I suppose the image of picturing birds with backpacks tend to see my mind be drifted to Daffy Duck or Donald Duck carrying a backpack, but in real life, things are very different as researchers from the University of British Columbia have strapped a couple of British Columbia subspecies of Swainson’s thrushes with penny-sized, state-of-the-art geolocators, in order to help them map out the birds’ wildly divergent migration routes as well as discover the exact location of the secret Rebel base, wait a minute there, I meant, conservation hotspots.
Kira Delmore, a PhD student with UBC’s Department of Zoology and lead author of the paper, said, “Birds of a feather do not necessarily flock together. Our teams of thrushes took dramatically different routes to get to their wintering grounds, either south along the west coast to Central America, or southeast to Alabama and across the Gulf of Mexico to Columbia.”
Good thing the geolocators do not run on Apple’s Maps app, as researchers might then be on the end of a gingerbread trail that could have led them to the Arctic circle instead.
Interior navigation with Google Maps for Android has usually been the province of only a handful of regions at best. But what about Provence? While the deal isn’t all-encompassing, Google is now serving indoor maps for popular locations throughout France. Coverage starts with the major airports in Paris and Lyon, extending to include major nationwide stores like Carrefour and FNAC, shopping centers like the Carrousel du Louvre and museums like La Géode. All told, over 50 venues have signed onboard and should be enough for those moments when you’re rushing to catch a connecting flight at Orly… or just want to find the salad dressings in aisle three.
You might have noticed a brouhaha over map accuracy in iOS 6. Nokia undoubtedly did, as it’s using the iPhone 5 launch to remind us that its strategy has been all about location lately. The crew in Espoo has pitted Nokia Maps from the Lumia 920 against both Apple’s equivalent as well as Google Maps — and to no one’s surprise, Nokia’s own platform comes out on top. In practice, it’s a relatively frank comparison that doesn’t try to win on every point. Nokia tends to use a liberal definition of the term “3D” that includes augmented reality, but it’s otherwise willing to emphasize its advantages in offline mapping and the sheer scope of its mapping coverage. Apple’s very young mapping effort struggles, while Nokia is willing to accept that it doesn’t have as much traffic coverage as Google. There is, however, the slight problem of the Lumia 920 not yet shipping: unless you’ve been blessed with a prototype of the Windows Phone 8 device, Apple and Google are the only ones that have their latest navigation software on a phone you can actually buy. Hit the source for the full, very tall chart as well as a few sly jabs at Nokia’s competitors.
If you’re a secretive person in the UK, you might want to stay away from Nestle candy for the next few weeks. Nestle’s new marketing campaign, called “We Will Find You,” has embedded six GPS trackers in in candy such as Kit Kat bars in an attempt at a Willy Wonka-style promotion. The difference is in the movies, you saw your Golden Ticket when you unwrapped a bar. In real life, when you open one of the winning candy bars, you won’t know until Nestle tracks you with the embedded GPS activated when the chocolate is unwrapped. So, if you’ve bought Nestle candy, there could be a very determined PR representative tracking you down. On the bright side, once he or she finds you, you’ll receive a check for £10000, or about $16000.
Navigon’s gearing up for tomorrow’s big day by updating its, erm, Navigon and StreetPilot Onboard apps. The refreshed software adds support for the iPhone 5‘s new 4-inch display as well as baking in public transport listings to Cupertino’s presently underwhelming mapping offering. It’s also gaining the promised “last mile” function to record the location of your car when finishing your journey on foot, sparing you the embarrassment of getting lost in the multi-storey lot when you return. The company’s offering a $10 discount on its apps if you pick ’em up before October 3rd, while the in-app purchase of Urban Guidance has been reduced from $5 to $3 for the same period.
Update: We’ve had a note from Garmin to say that while Navigon update is now available, StreetPilot Onboard has been slightly delayed.
Apple’s free iOS 6 update pushed out to iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch owners yesterday, has already begun provoking strong reactions from users, with the homegrown Maps app singled out for most criticism. Replacing Google Maps on the iPhone 5, Apple’s version has won praise for its eye-catching “flyover” 3D mapping and slick integration with iOS as a whole, but also come under fire for patchy and inaccurate data.
The mounting tensions between Apple and Google are believed to be the root cause of Google Maps’ being replaced, with Apple looking to control its own navigation experience instead of preloading its rival’s software. TomTom and OpenStreetMap have provided the underlying data on top of which Apple built its own interface. However, the usefulness of that data is in question today.
Much of the frustration appears to have come from international users, rather than those in the US, with Apple’s mapping data and satellite imagery for locations outside of the US coming in for criticism. The software suffers from out-of-date points of interest, the BBC reports, with some towns in the wrong position geographically or missing altogether, and search results prompting unlikely suggestions for straightforward queries.
TomTom has denied culpability, pointing out that it’s up to vendors like Apple who license its data to add “additional features to the map application such as visual imagery” and describing its mapping content as only the “foundation” of any service. Google has invested significantly into collecting its own location data, for instance dispatching Street View vehicles around cities to gather street-level photography.
Although there’s no way to avoid installing Apple Maps as part of iOS 6, and no option to reinstall Google Mpas from iOS 5, there are several third-party alternatives on offer. Some are available via the App Store, with ZDNet flagging up a soon-expiring deal of a year’s free Telenav premium service (the offer runs out by the end of the week), while others can be accessed via the browser.
Google Maps itself can of course be found at google.com/maps, but another solid option is Nokia Maps, which was launched as an HTML5 option for iOS and Android users earlier this year. Accessed at m.maps.nokia.com, it includes turn-by-turn navigation for cars, mass transit, and pedestrians, including optional audio guidance, satellite view, live traffic data, and more.
If you’re determined to stick with iOS 6 Maps, however – which also includes turn-by-turn navigation, for the first time in the native iOS mapping app – it’s worth remembering that you can report incorrect locations via the map itself and help Apple refine its data that way. Apple told SlashGear after the iPhone 5 launch last week that it expects third-party vendors to deliver mass transit guidance for users, at least initially.
Unhappy with Apple’s own Maps app? Happy with iOS 6 in general? Or holding off from upgrading until any early bugs have been ironed out? Let us know in the poll below, and then head over to our iPhone 5 review for more details.
We’ve all been there: drunk, flat phone battery, lost and unable to find a cab. While usually the only solution is to sit on the sidewalk and weep, if you were wearing Dominic Wilcox‘s new No Place Like Home GPS shoes, you’d be able to make it home by just looking at your feet. More »
“Appcessories” is probably one of the more abrasive, yet devilishly descriptive, portmanteaus we’ve heard in recent years. But, if you’re still not sure what it means, consider the Rhythm pulse monitor from Scosche a perfect example. The forearm-mounted device is a pulse / heart rate monitor with an iOS companion app. Working with some of your phone’s inner smarts (like GPS), along with a dedicated accelerometer, the hardware / software combo logs vital data from your work out, which you can then share with the world, or enjoy broken down into detailed statistical analysis. If you’ve ever gone jogging with your iPhone, you’ll know how fiddly it can be to change music tracks on the hop, so you’ll be pleased to know the Rhythm covers that too. If this sounds like what your workout is missing, you can strap-up right away from any Apple or AT&T store (real or online) for $99, with other outlets, including Best-Buy stocking in time for Christmas.
Goodbye everyone! I’m moving to the UK where I will eat my weight in chocolate. Coincidentally, Nestle’s just kicked off a campaign where it’s embedding GPS trackers in candy bars. If you unwrap one of six winning sweets, they’ll find you within 24 hours and award you 10,000 pounds and the rights to legally change your name to Charlie Bucket. More »
Canon has outed its latest DSLR, the EOS 6D, packing a 20.2-megapixel full frame sensor and integrated WiFi and GPS for transferring geotagged photos and video more easily. Directly taking on Nikon’s D600, the EOS 6D has a freshly designed CMOS paired with Canon’s DIGIC 5+ Image Processor, supporting 11-point AF and ISO 100-25600 (extendable to 50, 51200 and 102400).
There’s 63-zone dual-layer iFCL metering and 4.5fps continuous shooting, along with various preloaded “creative modes” including a built-in HDR photography option – combining three exposures of the same frame into a single image, without requiring post-processing on a computer – and a Multiple Exposure mode which can combine up to nine images.
Video is captured at 1080p Full HD resolution, with support for 30,24, and 25 fps, while 60fps and 50fps are supported in 720p mode. The camera also offers manual control over exposure and audio levels while recording.
On the back, there’s a 3-inch 1,040k dot VGA resolution LCD display, which promises 100-percent coverage during video recording, as well as a viewfinder. Inside, meanwhile, you get both a WiFi chip and GPS – two options most DSLRs would demand you add separately – which allow the EOS 6D to offload its photos and video to your computer, smartphone or tablet, or indeed be remotely controlled via the free Canon EOS Remote app for iOS and Android. Geotagged content can be subsequently shown on a map with details of where, exactly, it was captured.
The Canon EOS 6D will go on sale in December, priced at $2,099 body-only. It will also be offered as a kit, with Canon’s EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USZ zoom, for $2,899.
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I suppose the image of picturing birds with backpacks tend to see my mind be drifted to Daffy Duck or Donald Duck carrying a backpack, but in real life, things are very different as researchers from the University of British Columbia have strapped a couple of British Columbia subspecies of Swainson’s thrushes with penny-sized, state-of-the-art geolocators, in order to help them map out the birds’ wildly divergent migration routes as well as discover the exact location of the secret Rebel base, wait a minute there, I meant, conservation hotspots.
