Changelog: May 8, 2024

Kyler takes a big ride, meet our CFO, and more!

Hello and welcome to the first edition of Catenary Changelog! Despite being an open-source project, sometimes it can feel like (at least to us) that there's a division between users and our developers. We want to bridge that gap with occasional updates on what's new with Catenary, including new features, bug fixes, and community events.

These go to 11 (th Street)

Overview of Catenary showing central Boston

Over the weekend, we released Catenary 3.0, which features massive performance improvements, new distributed systems architecture, and several quality-of-life features. Most of the changes are under the hood, so you won't notice much of a difference in the app's UI itself - but it lays the groundwork for future long-requested features like built in departure times, and there are some new features you can start using right now:

Show trip headsign: You can now select "Headsign" from the Layers menu and see the final destination and trip variant of each vehicle on the map. (Available for select agencies)
Amtrak data has returned: We've restored Amtrak data and made train loading faster and more reliable.
Improved map performance: We've made the map faster and more responsive, especially when zooming in and out.
Multi-select vehicles: If you click on a map point with multiple vehicles, we'll show all of them, along with new line details, in the Sidebar.

We are aware of the following known issues in Catenary 3.0:

Button to activate the settings menu is missing on some devices (this will be fixed later this week, and is top priority for us)
UI icons can be slow to load and display text placeholders (we're switching these icons out for embedded SVGs)
Default 3D style can reduce performance on some devices (we will be reverting the default style and you'll be able to select 3D from settings)
Some run numbers are displayed as vehicle numbers (this is an agency data issue but we're still working to fix it as fast as possible)

Take the safe route

Catenary on a macOS desktop

Ever since we announced the beta of Catenary for Android, you've been telling us one thing: you want iOS and desktop support too. We've been hard at work on these apps as part of a project we're calling "Ruta Segura" (Spanish for "Safe Route"), and we have some exciting updates for you today:

Catenary for Android is now available on our website for sideloading. No need to sign up for the closed beta anymore! We've also added all new features from Catenary 3.0 to the Android app, no update required.
Catenary for iOS is building successfully, and we're currently in the process of verifying our nonprofit eligibility for an Apple Developer license. Unfortunately, the process for getting an app on the App Store is much longer than it is on Google Play, but we're working to at least get a TestFlight beta up within the next few weeks.
Catenary for Windows and Mac are both available now from the downloads page! We're still troubleshooting some issues with the building workflow for Windows installer builds, so only an portable (single-.exe) version is available right now. Both apps are still in beta, so make sure to report any bugs!
Catenary for Linux is available now as an early developer preview, currently only in AppImage format. This build is basically untested and is NOT intended for daily use.

Ready to roll

Kyler riding his bike in Irvine

Happy Bike Month from Catenary! We love bikes here on the Catenary team, and we've got a few things planned for this month!

Kyler's Grand Coastal Ride: Last week, the Catenary community officially exceeded our $300 fundraising goal to send Catenary founder Kyler Chin on a scenic bike ride along California's coastline - in a maid costume! You can now see the full route (opens in a new tab) on this map, and we'll share the final date and logistics here and on social media when we have more information.
Catenary Community Rides: Our community team has been hard at work on a series of community rides in various cities, starting with a ride in San Diego around the same time as Kyler's Grand Coastal Ride. We'll be continuing where Kyler left off, heading from Coronado down to Imperial Beach via the Bayshore Bikeway and beautiful Silver Strand State Beach. We'll have more information on this ride soon, but you can see the full route now on this map (opens in a new tab).
Bike Routes on Catenary: Catenary now shows select bike trails and safe biking routes, however we need your help to make this data better! Please submit your favorite bike routes and trails as OpenStreetMap (opens in a new tab) features so our routing and mapping algorithms can make use of them. Plus, you'll be helping other apps that use OSM data too!

You connect? No, iConnect

Chelsea on a Metrolink train

Finally for today's Changelog, we'd like to introduce you to Chelsea Wen, our Catenary CFO. She recently led our first-ever donation drive and has become an indispensable part of the Catenary team - so we asked her a few questions about the project and her role.

What do you do at Catenary?
I'm the CFO and the main person working on routing algorithms. So, my responsibilities consist of managing the Catenary finances from the bank account to the budget to planning fundraisers with the Communication teams. I'm also researching and testing routing algorithms that will eventually be implemented into the service -- we have big plans for how it'll work and there's a lot of moving pieces that we'll have to consider since we're looking to implement dynamic, multimodal trip planning with various customizations. Yeah, that's quite ambitious, and quite a mouthful too! But it's in the works, we're cooking hard.

What do you like the most about working on Catenary?
You can see that your work is going somewhere -- it's rewarding. I've been part of a lot of projects that ultimately stagnate or fall apart, and I'm proud to say that Catenary isn't showing the same warning signs I've seen in the past. We got hard work, we got passion, we got dedication. We're not letting setbacks throw us under the bus ;3 Also, the sooner we get a reliable app the sooner we can use it! Let's all do our best together! (⁠っ≧⁠▽⁠≦⁠)っ

What's the coolest or most impressive thing you've done for Catenary?
It was really bumpy but I managed to get the Catenary bank account and the donation system set up. It took dozens of phone calls to find a suitable bank and then a crap ton of paperwork to get the account made (which took me on a 12 hour, 1 train, 6 bus trip to find Kin [our director of Systems Architecture] in LA and have him sign something). I'm very satisfied with the way everything turned out! We'll be able to start sourcing servers soon, which means we'll be able to run through more data and more complex algorithms.

What does an average day in the mines look like for you?
I'm a full time student with a part time job so my days are pretty hectic...! I work on Catenary stuff whenever I have the time, which usually means after 9 pm or so on weekdays, and on weekends. My coding setup is VSCode split-screened with a Firefox window open on some routing algorithm related site and Rust documentation on another tab. Oh, and music in the background. I also make my own milk tea and drink that while working. Sometimes I stream coding on Discord, feel free to come watch! >_<

What transit do you ride?
I use public transit for my daily commute to and from school! I live like 13-14 km/8-ish miles away so there's two route that I take - either the OCTA 167 or Irvine iConnect + OCTA 79 if it's faster. And yes, I use Catenary maps to track the vehicles :D. I usually use the bus trip to school to wake up, maybe study a bit and read through my emails. On the trip back, I'm either working on something, or reading and relaxing. I hope one day public transit can be accessible and reliable everywhere!

In other transit news...

Thanks for reading this first-ever Catenary Changelog! Until next time, keep being awesome and riding trains! - Samuel