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Wow. Apple Maps is a disaster.
- Thread starter b24pgg
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There's a big difference between having some parts of the world that are not finished, and the mapping data overall being of poor quality. The former is to be expected, the latter points to a fundamental problem that will not be fixed by this fall.
My thoughts precisely. The iOS 6 section should be for registered Apple developers ONLY. Keeps the trolls and fruitcakes at bay. It's absurd, that one on the New York navigation is a prime example.
And fanboys that can't stand anyone criticising Apple? Few weeks vs years? What kind of an excuse is that for putting out a crappy app?
To anyone with eyes and half a brain Apple Maps in its beta state is a disaster, even for a beta. Development goes thru builds, alpha builds, beta builds, if this is where they are in their development for a planned fall release then we're all in trouble especially if Google Maps will not be available/functional/abel to be integrated into ios6 at lunch or close to.
I hope Apple can fix this.
I'd actually agree...if they had released iOS 6.... What part of "BETA" do people have such trouble with? I guess Google messed it all up as they just slapped "BETA" on any thing and everything.
So wait, because Apple only had a "Few weeks" (3 years btw...) we should excuse them for downgrading our map data vs what they currently offer with iOS 5 ?
Hum... no.
That was his point.
The version available now (G Maps with an Apple front end), is better than the version currently released to devs. Not a little bit, but a lot better.
Now front end improvements will happen. Cartographically, that will make a some difference (ie improvements in symbology), however unless the data dramatically changes (and I doubt that will happen because at most the data is about 9 months old - the A3 Hindhead Tunnel is in there and that only opened last July and started appearing on TomTom sat navs about 9 months ago), then the problem still remains. The digitisation is poor.
I'll give a few examples on here to give you an idea.
On a sat nav it doesn't matter too much if you depict a road as straight lines from point to point. Most people just follow the line of the road in the middle of the screen.
On a map it does matter. Roads generally don't have sudden changes, they curve. That curve has a radius, it has an angle. The map looks wrong if those curves aren't drawn with the same radius to scale and the correct angle. The trick when using vector mapping to getting this right is to put more points (vertices) in so that at the scale drawn (and on an iPhone we're probably down in the region of 1:7500 - 1:1500) it appears correct. As someone correctly said, cartography is an art as well as a science. It took Google years to understand that.
The other example I'll give is again on a sat nav it doesn't matter if a side road appears to come into the middle of another road. It probably is done that way to enable the software used on the relatively low powered computer in the sat nav unit to comprehend that it is possible to turn from one road into the other.
On a map of course that matters. It's incorrect. The side road finishes at the kerb line of the main road.
Apple maps fail on both counts. None of that is software, it's the fact they're using tele-atlas data, which is primarily designed for use in the sat nav units of its parent company TomTom.
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I'd actually agree...if they had released iOS 6.... What part of "BETA" do people have such trouble with? I guess Google messed it all up as they just slapped "BETA" on any thing and everything.
Maps data isn't in Beta.
It has been stated time and time again, what part of that don't you understand? I'd be happy to agree is maps data was tied into iOS 6, but that is a ridiculous claim, and is what you are saying.
This has been quite the amusing thread, primarily because so many people refuse to get over their own lack of understanding of what "beta" software means. As others have pointed out, it's fine for the Maps application to have bugs and crashes here and there - that's the point of letting people beta test your software, to find those things. It is not an accepted practice for entire chunks of data to be missing from the software at this stage of development. That's only inviting a whole new slew of potential bugs and such at whatever later date the entire "live" dataset introduced into the software (IF it's going to be introduced). If this is indeed the route that Apple is taking, it will be closer to the actual launch date, giving Apple far less time to correct any problems that arise from the introduction of said live data. That is extremely risky for an application of this magnitude.
You'd have a point if the map data was based on the device in the app, but what you and many other people here seem to forget is the map data is server side. That can be updated anytime, google maps, bing maps, they all update their map data regularly, so why do people seem to think that this is not easily done for apple?! All that needs to be in place for the beta for the devs to test the API's is for the app to be working, which it does......
It's a BETA! By the time the GM is released it should be as good as or better than Google Maps. Apple haven't taken anything away from you as iOS 5 is the current software and that map app works great. I am guessing most of the whining is from non devs who installed the beta on their devices. Apple maps should get better beta by beta. If you don't like that, downgrade to iOS 5!
For an initial release of something, you would normally place a full copy of the live data on the server. This allows you to test server performance as that will vary with the amount of data that has to be cached (as well as load on the server) Tele Atlas (TomTom) provide the maps and I can tell they are reasonably up to date.
My issue is the data cartographically isn't suitable for maps use outside of a sat nav unit. Maybe I'm very fussy as in my day job, I'm a cartographer (my dev work is a hobby) and use vector based mapping in GIS systems.
Just cos you think that normally people would do that does not mean apple would. Also there's the possibility that they don't have all the up to date data ready yet, but could do at launch.
Until its officially released, no-one knows for sure what it's going to look like. That's been my point all along. some people on here seem to think they know all that apple are doing and claim there's no more data ready to be included, but there is, as I have pointed out, there's 20 cities in 3D that apple has that's not in the beta. If that's not been enabled, what else hasn't? The naysayers that claim this is all the data apple has, seem to ignore all that evidence......
I work in SW development - and I don't see the issue. With a large enough test/dev team and environment, you can easily have multiple testing groups. For the large public beta - they might be using a limited dataset (first reason might be the production servers might still be getting built/setup etc) while using the full dataset with smaller set of internal testers.
There are lot of scenarios where this is fine - some where it might not be.
If it makes anybody feel better, I read somewhere Google maps will now be an optional downloadable app in the app store. So if Apples app does not fully deliver by the time iOS 6 is launched Google maps will be able to point you in the right direction.
Yes pun intended.
Yes pun intended.
Yes exactly. I think the maps move has been planned for awhile now. But maybe Apple decided to pull the trigger on Google a little to soon. However, if Googles app is available in the app store, then there should not be to much upheaval.
Where do you read this for a fact? I've seen this thrown around by a lot of people but I have yet to see s statement by Google saying they are releasing an ios Google maps app. And of course Apple won't say anything on the subject or how long it will take them to "approve" the app. Google currently has had Chrome and Google Drive done and awaiting approval in the App store for months.
I don't remember exactly and I do not wish to lead people in the wrong direction. My apologies for that. But I want to say I read it before Google's map announcement or in the same time frame. I believe it MAY have been The Verge. But I'm not positive.
Yea if it was during Google's maps event they were talking about updating the ios Google Earth app to include the newer 3D feature and better satellite photos. They never said anything about bringing a Google Maps app to ios though
Of course they wouldn't say say anything about it though because their event was s week before we even learned about Apples new map app at WWDC.
The maps data is an online service Apple will be providing. 6 month prior to release, if the servers are not in place and already ready to accept the predicted load, you have a problem.
Working along side dev teams and solution builders, I can tell you that "live" production environnements are present at least 1 year prior to launch, Q&A environnements are built from copies of the production data set, anonymized to prevent information leaks (though with maps I doubt the anonymization step is required), and everything is ready quite a few months in advance.
At this point, I think anyone wishing Apple has some secret stash of data just don't want this to be what is real, as much as everyone else. I think everyone can agree (no matter which side of the "beta" debate you're on) that this dataset just isn't production quality.
But to me, that comes as no surprise. Apple has never been good at online services.
Agreed. I don't see Apple flipping a switch and magically all the map data gets fixed a couple months before release. Besides, when has anything in the beta between WWDC and release ever seen a drastic change? No, I think what we are seeing is 90% representative of what will be there at launch, and we will just be hearing "it will get better with time". But how long? A year from now? iOS 8? iPhone 7?