I’ve been looking at any apps that would help someone find available bicycles with their Android-based phone.

I previously tried Velimap and MyCityBikes and liked them but they didn’t support Bixi. I contacted both their authors but didn’t get much further.

Yesterday I came across Veloid which suppor Bixi but also bike sharing networks in another 30+ cities! I find this very interesting for anyone traveling with their Android phones 🙂

I really like the interface, although the option menus differ from standard dialogs. The official website has a very nice flash animation that shows best all its features, this is an example of it using Bixi:

I also came across SpotCycle, developped by 8D Technologies. Recognize the name ? 8D is the creator of the parking meter systems in Montreal, which also run Linux internally. Proudly Québécois 🙂 And no, I am not affiliated to them in any way. Although minimalistic, Spotcycle works well and does its job. It only supports the Bixi networks in Montreal and Ottawa, though.

I am still confused as to why there is no obvious licensing information on most apps found on the Marketplace. I wish I could easily see if an app is GPL or not and I’d like to be able to report bugs and other stuff easily. I guess I have too many bad habits from Ubuntu 🙂 Perhaps any Ubuntu + Android users have found how to do this before me ? Granted I haven’t looked much into it I have the best excuse as I recently welcomed a 5 member in the family. It seems many Marketplace apps users only feedback mechanish is the comments section.

Anyways, I lacked the time to take any interesting screenshots today but I’ll try to post some more soon. Meanwhile, enjoy biking!