How to Remove MileBug Backups from your iPhone

An iPhone MileBug user wrote in asking if there was a way to remove old backup files from his iPhone. There certainly is, and such, I thought there may be others out there wondering the same questions.

WARNING: For either answer, DO NOT DELETE "appData.mbdata"

Short Answer:  via iTunes File Sharing.

Step-by-step answer:

1) Connect your iPhone to your computer, open iTunes, select your iPhone listed on the left

2) Choose "Apps" on the top and scroll down to "File Sharing"

3) Select MileBug and you'll see your backup files listed on the right

4) Select the files you wish to delete and hit "Delete" on your keyboard

5) DO NOT DELETE "appData.mbdata" as this is your current working database for MileBug

Don't be afraid to write-in with questions. We would love to help you, and more than likely there are others out there looking for the same answers.

Facebook Fan Page Up and Going!

The MileBug Facebook Fan Page is growing! So come join the fun, leave comments, share your favorite destinations...or your biggest deductions!

We also have secured the custom URL, www.facebook.com/milebug, which we were able to do once we got our 25th fan yesterday. Thank you to the first 25 fans that allowed us to do that. We're now up to 42!

Please come LIKE us on FACEBOOK and join the fun!

More Feature Requests - Need More!

OK, so we've heard from some of you. Let's hear more. As it stands, the list of desired new features is as follows, sorted by most requested:

1) Select from Contacts when add new trip
2) End date/time
3) iPad Version
4) Multiple destinations per trip
5) Add person's name to the reports
6) Backup to iCloud

Please comment below or send in your votes and requests via the Contact Us form above.

This goes for all you Android users out there, too!

IRS Increases Mileage Rate to 55.5 Cents per Mile

For the second time in three years, the IRS is making a mid-year increase in the deduction rates for miles driven for business and medical/moving. It's a nice little healthy jump too! For July 1st through December 31st:

Business rate is now 55.5 cents/mile (up from 51)
Medical/Moving rate is now 23.5 cents/mile (up from 19)
Charity rate remains the same at 14 cents/mile

See the IRS site for the official statement:
http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=240903,00.html?portlet=6

MileBug 2.1 - GPS Full Path Tracking with Map Display

Last night MileBug 2.1 hit the App Store with the most exciting feature of the year - GPS Full Path tracking with Map Display. Ever since Apple allowed apps to run in the background, users have been requesting full GPS tracking. Now it's here - http://bit.ly/MileBug!

When adding a new trip, select "GPS Tracking" under the odometer readings on the Add Trip screen. This will slide on a Map View and show your current location. Simply tap "Start Tracking" and MileBug will drop a pin every time you move more than 1/10 mile. You can return to Add Trip and fill in the rest of the information, save it, and even leave MileBug to open other apps. As long as MileBug is running in the background (which it does by default), it's tracking your trip.

At any time, you can open the Trip and return to GPS Tracking and see your path on the map. Your path is drawn on the map, with dragable pins every 1/10 mile. To edit your path, you can drag pins around, remove pins, even add new pins. If you happen to forget to turn off GPS tracking when you arrive at your destination, you can easily trim your path to the correct pin when you do remember.

Full Path GPS Tracking is in the full version only. MileBug Lite GPS is only "as the crow flies" and does not include map display.

Please let us know in the comments below how it's working for you and suggestions on improvement, or even new features for our next release.

MileBug in the App Store - http://bit.ly/MileBug

Link for MileBug on Android

Unfortunately Android Market doesn't allow direct links to apps from a web page, but here's the Cyrket link that will get you there:

http://www.cyrket.com/p/android/com.izatt.milebug/

Open that link on your device and click the QR code to get to MileBug in the Android Market.

First episode of iPhoneDevShow with MileBug Developer now posted

As mentioned in a previous post, I was invited as one of two guests on the inaugural episode of the iPhoneDevShow by TheDailyAppShow last month. The video of that show is now on the site:

iPhoneDevShow: Episode 1 (26 January 2010)
http://thedigitallifestyle.tv/home/2010/2/3/behind-the-apps-google-courting-iphone-devs-for-android.html

MileBug hits "What's Hot" list in U.S. App store!

What a great surprise to see MileBug in the "What's Hot" section of the U.S. App Store!

THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR WONDERFUL SUPPORT!

New MileBug VIDEO Review

Check it out, the AppPodCast posted their VIDEO review of MileBug:

http://theapppodcast.com/milebug-mileage-log-iphone-app-review

Video Review of MileBug on TheDigitalLifestyle.TV

Great news! Ryan Ritchey of TheDigitalLifestyle.TV has done a video review of MileBug. Just check out the link below:

http://tinyurl.com/milebug-video

Apple Store: Icon collage includes MileBug

The Apple Store at the Gateway in Salt Lake City presented a collage of various iPhone application icons...and MileBug is included! Can you see it?

Another Izatt app icon is actually the most prominent icon in the whole collage...Fingerspell!

Can you find yours?

Reports: Copy/Paste for Mac users best with Office 2004 or newer

Working with a customer, we determined that copying and pasting the emailed reports will work properly if the user either has Windows Office 2000 or newer, or Mac Office 2004 or newer.

Older versions result in all the data in one column in Excel or a running sentence/paragraph in Word.

UPDATE: MileBug 1.3 is HERE!

Here it is! Update 1.3! Here's what's new:

1) Origin or Start Location
2) International currency support
3) Grand total km/miles and deduction across businesses
4) Display vehicle in trip list
5) Additional instructions on key screens
6) Localized to Swedish
7) Bug fix - Swedish support on dates in report

ENJOY!!

How to Restore MileBug data from iTunes

An alert customer sent this in and another customer has already found it to be successful. I have not verified it myself, so I would appreciate feedback and additional guidance to other readers as you use this approach.

For MAC:

1) Just go to the directory, /Users/[username]/Library/Application Support/MobileSync, and you will see a folder called Backup.
2) Enter Time machine, and replace your backup folder with the most recent one from a time when all was well
3) go to your iPhone in iTunes, right click on it and select restore from backup...

For PC:
1) Save off the backup files as a copy somewhere
2) Connect your iPhone to the computer, but don't sync, cancel it if it starts automatically.
3) go to your iPhone in iTunes, right click on it and select restore from backup...

-- see http://www.maciverse.com/restore-your-old-iphone-backups.html

"for me I only had to re-enter one day of trips... genious. Credit goes to some blogger out there somewhere. It was too late in the evening to take it all in! Hope that you can use that to help any other folk out there."

Editing Destinations and Purposes

It seems there's some confusion on how to edit, delete, and reorder destinations and purposes. So here's another blog post to help you out.

Simply select Businesses in the Presets. Then select the business that has the destinations and purposes you want to edit. You'll then be able to edit the business name and type/rate, as well as edit/delete/reorder the destinations and purposes for that business. It's that easy!

Also see the earlier post: Reordering Presets: A hidden feature

Reports: Date sorted...or Business/Vehicle sorted?

A couple users have inquired about why the emailed report is not sorted by date. However, upon closer examination, you'll see it is sorted by date...but within each business/vehicle.

When we were designing the report, we had to choose between listing all the trips by date, regardless of business, and listing the trips by business/vehicle. Since each business, and vehicle within a business, needs to be submitted separately to the IRS or to an employer, we opted for grouping the trips by business, then vehicle, sorted by date within a business/vehicle.

So if you look closely, you should see that all the trips for one business are together in chronological order, followed by the trips for the next business, and so forth. If multiple vehicles were used in one business, then the trips are sorted by vehicle first then date.

New IRS Rates: Effective January 1, 2009

The IRS has issued its new tax deduction rates for 2009. Come January 1st, please email yourselves a full report of your 2008 trips, and then clean out the Trips List. Then change the rates for your businesses/charities/medical/other categories to the following:

Business: $.55/mile
Charity: $.14/mile
Medical: $.24/mile

MileBug Story Hits DIGG Front Page!

TheAppleBlog ran a story last night entitled, "9 iPhone Apps for Your Car" that included links to reviews for each app listed. MileBug was among those 9 apps and the story hit the DIGG Front Page for Technology just before midnight! It's still there this morning with 415 diggs. In the MileBug review, he said, "The trip log that I liked best is MileBug from Izatt International."

Very Exciting! Spread the news!

U.S. IRS tax deduction rates

July-Dec. 2008
------------------
Business: $0.585/mile
Charity: $0.14/mile
Medical: $0.27/mile

Using Kilometers: Accessing your iPhone Settings

Basically, Apple has designated the iPhone/iPod Touch General Settings as the place to make "set once" choices that affect the behavior of an application. This is where the kilometers/miles setting can be found.

On the home screen, there is an icon labeled "Settings" that is gray and looks like a gear. Open "Settings" and scroll to the bottom of the screen. There you will see a selection for each application you have installed that has "set once" choices. MileBug will be listed, and by selecting it, you will find the following options:

1) Open To: (Trips List or Add Trip)
2) Measurement: (Kilometers or Miles)

So to use kilometers, simply select kilometers for the Measurement setting and return to MileBug.