Links

Terse Directions

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Adding to the discussion as to whether online maps’ directions are too exhausting, Tim Bray argues for terse directions: “When I’m navigating an area I already know about, don’t give me turn-by-turn, just give me a short list of the streets to take.”

Right now, Google Maps insists on turn-by turn, with three warnings for each turn. It’s dumb and annoying and interrupts whatever music or show I’m listening to.

What I want is to get in the car and say “Short directions to New Brighton Park” and have it say “Take Main to 12th to Nanaimo to 1st to Renfrew to McGill.” Then when I’m driving, I’d get one vocal warning a block out from each turn, like “Next left on Nanaimo” or some such.

Previously: ‘Map-Splaining’.

Apple Maps on the Web

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Apple announced yesterday that Apple Maps is now available on the web as a public beta. Prior to this it was mostly available through its iOS, iPad and Mac apps, except that developers have been able to embed Apple’s maps on their websites through the MapKit JS API for several years now. Those embedded maps can now point to the web version, “so their users can get driving directions, see detailed place information, and more.” Limited browser and language support for the time being.

Historical Maps of London

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
Tudor London: The City and Southwark in 1520. Historic Towns Trust.

Londonist does a good job introducing us to two maps of old London published by the Historic Towns Trust a few years ago—a map of medieval London (1270-1300) published in 2019, and a map of Tudor London (1520) published in 2018 (and updated in 2022). The Historic Towns Trust publishes many maps of British towns and cities—historical maps, not reproductions of old maps (in fact, Londonist points out that no maps of London prior to about 1550 currently exist). The Trust’s London maps are also available as overlays on the Layers of London online map: Tudor, medieval. Some maps from the Trust’s British Historic Towns Atlas, which began publishing in 1969 and the earliest volumes of which are out of print, are also available as PDF downloads; here’s the page for London.

Google Maps Navigation Updates

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Google Maps is introducing a speedometer and speed limits to iOS and Carplay; the feature has been on Android since 2019. Meanwhile, Google has pushed back on the claim from one user that pop-up ads were turning up while navigating with Google Maps; rather, they say it was an instance of “promoted pins” that (should) only pop up if tapped on. 9to5Google: “we were able to replicate the exact same UI by tapping on a location on the map, so it seems the screen was either touched by accident or a glitch was at play.”

‘Map-Splaining’

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Modern online maps have so much data under the hood, and provide an overabundance of detail, that they can’t help but bombard the user, The Atlantic’s Ian Bogost argues, coining a term for their “sheer exhaustiveness”: map-splaining. It’s a challenge to take all that data and make directions comprehensible.

The maps know that one road is five lanes wide and the other six; both have medians. They understand that right turns between the streets can be accomplished via dedicated merge lanes that skip the red light. They appreciate that two lanes allow left turns between each of these streets, facilitated by a left-turn-arrow traffic signal. Having all this information helps the maps give their step-by-step instructions: Take the first turn lane from northbound 28th Street, then a quick right into the parking lot for Flatiron Coffee. That level of precision may be convenient for some drivers, but it comes at the price of breaking down the built environment into lots of extra segments and transitions that may trigger the display of useless routing information. Perhaps the software should just be telling you to “go past the light and make a left.”

Indian Residential Schools Interactive Map

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
Indigenous Services Canada (screenshot)

The Canadian government has launched an interactive map of former Indian residential schools. “The Indian Residential Schools Interactive Map allows users to visualize the location of the 140 former residential school sites recognized in the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement as well as provide information on the current status and historical context of the site. The map has a search, filter, measurement and imagery slider to help users with analysis.” The map makes use of historical aerial photography to pinpoint the locations of schools that are no longer standing; many of the sites have since been redeveloped.

The purpose of the map is grim: to determine the potential locations of additional school gravesites. Generations of Indigenous children were forced to attend residential schools in Canada: many were subjected to physical and sexual abuse, and thousands died of disease or neglect. In the past few years, unmarked graves have been found at several residential school sites across Canada, and searches are under way at many others. This map makes available to searchers imagery that was otherwise difficult to access. (The imagery is also available as a dataset.) More at the CBC News story.

A Digital Archive of Ireland’s Ordnance Survey

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

A digital archive of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland has been launched, two hundred years after its founding. From the University of Limerick media release:

In Ireland, between 1824 and 1842 the OS completed the first ever large-scale survey of an entire country, at a scale of six inches to the mile. Acclaimed for their accuracy, these maps are regarded by cartographers as amongst the finest ever produced.

In addition to maps, the Ordnance Survey staff, both military and civilian, recorded other information such as archaeological and toponymical material including local customs, antiquities, place names and topographical features. However, over time, these materials have been disparately housed in various museums, repositories and archives across Ireland and Britain. […]

By reconnecting digitally, the OS maps, memoirs, correspondence, drawings and books of placenames into a new online resource, the project aims to open up the histories to wider audiences, enabling a richer and deeper engagement with and understanding of the OS operations in Ireland two centuries ago.

More about the project here.

Quantum Navigation

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Quantum navigation systems are being tested in Britain. Last month there was a successful test flight of an aviation system, and a system is being tested on test trains on the London Underground. (It’s not clear to me whether these systems are related, but the U.K. has apparently been making a big push into quantum tech lately.) Quantum navigation is essentially quantum mechanics applied to dead reckoning, using the properties of supercool atoms to measure change of position. The advantage of the system is that it’s self-contained: it doesn’t require a GPS signal or navigation beacon to triangulate from, which makes it resistant to jamming or spoofing—and considering how essential real-time location data has become, and how easy it is to disrupt location signals, the appeal of a self-contained solution is self-evident.

Islario, an Atlas of Islands

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
Banner image from the Islario Kickstarter, showing a cover of the book plus a background map image.

Islario, Alejandro Polanco’s latest Kickstarter project, is a collection of 16th- to 19th-century maps of islands—some real, some phantom. “In Spanish, the word ‘islario’ means something like a “compendium of islands’ or an ‘atlas of islands’. Between the 16th and 19th centuries, many ‘islarios’ were created, books that contained only maps of islands. Since the traces used to draw these maps were often based on legends or comments from sailors in ports, the problem of distinguishing between real and fantastic islands arose.” In this blog post (in Spanish), Alejandro takes a look at one of the fantastic islands his book will cover: Frisland.

Topo and Trail Maps Coming to Apple Maps in iOS 18/macOS Sequoia

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
Three views of Apple Maps in hiking/trail mode on an iPhone. (Apple)
Apple

Topographical maps and hiking maps are coming to Apple Maps on the Mac, iPhone and iPad as of macOS Sequoia and iOS/iPadOS 18, due out this fall. The hiking maps will be at least for U.S. national parks, and will also be available in offline mode because hiking in areas without cell service is the point. Other features coming to Maps include custom walking routes and saved places. [Spatially Adjusted]

China Accused of Erasing Uyghur Names from Villages in Xinjiang

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Human Rights Watch accuses Chinese authorities of systematically renaming Uyghur villages in Xinjiang in a way that erases references to Uyghur religion, history or culture. According to their research, about 3,600 of 25,000 villages in Xinjiang were renamed between 2009 and 2023. “About four-fifths of these changes appear mundane, such as number changes, or corrections to names previously written incorrectly. But the 630, about a fifth, involve changes of a religious, cultural, or historical nature.” [BBC News]

OpenStreetMap Is Dealing with Some Vandalism

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

It seems OpenStreetMap has had to deal with a wave of vandalism attacks lately. If you see some nonsense on OSM, this post on their community forum outlines what to do about it (it may have already been taken care of even if it’s still appearing, so check for that; also, don’t post screencaps, because propagating the nonsense is what the vandals want). The OSM ops team provided this update on Mastodon today: “OpenStreetMap is now stronger with improved monitoring, automatic blocking, and respectful limits on new accounts. The default osm.org map is now quicker at fixing large-scale vandalism. Offline actions are also progressing.”

Google Timeline: Location History Moves to On-Device Storage

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

More details emerged this week on how Google Maps is changing how it stores users’ location data—which is that as of December 2024 it basically won’t: Location History has been rebranded Google Timeline and will be stored on-device, where you can set it to auto-delete after a specified period of time, rather than on Google’s servers. Not having your location data in the cloud is better for your personal security (Google can’t respond to geofence warrants if it doesn’t collect and store location data), but it also means that Timeline won’t be available via the web. This is a bit more definitive than what I understood it to be last December. See news coverage from 9to5Google, The Guardian and The Verge.