PostRunner

PostRunner is an application to manage FIT files such as those produced by Garmin products like the Forerunner 620 (FR620), Forerunner 25 (FR25), Fenix 3, Fenix 3HR and Fenix 5. It allows you to import the files from the device and analyze the data. In addition to the common features like plotting pace, heart rates, elevation and other captured values it also provides a heart rate variability (HRV) analysis. It can also update satellite orbit prediction (EPO) data on the device to speed-up GPS fix times. It is an offline alternative to Garmin Connect. The software has been developed and tested on Linux but should work on other operating systems as well.

Installation

PostRunner is a http://www.ruby-lang.org application. You need to have a Ruby 2.0 or later runtime environment installed. This application was developed and tested on Linux but may work on other operating systems as well.

$ gem install postrunner

Usage

Importing FIT files

To get started you need to connect your device to your computer and mount it as a disk drive. Only devices that expose their data as FAT file system are supported. Older devices use proprietary drivers and are not supported by postrunner. Once the device is mounted find out the full path to the directory that contains your FIT files. You can then import all files on the device.

$ postrunner import /run/media/$USER/GARMIN/GARMIN/ACTIVITY/

The above command assumes that your device is mounted as /run/media/$USER. Please replace $USER with your login name and the path with the path to your device. Files that have been imported previously will not be imported again.

Viewing FIT file data on the console

Now you can list all the FIT files in your data base.

$ postrunner list

The first column is the index you can use to reference FIT files. To get a summary of the most recent activity use the following command. References to already imported activities start with a colon followed by the index number.

$ postrunner summary :1

To get a summary of the oldest activity you can use

$ postrunner summary :-1

To select multiple activities you can use a range.

$ postrunner summary :1-3

You can also get a full dump of the content of a FIT file.

$ postrunner dump 1234568.FIT

If the file is already in the data base you can also use the reference notation.

$ postrunner dump :1

This will provide you with a lot more information contained in the FIT files that is not available through Garmin Connect or most other tools.

When you upload your FIT data to the Garmin Connect site using WiFi or Garmin Software, your device will be updated with 7 days worth of Extended Prediction Orbit (EPO) data. The GPS receiver in your device can use this data to acquire GPS locks much faster during the next 7 days. To fetch the current set of EPO data, just use the following command while you have your device mounted via USB.

$ postrunner update-gps

This was tested on the FR620 and FR25 and will probably also work on the FR220. Other devices may work, but you use this at your own risk. This feature will download a file called EPO.BIN and copy it to GARMIN/REMOTESW/EPO.BIN.

Viewing FIT file data in your web browser

You can also view the full details of your activity in your browser. This view includes a map (internet connection for map data required) and charts for speed, pace, heart rate, cadence and the like.

$ postrunner show

This will open an overview of the most recent activities in your web browser. It will use Firefox by default. You can overwrite this by setting the BROWSER environment variable.

To view a specific run directly, you can use similar specifications like those explained above.

$ postrunner show :1

Contributing

PostRunner is currently work in progress. It does some things I want with files from my Garmin FR620. It's certainly possible to do more things and support more devices. Patches are welcome!

  1. Fork it ( https://github.com/scrapper/postrunner/fork )
  2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b my-new-feature)
  3. Commit your changes (git commit -am 'Add some feature')
  4. Push to the branch (git push origin my-new-feature)
  5. Create a new Pull Request

License

PostRunner is licensed under the GNU GPL version 2.

The distribution includes third party components that are licensed under different OSI compatible terms.