Problem with the "explore" part, in the application

Bug Reports
1

Hello.

It’s been several times that I notice that the application does not recognize certain places, in the “explore” part of the application while the places in question are displayed without problems on the website.

Is this an app bug?

Platform (Android, iOS, Website): Android

App version number, if a mobile app issue (shown under Settings or About): 1.26.7

Browser, if a website issue (Firefox, Chrome, etc) :

URLs (aka web addresses) of any relevant observations or pages:

Screenshots of what you are seeing (instructions for taking a screenshot on computers and mobile devices: https://www.take-a-screenshot.org/):

Description of problem (please provide a set of steps we can use to replicate the issue, and make as many as you need.):

Step 1:

Step 2:

Step 3:

2

Can you please include screenshots of some examples? Without specific examples it’s very difficult to diagnose a problem.

1 Like
3

as far as i can tell, the Android app’s Explore page allows you to filter by places that have been defined within the system, while the website allows you to additionally filter by places defined in Google Maps. this provides the ability to search by many more places in the website, though usually the Google places will be represented by only a very rough box (as opposed to a more precise polygon), and there can also sometimes be issues trying to return / match Google places vs iNaturalist places when places with similar names exist in both systems.

i assume that it was intentional to allow the app to search only by iNaturalist places, since that would simplify the development and maintenance of the app and also keep it lightweight on a mobile device.

if there is a particular place that you search for frequently, you could just add that place in iNaturalist (from the website), and then you would be able to use your new place in the app.

2 Likes
4

I have experienced this too. Example, the Android app cannot find Foster, Victoria (in Australia), but the website can.

Edit: the other way around, I can select Oceania in the Android app but it doesn’t exist in the website.

5

it does exist, but this is one manifestation of the Google place vs iNaturalist place matching issue i noted above. there are other reports of cases like this, if you search the forum. some cases are more problematic than other cases, and some are more like actual bugs than other cases. but the solution (workaround?) for these cases usually is:

personally, i almost always filter for locations using Filter > More > Places. the only time i might use the Location box (next to the Species box) is if i can’t find the place the other way, and i don’t want to bother adding (or can’t add) a new place to the system.