Tag: Navigation »

Easy Trails GPS, the navigation application made specifically for outdoor enthusiasts, has updated to 6.0 and added new features and interface changes with the release.

The interface for Easy Trails GPS 6.0 has been significantly changed with this update. The interface design was rewritten completely from scratch to keep in mind usability. The new interface displays every feature of the application regardless of the current activity going on, making it easy to switch between Easy Trails GPS’s many features.

Other features added in the release is support for Retina display devices, sharing location via Twitter, the ability to archive up to 1000 tracks and 2500 waypoints, waypoint proximity alerts can be turned on with use of the Notification Center, exporting all track information, and the ability to copy and save waypoint pictures to the clipboard or the iOS camera roll.

Easy Trails GPS is available for $3.99.

Regular users of public transport know that it's a bit of a maze to navigate through. It's all too easy to stick with the tried and tested routes while still not really knowing anything else about travelling around a city. HopStop sets out to help in such matters by offering detailed public transit, walking, taxi and biking directions for dozens of cities throughout the US, Canada and Europe.

A free app, HopStop offers directions from the user's current location, the ability to find nearby subway stations or bus stops along with estimates for taxi costs ensuring there are plenty of options.

High quality transit maps are available for NYC, LIRR, Metro North and San Francisco, with updates for NYC transit advisory services. Further biking directions are available for cities such as NYC, Washington DC, Chicago and San Francisco.

For the disabled users, it's easy to see what services are wheelchair accessible, plus calorie consumption and carbon emissions are calculated for the health and environment conscious.

HopStop is out now and set to solve everyone's travelling woes in both new and familiar cities.

One of the most popular (and expensive!) navigation apps on iOS, TomTom, has just released it’s newest update, 1.8, that includes a new add-on called TomTom Traffic HD. The add-on, available via in-app purchase, helps the driver find solutions to avoid traffic jams and delays. The traffic is advertised to update every two minutes, providing incredibly up-to-date traffic information. The in-app purchase for the TomTom Traffic HD service costs $19.99. The TomTom Traffic HD service is part of TomTom's recent mission to reduce traffic congestion everywhere. Read more about TomTom's traffic reduction plans here.

Also available with the 1.8 release of TomTom is multi-stop routes. Users can now add up to five planned stops for their trips. iOS navigation apps are getting closer and closer to rival their dedicated GPS system counterparts. And with the release of TomTom’s 1.8 release, it just got closer. I personally don’t use a dedicated GPS system; I use iPhone GPS apps like TomTom. The 1.8 release also updates the map including recent road changes.

Ever wonder where the heck something is? Sure there's Google Maps but it's not always the easiest way of searching for something. As Jeff pointed out a while back in his review, Where To? does exactly that. It was good back then and now it's had a huge update making it all the better.

In the latest update, FutureTap has added a plethora of useful features. Perhaps most useful of all is the ability to view business hours for each destination. It's easy to turn up at a store too late without realizing, or visit the cinema before it's opened - something like Where To? sets out to eradicate that problem. Throughout the experience, a compass style directional arrow points the user in the right direction and links up with Google Earth. This means that users who have never seen their destination will have a great idea of what they're looking for with an actual view of the area. In the U.S and Canada, turn by turn navigational app MotionX GPS (purchased separately) drive can also come in handy here with the Where To? app linking up with it to provide accurate directions within the app. Previously, there was already connectivity with Navigon MobileNavigator and TomTom.

There's even now improved functionality for the visually impaired, courtesy of VoiceOver support, providing directions and distances continuously announced to help any such users.

Where To? was already a great app with over 2,400 brands searchable via the app and the Augmented Reality tools superimposing search results onto the live camera video, but this update looks set to have made it even more vital for those in need of some help travelling.

Where To? is available now for all iOS devices. It's priced at $2.99 with an in-app purchase of $0.99 adding Augmented Reality features.

There's a new competitor for the navigation app throne and its name is Don't Panic. Admittedly this is a new competitor for the UK crowd as it only currently works in the UK but it could be well worth a look for those from these fair shores.

Don't Panic promises to be precise in its turn by turn instructions as well as speedy with some impressive promises of being up to 100 times faster than its competitors. An intuitive search feature is easily and instantly accessible from any point within the app and the ability to find destinations via partial addresses and points of interests is possible along with other typical navigational features.

A constant internet connection isn't even needed as the maps are available offline presumably aiding the speed issue hugely with promises of no stuttering or image lag.

For the asking price, Don't Panic offers unlimited free updates for the app with iPhone users exclusively getting unlimited free updates on the maps that come with the app itself.

Don't Panic is available now for UK users and priced at £19.99.

Ideal for electric car owners based in the US is Recargo, an app that offers users the ability to find electric vehicle charging stations nearby them.

Besides using a simple Google Maps-esque interface to help users find the nearest charging points, there's also the ability to plan trips according to these stations. It's a particularly useful feature considering electric charging stations aren't as widespread as regular filling stations, ensuring that users need never worry about running out of power.

Community features also exist within the app with the ability to view the latest news from plugincars.com as well as share photos through the app. There's even a Foursquare style checkin feature which could potentially be very useful for electric car owners to get to know other ecologically minded people.

It looks like electric vehicles could well be the future and apps like Recargo are certainly setting out to help this trend develop.

It's out now and it's a free app compatible with all iOS devices.

Maybe I still haven't fully accepted technology for just how wonderful it really is, but it still impresses me hugely when my iPhone can tell me exactly how to get from one place to another within seconds. Presumably, there's a future ahead of us where no one can ever get lost, all thanks to wonderful GPS and Google Maps. This future should clearly include Maps+, a new app from IZE Ltd which aims to build upon the uses that the built in app Maps already offers.

Maps+ brings with it the lofty promise of ensuring that its users will never be lost. A tap of a button ensures that users can pinpoint their location on the map with another tap enabling a compass feature that then rotates the map to match the direction that the user is currently facing.

Users can easily search for an address using the search function and even co-ordinates can be searched if the full address isn't known. Route directions are simple to acquire then with car, bike (in the US) and pedestrian paths being available to consult. There's also the added benefit of being able to set midway stopping points if the user wishes to stop at certain other locations on the way.

If the user is waiting to reach their destination via public transport, they can even set up an alarm that's dependent on location so they need never miss their stop on the train for example.

Particularly useful to fitness addicts, there's also a feature to record the route taken via GPS so that users can keep track of the path they've taken.

Simple social networking features are also available whereby users can view their friends' tweets and the location in which they were tweeted.

Maps+ offers a lot in its quest to be more feature rich than the bundled app of a similar name. It's certainly worth a look for those after a bit more to the free GPS navigation apps currently available.

Maps+ is available now and is compatible with all iOS devices. It's a free app to download but there are some limitations that are bypassed with a $2.99 in-app purchase.

Ever wonder why it's so hard to find a good parking spot downtown? Perhaps ninjas are stealing all the good spots at the local garages. Well, if you're in San Diego, you too can be a parking ninja, thanks to an app called, appropriately enough, Parking Ninja.

Designed to help San Diego residents find parking garages near them while out and about in the beautiful city. It shows you nearby parking garages, as well as their prices and phone numbers. This app may come in handy especially for visitors to San Diego Comic-Con who rent cars to drive into the city, so they can see where they can park as close to the convention center as possible.

While Parking Ninja is only available for San Diego right now, this could be a useful app if it expanded out to other major cities, after all, ninjas don't just live in San Diego.

WHERE, recently updated to 4.1, is a geolocation app designed to help users find places to go to based on their current location, with the ability to list your favorite places. The 4.1 update adds in new features designed to bolster the social aspect of the app. You can now Bump phones with other users of WHERE to get shared recommendations for places to go with them, called 'Perfect Places'. As well, there's now expanded Facebook support, with the ability to find WHERE users among your Facebook friends, and to check in with Facebook Places using WHERE. As well, you can share your WHERE Lists with your WHERE friends and search within those lists and your friends lists as well. WHERE is currently available from the App Store for free, and promises unique content for attendees of SXSW in Austin, TX this March 11th-20th.

Seriously, if it's free and will help you be much cooler than you already are, how can you go wrong? For all you fun seekers and SXSW attenders, this one is a no brainer.

Everyone knows that in order to organize their lives, sometimes lists are a necessary evil, just to help maintain the sanity.  Further helping to cut through the mental fog, timed schedule reminders will can once again aid in burning through the mental clutter.  But what if there was another way to keep your head straight that didn't necessitate a specific time frame or list?  While it may not seem completely apparent, geographical location can play a big role in choosing what tasks you choose to tackle on a daily basis.

Seeing this niche, and taking the phrase, "If you're ever in the neighborhood..." to heart, Hillcrest Lab has created an app that keys on the innate need to make life as efficient as possible.  Regions is your one stop app for reminders based on your location. It is so simple to use, they can describe it in no time flat:

Regions is a simple iPhone app that reminds you to do things based on where you are. It won't kill your battery either. It does one thing and does it well. Regions provides just enough functionality to get the job done and avoids getting in your way.

So how simple is the software to use?  All you need to do is place a pin on the map, set a notification reminder and warning radius, and the tool does the rest.

It is always awesome when functionality meets a need that we never even knew we had.  That said, I can't even count the number of times that I have driven past a store and though that I would take care of something next time I passed through, only to kick myself later when it slipped my mind.

Those days are a thing of the past, as Regions hopes to revolutionize the travels of a multitasking mind.  For under two bucks, it is bound to make an instant impact.

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My wife and I decided to eschew family Christmas traditions and make our own this year by visiting Disney's Magic Kingdom in Orlando. The experience itself was wonderful, in spite of surprisingly large crowds when we visited on Christmas Eve (no fault to Disney there, but even THEY seemed overwhelmed by the numbers that visited the park). But what amazed me the most about our trip is how essential our iPhones have become to every aspect of our travel. From navigation to photography to even Disney park preparation, our iPhone 4(s) had us covered every step of the way.

Our single-purpose GPS is way out of date (I'm the cheapskate and can just never bring myself to pay for map upgrades) so we decided to try out MotionX GPS Drive on this trip and the results could not have been better. MotionX GPS Drive has recently received a much-requested upgrade adding full-voice support for street names, so this new feature was added just in time for our trip. Mind you, neither the app nor the full-voice is perfect. "Exit 83-A" was commonly referred to as "Exit 83uh" and other street names were mangled from time to time, but as a whole the new voice functions worked well. And then there was the time when we needed to travel to the Animal Kingdom Lodge for dinner at African restaurant Boma. When I selected "Boma's at Animal Kingdom Lodge" from the app, it began navigating us, but our destination ended up at the main gate of some Orlando resident's palatial estate. A little fine-tuning was needed, but the app finally got us where we needed to go. MotionX GPS Drive is also a steal from a financial perspective - $0.99 for the app with guided navigation for $2.99 for 30 days. MotionX wisely does not auto-renew, so you only need to pay the navigation fee when you really need it, which is a very nice touch.

Once in the park, we had two go-to apps - Undercover Tourist and Hipstamatic. If you're unfamiliar with Undercover Tourist, it's an app designed to give you information about anticipated crowds at the various Disney parks and queue wait times at rides within the parks. Unfortunately, Undercover Tourist pushed an update right before our trip and it broke the app on my iPhone 4. I was hopeful when I saw a new update released, but mine still crashes. My wife, ever reluctant to update apps, still had an older version on her phone, so we were able to use it. The crowd forecast for December 24th (color coded: red for heavy, yellow for moderate and green for light) showed green so we thought we had it made. Like I said earlier, the crowds seemed to surprise even Disney, so I can't really blame Undercover Tourist for a mistake in its data. The good news is that the queue estimates were generally accurate and helped us, particularly early on, decide where to go and what to do. And since the app is free (there is a paid ad-free version) there isn't much I can complain about.

Finally, what would a trip to the Magic Kingdom be without lots and lots of pictures? Sure, the iPhone 4 has a much-improved camera, but I'm a sucker for the retro surprises generated by Apple's iPhone App of the Year Hipstamatic. I suppose it's because my first trip to the Magic Kingdom happened only a year or so after the park opened, but I love the washed-out, 1970s style prints that Hipstamatic generates on the fly. Changing virtual lenses and films was a great way to while away the time spent in long, long lines (the Haunted Mansion line was longer than I have ever experienced), and the photos the app took are some of my favorites from this trip. There's a reason Apple selected Hipstamatic, and it's primarily because of its easy of use, versatility and overall fun-factor.

So, we're back home now, but there's no mistaking that the iPhone 4 changed our Disney experience for the better. For one thing, it was the first time we didn't have to lug around a heavy, cumbersome camera throughout the park; but beyond that, it made the day more pleasant, more organized and a lot more fun to remember.