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Montebello Software has released an update to Ascent. 1.6.0 Improvements and Bug Fixes:

• New Feature: added speed, pace, gradient, and cadence zone support; ranges are settable in a new preference pane
• New Feature: paths in the Detailed Map View can now be color-coded by zone
• New Feature: laps can be highlighted in the Detailed Map View
• New Feature: new zone types can be displayed in the Activity View
• New Feature: zone type can be selected in the Activity View Statistics HUD
• Added preference to set "below zone" color for heart rate coloring
• Fixed problem with "last sync time" set incorrectly when tracks synced in an un-registered version of Ascent
• Added "Are you sure?" dialog to "Clear Map Cache..." menu choice
• Fixed bug that caused wrong max heart rate values to be shown in the browser for laps when units were set to metric
• Fixed bug that was causing errors in "Active Time" displays for laps and tracks in the browser
• Fixed problem where browser would show wrong values for certain fields if activity started at a non-zero distance
• Fixed problem where selected activity after sync was not displayed in browser map or stat mini-views

Garmin released version 2.0.3 of their Training Center for OS X on May 4 (I signed up for notifications but never received one). Changes include:

• Implemented length restrictions to workout name, workout step name, course name, course point name, and speed zone name for compatibility with fitness devices. Using this version of application could cause existing names that exceed the length restriction to be truncated.
• Fixed an update issue with course point name.
• Fixed some XML export issues.
• Fixed a transfer issue with speed and heart rate values.

More info here.

Direct download.

A reader (yes, a reader of at least one of these blog posts...hard to believe it, eh?) pointed out in a comment today that Montebello Software makes an interesting app called Ascent which seems to fill in many of the gaps Garmin left with it's new OS X Training Center, and provides some extra functionality to boot.

Alas, you'll have to wait for a review since I won't be able to play with Ascent until tonight or tomorrow. It's nice to have options, tho, and it's great to see another GPS-enabled OS X app out there.

Version 0.4a of the iWorkout Dashboard Widget idget is now available for download. No additional modules or libraries are required. It should install out of the box. I've changed the naming scheme of the widget a bit, so please delete any existing widget you have installed before using this one.

This is still an alpha version since all it does is show your last workout and doesn't format some of the data as pretty as I'd like it to be. If you have any votes for how you'd like to interact with this widget and what you want to be able to do with the data, please leave feedback to this post since I'm more likely to work on features people actually want as opposed to my list of things I'd like it to do.

Major thanks to KT & Jeff for their testing and coding input. Once I get the Google Code project repository setup, you'll be seeing credit in the code.

Version 0.3a of the iWorkout Dashboard Widget idget is now available for download.

Even with the changes in 0.2a, there were still issues with the widget working for folks (XML::Simple was just not being found). So, I re-worked the module and library organization, cleaned up the code and am releasing this one for testing. Hopefully this will be "the one" so I can focus on adding the other features.

Reviewing the eCheck widget was a big help.

Version 0.2a of the iWorkout Dashboard Widget idget is now available for download. Due to all the problems folks were having dealing with the perl modules (and the ones I missed in the instructions), I spent some time figuring out how to encapsulate everything inside the widget itself.

I've tested this one on PPC and Intel hardware, and the PPC test was done on a machine that did not have the libraries and modules installed somewhere else.

If you have issues with this one, please drop a note in the comments feedback. If you do manage to play with it, please feel free to drop suggestions there as well.

With seven-or-so minutes left to go (at least here on the east coast), I present the iWorkout Dashboard Widget version 0.1a. Yes, this is *alpha* code and if it eats your iPod (unlikely), don't blame me.

Unfortunately, I have not had time to do a local build of perl that is a Universal Binary (UB), so I cannot build any modules as UB's (if I'm wrong about this - I got the impression from here - please post in the comment feedback so I can do this ASAP). Therefore, I opted to not include any perl modules local to the widget. That means you'll have to do some work if you want to use this widget. The final version will not require this work, so if you're not keen on opening up a Terminal (or iTerm) window and running some commands, I suggest waiting until this thing matures a bit.

As I mentioned here, I finally sub'd to the iPod Sport Apple forum and I saw other msgs indicating problems with the Nike+ site and data loss.

I should have a 0.1 alpha up tonight for those brave enough to try it out. All it will do is show the last run, but under the covers it slurps all of of the historical data still on the iPod into a SQLite database and even sucks in the entier sync XML file so I can add functionality later.

I'll post something here and to the forums as well once it's available. Unfortunately, it will require the installation of some perl modules. It's pretty easy to do this and the release version will have them fully integrated. I need to rebuild perl as a Universal Binary so I can then compile the necessary modules as UB's and then include them locally as part of the Dashboard Widget bundle.

If some kind sould would like to build XML::Simple, DBI and DBD::SQLite as "local" UB perl modules (I don't thiink XML::Simple requires it, tho) and send them to me, it would be most appreciated (and credited)!

I picked up a [Nike +] iPod Sport Kit today after reading enough blog entries of it working with shoes other than the Nike + brand.

My initial stab @ jury-rigging the attachment of the sensor worked fairly well, but I need better velcro to ensure a solid hold.

The iPod automatically reconfigured itself once the receiver was attached and iTunes walked me through setting up an account on the Nike site. It was all painless despite being most Flash once the process got to Nike.

I was too much in a hurry to calibrate the unit and it really showed. I compared the iPod Sport output to that of the Garmin Edge 305 and the iPod Sport was almost .5 miles off. I'll take time to calibrate it next run.

Apple really did a great job on the interface. The prompts are very clear with the perfect music fade to the background. The notification of how far along you are on the run is not that intrusive and it does help push you along.

I'll post more once I get it calibrated and do a run that isn't in 90°F heat.