Friday, April 4. 2008

Quote of the Week

PC World has a reasonably useful article on How to Buy a GPS. I give the author much credit for noting at the outset that if you don't go anywhere, you should go cheap, but if you travel to many different places regularly (salesperson) go big.

Which brings me to the quote - it relates to the timeliness of map updates for different units.

If you expect to use your GPS device primarily to find convenient java shops during occasional travels--or retail outlets that you've never visited before--working with less-than-up-to-the-minute mapping data is probably okay. And you can always turn to MapQuest for more-recent information.

No disrespect to MapQuest; I just find it amusing that the author assumes MapQuest (or likely any online site) will necessarily have more up-to-date information.

The Register Weighs in on Blue Dasher

The Register doesn't see the application of the latest offering to collect spherical images of a city from a five camera array sticking out of a car roof. "...it seems like using a technological sledgehammer to crack a nut." Still the paper does concede it could be useful for law enforcement.

Yahoo Maps India Adds Nine Languages

In what the Channel Times says is a unique move, the company will now offer the service in Hindi, Tamil, Kannada, Marathi, Gujarati, Telugu, Malayalam, Bengali and Punjabi. The article goes on to wonder if its worth the effort as the Indian population has limited Internet access and most people live in the cities. The offering includes many features including "key landmarks along the route (ATMs, hospitals, etc.), the walking direction."

Persistent Tracking in New iPhone OS

C|net's IphoneAtlas blog highlights location tracking in the beta of the Iphone OS 2.0. It provides location (cell tower based, per a comment) on a "persistently updating basis" making it "more like a real GPS." How does it work? "At this point the function (along with the entirety of iPhone OS 2.0) is somewhat flaky and slow, but promising."