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Bushnell BackTrack D-Tour personal GPS takes you home, shows you how it got you there
We've seen our fair share of uncomplicated (and under-featured) GPS units, but the Bushnell BackTrack D-Tour throws in just enough tricks to make our inner techno-mountain-man salivate. The D-Tour does away with onboard maps and turn-by-turn directions for five simple waypoints and a digital compass. Lose your way? Just follow the arrow back to the campsite. When you get home, you can dump your hiking data into Bushnell's map application, which will show you exactly where you've been, how far you traveled, and how fast you trekked. Its also a built in digital compass, clock, thermometer, and altimeter. Not too shabby, but a bit steep at $120, considering you'll still need to provide your own maps. Hit the break for a video of the doodad's track recording and mapping software.
Vodafone's Wayfinder is first victim of free smartphone navigation services
Back in January 2009, as Vodafone was preparing to close a £20 million ($30 million) deal to buy Swedish mapmaker Wayfinder, it was seen as a bold move from a carrier intent on entering the apparently lucrative market for location based services. Fast forward to the present day -- past the bit where free Google Maps Navigation destroyed TomTom and Garmin share prices, and past the introduction of free turn-by-turn navigation to Nokia's Ovi Maps -- and you'll find Wayfinder gently sobbing into a handkerchief as it permanently closes up its doors. Vodafone's Anna Cloke gives us the reason for it with devastating concision: "We could not charge for something that others gave away for free." So there we have it, the paid navigation services deathwatch has its first fatality, and it's the unfortunate nature of the beast that plenty of others will be following suit, unable to resist the destructive effects of the free and ubiquitous services now on offer. [Thanks, Chris]
Waypoints: Another way to see where you've been
Hard on the heels of my review of Geotags, some of our readers suggested we take a look at Waypoints, [App Store link] which has some similar functions and a smoother interface. Waypoints, which is US $2.99, can save any GPS location you choose, and allow you to access them with your desktop web browser, or it can download GPX or Google Earth (KML) files for the waypoints you've visited. It runs on the iPhone and requires iPhone software version 2.1 and above.You can view any waypoint in Google Maps on your iPhone, and you can email locations including latitude, longitude, elevation, and any notes you add to the description. The software also embeds a hyperlink to open Google Maps at the spot you bookmarked. There is also a feature to share saved locations with people on the same wireless network. The usefulness of that feature will depend on how a person wants to use the software. Waypoints will work on an iPod Touch, but with limited usefulness because there is no on-board GPS in those devices and the WiFi/Skyhook location services aren't really precise enough to take up the slack (nor are hotspots prevalent out in the backcountry).Read on for more impressions, or check out the screenshot gallery:%Gallery-45673%
