Automaker navigation could get cheaper with a hybrid navigation unit developed by Harman International for Mercedes-Benz. It’s partly integrated into the car and doesn’t require the automaker to lock in a navigation design three years in advance. Harman made the announcement in a quarterly financial statement that was reported by TWICE. It’s described as a two-piece solution: a cradle-mounted screen with controls plus a hidden processor unit that also includes Bluetooth and music storage. Harman says the device will first appear in eight Mercedes-Benz models in the second half of 2010, mostly likely meaning 2011 models.
Google’s released Latitude, a Maps tool that allows for automatic tracking of friends in real time, using a laptop, Symbian 60, Blackberry, WinMo and soon, iPhone or Android.
Laptops and cellphones (when not using GPS) can locate to a fair level of accuracy using geotagged Wi-Fi and cellular tower points in a database that Google’s collected on its own, perhaps while doing Streetview photography. Or you can set your location manually. Google told me that there’s no set standard for how often the map updates your location. Rather, they have an algorithm that depends on how often the device has moved, historically, and how much battery your device has left. You can also sign out of the service entirely, and set per user preferences on whether or not certain friends can see your location at all, or if only on city-levels of accuracy.
Google says its been useful for family members to find out if they’re stuck in traffic, or on their way home. I tested the service with some people I know, but its been hard to say if its useful for a guy who has loved ones in generally predictable places. I generally know where my friends are, more or less, or can find out by texting them. I’d probably use this service more often while skiing or picking up friends at the airport, but not day to day. I mean, sure, I can turn off my privacy, but wouldn’t people used to seeing your location at all times be suspicious if you suddenly turned off permissions when you want privacy?
Then again, maybe it would be nice to know when my father is playing golf in HK (all the time) or when Lisa is eating at her favorite place in Tokyo for Ramen, or where my brother is on tour with his band. That would be interesting, I suppose. But most of the time, most of us are in front of our computers. Until we’re not. And that’s where the phone clients come in.
Most phones will be able to keep the map location updated in the background. Except the iPhone. What the iPhone users can do, as a work around, is to lock the phone with the Google app running. That’ll keep the phone updating until batteries die.
The Blackberry, WinMo and Symbian phones and laptops/Desktops can use Latitude now by downloading the most recent version of Google Maps or hitting Http://google.com/latitude. The iPhone gets it with an updated version of the increasingly powerful Google app, soon, as does the Android powered G1.
So, the groundhog everybody loves to hate, Punxsutawney Phil, saw his shadow yesterday, leaving us with six more weeks of winter. But, don’t get discouraged! There are still great bargains for you to take advantage of from the comfort of your home. Check out Gearlog’s deals for Tuesday, Feb. 3:
1. Amazon’s Deal of the Day today is the Sony NVU73T 4.3-inch Widescreen Portable GPS Navigator for only $99.95. The GPS system is normally $250, so you’re saving 71 percent off.
2. If you’ve never seen Planet Earth, you must go out and buy this DVD immediately. Planet Earth, the Discovery Store’s best-selling DVD of all time, is on sale right now on Blu-ray for just $34.99 (normaly $99.95), or on standard DVD for $39.99 (regularly $79.95).
3. Check out HandHeldItems.com to save up to 85 percent off of second-generation iPod accessories. Prices start as low as $3.99. Save an additional 20 percent when you apply coupon code TUCHI20. [Via Bargainist.com]
One of the more interesting announcements at CES 2009 was Nokia’s Location Sensor concept, but since it recalls GPS location tech already available, it sort of flew under the radar. But new information revealed recently on the Nokia Research site suggests that the company has bigger ideas than just finding an easier way to find your lost keys through sensors.
The LBS (location-based services) concept is rounding out to feature a full indoor service for large buildings and institutions (like hospitals) that improves on current GPS tech. It will most likely aggregate a sensor’s location through a combination of RFID tags, bluetooth, and NFC to send direct info to your cell phone. The hybrid LBS system should improve upon the current limitations of GPS tech, according to a Nokia research doc: "[GPS devices] don’t work well in the structures in which we find ourselves every day, such as offices, shopping malls, hospitals. . . 80 percent of our time is spent indoors."
Among the limitations most often mentioned are transmission problems (with terrain, distance and interference effects), length of finding a location, and battery drainage. Adding multiple reference data points into one easily accessible app should greatly improve location accuracy. Other companies already have LBS locators that push location info to websites, but access is still restricted.
The current version of the concept includes sensors embedded in a keychain-sized box (see right) that is hitched to individual personal items. The sensor wirelessly sends the location info of each item to a smart phone app that tracks and manages each item. The distance range of each sensor is around 100 meters for now, but they’re working on extending it.
The sensor concept also supports 100 individual sensors at the same time. There’s no word on how often it will update location data, or whether this only includes sensors provided by Nokia. The most useful application, of course, would be one that was open and compatible with other LBS services.
The potential applications for this tech are numerous.
The LBS advertising seen in Minority Report could make shopping more useful and promotions would be easily tailored to people walking through their doors. Of course, customers should have the option to turn it off and be OK on getting called on their last underwear purchases by a giant smiling screen saying your name for all to hear. I’d love it if the app automatically geo-tagged your pics down to specific halls of large museums, like NY’s Metropolitan. Currently, an LBS in Japan sends messages to sleeping train riders when they reach their destination.
According to Gartner analysts, the number of people receiving LBS services will move from 43 million in 2009 to 300 million by 2011.
But improved, hybrid LBS isn’t the only interesting application the Nokia research team is working on. Recently, the company demoed Point & Find, a tech that helps mobile users find info about show times and prices of movies by pointing their camera phones at movie posters.
As is becoming increasingly clear, Nissan seems to be intent on having cars do everythingshort of drive themselves, and it’s now taking yet another step in that direction with a proposed system that would prevent drivers from going the wrong way. While it’s all still in the planning stages at the moment, the system would apparently make use of a cellular-connected GPS unit that would not only be able to be able to warn the driver if they’re headed into the wrong lane, but alert them if they should be slowing down on a downhill stretch, or if they’re approaching an area prone to congestion. There’s not much else in the way of details just yet, unfortunately, but Nissan has apparently enlisted the help of the West Nippon Expressway Co. (or West NEXCO), and it’s promising to demo the system for the press as soon as they have something ready.
If uPlay’s uPro was the “iPhone of golf GPS technology,” what then would you call this? Savant GPS has just come clean with what’s likely to be the most sophisticated GPS rangefinder to date. The simply-titled OnPar measures in at 4.17- x 2.8- x 0.63-inches and features full touchscreen (3.5-inch) operation. It’s also claiming to be the planet’s first “GPS rangefinder with a dynamic hole layout display and GPS positioning that provides instant distances to anywhere and remaining distance to the green, personalized club averages, and simple score and shot tracking.” The unit is designed to hold up to 300 golf courses with no membership fees or course map fees, and it’ll be available for the taking (er, purchasing, we should say) early next month for an undisclosed price.
This article was written on June 04, 2008 by CyberNet.
With the WWDC conference quickly approaching, rumors are running rampant about not only the next iPhone, but also when the App Store will launch. News.com is reporting that Apple is ready to launch the first app on Monday and so people are drawing the conclusion that the App Store will launch on Monday as well. Originally it was said that the App Store would launch by the end of June, so is Apple just ahead of the game or will it only be announced on Monday and released later?
There’s so much hype surrounding the App Store because this is the way that people will be able to get their hands on all of the third-party applications that have been developed. Ever since the SDK was made available, developers have been hard at work trying to come up with applications that both iPhone and iPod Touch (assuming they pay the fee to get the update) users will want to use. We already know that an AIM client is in the works, as is a mobile version of Spore, along with hundreds of other applications.
As some of you have probably heard rumored before, the new iPhone is expected to have support for GPS technology. News.com makes a good point and says, “the combination of GPS and faster networking speeds should allow for a whole range of location-aware applications to proliferate on the iPhone, as they have on other competing phones.” Oh the possibilities this brings to the table now!
We’ll be following the WWDC keynote scheduled to start at 10:00 A.M. (Pacific) on Monday, June 9th. It should be an interesting day…
If that ’92 Riviera is getting a bit long in the tooth, Alpine’s got a trifecta of ways to simply spruce it up rather than take on an all-too-burdensome new car payment. Both the IVA-W203/P1 and IVA-W505/P1 are double-DIN head units with touchscreen displays (6.5- / 7-inches, respectively), support for iPods / sat ratio / HD Radio / Bluetooth, preloaded NAVTEQ maps of the US and Canada, a foursome of map viewing options and text-to-speech for good measure. For those with single-DIN gaps in the dash, there’s the all new IVA-D106, which offers up a slide-out 7-inch touch panel, 18-watt x 4 amplifier and support for navigation via the optional NVE-P1 drive. All three systems are available as we speak for $1,100, $1,400 and $350 in order of mention.
Anyone that dreads the thought of needing to take a GPS beyond the comfy confines of their vehicle will likely want to steer clear of these, but the more adventurous out there will no doubt find plenty to like in Lowrance’s new trio of GPS units. Appropriately (if unimaginatively) dubbed the Outback, Safari, and Sierra, these each boast 2.7-inch LCDs, along with a microSD card slot, all the usual outdoor-friendly GPS features, and some nifty additions like a barometric altimeter and 3D electronic compass on the higher end models. Look for them to be available in May for between $230 and $550.
We’ve had discussions surrounding those petite navigators that stay safely within the confines of your vehicle, but it’s about time we broke it back out for the argonauts in attendance. We’ll let Tyler take it from here:
“I’m an avid hiker, and I’m looking to get a new outdoor-centric navigator that can withstand the elements and last a good while without a charge. I’m particularly interested in getting one with extra features like a trip logger and multimedia player, but obviously I’m trying to spend the least amount while not sacrificing usability. Any other outdoorsy individuals have any advice?”
Once you’re back in from the tent, why not give this some thought and chime in? After that, feel free to send in a question of your own at ask at engadget dawt com.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
With the WWDC conference quickly approaching, rumors are running rampant about not only the next iPhone, but also when the App Store will launch. News.com is reporting that Apple is ready to launch the first app on Monday and so people are drawing the conclusion that the App Store will launch on Monday as well. Originally it was said that the App Store would launch by the end of June, so is Apple just ahead of the game or will it only be announced on Monday and released later?
We’ve had 