Google Maps Navigation for Android now available in SA

I am very interested in the way they are implementing this because for a while now I have been contemplating getting an Android device as my secondary phone - just for fun. So the reason I ask is purely to find out how easy it is to use. With Nokia Map Loader you simply select the country and languages you want and it downloads it to the phones map storage cache. It also checks for map updates each time you connect the phone to the PC.

Do they have that on android yet?
 
Rouxenator said:
I am very interested in the way they are implementing this because for a while now I have been contemplating getting an Android device as my secondary phone - just for fun. So the reason I ask is purely to find out how easy it is to use. With Nokia Map Loader you simply select the country and languages you want and it downloads it to the phones map storage cache. It also checks for map updates each time you connect the phone to the PC.

Do they have that on android yet?
Click to expand...

No. I think GMaps was envisioned as a purely cloud-based service, before Google realised that plenty of their phones are sold in tech backwaters such as good ol' SA. I don't even know whether GMaps will ever go offline completely - as I said earlier, regardless of having the maps cached routing and searching still requires an active connection.

That being said CoPilot is pretty good, and I got it at a price I'm quite willing to pay for always having reliable navigation at hand.
 
I need it to be complete offline - many times you simply don't have coverage and for this to be a real routing solution (like TomTom, Garmin, Nokia Maps) it will have to allow for total offline navigation. I think they will implement that fairly quickly.
 
Rouxenator said:
I need it to be complete offline - many times you simply don't have coverage and for this to be a real routing solution (like TomTom, Garmin, Nokia Maps) it will have to allow for total offline navigation. I think they will implement that fairly quickly.
Click to expand...

I dont think so, If you want purely offline maps there is commercial apps like mentioned above or you could always opt for crowd sourced maps on Android that gets maps from say Open Streetmaps.

The way Google Maps was designed was more online, with caching purely to releave the constant data use. Example, even with maps/routes cached it still does route planning via 3G. This was done maybe with things like traffic data in mind, the more Android users that use it as a GPS the better picture you get of traffic esp when doing route planning that they can in turn use as a selling point. It would be counter productive for them to offer total offline solutions.

Example totally free : https://market.android.com/details?id=net.osmand
Paid for https://market.android.com/details?id=com.alk.copilot.marketplace.af.full
 
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falcon786 said:
One of my buddies used a xda version but it keeps freezing even after numerous flashes,which regional version of did you use since the sa update isnt out yet?You used the flash tool right?

Yep the nav is excellent,street view and even the satellite view come in really handy!
Click to expand...
I flashed and used X10i Generic
Generic version 2.3.3 build 3.0.1.G.0.75
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=920746
 
This is one of the coolest things I have seen on my phone yet!

I for one, welcome our new GPS overlords.
 
intresting use of Offline maps for your phone.

Check out http://sourceforge.net/projects/mobac/ this is an app to create Mapps for your devices from say Openstreet Maps and then you can use an app like say https://market.android.com/details?id=com.robert.maps on your phone to view those maps.

What is intresting is you can even use mixed maps at diffrent zoom levels

IE I use
0-10 Open Piste Map
attachment.php


11-13 Open street maps (Mapquest)
attachment.php


14-18 Open street maps (Mapnik)
attachment.php
 
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