Traccar 3.0

June 27, 2015

The long-awaited new version of the web interface is finally ready. Version 3.0 of Traccar GPS tracking system is available for download.

WARNING: it includes a lot of major changes since the last release, so I expect that there will be a fair number of bugs, especially on the web side. So, if you need stability, I would recommend skipping this release.

WARNING: the database structure has changed, so if you want to keep your data, you need to copy data from old database tables to the new ones.

This is the first major update in a long time. The main feature is the web interface, completely rewritten in pure JavaScript. For the initial release the target was to implement the same functionality as the old version, so there is not much difference in terms of new user-visible features.

There are a lot of under-the-hood changes and improvements:

• All strings used in the web interface are now located in a single file, which should make it easy to implement localization
• Proper password hashing with salt will significantly improve the security of user data over the old plain-text approach
• Live instant updates of current locations using long polling instead of the periodic updates implemented in the old web interface
• New JSON API to allow developers to easily implement their own web or mobile interface for the Traccar GPS system
• As the new web interface doesn't use GWT RPC any more, it should be possible to proxy Traccar to integrate it with existing websites and add SSL support
• All database queries are now configurable to allow more flexibility and SQL optimizations
• New reverse geocoding provider support (Gisgraphy) and major changes to the module which would allow customizing address output in the future

The new web interface is based on the ExtJS 5.1 JavaScript library and the OpenLayers library version 3 for map drawing. The initial release points to the debug versions of the libraries to allow easier investigation of possible problems, but in the future it will use minified versions to improve performance even more.

In addition to that, there are quite a few bug fixes and, of course, support for new protocols:

• Tytan - GPS device manufacturer from Poland
• Avl301 - protocol used by Tzone AVL301 GPS tracker
• Castel - protocol for SinoCastel GPS devices
• MXT - MaxTrack MXT protocol (Brazil)

One of the features planned for the next release is support for commands. I expect it to be ready soon, so Subscribe to get notified about new releases and other updates.

Discuss it on the forum.