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How many of us use a smartphone GPS app when playing?

SuperStroke
I use tour caddie through my whole round. I do t use the other phone features minus a text or two to rub my buddy in the other cart. No calls no noises etc.
 
Good thread. I like hearing about some of the asinine rules of golf. It's fun to share them with your golfing buddies whenever you hear a new one.
 
I rotate between golflogix and skydroid on the course. I only bought skydroid because it was 10 cents On the android market. I find skydroid works great and is such a friendly interface with less buttons to press than golflogix to get the same info
 
fupresti said:
Without data enabled on your phone your GPS won't work. The GPS on your phone is different then a GPS unit in a Garmin or SkyCaddie device. Mobile phones use a system called A-GPS, or Assisted GPS, which uses a combination of Satellite signals and transmissions from cellular radio towers. If you disable the data, it can no longer reliably calculate your position.
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Ay? I dunno about the phones in the US but my HTC ONE X, when I use FreeCaddie only connected via GPS has no problems and is dead accurate. There is no need to have data enabled to use it, sure if you had the pro version with hole flyover etc then those features wouldn't work. As a pure golf GPS it works perfectly with no data connection.
 
I use the oobgolf app with the phone set on silence.
 
I use mine all the time, but not during competitive rounds... It clearly states there has to be a local rule allowing them.

But for normal rounds with friends I use Golfshot GPS


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golfshot is a decent app. I am going to pick up the garmin watch over the winter and give it a try

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I use my phone all the time for GPS yardage. All I use it for is yardage. I turn incoming calls off. So its just used for yardage.
 
Is a dedicated gps device, worth the extra expense over an app based on accuracy?
 
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I was using the Swing by Swing app on my phone last year and up to the first half of the year until I decided to get a GPS watch, Bushnell NEO-X. The watch was more convinient and instant, granted it doesn't give me course layout and scoring capabilities but the app was getting in the way of just playing the game.
 
SaffaClint said:
I ask this because I was confronted by a senior member a few weeks back when playing a Saturday comp at our course. He saw me using my HTC One X and immediately told me I was in violation of the rules because it was a phone. I know the rules about measuring devices and politely explained to him that it was in fact ok to use a smartphone according to the R&A. He was a stubborn old guy so I turned my phone off and played the rest of the round. I went home and found this chart at http://www.randa.org/en/Rules-and-Amateur-Status/Rules-in-Focus/Archive/2011/March/DMDs.aspx
I printed it our and took it to the club when I knew he'd be there and handed it to him as proof. He was still stubborn but admitted as there was no local rule and I wasn't in breach and the club would look into making a local rule clearly defining conforming devices. I intend to follow this up because as I explained to him, golf's expensive enough and why should people be excluded from using a free app, nevermind that golf's ruling body says is ok.
I can see the problem with some apps, especially ones like golflogix and most pro versions with their hole flyovers etc which require the phone to have an internet connection and that's a whole other kettle of fish. Anyway, curious to know how many use these apps and if people are aware of the rules. I thought the link might help some people?
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Curious, what app where you using? And where you using it for keeping score or gps or both?

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I don't use a GPS app anymore on the course, I use the rangefinder all the time now, but I use Easy Scorecard Pro for scoring and stats. I've got an oob account and downloaded their app and actually like it quite a bit, I'm just so used to opening ESP that I typically use it.
 
I'm not in a club nor do I play comps, so I use Golfshot GPS all the time. GPS on the course, and I only enter my stats after the round, never during it (I make shorthand notes on my scorecard during play).

As I'm still unfamiliar with most courses around me, the GPS aerial view is a real help to me.
 
I use FreeCaddie, not the pro version. All I need for the app to work is a GPS signal. The beauty of it is that I don't need data enabled to use it which is why by my reckoning it's a legal device. For me to know the weather and temperature I need to turn my data on. Read the flow chart, I'm not wrong. Any dmd needs to be allowed by local rules. If there are no local rules in place then all dmd's are illegal to use.
 
Here in UK - most courses do NOT allow smartphone apps - because they 'can' be used for weather, wind etc - but do allow DMD that do not have this function.

This is the same game that relies on its players to call penalties on themselves regarding a ball moving...seems a little inconsistent, but there you go.
 
During practice rounds I use the Golfshot, the GPS is on, but I use it only when the visibility (fog or something) is so poor that my rangefinder cannot give me any readings.
 
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The most important point here is the question, "Does the application". It doesn't ask, does the device. That to me makes it pretty clear that a phone is fine because to access weather conditions etc a browser needs to be accessed.
 
I use my phone with Golfshot for yardage measurement and keeping score. Several of the tournaments I have played in allowed the use of it. What I don't understand about that chart is where it says "Does the device contain other applications or features (golf related or otherwise) capable of measuring conditions or providing information(e.g. compass...." How the hell can you cheat with a compass?
 
SaffaClint said:
Ay? I dunno about the phones in the US but my HTC ONE X, when I use FreeCaddie only connected via GPS has no problems and is dead accurate. There is no need to have data enabled to use it, sure if you had the pro version with hole flyover etc then those features wouldn't work. As a pure golf GPS it works perfectly with no data connection.
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Here in the US, nearly all modern phones are also perfectly capable of very accurate GPS-only measurements. A-GPS is only used to speed up acquisition of satellites in most cases, and to provide location estimates for things that can't wait for satellite lock (911 calls, stuff like that). I've used an old, disconnected android phone that is even tied to a provider I no longer use. Works fine as a golf GPS and I don't have to risk dropping my new, way too expensive phone on a cart path or in a water hazard. I guess in that case it also could feasibly avoid the rules issue since being completely out of subscription means it has no capability of providing anything but GPS data. Well... I guess I could turn on my mobile hotspot and consume that with the disconnected phone's wifi...

amazon has upro mx+ devices at a crazy discount right now. Sure they're year-old tech but new in the box. I'm going to pick one of those up to avoid any issues with rules.
 
Ex golfshot user here, I moved away from the app because it took too much time for me to put the score, how many putts, If I hit the fairway, if there was a penalty shot, sand?, which club did u use to tee off?

I use the time in the cart between a green and the next tee to reload and forget about the last hole, good or bad. I got to a point that I was either scoring all this while driving to the next hole, or I have my partner waiting for me to finish my scoring so we could drive away.

anyways... I use a rangefinder now and I take the scorecards with me every time I can.
 
I use golfGPS app
 
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