August updates
Hi all,
It’s been since April that we haven’t done another community update. Back then, we announced our migration to new servers, we’ve announced that we would have 2 students at open Summer of code 2015 and that we would start building a GTFS ourselves, as the law would now permit us to do so. NMBS/SNCB will open up their data by the end of this year… but why wait if their data is already on their website?
Launch of GTFS and GTFS-RT for the SNCB
Check out http://gtfs.irail.be! It now contains data from NMBS/SNCB for 2015, including our first realtime feed for the Belgian railway company (huge news for techies)! This feed contains the updates such as train delays and notifications on the entire network. You can discover what’s in this GTFS-RT by checking out our new dashboard http://analytics.irail.be.
2/3d of the iRail team at open summer of code 2015’s final event
The project has been developed during open Summer of code 2015 by Brecht Van de Vyvere and Tim Tijssens. A report on their 3 week journey can be read over here: http://open.summerofcode.be/?s=gtfs.
Nice GTFS bla bla… but what does it mean for me?
If you are not technical, you might be delighted with this news: you can now do intermodal route planning across entire Belgium with apps such as CityMapper and Ally.
Walking to Hasselt station with @Citymapper. The first time I have a 100% realtime intermodal exp in Belgium @iRail pic.twitter.com/Lh6Wk1jANI
— Pieter Colpaert (@pietercolpaert) August 1, 2015
Furthermore, also webservice creators such as the guys from Navitia.io implemented our feeds in their webservice! As a developer, you can now use their API to get route planning advice from A to B across Europe.
After @citymapper, also @canaltp integrated our @SNCB #GTFS into @navitia! Their API: http://t.co/uY1mDbtVQW
— iRail (@iRail) August 3, 2015
New apps on top of our API
RailerApp
I know, this one was also announced in the April updates, but hey… they now added support for the Apple Watch!
apple watch with NMBS/SNCB info
Version 1.4 has just been submitted to the App Store. Featuring Apple Watch App, location awareness and a lot of other cool new stuff.
— Railer (@RailerApp) August 10, 2015
Trainfo
A new Android app hit the market. Let us know what you think!
Gebruik nu Trainfo om live notificaties te krijgen over mogelijke trein vertragingen. http://t.co/Ntnerl1MP9 #Trainfo @NMBS #RailTime
— Dirk Vranckaert (@dirkvranckaert) August 3, 2015
Our servers
Moving away from apache, now installing nginx and varnish for cachability. We used to have varnish installed over apache a while back. Then we’ve decided to put HTTPS on all our domains. Now, we’re going to make our servers faster again by installing varnish. This will be done by the lovely people of skyscrapers (who gladly gave me a spot to work when I was in Antwerp last week 😉 ).
Thank you @skyscrapers @BurooZ @SamClinckspoor: checking all the boxes pic.twitter.com/M2mxWK40ZB
— Pieter Colpaert (@pietercolpaert) August 7, 2015
The future
Want to contribute to iRail? We’re in desperate need of some extra hands. We’re organising an event in September to get more people on board. Do stop by!
We need your help: https://t.co/mDVoCvE31q Ready to contribute to #iRail? #opensource #nodejs #laravel #angularjs #php
— iRail (@iRail) August 11, 2015
One more thing…
We might get NMBS/SNCB support in Google Maps earlier than you think…
And everything went from wrong to right. And @irail came out to fill up the sky… pic.twitter.com/Bq1MsX0bjK
— openOV (@openOV) August 3, 2015
It’s great to see a community that started 5 years ago more alive than ever!
– Pieter
