gravel starts here, that bridge is shut. Knowledge like that normally evaporates by the time you get home.

Scout is the one-tap field recorder that catches it. It runs on your bike computer or your phone, and it writes what you mark straight into the activity your device was already recording.

Scout stands alone

The app and its file format work with or without the Cycling Commons. Your tags are yours, in your own ride file, in an open and documented format that anything can read. Sending them here is a choice you make afterwards, one tag at a time.

What you can tag

Six types, plus one that needs no tapping at all.

Tag What it is for
Resupply Water, food, or a bike-repair and pump stop.
Closure Road shut or a detour, and roughly how long you think it will last, which is what lets the map retire it by itself later.
Surface Mark a stretch with a start type and an END, so it is recorded as a segment rather than a point. Aligned to OpenStreetMap surface values.
Notice A bad corner, a junction, potholes, or anything else sketchy.
Scenery A view worth remembering.
Other Everything else. Single tap, no submenu: decide what it was when you get home.
Overtakes With a Varia-compatible radar paired, Scout counts the vehicles that pass you, automatically. It is the closest thing there is to an objective measure of how busy a road really feels.

A tag takes one press. The submenu (which resupply, which surface) is optional: skip it and sort it out later.

How a tag becomes a place on the map

---
config:
  flowchart:
    rankSpacing: 18
    nodeSpacing: 24
    padding: 4
    subGraphTitleMargin: {top: 0, bottom: 0}
---
flowchart TD
    subgraph R1[" "]
        direction LR
        RIDE["You tap while riding"] --> FILE["Written into your ride file<br/>(open FIT format)"]
    end
    subgraph R2[" "]
        direction LR
        HOME["At home: open the file<br/>at /scout/review"] --> FIX["Fix what needs fixing:<br/>drag a pin, rename it,<br/>change a mis-tapped type,<br/>attach a photo"]
    end
    subgraph R3[" "]
        direction LR
        SEND["Send the ones you choose"] --> MOD["The same review queue<br/>as every other contribution"]
    end
    R1 --> R2
    R2 --> R3
    R3 --> MAP(["On the map"])
    style MAP fill:#FF5A1F,color:#101E16
    style R1 fill:none,stroke:none
    style R2 fill:none,stroke:none
    style R3 fill:none,stroke:none

Nothing is sent from the road. You open the ride when you get home, look at what you marked, and decide, tag by tag, what is worth sharing. A tag you never approve simply stays in your file.

The review screen needs an account: /scout/review asks you to sign in first, because sending a tag from it is a contribution from your account, like any other. The sign-in is for what you send; the file itself still never leaves your browser (see below).

Once sent, a Scout tag is an ordinary contribution: the same form fields, the same curator, the same queue as a place typed in by hand. There is no fast lane and no separate standard of proof: a new way of collecting facts must not bring a new way of judging them (Contributing, How data earns its place).

Your ride stays yours

Scout sends the tags you approve. Nothing else leaves your device.

  • The ride file is never uploaded. The review screen reads it in your own browser. It is never posted, never stored on a server, and there is nothing to expire or delete, because we never had a copy.
  • Only the tags travel: the point you tapped, what you tagged it as, and when. Not the route between them.
  • The overtake count is shown to you, and goes nowhere. It is measured from your own ride file while you look at it. Publishing traffic measurements is a design question the project has not answered yet, and until it has, nothing is collected.
  • A tagged spot is a place you chose to publish. Everything around it (where you started, where you live, how fast you ride) stays on your machine. See Location & privacy for the whole picture.

Where it runs

Platform Status
Garmin Edge Available now
Android Coming soon
Hammerhead Karoo Planned

What it cannot do yet

Being honest about the edges is more useful than a feature list:

  • A surface stretch has to be finished on the map. Scout records a start and an END, and the review screen names how many stretches a ride carries, but sending one from that screen is not built; add it from the map instead.
  • A tag with no GPS fix cannot be placed. It is counted and named rather than silently dropped, so a rider who tapped thirteen times and sees eleven pins knows why.
  • Nothing verifies the file. Because the ride is never uploaded, the server can make no claim about the device it came from, so Scout's provenance says submitted through Scout, never device-verified. A Scout ride-claim counts exactly as much as a rider clicking I rode this, which is the honest position when neither can be checked.

Reading the numbers on a reviewed ride

The review screen tells you about the ride itself:

  • overtakes, drawn where they happened, each carrying the speed the vehicle was doing (its own ground speed, not the difference between it and you), or ? when the radar gave no usable reading;
  • tags with no GPS fix, counted;
  • surface stretches recorded.

Speeds follow the unit you set in your profile: kilometres per hour if you read kilometres, miles per hour if you read miles.