Using Routino as a free offline route planner

Browsing

To access the web interface for the program, you have to install the routino-www package first:

sudo apt install routino-www

This will install also the Apache web server (if you don't already have it) and some other dependencies. The contents of the Routino web are in /usr/share/routino/www , and you should make them accessible for the Apache web server with:

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /usr/share/routino/www

In theory, you should now be able to visit http://localhost/routino with your browser and see the map information, but if you open the address, you'll see controls on the left of the window, but a blank space where the map should be on the right.

Turns out the program cannot find an essential component, leaflet.js , a library that reads and graphically shows map data. Download it from [11] and unzip it to /var/www/html/javascript/leaflet . You will have to do this as root, which means you will again have to make the contents accessible for the server before everything works correctly:

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/javascript

The final step is to make sure Apache understands and executes correctly the Perl-rich pages Routino generates to show the results – which is something else that is messed up in the web interface in Ubuntu.

The first thing you have to do is make sure the /etc/routino/apache.conf looks like what you see in Listing 2.

Alias /routino /usr/share/routino/www <Directory /usr/share/routino/www>
 AddHandler cgi-script .cgi
 LanguagePriority en
 ForceLanguagePriority Prefer Fallback
 Options +ExecCGI
 AllowOverride None
 Require ip 127.0.0.0/255.0.0.0
 Require host localhost
 <FilesMatch .*\.pl$>
  Require all denied
 </FilesMatch>
</Directory>

You can comment out the lines

Require ip 127.0.0.0/255.0.0.0
 Require host localhost

so they look like this:

#Require ip 127.0.0.0/255.0.0.0
 #Require host localhost

Because then you will be able to access the web interface from any device on your local network rather than just from the machine on which the program is running.

In the next step, open the /usr/share/routino/www/results.cgi file and change the line that says

require "router.pl";

to

require "/usr/share/routino/www/router.pl";

Save and close the file.

You have to do the same with the /usr/share/routino/www/router.cgi and change the line that says

require "router.pl";

to:

require "/usr/share/routino/www/router.pl";

In /usr/share/routino/www/router.pl , you have to change the line

require "paths.pl";

to:

require "/usr/share/routino/www/paths.pl";

And the line that says

require "profiles.pl";

to:

require "/usr/share/routino/www/paths.pl";

Finally, in /usr/share/routino/www/statistics.cgi , change the line

require "paths.pl";

to:

require "/usr/share/routino/www/paths.pl";

Once you're done with the changes, you can restart the Apache web server:

sudo systemctl start apache2

Then, visit http://localhost/routino and start planning your trips. Figure 3 shows what the web interface looks like once it is working.

Figure 3: The Routino web interface offers the same functions as the tool for the command line, but with a nice graphical interface. Be prepared to do quite a bit of tweaking to get it to work on Ubuntu.

You will find the navigation function on the left side of the interface and the results on the right. Settings include options for the interface language, a maximum of nine route points, transportation method, conditions along the route, and the type of use.

However, we were unable to get the green line that marks the shortest route between the points or the blue line that represents the fastest. These lines do show up on the demo site at [12]. However, if you float the cursor over the directions on the left, a circle will show up on the map showing where you should be.

Pressing the left mouse button lets you move the map section. In order to recalculate the route, you should first move the corresponding point on the route and then click either on the Shortest route button or on Fastest route .

You will find the results for the route, the appropriate GPX track, various route descriptions, and also the corresponding coordinates on the Results tab. Routino uses the Data tab to reference the database that has been used. This means that Routino provides information on the number and size of the nodes and also the stored segments.

In Practice

The times calculated by Routino for the route should be taken with a grain of salt. Figure 2, for example, shows that Routino indicates that the nearly 10 kilometers between Pacific Grove and the Monterey Airport in California requires seven minutes. In reality, this amount of time only applies when the road is empty of all other traffic, all lights are green, and the maximum permissible speed is maintained.

Uwe Steinmann is the developer behind the software. He himself admits that the time indications are optimistic and that the program does not take traffic volume into account. Routino derives the travel speed solely from the type of roadway. Since calculations have been done offline purely according to distance, the speed factor appears to play a subordinate role [9].