The Map Room

Sometimes great links sit in my to-do list for far too long. This is one of the best: I should have posted it a year and a half ago. Their site isn’t responding right now, but when it gets back online you must go and read “Global Impositioning Systems,” Alex Hutchinson’s article in the November 2009 issue of The Walrus. (Or find a cached version if you can.) It’s about how regular GPS use may be making our brains’ ability to navigate atrophy, and brings to my attention a disorder I hadn’t heard of before: “developmental topographical disorientation” — an inability to form cognitive maps. (If you know anyone who cannot deviate from their normal commuting route without breaking out in a cold sweat, you’ve probably seen this in action.) A must-read, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about it sooner.

Garmin seems to be adding cameras to a lot of its top-line handhelds: now it’s the turn of the GPSMAP 62 series, which will get the five-megapixel-camera-equipped 62sc and 62stc units in the third quarter of 2011. Adding the camera is only a $50 premium over the non-camera-equipped equivalents (Rich thinks that means a price drop for some units). That said, $600 for a GPS is a lot of money.

Pentax already makes a compact digital camera with built-in GPS (see previous entry) so their announcement yesterday of a GPS unit for use with some of their digital SLRs is not too surprising. The $250 O-GPS1 GPS unit works with Pentax’s K-5, K-r and medium-format 645D cameras, and appears to do a bit more than just work as a GPS logger. It’s weather-resistant (something I sometimes worry about when using my Nikon GPS unit), and it even has an astrophotography function: it uses GPS, a compass and accelerometers to figure out where the camera is pointing, and activates shake reduction to reduce star trails in long-exposure images. (Considering the wide field of view in camera lenses when used for astrophotography, that could allow much longer exposures without having to resort to an equatorial mount.) Available in July. Via Photography Blog.

Garmin announced new GPS handhelds this week: new eTrex handhelds yesterday (product site) and new Rino handhelds today (product site). Both series have been around for ages: the eTrex series is Garmin’s entry-level handheld GPS receiver; the Rino series combines a GPS receiver with an FRS/GMRS radio.

As for the new units:

The eTrex 10 ($120) is a basic monochrome handheld; the eTrex 20 ($200) and 30 ($300) add colour screens and expandable memory; the eTrex 30 also adds a compass and altimeter.

The Rino 610 ($350) uses AA batteries and is thicker than its stablemates; the Rino 650 ($500) adds a removable lithium-ion battery (with less battery life), a microSD card slot, a compass and altimeter, a more powerful GMRS radio, a NOAA weather radio, and unit-to-unit transfer; the 655t ($600) adds to that more internal memory, preloaded topo maps and a five-megapixel camera.

Garmin expects them all to be available in the third quarter of 2011.

I’ve done a lousy job trying to keep up with all the map- and navigation-related stuff coming out for the iOS platform (i.e., iPhone, iPad, iPod touch). There’s just too much out there. (Someone could do a whole blog about it.) But here are a couple of recent items.

GPS Tracklog notes the Bad Elf GPS, which attaches to iOS devices that lack onboard GPS.

(If I recall correctly, the iPad supports GPS via Bluetooth: you can, for example, tether a WiFi-only iPad to an iPhone and use the iPhone’s GPS.)

Meanwhile, The Unofficial Apple Weblog’s Erica Sadun offers reviews of Navigon’s and TomTom’s navigation apps for the iPhone, both of which sound, well, less than perfect. Despite Navigon’s navigation “oddities,” she prefers their app to TomTom’s because of the latter app’s “weak interface.”

• Buy Bad Elf GPS Receiver at Amazon.com

Garmin has announced the Montana series of GPS receivers, which seems to be an attempt to make an all-round, all-in one, GPS unit — i.e., it can be used on the trail as much as it can be used…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Glenn Fleischman’s article on Macworld.com, How the iPhone knows where you are, explains in great detail how an iPhone — or anything else using assisted GPS — can figure out where it is far more quickly than it could using…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I wasn’t aware that using a GPS during flight presented a hazard to navigation, but a 73-year-old passenger was arrested in Winnipeg after refusing to turn his off during a flight from Minneapolis. (But then refusing to do what you’re…  •  Continue reading this entry.

CNN Travel’s Jeffrey Weiss: Why your trusty GPS sometimes fails you. “GPS navigation systems aren’t perfect. Most of them are pretty good, but blind acceptance of their advice can become a traveler’s nightmare. … The bottom line: GPS is an…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Photography Blog has a review of the Fujifilm FinePix XP30, a rugged pocket digital camera with built-in GPS. The review cites some problems with both the camera’s ruggedness and its GPS. “Putting GPS on the camera is a great…  •  Continue reading this entry.

As part of an ongoing effort to find an ideal GPS receiver for field work, Leszek Pawlowicz has a three-part review of the Garmin GPSMAP 62s up on Free Geography Tools: part one, part two, and part three. The…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Two new point-and-shoot digital cameras from Panasonic with built-in GPS, announced in January, are available this month: the 14-megapixel travel compact ZS10 or TZ20, which I presume is a successor to the ZS7/TZ10, and the 12-megapixel ruggedized TS3 or…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Briefly noted: GPS Tracklog’s review of the Magellan RoadMate 9055, with a monster seven-inch screen, which Rich calls “perhaps the best Magellan I’ve ever tested.” Buy Magellan RoadMate 9055 at Amazon.com (Canada)…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Cruise missiles use GPS for navigation. As we have seen, GPS signals can be rather easily disrupted by an inexpensive jamming device. This would be a problem if cruise missiles didn’t have a backup, as Technology Review explains: terrain contour…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Tracklog’s hands-on review of the five-inch Garmin nüvi 2460LT only finds fault with the “wonky routing” occasionally thrown by the navigation unit’s use of its historical road speed database. “With that caveat, the nüvi 24xx models may actually…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS is ubiquitous and an essential component of many critical things — and, as New Scientist points out, GPS reception can be knocked out in a wide area by an inexpensive device, thanks to the fact that GPS signals are…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Macworld has an extensive review of the GPS-equipped Casio Exilim EX-H20G. “The EX-H20G also has some of the best in-camera GPS features we’ve ever seen, thanks to its intuitive map interface, points-of-interest database, real-world location names (not just raw…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A driver got stuck in the snow for three days because she followed her GPS navigation unit’s directions, which sent her along unpaved logging roads in New Brunswick that were impassable due to snow. New Brunswick is one of those…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The Ordnance Survey Blog explains why “space weather” — such as the coronal mass ejection the Sun let loose this week — is bad news for mapmaking: solar flares disrupt navigation satellite accuracy. During a space weather event, sat nav…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I was wondering what had happened to Casio’s digital camera with built-in GPS, which had been announced last year at CES and was scheduled to be released last fall (see previous entry). Turns out that in the interim it…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Links to a number of GPS reviews have been piling up in my files over the past few months, and mentioning them here is long overdue. During that time, GPS Tracklog has had reviews of the Garmin nüvi 2350LMT and…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A couple of compact digital cameras with built-in GPS have been announced at the CP+ Camera and Photo Imaging Show in Japan this week: Canon’s PowerShot SX230 HS ($350) and Pentax’s Optio WG-1 GPS (pictured; also in black), which…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Engadget passes on a Federal Aviation Administration advisory (PDF) that, due to Defense Department testing, GPS signals may be “unreliable or unavailable” within several hundred miles of a point off the coast of Florida and Georgia for brief periods…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Tracklog reports that GPS receivers from Magellan, Mio and Navman — all owned by MiTAC — are switching from Navteq to Tele Atlas as their map provider. Since TomTom owns Tele Atlas, does that mean that Garmin is the…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Tracklog has a two-part review of the DeLorme Earthmate PN-60w GPS receiver and SPOT satellite communicator combo: the SPOT review went up last month; the PN-60w review showed up this morning. The SPOT communicator allows you to send…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal comes up with an interesting example of humanity’s sense of entitlement: how long it takes a GPS receiver to get a satellite lock. Via @wilw….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Rich Owings’s interview with TeleNav CTO Bob Rennard addresses some of the “myths and misconceptions” about GPS reception — for example, whether water or trees interfere with GPS signals, whether being in motion affects GPS lock, and so forth….  •  Continue reading this entry.

As I understand it, the Garmin GPSMAP 62 and 78 series, like their 60-series and 76-series predecessors, are essentially the same under the skin, except that the 76 series is for marine use (and floats). GPS Information reviews them both….  •  Continue reading this entry.

It’s Garmin night tonight, apparently. (This is what happens when I start paying attention to consumer GPS devices.) Garmin announced the Edge 800, a touchscreen GPS for cyclists, today. Rich’s post points out the pertinent details and differences about…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Yesterday, Garmin announced a voluntary recall of some 1.25 million nüvi 200W, 250W, 260W, 7xx and 7xxT GPS receivers; 796,000 of those were sold in the U.S. Garmin has identified potential overheating issues when certain batteries manufactured by the third-party…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I know I link to Rich Owings’s reviews on GPS Tracklog all the time, but I’ve been interested in the GPSMAP 62 since it was announced and was looking forward to his review of the GPSMAP 62s (the middle…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Geek.com reviews the base model of Garmin’s new GPSMAP 62 series, which replaces the venerable GPSMAP 60 series. The reviewer is not a fan of the user interface or the included base maps, but is impressed by the unit’s…  •  Continue reading this entry.

CNN’s article, Why GPS voices are so condescending, is more ambitious than its headline: it looks at the limitations of computer speech in general, and why it has the limitations it does. For GPS navigation devices — which is where,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Now that I’m using GPS receivers on a regular basis, I seem to be linking to Rich Owings’s reviews on GPS Tracklog on a regular basis. Here’s his review of the new Garmin nüvi 3790T, part of a series…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Old-Map-Blog posts scans from the author’s collection of antique maps; so far they seem mainly to be from German-language atlas plates. GPSFix focuses on Garmin’s outdoor GPS receivers….  •  Continue reading this entry.

No sooner do I post a roundup of GPS reviews than I discover that Gadling has reviewed the Garmin-Asus Garminfone, a smartphone available from T-Mobile in the U.S. next month tomorrow. Truth be told, I have a bone to…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Garmin’s GPSMAP 60CSx has long been considered the gold standard for accuracy among its units, so this tracklog comparison with an Oregon 400t is interesting. Via GPS Review. (Note that a successor to the GPSMAP 60 series, the GPSMAP 62…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Garmin has put out so many different models of nüvi, their GPS navigation systems for cars, that it’s very hard to figure out which one’s which. GPS Tracklog makes a game attempt at sorting them all out, but I think…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Another explanatory thingy from GPS Review: the difference between GPS and “assisted” GPS (A-GPS), used by smartphones and the like, which speeds up the process by using cell towers or geolocated Wi-Fi base stations….  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Review explains how street-navigation GPS receivers appear more accurate than they actually are by using a “snap-to” feature that aligns the user to the nearest road. I’ve seen this happen with mine on more than one occasion; it’s interesting…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Today marks the 10th anniversary of the end of Selective Availability. Until it was turned off on May 1, 2000, GPS signals available to the public were only accurate to within 100 metres. In hindsight, especially when you consider how…  •  Continue reading this entry.

On GPS Tracklog, Rich Owings has a review of Garmin’s Oregon 450 handheld GPS receiver. (I’m finally at a point where I can read such reviews and understand what they’re getting at.) Rich recommends it: “The Oregon 450 is…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Pingdom has a collection of factoids about GPS entitled, oddly enough, Everything you ever wanted to know about GPS. (Yes, but how do they know what I wanted to know?) Via geoparadigm….  •  Continue reading this entry.

John McKinney argues that paper maps may have some life left in them; among other things, he cites a Japanese study that found that “people on foot using a GPS device make more errors and take longer to reach their…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Engadget reviews Dual Electronics’s GPS cradle for the iPod touch, and wonders whether the $200 cradle, which, as you might expect, adds GPS and navigation, is worth it when there are plenty of standalone GPS navigation systems out there that…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Wired’s Joe Brown tests the SPOT Satellite GPS Messenger the only way he can: by getting lost. After eight hours of doing his best to get lost in Tahoe National Forest, he pressed the SOS button; help arrived in…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The New York Times reports that the number of operational GPS satellites will be increased over the next couple of years from 24 to 27, using spares already in orbit, to improve GPS signals in Afghanistan. The rest of us…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Via GPS Review, a short promotional video from the U.S. Air Force’s Space Command about GPS:…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Leszek Pawlowicz imagines a the perfect fieldwork GPS: “I keep getting asked by field professionals what the best handheld GPS is for serious field work. I have to tell them that there isn’t a single model currently available that does…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I’ve been remiss in covering the other global navigation satellite systems aside from GPS — such as Russia’s GLONASS system, completion of which was delayed by the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the European Union’s forthcoming Galileo system, which…  •  Continue reading this entry.

With TomTom apparently coming out with a GPS device priced at $59(!), DailyFinance asks: just how much lower can GPS prices get? Via Gadling….  •  Continue reading this entry.

If GPS isn’t accurate enough for you, you should probably look into something like real-time kinematic (RTK) navigation, which corrects GPS signals down to an accuracy of one centimetre. RTK is explained on Wikipedia and Magellan’s site. Make points to…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Gadling reminds us that handheld GPS units do have their limitations when you hike with them in the wilderness: they don’t have turn-by-turn directions, they may not get a signal in rough terrain (e.g., in a canyon), and they’re dependent…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The Reverse Geocache Puzzle is a fiendish bit of fun: a locked box that only opens at a given location, and only gives the distance to that location — forcing the user to triangulate it over repeated attempts. Oh, and…  •  Continue reading this entry.

An interesting data point: a recent survey found that 31 percent of North American adults own some kind of GPS — whether a portable unit, built-in car navigation, or GPS-equipped cellphone. Cellphone GPS use is growing a lot faster than…  •  Continue reading this entry.

This fun short video from Sheepfilms reminds me of the funny videos done about Google Earth and Street View a while back — they all intersect the map and the interface with reality. Via Gadling. Previously: The Vacationeers: Google My…  •  Continue reading this entry.

So I was thinking that using a GPS with maps and turn-by-turn navigation on a bicycle might be interesting, but a lot of the biking GPSes I’ve seen (i.e., Garmin’s Edge series) seem to be interested in awful things like…  •  Continue reading this entry.

You might remember that for the longest time, I was in the weird position of writing a blog about maps and mapping technology without so much as owning a single GPS receiver. That state came to an end last December,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The New York Times’s Jenna Wortham raises the question: if you have a GPS-equipped smartphone, do you need a standalone GPS unit? And what will the near-ubiquity of GPS on smartphones do to the standalone GPS market? Wortham looks at…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The July issue of Wired has a few tips for improving the performance of your GPS receiver; they include adding an external antenna, giving your unit enough time to acquire a fix, and keeping the software up to date….  •  Continue reading this entry.

There was, you may have heard, some news about a new iPhone yesterday; over on O’Reilly Radar, Brady Forrest sums up the geotechnology implications of the new iPhone 3GS and iPhone OS 3.0, including the ability of the web browser…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Following up on this post: the Air Force says that even if the GPS network drops below 24 satellites, GPS will still work, albeit with degraded performance. On Twitter, Air Force Space Command says that “[t]he issue is not whether…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Take the constant availability of accurate GPS signals for granted on your own risk. TidBITS’ Adam Engst reports that there are concerns that the current constellation of GPS satellites will drop below the 24-satellite minimum within the next few years,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Less than two years after entering the North American personal navigation device market, Navigon is calling it quits — they were undercut, says GPS Business News, by competitors selling at less-than-premium prices. Via GPS Tracklog, where Rich has some thoughts…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Egypt has lifted the ban on importing GPS receivers; the country’s National Telecommunication Regulatory Authority is now allowing the importation of “cars equipped with GPS and navigation programs … GPS-enabled mobile phones, computers and other devices with civilian applications provided…  •  Continue reading this entry.

It may surprise you that GPS gets used a lot in amateur astronomy, which in recent years has gotten awfully computerized. Now, you might not think that a technology that locates where you are on Earth has a lot to…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Everything old is new again. CNet’s Mark Rutherford looks at the NaviSeer, which addresses the problem of GPS dead zones (e.g., indoors or in deep valleys) with a high-tech implementation of an old navigation system: dead reckoning….  •  Continue reading this entry.

When it comes to Macintosh compatibility with GPS units, past entries have largely focused on Garmin’s Mac support. But Garmin certainly isn’t the only game in town on the Mac. Macworld reviews TomTom Home 2.5 for the Mac, which “allows…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Google Earth’s GPS support was once limited to its $20/year “Plus” version; now that that version has been eliminated, it’s available in the free version. Free Geography Tools and Google LatLong have some details; about 200 receivers are supported….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Last month, because its onboard GPS failed, a train in England wasn’t able to stop at any stations until the end of the line, forcing passengers to double back. It’s not just British cars running into trouble with GPS, you…  •  Continue reading this entry.

For our purposes, the big news from Macworld earlier this month was iPhoto ’09’s built-in geotagging. iPhoto is not the first application to support geotagging, but it’s the first to provide a compelling answer to the question of what geotagging…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Two articles from the February 2009 issue of Wired look at location-aware applications for smartphones with built-in GPS (or other means of determining location). Inside the GPS Revolution: 10 Applications That Make the Most of Location is a list of…  •  Continue reading this entry.

MiTAC has completed its purchase of Magellan’s consumer products line, which will continue to exist as a brand separate from MiTAC’s existing Mio line. Previously: Magellan Sells Consumer Products Division to MiTAC….  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Tracklog and GPS Review are reporting that Magellan has sold its consumer products division — think the Maestro, RoadMate and Triton — to MiTAC, whose Mio subsidiary also makes consumer GPS products. Curiouser and curiouser. (Apparently Magellan has been…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Car navigation system buyers take note: Rich Owings explains the five GPS features you don’t need and the six features worth paying extra for, in his opinion. Interesting that, on balance, he considers lane assist and speed limit display more…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Beginning in January, Californians will be able to use windshield-mounted GPS units; Minnesota is apparently the only remaining U.S. state that prohibits mounting navigation units on the inside of your windshield. Meanwhile, Egypt is one of only three countries —…  •  Continue reading this entry.

With the number of vehicles using GPS as a form of security — tracking a vehicle’s location and speed — it’s interesting to see whether GPS security can be spoofed, allowing a truck to be hijacked, for example, and whether…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Two very different ways of making your own topo maps are explained in the following guides: Kevin Kelly talks about how to download free digital versions of USGS topo maps and print them (via Kottke); GPSFileDepot’s tutorial on how to…  •  Continue reading this entry.

An 18-year-old driver was able to beat a speeding ticket by using data from a vehicle-tracking GPS, which, an expert affirmed at trial, was sufficiently accurate enough to disprove a radar gun’s clocking of 62 mph in a 45 mph…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I’ll have more to say about location-aware iPhone applications once I’ve installed the 2.0 software update on my iPod touch and played with a couple of them. I won’t be able to say anything about the GPS on the iPhone…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The problem with the ABC News article entitled “Will GPS Make Us Dumb?” is that it makes a false juxtaposition: map-reading skills with navigation devices’ turn-by-turn directions: “One effect of an increased dependence on GPS will be that peoples’ ability…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The new 3G iPhone’s GPS is only one of several location-finding methods. From Apple’s page: iPhone 3G uses signals from GPS satellites, Wi-Fi hot spots, and cellular towers to get the most accurate location fast. If GPS is available, iPhone…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Another profile of map publisher (and now GPS maker) DeLorme, this time from the Bangor Daily News’s Bill Graves. DeLorme got its start mapping Maine, so no surprise that the Maine media likes to cover the company’s history: local success…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GIS: An Overview is a very basic introduction, but it seems to me that that sort of thing is necessary. Via About.com Geography. PC World’s How to Buy a GPS Device is slanted very heavily towards car-mounted GPS navigation systems,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

MapQuest’s announcement about partnering with Garmin jumped the gun somewhat; Garmin’s announcement says that the send-to-GPS feature is available with Google Maps as of today, but MapQuest only as of April 15. Announced earlier than Google, but available later. Rich…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Garmin and MapQuest are up to something. The MapQuest blog says that, “coming in April, we’ll be adding a simple drop-down link to our search results pages that allow you to download destinations or itineraries to your Garmin GPS device,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Geophoto has reached version 2: MacNN reports that it now features simpler tagging, “now sports closer integration with iLife ‘08 and .Mac Web Galleries, and can import photos from Aperture and Lightroom”; at $25, it’s also half its previous price….  •  Continue reading this entry.

In January, Hitwise reported on the relative market shares of the online map sites. MapQuest continued to lead with more than 50 percent of the market, with Google Maps second at 22 percent, and Yahoo and Microsoft trailing. But,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I’ve had a few items cluttering up my to-do list that relate to Apple, the Mac and Mac software, and the iPhone/iPod since Macworld; time to stop procrastinating. iPhones and iPods. The iPhone’s mapping application got a major upgrade at…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Nokia announced its Maps 2.0 Beta last week; its key feature is pedestrian navigation — i.e., turn-by-turn navigation on foot, rather than in a car (see also CNet Reviews). CNet’s Margaret Reardon tried out the service in Barcelona, with…  •  Continue reading this entry.

On the Garmin blog, Chet tantalizes us with coy references to Mac-compatible hardware and software, especially a software product code-named “Bobcat,” to be announced this week at Macworld (Gizmodo). Garmin’s been behind on its now two-year-old promise to provide Mac…  •  Continue reading this entry.

An article about using GPS with a Mac from the current (September 2007) issue of Macworld. If you’ve been following this blog long enough, you will know that this is a subject dear to my heart. The article is brief…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Spain may make fiddling with a car’s satellite navigation system illegal (via All Points Blog). Meanwhile, Quebec — where I live — may make them legal. It seems risible that something so widespread is not allowed, however technically and unenforced,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Introducing the Hipster GPS: “Inspired by 43Folders’s Hipster PDA, the Hipster GPS takes a similarly low tech approach. Also, the price of entry is far below that of an electronic GPS system.” Photo by James Foreman. Via 43Folders….  •  Continue reading this entry.

To read some of the commentary about the iPhone’s implementation of Google Maps, you’d think that a mobile mapping application is worthless without GPS. But is it? All Points Blog’s Joe Francica doesn’t say so outright, but in this dismissive…  •  Continue reading this entry.

HoudahGPS is an OS X front-end graphical interface for the open-source GPSBabel utility. It allows you to download data from a GPS receiver to a Mac. Unlike Houdah’s geotagging software, this application is free of charge. Via Ogle Earth….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Rich Owings takes apart an ABC News article that appears to conflate GPS receivers and personal locator beacons. “So let me make this clear,” Rich writes. “A GPS is not a personal locator beacon. A GPS receiver, by itself, will…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Review: Expectations of GPS, an article about what people should expect, in terms of map accuracy, routing and number of points of interest, from their GPS receivers. “What I was most amazed about was how quickly their expectations of…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Garmin has announced an API and a new web site for developers, the rationale for which is explained on their corporate blog: “Well, this site is for software developers and content provides who want to make their website, applications and…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Google Transit adds Reno and San Diego; I must have missed when they added the Japanese rail networks, domestic airlines and ferries. Google Maps for mobile supports GPS on certain devices — for example, the BlackBerry 8800 and some Windows…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Still on the subject of in-car navigation systems, it turns out that these systems — which apparently cost something like $2,000 — actually increase a car’s depreciation, according to an article in USA Today. As Autoblog points out, “It makes…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Security experts — who, to be fair, have an interest in crying wolf — warn that hackers can use off-the-shelf equipment to send messages to car navigation systems using the FM channel for traffic and weather data. Remember: if your…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Tim likes the idea of aerial photography on a GPS unit, which is now starting to become available: it adds a layer of information that you might otherwise miss with topo maps — he cites vegetation as an example….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Oops — another Garmin app for the Mac in beta: POI Loader, which allows you to upload points of interest to Garmin GPS from a Mac. Also via GPS Review. Keep it up, folks — I’ll get a GPS sooner…  •  Continue reading this entry.

WebUpdater is an application that updates the system software of Garmin GPS units. Previously Windows-only, a beta Mac version is now available for download. The usual caveats about using beta software probably apply. Via GPS Review….  •  Continue reading this entry.

The Chicago Tribune’s Eric Benderoff argues that GPS-enabled cellphones will doom standalone GPS units (and the companies that make them). Not that music-enabled phones have doomed iPods or cameraphones have doomed digital cameras — the apostles of convergence devices have…  •  Continue reading this entry.

If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you’ll recall that the mapping data for most of the online mapping services, and for the driving directions on GPS navigation systems, invariably comes from one of two map database suppliers:…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Rob Boyer writes to tout his new software application, Ascent: “Ascent is a new application written for the Macintosh that is designed to help cyclists, runners, and hikers train better by displaying, in various ways, their activities uploaded from…  •  Continue reading this entry.

They’re putting GPS in everything nowadays, the Boston Globe reports, and it’s not necessarily out of a pressing need to do so — it’s getting cheap enough to include that gadget makers simply include it and (presumably) figure out what…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Garmin has released a list of issues with its software running on Windows Vista: Garmin Blog, GPS Review….  •  Continue reading this entry.

For the last couple of weeks, Garmin’s blog has been hyping the company’s forthcoming Super Bowl ad, with an extended music video and behind the scenes clips. With the Super Bowl now over, the ad itself is now finally available:…  •  Continue reading this entry.

As promised (see previous entry), the Mac OS X version of Garmin’s Training Center software is now available. (See also GPS Tracklog, TUAW.)…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Chad has a brief review of Microsoft Streets & Trips 2007 and its accompanying GPS unit: “I think it is very well worth it. … All and all I am impressed with the software and the GPS unit. They…  •  Continue reading this entry.

DigiTimes, which reports on Taiwanese electronics manufacturers, reports that Wal-Mart may be thinking about dropping GPS receivers due to a high return rate — 40 per cent at Wal-Mart, 25 per cent elsewhere. (Wal-Mart, unlike Best Buy, doesn’t charge a…  •  Continue reading this entry.

James and Dan are enthusiastic about Ricoh’s release of the 500SE GPS-ready digital camera, but I’m not sure how groundbreaking this is. (By which I mean that I’m confused and seek enlightenment; I’m not speaking rhetorically.) For one thing, it’s…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Earle writes, “I live in San Francisco and am planning a trip to NW India. At home I use a Garmin GPS sensor attached to a PC laptop with Windows XP operating system. Do you know of map software for…  •  Continue reading this entry.

For Mac users, some Automator actions to tell you about: GPS Automator Actions (which require GPSBabel) is a collection of scripts that automate downloading data from, and uploading to, a GPS unit and converting file formats; GeoTagging Automator Action…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Macworld: “Garmin’s recent announcement of new Mac software for runners, bikers and other outdoor sports enthusiasts has led some Mac users to wonder where the rest of their promised Mac software is. Garmin says they’re still working on it, though…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The Garmin blog announces the (long-delayed) availability of Training Center (the fitness software used by the Edge and Forerunner lines). Only not quite yet: “now available” (as per the press release headline) means that you can pick up a CD…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The Russian government has lifted a (widely ignored) ban on the use of high-resolution images and high-accuracy GPS. Reuters: Until now, global positioning systems that helped locate ground objects more precisely than in a radius of 30 metres (98 ft),…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Gizmodo shows us how to download route data from a Suunto X9i GPS watch and a Garmin Forerunner and export it into Google Earth, using a couple of applications. Not so much a how-to guide, but it does show you…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Recent map- and GPS-related questions on Ask MetaFilter (they even come with answers): Why haven’t GPS prices dropped as much as other electronics? The consensus seems to be that the GPS electronics cost next to nothing; the price point is…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A weird GPS story from my neighbourhood: someone stole an Ottawa city bus a couple of nights ago, but thanks to the bus’s onboard GPS system, it was recovered within a couple of hours. The city’s buses are being equipped…  •  Continue reading this entry.

At one point I was a heavy PDA user and was watching the release of Garmin’s Palm OS-based PDAs with built-in GPS (naturally) — the iQue series — with great interest. Times have changed: I’ve gone back to pen…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I can’t keep up with all the GPS product announcements — too many of them! — so as a general rule I don’t bother trying. But GPS Review’s Tim Flight e-mailed me to point out something interesting about the…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Over on Ask Metafilter, a question about real-time GPS data logging has gotten a few answers; the questioner is trying to get at the data (altitude, speed) that is recorded but not necessarily logged by standard software….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Engadget covers this weekend’s opening of Garmin’s flagship retail store in Chicago, with plenty of photos to stimulate those who would find an upscale store dedicated to GPS products stimulating. Also points to Garmin’s corporate blog, which I don’t think…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Not every GPS receiver has driving directions; not every GPS user needs them. There are, in fact, plenty of GPS receivers for other users, and have been for years; you just don’t hear about them as much. Recently, GPS Tracklog…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS receivers with built-in street maps and driving directions are now so ubiquitous that it’s apparently hard to remember any other sort. This article reprinted from the Wall Street Journal discusses handheld GPS receivers with driving walking directions for pedestrians…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Microsoft Streets & Trips 2007 was announced today. The highlight is that it comes with an improved USB GPS “locator” that turns your computer into a GPS receiver. This isn’t new: the 2006 version also came with such a…  •  Continue reading this entry.

This is a strange article; it talks about viewing fall colours and segues into using or buying a GPS receiver for that purpose. It also repeats the canard that a GPS renders paper maps unnecessary: “A foldable map is cheaper…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Richard has managed to lay hands on a new Sony GPS-CS1, the small gadget that records time and location data and comes with software that allows you to add that location data to the photos you took at that…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The Guardian looks at the privacy implications of location-based and GPS tracking services. “‘People are very willing to give up their privacy,’ [Tim Hibbard, who has a site pinpointing his current location,] says. ‘You just have to give them a…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Tracklog: 10 Ways to Get Lost with a GPS. Number 10: “Think that you can’t get lost because you have a GPS.”…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Review: 10 Myths About GPS. Mistaken assumptions and received wisdom from the potential buyer’s/consumer’s perspective….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Ask MetaFilter: “I’d like to track my route using a GPS, and in the evenings, overlay that day’s trip on a map. For some reason my Google-fu fails me and I can’t seem to find a straight answer to the…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A bit more on geotagging — adding geographic coordinates to digital photos. One the one hand there’s having a GPS-enabled camera; on the other there’s adding latitude and longitude manually. Some options in between the two extremes are emerging which…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Via Ogle Earth: GPS Photo Linker is software to save GPS data to a photo. iPhotoToGoogleEarth exports photos to Google Earth. You should have GPS data assigned to the photo data; isn’t it handy that you already have GPS Photo…  •  Continue reading this entry.

RouteBuddy, a new Mac GPS and mapping application, was announced today (Cartotalk; GPS Review; MacNN; MacWorld; Ogle Earth). It’s a bit of an enigma: at first I wasn’t sure what problem it was trying to solve. After all, there…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPSBabel is a free (donationware) utility that converts GPS data from one format to another. (It doesn’t convert map data, but such things as waypoints and routes.) Useful, I would imagine, if you’re trying to get ostensibly incompatible hardware and…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Review tackles a basic question, but a frequent one nonetheless: why are the maps in GPS navigation units out of date? The same question could, and doubtless has, been asked about all consumer mapping products — online maps included….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Drat. Garmin’s previously announced plans for Mac compatibility across its product lines (see previous entry) have been delayed somewhat: Training Center will come at the end of the year rather than the spring (obviously), with other products to follow. See…  •  Continue reading this entry.

On We Make Money Not Art, Régine rounds up previous stories about drivers in the UK being led astray (into rivers, along cliffs) by their dashboard GPS navigation units. (Or rather, about drivers in the UK allowing themselves to be…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Martyn Davis has written up his experiences getting bike routes onto a GPS-enabled bike computer using Linux command-line applications and a bit of Google Maps. Via MAKE: Blog….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Two men were killed when their Jeep plunged into a ravine in Kern County, California, north of Los Angeles, during what’s described as a GPS treasure hunt (geocaching?). Via GPS Tracklog, where Rich promises to post more details as they…  •  Continue reading this entry.

MacGPS Pro 6.4 is a Universal Binary, which means it will now run natively on Macs with Intel processors (rather than via Rosetta emulation). Via MacNN. See previous entries: MacGPS Pro 6.1; Mac Geocaching and GPS Software; Garmin Announces Mac…  •  Continue reading this entry.

On Here Be Dragons, a list of resources for making custom maps for Garmin GPS receivers. On Very Spatial (via), a list of desktop GIS applications….  •  Continue reading this entry.

If you thought sending drivers along a 100-foot cliff was crazy enough, you won’t believe this entry from the annals of bad directions from wonky British in-car navigation systems. Except this time I’m not so sure if it’s the fault…  •  Continue reading this entry.

BBC News: “Drivers following satellite navigation systems through a village called Crackpot have been directed along a track at the edge of a 100-ft cliff.” Another entry in the annals of errors made by in-car navigation systems. Via Slashgeo. See…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A tutorial on setting up GPS tracking on a Treo 650 using a Bluetooth receiver, the Internet via the cellular network, and some software. Via Slashgeo….  •  Continue reading this entry.

More geotagging coverage. Tim’s page covers the steps involved in taking photos from a GPS-compatible digital camera (in this case, the droolworthy Nikon D200) and placing them on a Google Map; with source code (via Google Maps Mania). On the…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Jeff Thurston’s contribution to the debate over free geodata looks at the question of scale: if you want geospatial data to be free and updated regularly, consider the huge amount of territory that has to be mapped. Wired’s piece,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

An article about GPS and geocaching in South Africa points out the extreme markup for GPS devices in that country: they cost twice as much as they do in the U.S.. The proposed INSPIRE directive, which would ostensibly standardize…  •  Continue reading this entry.

(I’m going to try calling these link roundups “Triangulations” and see how that goes.) Via GPS Tracklog, the difference between Garmin’s and Magellan’s topo maps. The National Geographic Society is planning a “mega-map” of the Sonoran Desert region. “It will…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Yes, I’m still alive. Should be back to normal on Monday. Meanwhile: The centre of Google Maps’s universe is apparently Coffeyville, Kansas. And you thought talking on the phone while driving is bad. You’d think that consulting a map while…  •  Continue reading this entry.

GPS Mapping: Make Your Own Maps by Rich Owings Ten Mile Press, 2005. Softcover, 382 pp. ISBN 0-9760926-3-8 This is a book for people who want to get their hands dirty with mapping software and GPS units and generate maps…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I’ve been off my feed a bit this past week, so I’ve got some catching up to do. I’ll start with a few random links from here and there about this and that. From the Google Blog: “Not only have…  •  Continue reading this entry.

In a press release, Garmin announced today “that it will immediately begin to make its line of GPS and mobile electronics devices compatible with Mac OS X version 10.4 ‘Tiger.’ This makes Garmin the first major GPS designer and manufacturer…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Jeremy Atherton’s page on geocaching with a Mac lists a whole whack of Macintosh-compatible GPS software. Via GPS Review. Update, 5:08 PM: GPS Review also points to another bit of Mac software: TrailRunner, route planning freeware that apparently supports importing…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Speaking of bias, my overwhelming interest in Mac software reveals itself when I point out that version 6.1 of MacGPS Pro was announced yesterday. It adds support for some USB Garmin GPS receivers (serial-port support via an adapter only prior…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The 19th edition of the Connecticut Forest and Park Association’s “Walk Book” was generated by volunteers with GPS receivers; it took them three years to cover approximately 1,200 km of trails. With 40 per cent of the trails on private…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A satellite launched Sunday is the first in a series of eight new GPS satellites that will, among other things, add a second civilian frequency once more of the satellites are launched. Space.com’s coverage is full of geeky detail….  •  Continue reading this entry.

To save money, some Chinese GPS manufacturers use counterfeit maps instead of official ones; as a result, Shanghai drivers who buy the cheaper units are getting lost. Via GeoCarta and Very Spatial….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Rich Owings, author of GPS Mapping: Make Your Own Maps (Amazon, web site), reports that he’s started a new blog about GPS and mapping software called GPS Tracklog. Like The Map Room, it’s aimed at mere mortals rather than professionals….  •  Continue reading this entry.

You’ve got to be kidding me: Google Maps and GPS on a Nintendo DS. Via Engadget. See previous entry: Google Maps on Mobile Devices….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Slate has a review of five aftermarket GPS-based in-car, dashboard-mounted navigation systems, focusing on setup, screen size and, if you can believe it, how nice the robotic voices sound. None apparently stand out from the others in terms of accuracy…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I’ve talked about using a GPS with a Mac before, and even — back when this blog’s audience was a fraction of what it is now — solicited my readers’ opinions on which GPS I, as a Mac user (or…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Intel is experimenting with using WiFi and cellular networks instead of GPS to pinpoint users’ locations, CNet reports. The problem this proposes to solve is that people in urban areas are rarely outside enough to get a clear GPS signal….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Tony has written up a Perl script to take the data from his GPS watch and overlaid it on orthographic imagery from the USGS. These are ridiculously huge and detailed files, but the end result is an extremely precise map…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A couple of links about GPS-equipped PDAs — those gadgets I covet but cannot possibly ever afford. Brighthand’s got a review of the Garmin iQue M5, which runs Windows Mobile instead of Palm OS like Garmin’s other PDAs (see previous…  •  Continue reading this entry.

My coverage of GPS stuff is paltry at best, but gadget blog Engadget has a dedicated GPS section (RSS feed) that I’ll be keeping an eye on, to learn more about the subject….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Sea Kayaker magazine has an extensive guide to digital navigation — i.e., using a GPS, digitized maps and mapping software — in its February 2005 issue. Via Gadling….  •  Continue reading this entry.

OpenStreetMap “is an effort to produce free (CC-licensed) streetmaps of the world.” It’s in “pre-pre-pre alpha” at the moment. The idea is to get free data by running around with a GPS, analysis of aerial photography or other methods since…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Speaking of GPS receivers. Because of poor-to-nonexistent Mac support by GPS manufacturers, Mac users have to resort to third-party software to connect to their gadgets (see previous entries: Mac Mapping Software, Mac Software Updates). One option I was aware of…  •  Continue reading this entry.

My coverage of Garmin’s first GPS/PDA was pretty compulsive — I don’t usually cover GPS receivers, but PDAs are one of my other hobbies — so for consistency’s sake I should at least note two new models announced by Garmin…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I covered the release of the Garmin iQue 3600, a Palm OS handheld with a built-in GPS, rather obsessively last year. Now Garmin has announced a slightly cheaper sibling, the iQue 3200, which has a smaller (320×320) screen and lacks…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Radio-tracking wild animals for conservation purposes is not new, but using GPS collars — at $5,000 apiece — to track the movements of mountain lions is not something I’ve heard of before (via Gizmodo)….  •  Continue reading this entry.

MacMinute reported updates to desktop mapping and GPS software for the Macintosh yesterday: EarthDesk 2.5, which generates a realtime map of the Earth on your desktop; and MacGPS 5.0, third-party software for using (normally Windows-only) GPS receivers with a Mac….  •  Continue reading this entry.

I did get a couple of replies during the downtime to my post asking for suggestions about the best GPS receiver for my needs. Eric Arnold, who works at the University of Tennessee Map Library in Knoxville, mentioned the Garmin…  •  Continue reading this entry.