{"id":37,"date":"2008-03-02T16:28:30","date_gmt":"2008-03-02T21:28:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gabeanderson.com\/2008\/03\/02\/how-to-hack-your-nano-nike-run-data-when-ipod-freezes\/"},"modified":"2008-04-04T08:57:00","modified_gmt":"2008-04-04T12:57:00","slug":"how-to-hack-your-nano-nike-run-data-when-ipod-freezes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gabeanderson.com\/tech-blog\/2008\/03\/02\/how-to-hack-your-nano-nike-run-data-when-ipod-freezes\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Hack Your Nano \/ Nike+ Run Data When iPod Freezes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today was my weekly Team in Training run — I’m training for and planning to run a marathon to raise money<\/a> for blood cancer research — and 6.61 miles into the run, my iPod Nano froze on me for the first time in the month that I’ve had it (yes, it let me down after I raved about it in my last post<\/a>). I was really upset that I was not only going to lose my run data, but that I wouldn’t get the mileage credit for the Articulate miles challenge<\/a>. I ended up doing another 2+ miles for a total of 8.78 miles. <\/p>\n

So on my drive home from the run, aside from being bummed, I started thinking about how to fix this. I thought that there had to be some way to hack into the iPod to recover my lost run data — or at least simulate the run based on similar run data.<\/p>\n

Sure enough, I was right: My run data was lost during the iPod crash, but I was given the opportunity to tackle a fun technology challenge. <\/p>\n

I got home and started doing some Google searches to research the topic before I just started digging into my iPod’s hard drive. I found a couple resources with the info I needed — “MadeUpName’s” method outlined on runpl.us<\/a> and WalkBlogRun’s method here<\/a> — and pieced together my own approach that did the trick beautifully. <\/p>\n

Here’s how I did it — proceed with caution and at your own risk<\/strong> to your data and software:<\/p>\n

The Setup<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hacking your iPod’s run data requires that you create and edit XML files, so before you can do that, you need to confirm two things (both were already the case for me):<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Make sure iPod is set to be a disk (check the Enable disk use<\/strong> box on your iPod Summary tab in iTunes).<\/li>\n
  2. Make sure you can see hidden system files & folders in Windows (XP how-to<\/a> | Vista how-to<\/a>).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    The Backup<\/strong><\/p>\n

    As is the case whenever you’re editing pretty much anything — especially files that help drive your iPod and iTunes software — always make a backup first since you never know what might happen:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Connect your iPod to your computer.<\/li>\n
    2. Navigate to this path (yours may vary):
      \nG:\\iPod_Control\\Device\\Trainer\\Workouts\\Empeds\\<unique ID><\/em><\/li>\n
    3. Copy the entire contents of that folder to your hard drive (2 folders — latest <\/em>and synched<\/em>, and 5 files — best<\/em>, calibration<\/em>, settings.plist<\/em>, lastWorkout.xml<\/em>, and preferences.xml<\/em>).\n

      iPod Nike+ run data folder<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      The Hack<\/strong><\/p>\n

      Now that you’ve backed up the key files, you’re ready to get down ‘n dirty. It just so happened that, in my case, the run I did today was the same run I did a couple weeks ago (February 16) in terms of location, mileage, and rough pace. So that made copying the run data fairly easy. Along with that, I also wanted to ensure my last workout and workout summary data were correct. <\/p>\n

      So there are 3 things you need to do:<\/p>\n

        \n
      1. Create or copy your new run data (the XML file named after the date & completion time of your run — e.g., 2008-03-02 08;14;25.xml<\/em> — that’ll begin with the <sportsData><\/em> tag inside the file) to your latest<\/em> folder.<\/li>\n
      2. Update your lastWorkout.xml<\/em> file.<\/li>\n
      3. Update your preferences.xml<\/em> file.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        Those last two files are used to display your run summary data in both iTunes and in your iPod. Here’s what the screen with that info looks like in iTunes:<\/p>\n

        iTunes Run Summary Data<\/center><\/p>\n

        <\/p>\n

        So here’s what I did for each of the above steps:<\/p>\n

        1. Copying run data.<\/strong><\/p>\n

        The first thing I needed to do was to re-create today’s lost run data file by duplicating the data for the last time I did the run and update it with today’s date:<\/p>\n