Ok, so here's my much delayed update on mapmyindia iNav WF on my N95. Actually, I had sent this email out on the very first day I installed it last month - but I wished to try out more to get over initial bias/disappointment, and also to let mapmyindia have a chance to respond to some of the feedback/query. Since then, I had a chance to do more tests, and my overall view remains one of disappointment interms of things missing/not possible/not easy to use, and especially in comparison to free options like mgmaps, Nokia sportstracker, gpsed etc that I have been using for a while.
I'll use my colleague's Asus P527 with Satnav for a couple of days, and post comparison to mapmyindia in some days (he is out of station till end of month).
Disclaimer: These are my own opinions and they do go into deep usage issues as I perceive. For simple navigation, map browsing etc, one may find iNav WF to be adequate and indeed it is a somewhat simple app (rather over simplified/reduced functionality in some cases). So, you may find it of more useful, easy to use or less. Most importantly, the below is more a relative assessment (in terms of my experience) against other commercial GPS software like Garmin, Nokia maps and free GPS/map software including trackers and so on. A few points are related to usability improvement potential on a mobile (w/o touchscreen capability).
I do believe mapmyindia maps are still the most detailed over wide regions of India, and their PoI database is also probably more comprehensive.
---------Mail to mapmyindia 6th Dec 2008 --------------------
Hi mapmyindia team,
Today, I finally installed the iNav WF on my N95. Here's feedback from trying it out for 1 day (still have to take it out in the car for the navigation). I have used navigation devices like Garmin Street Pilot, Nokia Maps (Germany and US), Satguide, free programs like mgmaps and j2memaps, so you may want to take my feedback quite seriously. I have in the past given feedback to mapmyindia (as also kudos) on some occassions, urged to make a navigation device for India, and then urged to release the software solution for navigation on mobile phones. I have benefited immensely from using online maps since the
beta.mapmyindia.com days and even before. I preferred to buy iNav WF from mapmyindia than Satguide for mobile which is 2/3 the price currently. I would really wish to see a much improved iNav product, and this is my intent with the rambling below.
First impressions : Have to admit, i am very disappointed with the navigation software and also the way maps are rendered and detail that is shown :-( Naturally, I'll use it for a while with actual driving for more detailed report. One nice feature is the roadblocks option though I have to still use this - but I can see this is a must have for India, so that I can guide the routing logic)
Some key feedback (I am only giving the negative ones here hoping for improvement. I'll provide both + and - in a more detailed review after i have used the software for a week or two) :-
* WF seems to be a pretty basic and limited capability software. I know mapmyindia did not make WF software, but you guys need to push for improvements in it if its to become useful and you guys want to get adv over Nokia Maps (beats the heck out of WF to my disappointment, though WF does have a few things for it like narrowing down places to search etc. but its way too limited and clumsy in most aspects), Satguide, Garmin, Route 65, TomTom and others. I believe WF is worse in this customization for India maps, than it maybe for Europe etc - otherwise, it wouldn't sell at all in Europe, trust me. And I am wondering why mapmyindia didn't use Tomtom or Route65 which are atleast from this experience way superior navigation solutions!
1. No font size adjustment in the menu settings. I mean even mgmaps freeware allows you to do this. One size does not fit all!
2. What's with all these apartment names written in ugly big font regardless of the zoom level of the maps. Totally destroys the map and ability to use it meaningfully.
- in every other navigation device I used, the names were scaled depending on zoom level. Also, instead of showing landmarks, putting out names of apartments using BLOCK capitals is wasteful to say the least. Here is an example
"RIFCO SANTOSH APARTMENTS" - can't even read the full name at a certain zoom level and beyond. Why is it important ? And all the road names are hidden till a few pop up at the highest zoom levels :-( Is this a map & navigation device or an apt locater ? Why isn't there a mode to toggle of apt names and other's on the screen to choose what info comes there. Why are names not scaled down in size when printing it in ugly caps is an eyesore ?
3. No map browsing mode of any value in the product! I understand navigation has certain goals - keep info legible, use zoom levels as per speed etc, but I also want to be able to browse the India maps on my phone when I am trying to locate routes manually. The level of detail in the zoom levels (spoilt again by those horrid apt names) is absymal. I can use Yahoo India maps (from mapmyindia) from an application like mgmaps over the GPRS net, and use the maps meaningfully. But in WF, its next to useless to browse a city like BLR or Delhi.
4. No tracking mode whatsover. I found no option (maybe I haven't seen it yet, so in that case you can ignore this) to track my route, save it to KML or other formats, to import tracks from saved track files. There is no way to record new paths/roads and report back to mapmyindia for improvements in an electronic format :-(
5. The road names as well don't scale and only pop-up in an odd manner at the highest zoom levels. This maybe ok in navigation when the software is guiding you, but absolutely crap in map browsing, and also when you're trying to locate those small roads etc that the software does not even have in its database. Now, both you guys and I know, that street address searching is highly limited for India even in metros in such software. Heck, I can't search for some of those apartments which block most of the screen space. So, how am I going to take those final turns, when I can't see any names and so on ? Just use Nokia maps on your Nseries phone (there maps are crappy - why else would I buy mapmyindia for mobile), and you'll understand how limited iNav WF is in terms of use.
6. The settings and options are way too limited. And even the route planning options are horribly bad. If I plan A -> B, I can't do a single option routing from B -> A. There are via points through the waypoint add option, but its quite unintuitive to a first time user ? The WF user manual is also crap. For an expert user like me, I don't care that much for manuals, but for your average customer, its incomplete, does not show any examples and what not!
Back to options in the menus - it does not automatically use my GPS location to search within the same state, or city. So, I can have 10 Airport Roads all over India and even more M.G. Roads and what not. It also does not have an option to manually enter the state. This becomes important because you cover 200+ cities, and hundreds of thousands of roads. Alternately, there could have been options to only enable "North India", "South India', 'East', 'West', 'Central' maps, so one could enable all, or one or more of them. That way, sitting in BLR, I don't hit all the roads in Delhi.
Unlike Nokia maps, there isn't an easy "Use this place" option on the menu for a search result, manually positioned cursor on the map or whatever, where this becomes "source" or "destination" for routing purpose. Atleast, options are limited and not intuitive.
7. No use of T9 to match city, street names auto from the database. So, one has to go tap-tap-tap using the number keypad. This also means that WF gives a pause of 3-4 seconds before it brings out the list of matches (since it cannot be sure if the user is pressing A or B or C and taking a bit of time with it - 1,2 or 3 key presses of the same key). This makes it quite slow to reach final addresses compared to say Garmin navigation devices.
8. The whole route is shown blinking for a couple of seconds before going to navigation level map zoom level. Don't know how to get back to it except for manually zooming out 'n' number of levels.
9. Does not keep a history of last planned/calculated routes. So, if I have to do it again, I must do the whole jing-bang process again...
10. There seems to be only street and city and number. Don't know what number is - pincode or house number ? Also, no way to use important landmarks, regions, colony names or apt names while doing the search. This is rather limiting. I did see though that if I use Airport Road, some options are suggested from the map database - so there is some capability to get around it.
11. The drive time provided for the route is completely off for Indian road conditions in cities. This is, ofcourse, difficult to tackle for India.
12. No simulation of the route path, or move from one turn to another by pressing a key unlike Nokia maps. So, I need to keep pressing up arrow key to move forward in the route (and zoom out for faster coverage of the route). Also, the waypoints/turns in the route path are not numbered, and the numbers aren't displayed on the map - which makes it confusing at times...
13. For such a limited capability application, it uses a whopping 8-10MB of RAM. What does it do ? Even java based map applications take only the same amount of memory while this is native Symbian. For comparison, Nokia maps uses 3-4 MB only. I am wondering how this will run on most N-series phones w/o running into memory issues.
I don't mean to sound so harsh, but I have been using mobile navigation in India and outside for close to 2 years now. I have also used dedicated GPS navigation devices. I have spent a lot of time and effort with certain freeware apps to overcome the lack of maps for India as a temporary hack. so, i am disappointed to see this application fall way beneath my expectations. Even the strongest point of mapmyindia - the quality and depth of map data relative to competition, has been severely compromised in terms of viewing and using it as I explained in some of the points above.
I really hope we get a much improve iNav for Symbiam - WF or otherwise! If that does not happen in next 3-6 months, I probably need to go back to Nokia maps, freeware or Garmin for mobile/ Satguide (hoping the maps improve) and they have more useful solutions - and that would be sad indeed!
Regards,
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11th January 2009, 02:22
