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BeeLine's bike computer makes every ride an adventure
Cycling in a city can be stressful, especially if you're headed somewhere that you've never been to before. Most people ride with a specialized cycle computer, or with a smartphone strapped to their handlebars. While useful, both devices can be a distraction on busy, dangerous roads. Instructive turn-by-turn directions also do little to improve your street-level knowledge -- the screen becomes a crutch, rather than a tool to help you learn about the various roads, bridges and tunnels around you.
Google Maps may soon offer parking suggestions
Google Maps can already tell you how congested your drive will be, but how about when you arrive? It looks like the app is about to give you at least a decent idea about the parking situation, thanks to a new feature spotted in the latest 9.44 beta by Android Police. Availability of spaces at a selected destination is shown as "easy," "medium" and "limited," with the latter situation highlighted in red. Once you start navigating, it'll give further details in the instructions, indicating that parking around your arrival address is "usually not easy" or "limited," for instance.
Garmin's newest 'Drive' navigation systems focus on road safety
Whether you're on the open road or just trying to make it to work in one piece, getting where you're going is hassle enough -- even when there isn't traffic to be stuck in. Garmin's latest iterations of its Drive GPS navigation systems will soon be receiving a host of features that will deliver live updates and easier-to-follow directions in hopes of changing driver behaviors for the safer.
Google Maps will help you avoid Black Friday hordes
For over a year now, Google Maps and Search have been telling people when stores, bars and restaurants are likely to be busy. Now, it's going one step further. From today, searching for a business via Google will not only show you when it's typically crowded, but also an estimation of how busy it is right now. So if you see that a particular store is very full you can plan to head somewhere else. It's hoped that the feature will help users avoid the worst of the crowds over Thanksgiving long weekend, and beyond. There are a couple of other additions rolling out today. Place listings in Search and Maps will now tell you how long the typical stay is at a location, so if you people usually spend two hours at a restaurant, you can plan the rest of your day accordingly. Finally, Maps will now list more complex opening hours. "You'll know what time to pop by the pharmacy at your local drugstore or supermarket, when food delivery begins at a nearby restaurant and what the service hours are at the auto dealership," said Google.
Google's memory-boosted AI could help you navigate the subway
Modern neural networks are good at making quick, reactive decisions and recognizing patterns, but they're not very skilled at the careful, deliberate thought that you need for complex choices. Google's DeepMind team may have licked that problem, however. Its researchers have developed a memory-boosted neural network (a "differentiable neural computer") that can create and work with sophisticated data structures. If it has a map of the London Underground, for example, it could figure out the quickest path from stop to stop or tell you where you'd end up after following a route sequence.
Apple Maps displays nationwide Amtrak train routes
Prefer to travel cross-country by rail? If you're an iPhone owner, you no longer need to fire up a third-party app to plan your trip. Apple Maps has introduced support for Amtrak train routes across North America -- if you want to navigate all the way from Los Angeles to Toronto while seeing the sights, you can make it happen. You'll need to live in an area where Apple's mass transit directions are available, of course, but this remains a big deal if you're more interested in how you travel than the time it takes.
Hands-free 'Ok Google' commands come to Google Maps
The "Ok Google" command has expanded since the debut of Android KitKat, allowing devices to respond in various smart ways to those two words. Now, Google Maps on Android has this ability too, whether you're in the middle of a road trip or doing something else. Once it's enabled in settings, you can choose whether it works only while Maps is open or from any screen. Say the magic phrase then follow it up with something like "find a gas station" or "How's traffic ahead?" and it will let you know.
German cars will share real-time data to help you find parking
However smart your car might be, there's only so much it can tell you by itself. Wouldn't it be nice if cars regularly shared helpful driving info beyond what you offer in mobile apps? Here thinks so. It's launching services that will have cars automatically sharing real-time data to improve commutes for everyone. Vehicles (starting with those from Here owners Audi, BMW and Mercedes-Benz) will use their sensors and cameras to offer details on free parking spaces, traffic conditions, and road hazards. You'd know that a parking spot has opened up, or that heavy rain is forcing drivers ahead to slow down.
Transit's app now tells you when to hurry for the bus
Sure, your existing phone apps can tell you when to catch the bus and when to hop off, but public transportation fans know that's only half the story. What if the driver is quicker than you expected, or a delay ruins your subway connection? Transit might just save the day. It's updating its Android and iOS apps with a Go routing feature that could take some of the uncertainty out of commuting. You'll get on-screen and voice notifications when it's time to head out or disembark, but it gets truly interesting when things go haywire. Transit will tell you to hurry up if your departure time suddenly skips ahead, create a new itinerary if you miss a ride and warn you if a bus takes a surprise detour.
Waze will help you avoid traffic jams around big events
Navigation apps like Apple Maps, Google Maps and Waze are good for letting you know when you're approaching a traffic jam. Waze is taking that task a bit further with its new Global Event Partner Program. The company is teaming up with organizers of big events like marathons and pro sports to keep you from experiencing unnecessary delays. Those partners will now be able to use the Waze Closure tool to input any scheduled closures ahead of an event. TechCrunch reports that event organizers will be able to add details like turn restrictions, lane reversals, parking locations for more than 65 million users.
The next Google Maps update could show how bad the parking is
Google's next iteration of its popular Maps app looks to be adding a whole bunch of new functions, if the recently released 9.34 beta is any indication. The big news is that the update could include text-based alerts informing users to parking shortages at their destination. This will allow you to account for not just enroute traffic but also fighting for a spot once you get there. It's not like Google can actively track open spaces so the service will more likely be based on the total number of spaces available in given area while taking into account time of day and nearby public sporting/concert events. Still, that's valuable information especially if you aren't a local.
Google Maps for mobile now handles multiple destinations
Believe it or not, the mobile version of Google Maps hasn't had support for multiple destinations. You could plan that multi-city tour on the desktop, but you'd still have to navigate one stop at a time on your phone. You might not have to the next time around, though: Google is quietly pushing what appears to be a server-side update to Maps for Android that lets you set multiple stops. You can navigate to a tourist trap, a restaurant and your hotel without having to enter fresh directions every time.
DARPA is building acoustic GPS for submarines and UUVs
For all the benefits that the Global Positioning System provides to landlubbers and surface ships, GPS signals can't penetrate seawater and therefore can't be used by oceangoing vehicles like submarines or UUVs. That's why DARPA is creating an acoustic navigation system, dubbed POSYDON (Positioning System for Deep Ocean Navigation), and has awarded the Draper group with its development contract.
Waze hack lets creeps track your driving
Waze's community-centric navigation is supposed to help you avoid obstacles that other apps might miss, but that same technology is also creating some serious privacy issues. UC Santa Barbara researchers speaking to Fusion have found an exploit that would let an intruder track your driving in real time. After reverse-engineering Waze's server code, the researchers found that they could create thousands of ghost drivers that monitor the real drivers around them -- they can even create virtual traffic jams. The trick only works when you have the app in the foreground (Waze turned off background location sharing in January) and breaks when you turn on the invisibility mode, but that's not going to be much comfort to drivers running the app non-stop during their commutes.
Waze will warn you when you're speeding
If you drive in unfamiliar areas often enough, you've probably run into situations where you couldn't spot a speed limit sign or were too busy finding your way to notice. However, Waze has some relief in sight: it just started rolling out an alert feature that makes it clear when you're breaking the speed limit on a given street. You can tell it whether or not to sound an alert, and even force the alert to show only when you run over the limit by a set percentage -- helpful for those fast-paced roads where obeying the limit actually makes you a hazard.
Waze warns you about dangerous intersections in big US cities
Most navigation apps can get you from A to B while avoiding traffic snarls, but they rarely give you a feel for how risky the drive might be. Is that intersection a cake walk, or a death trap? Waze thinks it can help. It's now alerting drivers in five big US cities (Boston, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco and Washington) when they approach intersections with historically high crash and injury rates -- get close to one of these danger zones and you'll get a reminder to drive carefully. This won't do anything to stop other drivers from ruining your day, but it should prepare you for the dangers ahead.
Waze helps you plan future trips based on expected traffic
Traffic can ruin your careful planning for that appointment in the 'burbs, but Waze can help with a feature called "planned drives." After you enter the destination, date and time, it will open a special screen that shows how busy your route will be at a given hour. "This takes into account expected traffic conditions based on smart algorithms, aggregated traffic history and predictive analysis," according to the Google-owned company.
Here Maps stops supporting Windows devices
We hope you weren't counting on Here Maps to provide directions on your Lumia. Here has announced that it's dropping much of its support for Windows Phone and Windows 10 Mobile. The company is pulling its apps from Windows 10's app store on March 29th, and a workaround that kept its apps running will stop working after June 30th. The Here apps for Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8 will continue to work, but you won't get more than "critical bug fixes" from now on.
Waze's cleaner and smarter design arrives on Android
Nearly five months after Waze rolled out its 4.0 update to iOS users, the service is finally doing the same for Android. That means the app on Google's platform now features a cleaner and smarter design, making it easier to navigate roads, share destinations and report any issues you may spot during your trip. Waze says this version is all about improving the experience for drivers and, as such, you'll start noticing less clutter on maps, brighter buttons and color-coded pins. As usual, you can grab the update from Google Play.
Waze app leads IDF soldiers into Palestine, conflict erupts
At least one Palestinian man is dead, and another 10 reportedly have been severely wounded, after an Israeli Defense Force truck strayed into the Kalandia Palestine refugee camp on Monday -- reportedly at the direction of the Waze navigation app. Multiple reports state that two members of the IDF's canine unit on an "administrative task" were travelling a road they thought was within the Israeli border. It wasn't, inciting residents who began throwing stones at the truck. When a hurled firebomb set the truck alight, the IDF soldiers ditched the vehicle and ran in different directions. One soldier managed to call for reinforcements. However, the other soldier left his phone in the truck and could not be immediately accounted. In response, the IDF deployed additional IDF ground and air forces to search for him. He was found, unharmed, a few hours later.
