Location Tracker

Importing the Google Timeline history

In 2024 Google moved Maps Timeline to storage on the phone and stopped showing it on the web. Google still lets you export the history, and Dawarich can import three kinds of Google export: the Semantic Location History files from Google Takeout, the older Records.json file, and the Timeline export made on the phone. This install was filled from a Google Timeline export. Dawarich can also import OwnTracks, Strava, GPX and GeoJSON files and the location data in photos, and it can export everything as GeoJSON or GPX.

The map

The map shows the history for a chosen period, with layers you can turn on and off: each recorded point, lines joining the points in order, a heatmap, Fog of War, which covers everywhere you have not been, and a scratch map, which shades the countries you have visited. The scratch map needs the country of each point, which comes from reverse geocoding (see below).

Stats, trips and visits

• Stats shows the total distance travelled, the number of points recorded and the distance for each year, with a page for each year that breaks it down by month.
• Trips are made by choosing a start and end time. Each trip shows its route on a map, its distance and duration, and notes you add.
• Areas are shapes you draw on the map, and Dawarich records each visit to them.

Some features need the name of the place each point is in, which Dawarich gets from a reverse geocoding service: the countries and cities visited in Stats, the scratch map, and suggested visits to places outside your areas. In Dawarich 0.37.1 this is turned on by setting a Photon or Nominatim host, or a Geoapify or LocationIQ API key, in the app’s environment.

How it runs

The setup is Dawarich’s own Docker Compose file with four containers:

• dawarich_app, the Ruby on Rails web app, on port 60005 of the Mac.
• dawarich_sidekiq, which runs imports and other background jobs.
• dawarich_db, PostgreSQL 17 with PostGIS 3.5, using an ARM build of the PostGIS image so it runs natively on Apple silicon.
• dawarich_redis, the job queue and cache.

The database, imports and uploaded files are kept in named Docker volumes on the Mac. The installed version is Dawarich 0.37.1, released on 30 December 2025. Dawarich’s README asks users to read the release notes before updating and to keep their original export files after importing.