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Jun

Report: Google Set To Buy Collaborative GPS Navigation Company Waze For $1.3 Billion

Posted by Jeremiah Rice in Applications, Google, News

If you haven't been following the broader tech news lately, GPS navigation provider Waze has been the corporate equivalent of a desperate college freshman, trying to find a match before the end of the first semester. The scuttlebutt is that both Apple and Facebook have shown interest in acquiring the Israel-based company within the last year. Now two credible sources, Israeli business websites Globes and Calcalist, report that Google has swooped in and agreed to purchase the company for a cool $1.3 billion.

What's so great about Waze? Its mapping system incorporates data submitted by tens of millions of users, whose smartphones collaborate to make the GPS service more accurate and flexible.

May

Google Enables Biking Navigation In Google Maps For Germany, France, Poland, Ireland, Luxembourg, and Liechtenstein

Posted by Ryan Whitwam in News

Bicycling enthusiasts in Europe (of which there are many) are getting a present from Google today with the addition of biking directions in Google Maps for six new countries. Cyclists in Germany, France, Poland, Ireland, Luxembourg, and Liechtenstein can now pull down routes that take into account the available biking trails, paths, and lanes. This applies to mobile and desktop apps.

When biking directions are selected in Google Maps, it chooses routes that avoid busy streets, and sends riders down dedicated bike paths where available. Google worked with other organizations in a few countries to catalog all the bike paths, but several hundred kilometers of trails were added by users.

May

[New App] Magellan Releases SmartGPS Turn-By-Turn App To Complement Standalone GPS Unit You Probably Won't Buy

Posted by Ryan Whitwam in Applications, Apps/Games, News

GPS veteran Magellan announced the SmartGPS system back at CES, touting its social networking integration and "cloud" stuff. The device has just gone on sale in the US for $249, but along with that comes the SmartGPS app. This is a free download that lets your smartphone talk to the GPS unit. If you don't want to buy a $249 GPS unit that duplicates the functionality of your phone, the app includes additional features for a price.

The free version of SmartGPS lets you search for destinations and plan trips. It contains a full US and Canadian map with tons of points of interest.

Apr

In California, Using Your Maps App Is Just As Illegal As Texting While Driving, Court Says

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Legal, News

Texting and driving is a pretty heinous crime. Bad enough that it's spawned entire ad campaigns devoted to educating the public on the dangers of such acts. Of this, you are no doubt aware. What you may be less aware of is the fact that figuring out where you're going is exactly as dangerous as sending someone a message that says "Doesn't the Peachoid look like a giant..."

California, despite having no known Peachoids, knows this very well and a court has ruled that using a mapping application is just as bad (and illegal) as texting behind the wheel. This isn't the first time California has come down hard against GPS in cars.

Mar

[Meta] New At AndroidPolice.com - Post Navigation With Keyboard Shortcuts [Updated: New Functionality]

Posted by Artem Russakovskii in Tips & Tutorials

Last Updated: March 8th, 2013

Being a huge fan of keyboard shortcuts (I have most of Gmail's keys memorized and use them exclusively for maximum productivity every day), I jumped at the opportunity to add similar functionality to AndroidPolice.com itself.

On various pages of the site that contain multiple posts, like the homepage, category, author, and tag pages, you can now:

press "j" to jump to the next article in the list
press "k" to jump to the previous article in the list
press "o" or "Enter" to go to the article that's closest to the top of the visible browser area
(new) press "O" to do the same as above, except in a new browser tab/window
(new) press "c" or "C" on a post page to zoom to the comments box

Furthermore, if you're at the end of a list, pressing "j" will advance to the next page.

Jan

Google+ Update Gives Notifications Their Own Special Tray, Adds Community Management Features, And More

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Applications, News

Can we be honest with ourselves for a bit? Notifications on Google+ have sucked for a while. It's never clear what's new and what's old, they're cluttered with information, and up until recently, they've been tucked away in the app underneath the sidebar navigation. Well at least one of those problems is getting fixed today as the Android app gets an update that creates a special new section for notifications on the right-hand side of the app. Also, you can access it in more places! Not everywhere, but a lot more!

^{Left: Old style notifications, below the side bar navigation.}

Dec

Google Maps Navigation Support Doc Updated To Include Bulgaria, Slovakia, 8 More Countries, Release Probably Not Far Off

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Google, News

In times past, we've seen Google add new countries to its list of supported territories for Google Maps Navigation shortly before we see the update itself rollout. Today, there's been a pretty huge change to that document that added 10 new nations including Bulgaria, Estonia, Ghana, Iceland, Ivory Coast, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Senegal and Slovakia (for some reason Singapore appears to have been added to the list, even though that nation already has Navigation).

Right now, it doesn't look like Navigation has actually appeared for the countries in question, but if history repeats itself, the service should appear for residents of these nations before too long.

Nov

Google Maps Navigation Goes Live In Mexico

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Applications, News

Update: Many of you in the comments along with @GoogleMexico have confirmed that navigation went live earlier today. Congratulations!

Google Maps Navigation(Beta) ahora disponible para Android en México. Descarga la versión más reciente en Google Play: goo.gl/DgNq8

— Google México (@googlemexico) November 28, 2012

Original story below:

It doesn't mean anything yet, and we'd be hard-pressed to tell you when it will mean something, but if you were to take a look at this help file listing countries where Google Maps Navigation is available, you'll see a relative newcomer to the crowd: Mexico. Countries have appeared here prior to their initial release before, so we can expect that support will be added before too long.

Nov

[Update: It's Live] Rdio Beta Review: Bugs Aside, Spotify Could Learn A Thing Or Two From This App

Posted by Eric Ravenscraft in Applications, News, Reviews

To call Rdio's latest beta a complete overhaul might be a bit of a misnomer. The feature set is largely the same, even if the design has gotten a facelift. However, seeing as the music streaming wars are heating up, it seems like a perfect time to take a second look at the service that always seems to play second fiddle to the behemoth that is Spotify.

Update: This version of the app is now live.

For the uninitiated, Rdio (ar-dee-oh) is a music streaming service with both web and Android-based applications. New users can get a limited amount of free music via the site.