I switched to the stock Apple Maps app on my iPhone (from Google Maps) about a year ago and haven't really had any issues. I remember when Apple Maps first came with my iPhone 5 some seven years...
I switched to the stock Apple Maps app on my iPhone (from Google Maps) about a year ago and haven't really had any issues. I remember when Apple Maps first came with my iPhone 5 some seven years ago. It wasn't very good then. But in the time since, they've done a fair bit to close the gap. Google Maps is stiill better, but not enough to justify the amount of data they collect on me to make it that good.
They don't do public transport routes for my city, which pretty much disqualifies the app right there. I have this theory that all these Silicon Valley companies aren't used to good public...
They don't do public transport routes for my city, which pretty much disqualifies the app right there. I have this theory that all these Silicon Valley companies aren't used to good public transport options and don't prioritize it (even Google Maps took years to implement it and it's still a bit shitty).
The original Apple Maps didn't do public transit, either. I think the reason public transit always seems to be a tacked-on feature is that they're marketing toward the majority of the US, which...
The original Apple Maps didn't do public transit, either. I think the reason public transit always seems to be a tacked-on feature is that they're marketing toward the majority of the US, which means prioritizing dinosaur burning pollution murderboxes cars and driving directions. Most people in this backward country don't have access to any kind of public transit and will never know what it's like, so the tech companies don't focus on it.
... that, and it's actually super complicated to do right. Every system is different and they're different in different ways and it's just a mess. There's a standard data format, but you know what they say about standards. And even then, just because there's a standard it doesn't mean people implement it, or implement it properly (scowling at you, Microsoft; glaring at you, email as a whole).
Oh, hey, TIL. Thank you for the correction! I do appreciate it. Guess I have something to read about. (I'm concerned this is coming across sarcastically and it's not at all meant to be; I'm being...
Oh, hey, TIL. Thank you for the correction! I do appreciate it. Guess I have something to read about.
(I'm concerned this is coming across sarcastically and it's not at all meant to be; I'm being entirely genuine here and appreciate learning that I was wrong.)
This is borne out by the fact that Citymapper manages to provide consistently better public transport routing despite Apple and Google having vastly more resources to apply to the problem....
This is borne out by the fact that Citymapper manages to provide consistently better public transport routing despite Apple and Google having vastly more resources to apply to the problem. Whenever I've tried using Google Maps for realtime directions in London the live arrival times just aren't accurate, and that has a knock on impact on how efficiently it can plan journeys; they also lack detailed info about station layouts ("take exit A", "change platforms near the front of the train", etc.) which makes any changes slower and less predictable.
For a long while the default understanding of "nearby" was also clearly based on West Coast density: a 3-5 mile radius makes sense when you're driving between low-rise clusters, but in dense European cities (or even places like Manhattan) that'll give you 500+ results for whatever you're looking for and maybe an hour of travel time when you wanted the top five within a <15 minute walk.
I can empathise with devs building towards what they're familiar with, but it doesn't make for a great user experience when they're operating on a global scale.
I originally thought this was the reason, but then I realized that these big tech companies have offices all over the world and attract talent from all over the world. Surely there's bound to be...
I can empathise with devs building towards what they're familiar with,
I originally thought this was the reason, but then I realized that these big tech companies have offices all over the world and attract talent from all over the world. Surely there's bound to be people from east coast US cities (or just any civilized country with public transit) on these teams? It's not quite the birthday paradox, but with the amount of people these firms employ as developers, it seems unlikely that nobody knows what good public transit is like, even if they're in the middle of car-worshipping California.
I remember some serious software gore in the original Apple Maps. To say "it wasn't very good" is... quite a charitable understatement. Some of the roads, particularly around the Philadelphia...
I remember some serious software gore in the original Apple Maps. To say "it wasn't very good" is... quite a charitable understatement. Some of the roads, particularly around the Philadelphia Museum of Art, were literal Möbius strips. They've improved dramatically since then, since the apology that led to Scott Forstall's firing, and I'm very happy with where Maps is right now.
Whether Google's maps are better really depends on what you use a mapping application for. My use is "what are this place's hours", "where are the things of this type (e.g. shop of certain kind) around me?" and "where is this specific named place?", which Apple Maps is quite good for. I live in the middle of Philadelphia in the US, a city undergoing a major renaissance of development, so keeping up with all the changes and being able to find that one shop or know when it's open is very important. I don't drive, I don't even have a license, so the navigation directions aren't important to me.
That said, one specific thing I use Google Maps for is Street View (so I know the façade of the place I'm trying to find), but with Apple working on that, I won't have much use for Google Maps when that's available for the part of Philadelphia I'm in.
This actually looks really nice. I don't follow apple very much, so I had no idea they are updating maps. The author thinks that Apple is making their process more and more automated, which is a...
This actually looks really nice. I don't follow apple very much, so I had no idea they are updating maps. The author thinks that Apple is making their process more and more automated, which is a good thing.
My only other thought was that I have never used Google maps for any of this information ever before. I don't know how useful it would really be.
Why is there now a huge chunk of Lake Michigan missing? I tried to check on duckduckgo and apparently they also use Apple Maps (never realized!) and also have an odd white spot there.
Why is there now a huge chunk of Lake Michigan missing? I tried to check on duckduckgo and apparently they also use Apple Maps (never realized!) and also have an odd white spot there.
You can see it in the GIF at the start of the article. I actually see a bunch of small pieces of lakes/sea disappearing in the new map, this was just the largest example. I thought it's just a LOD...
You can see it in the GIF at the start of the article. I actually see a bunch of small pieces of lakes/sea disappearing in the new map, this was just the largest example. I thought it's just a LOD thing because it's zoomed out so far, but I'm actually seeing it zoomed into the specific regions.
Interesting, I just confirmed the same thing on my iPhone. I wonder what happened there. St. Martin Island, MI, for example, is completely missing from Apple's data. (It's visible in the satellite...
Interesting, I just confirmed the same thing on my iPhone. I wonder what happened there. St. Martin Island, MI, for example, is completely missing from Apple's data. (It's visible in the satellite view.)
I switched to the stock Apple Maps app on my iPhone (from Google Maps) about a year ago and haven't really had any issues. I remember when Apple Maps first came with my iPhone 5 some seven years ago. It wasn't very good then. But in the time since, they've done a fair bit to close the gap. Google Maps is stiill better, but not enough to justify the amount of data they collect on me to make it that good.
They don't do public transport routes for my city, which pretty much disqualifies the app right there. I have this theory that all these Silicon Valley companies aren't used to good public transport options and don't prioritize it (even Google Maps took years to implement it and it's still a bit shitty).
The original Apple Maps didn't do public transit, either. I think the reason public transit always seems to be a tacked-on feature is that they're marketing toward the majority of the US, which means prioritizing
dinosaur burning pollution murderboxescars and driving directions. Most people in this backward country don't have access to any kind of public transit and will never know what it's like, so the tech companies don't focus on it.... that, and it's actually super complicated to do right. Every system is different and they're different in different ways and it's just a mess. There's a standard data format, but you know what they say about standards. And even then, just because there's a standard it doesn't mean people implement it, or implement it properly (scowling at you, Microsoft; glaring at you, email as a whole).
Oh, hey, TIL. Thank you for the correction! I do appreciate it. Guess I have something to read about.
(I'm concerned this is coming across sarcastically and it's not at all meant to be; I'm being entirely genuine here and appreciate learning that I was wrong.)
This is borne out by the fact that Citymapper manages to provide consistently better public transport routing despite Apple and Google having vastly more resources to apply to the problem. Whenever I've tried using Google Maps for realtime directions in London the live arrival times just aren't accurate, and that has a knock on impact on how efficiently it can plan journeys; they also lack detailed info about station layouts ("take exit A", "change platforms near the front of the train", etc.) which makes any changes slower and less predictable.
For a long while the default understanding of "nearby" was also clearly based on West Coast density: a 3-5 mile radius makes sense when you're driving between low-rise clusters, but in dense European cities (or even places like Manhattan) that'll give you 500+ results for whatever you're looking for and maybe an hour of travel time when you wanted the top five within a <15 minute walk.
I can empathise with devs building towards what they're familiar with, but it doesn't make for a great user experience when they're operating on a global scale.
I originally thought this was the reason, but then I realized that these big tech companies have offices all over the world and attract talent from all over the world. Surely there's bound to be people from east coast US cities (or just any civilized country with public transit) on these teams? It's not quite the birthday paradox, but with the amount of people these firms employ as developers, it seems unlikely that nobody knows what good public transit is like, even if they're in the middle of car-worshipping California.
As someone who uses Google Maps for public transportation in Los Angeles, I can say its results are pretty damn accurate.
I remember some serious software gore in the original Apple Maps. To say "it wasn't very good" is... quite a charitable understatement. Some of the roads, particularly around the Philadelphia Museum of Art, were literal Möbius strips. They've improved dramatically since then, since the apology that led to Scott Forstall's firing, and I'm very happy with where Maps is right now.
Whether Google's maps are better really depends on what you use a mapping application for. My use is "what are this place's hours", "where are the things of this type (e.g. shop of certain kind) around me?" and "where is this specific named place?", which Apple Maps is quite good for. I live in the middle of Philadelphia in the US, a city undergoing a major renaissance of development, so keeping up with all the changes and being able to find that one shop or know when it's open is very important. I don't drive, I don't even have a license, so the navigation directions aren't important to me.
That said, one specific thing I use Google Maps for is Street View (so I know the façade of the place I'm trying to find), but with Apple working on that, I won't have much use for Google Maps when that's available for the part of Philadelphia I'm in.
This actually looks really nice. I don't follow apple very much, so I had no idea they are updating maps. The author thinks that Apple is making their process more and more automated, which is a good thing.
My only other thought was that I have never used Google maps for any of this information ever before. I don't know how useful it would really be.
Why is there now a huge chunk of Lake Michigan missing? I tried to check on duckduckgo and apparently they also use Apple Maps (never realized!) and also have an odd white spot there.
Can you show a screenshot? I'm not seeing this.
You can see it in the GIF at the start of the article. I actually see a bunch of small pieces of lakes/sea disappearing in the new map, this was just the largest example. I thought it's just a LOD thing because it's zoomed out so far, but I'm actually seeing it zoomed into the specific regions.
Interesting, I just confirmed the same thing on my iPhone. I wonder what happened there. St. Martin Island, MI, for example, is completely missing from Apple's data. (It's visible in the satellite view.)