Apple on Friday updated the Acknowledgements page for its mapping software, adding a handful of new data partners. The page gives credit to TomTom, Yelp and other companies that provide Apple Maps with imagery and information.
Among the new partnerships added this week are E-WEGO, a business listing firm, navigational ad expert NavAds, and Yellow Pages. TripAdvisor and Booking.com are also now listed as official partners, following a report earlier this year.
Memorial Day is one of the busiest driving days in the U.S. so little wonder that Google is now boosting traffic alerts on Google Maps to warn drivers of congestion on the route ahead, helping them avoid traffic jam.
“Now when you input your destination, you’ll get an explanation of upcoming traffic conditions that helps you identify the quickest route,” according to the Internet giant.
One important piece of the Apple Maps puzzle is about to fall in place at next month's WWDC as Apple readies to announce the Transit feature within Apple Maps in iOS 9, 9to5Mac reported this morning.
The same publication ran a scoop last year reporting that the Transit feature would launch as part of the iOS 8 software update, but the rumor didn't pan out.
“Having originally planned to add a new transit directions feature to Maps last year, only to pull the feature before WWDC 2014, Apple now hopes to launch its Transit service with iOS 9,” the report, based on “sources,” reads.
Apple appears to have quietly acquired San Francisco-based GPS firm Coherent Navigation, MacRumors reported on Sunday. Several of the company's employees, including the CEO and co-founders, all started working for the iPhone-maker in recent months, and its domain servers were recently updated to point to Apple.
Among Coherent's technology is something called High Integrity GPS, which offers greater accuracy and precision and higher signal integrity versus standard GPS. It accomplishes this by combining signals from both mid-earth orbiting GPS satellites low-earth satellites used by data provider Iridium for voice and data.
While Nokia would prefer to sell out its mapping division to Apple, no offer has arrived yet from the iPhone maker for the competitive service, called Nokia Here.
Be that as it may, a window of opportunity has now opened for Uber, a privately-held transportation service, which has reportedly submitted a $3 billion offer for Nokia Here, The New York Times said Friday citing three people with knowledge of the offer.
But Nokia has other big name suitors lined up as well, including one from a powerful consortium made up of Chinese web services company Baidu and automakers BMW, Audi and Mercedes-Benz. It's unclear whether Apple, whose own mapping service relies heavily on third-party data, is still in the running.
The Apple Maps service has expanded Flyover coverage to an additional twenty locations around the world. Following today's update, owners of iPhone, iPod, iPad or Mac devices in the United States, Australia, France, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, New Zealand, Portugal, South Africa and Spain can being enjoying realistic three-dimensional virtual tours of select cities and landmarks, including the Arches National Park in Utah, Mont Saint-Michel in France and many more.
Apple is working on integrating public transit information into its Maps app, according to a job listing spotted by AppleInsider on Tuesday. The company is hiring software engineers for its Maps division's Routing team, which it says is working on "one of the most anticipated features of Apple Maps."
The job listing calls for applicants with experience in developing high quality, robust software systems using C++ and Linux, excellent problem solving and analytical skills, and asks that they have "in-depth knowledge about public transit, both as a consumer of those services and the technical aspects."
One of the welcome changes in the iOS 8.3 and OS X Yosemite 10.10.3 software updates, which hit yesterday, includes the ability for business owners to claim any point of interest as their own using an updated Report a Problem tool in Apple Maps for the iPhone, iPad, iPod touch and Mac, as reported Thursday by AppleMapsMarketing.
The company began allowing local businesses to manage their listing in the service last October, but required them to use its Maps Connect web service.
At the same time, the iPhone maker appears to be removing some TripAdvisor hotel reviews which started showing up in its Maps service last week.
Google Maps last evening received another update which has brought out a couple noteworthy new features.
The application can now render maps in full-screen mode to maximize screen real estate and provide colored transit lines when retrieving transit directions. To access maps in full-screen mode, just tap an empty spot on the map.
The Internet giant Google on Friday issued a refresh to its native mapping application for the iPhone and iPad, adding Local Guides and a couple other nice-to-haves.
A global community of the top reviewers on Google, Local Guides now appear in Google Maps 4.3 for iOS.
You can also add transit directions to your calendar.
Search has been improved, too, with the ability to search for event information for select venues, nearby businesses based on their address and even retrieve fun facts about popular points of interest.
Apple has started to animate certain landmarks in a three-dimensional Flyover view in Apple Maps, The Daily Mail reported Thursday. Specifically, London's Big Ben clock and the popular London Eye now feature animated segments in Flyover.
The face of Big Ben's clock tower is being animated to show the correct local time while London Eye's rotates slowly when browsed in Apple Maps' Flyover view.
Apple's acknowledgements page for its Maps service has been recently updated with several new references, MacRumors reports. Among the companies cited are GasBuddy and GreatSchools, both of which are data aggregates that display information about nearby gasoline stations and schools, respectively.