Palm map software

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops.pilot (More info?)

Steve Hodgson wrote:
> Having moved to an OS5 Palm Tungsten T5 I can no longer install Tom Tom
> CityMaps and wondered whether there are any alternatives. I need UK
> coverage and route planning but don't need any GPS capability.
>
> I have looked a Mapopolis but it was a bit flaky on opening maps from SD
> card. Are there any other worth looking at?

Check out ViaMichellin's MapSonic. It's pretty good (IMO TomTom is better but
you can't buy that without buying a whole GPS bundle).

Glenn.

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops.pilot (More info?)

Steve Hodgson wrote:
> Having moved to an OS5 Palm Tungsten T5 I can no longer install Tom Tom
> CityMaps and wondered whether there are any alternatives. I need UK
> coverage and route planning but don't need any GPS capability.
>
> I have looked a Mapopolis but it was a bit flaky on opening maps from SD
> card. Are there any other worth looking at?
>
> Cheers,
>
> Steve
If you otherwise like Mapopolis, I do, you can get TealAlias which will
make any application play nice with an SD.

--
George Fragos
_______________
Thank a Veteran

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops.pilot (More info?)

Hi Steve,

For what it's worth I've found Mapopolis to be an acceptable solution.
If
you ordinarily stay within the area covered by only a few of their
maps,
it's not too much trouble to copy the maps from the SD card into RAM
(especially on a new Palm with lots of internal memory). Even when I'm
traveling and need many maps loaded at the same time, I don't find it
too
difficult to copy the maps temporarily into RAM and then delete them.
If
you have to do this often, the suggestion of using TealAlias might be
good
one, although I've not used those two programs together before.

As for Mapopolis in general, it may not have the most beautiful
interface,
but it is acceptable to worth within. The route planning feature does
work (although like all such features, will occasionally produce
pathological routes!), and the map coverage is very good. It only
crashes
occasionally, which is pretty good for software of this kind. In sum,
although it's not perfect, I've been sufficiently satisfied with it to
not
seriously explore other mapping software alternatives.
Good luck with your decision!

--Sam Lipoff

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops.pilot (More info?)

On 2004-12-10, Glenn Proctor <none@null.com> wrote:

> Check out ViaMichellin's MapSonic. It's pretty good (IMO TomTom is
> better but you can't buy that without buying a whole GPS bundle).

I have Mapsonic and wouldn't buy it again. If only TomTom would nix
this stupid rule they have where everything they produce for the Palm
is twice the price of the PocketPC version.

Mapsonic wasn't really designed to work with large maps. You can fit
the whole of the UK onto an SD card of 256 megs in size if you don't
add polygons (sea, rivers, woods etc) but it's a little clunky to
use.

Mapsonic has two calculation modes, "Complete" and "Partial", the
former calculates the route to the destination from any point on the
map and allows instant route recalculations but it takes about 5
minutes to calculate even if the journey is only about 1 mile long as
it calculated all routes to any part of the country (probably using a
travelling wavefront algorithm).

The other mode is "Partial" in which it calculates the route from the
start to end only, and is quicker, however as soon as you go into
navigation mode it clears the route and only recalculates when you
start moving (so it can tell which direction you are travelling in).
This recalculation can take about 2 minutes on some routes and as it
only happens once you're driving then it can be a PITA if you are in
the middle of a strange city, you have to stop as soon as it's started
calculating or risk driving onto one of the daft one-way systems that
infest the cities. Sometimes during the journey it decides to re-run
the calculation even if you're not off-route, so you lose the nav for
a few minutes.

Both methods of calculation eat memory, and when you try to quit
mapsonic it tries to save the route, which involves writing what is
sometimes an 8 megabyte file to your SD card, which can take many
minutes to complete. I get caught out by this quite a bit as you
drive to your approximage location, get the address book out to call
your contact or look up the house number and then have to sit there
for 5 minutes while it flashes "please wait" with no progress
indicator... I never remember this until it's too late and I think
"Why didn't I write that address down!!"

Mapsonic also has absolutely no "avoid area" facilities or "route
via", so you can't get it to take known traffic hotspots or map
inaccuracies into account, and there's a fair few of these. The utter
inability to influence the route it suggests (other than by road type
preference) is a major PITA as far as I'm concerned.

Finally if an alarm goes off while Mapsonic is running, it crashes the
machine and you have to reset it, re-program your route and go through
all the recalculation again...

Some of these problems can be worked around, but I've certainly
learned what is important from Mapsonic. The manufacturer is
unresponsive to problems. TomTom's technical support isn't any good
either from past experience, but if Navigator had been available for
Palm when I wanted a navigation app I'd not have given Mapsonic a
second look.

Having said all that, Mapsonic is much better than nothing, it's still
very useful, but they could have learned something from the many years
of navigation apps on the PC.

--
For every expert, there is an equal but opposite expert

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops.pilot (More info?)

Has anyone ever tried "Directions on the Go" software from the Palm
Store (MDM makes it)? I have tried to find out how it does, stacked up
against Mapopolis Navigator for OS5.

Ian Rawlings wrote:
> On 2004-12-10, Glenn Proctor <none@null.com> wrote:
>
> > Check out ViaMichellin's MapSonic. It's pretty good (IMO TomTom is
> > better but you can't buy that without buying a whole GPS bundle).
>
> I have Mapsonic and wouldn't buy it again. If only TomTom would nix
> this stupid rule they have where everything they produce for the Palm
> is twice the price of the PocketPC version.
>
> Mapsonic wasn't really designed to work with large maps. You can fit
> the whole of the UK onto an SD card of 256 megs in size if you don't
> add polygons (sea, rivers, woods etc) but it's a little clunky to
> use.
>
> Mapsonic has two calculation modes, "Complete" and "Partial", the
> former calculates the route to the destination from any point on the
> map and allows instant route recalculations but it takes about 5
> minutes to calculate even if the journey is only about 1 mile long as
> it calculated all routes to any part of the country (probably using a
> travelling wavefront algorithm).
>
> The other mode is "Partial" in which it calculates the route from the
> start to end only, and is quicker, however as soon as you go into
> navigation mode it clears the route and only recalculates when you
> start moving (so it can tell which direction you are travelling in).
> This recalculation can take about 2 minutes on some routes and as it
> only happens once you're driving then it can be a PITA if you are in
> the middle of a strange city, you have to stop as soon as it's
started
> calculating or risk driving onto one of the daft one-way systems that
> infest the cities. Sometimes during the journey it decides to re-run
> the calculation even if you're not off-route, so you lose the nav for
> a few minutes.
>
> Both methods of calculation eat memory, and when you try to quit
> mapsonic it tries to save the route, which involves writing what is
> sometimes an 8 megabyte file to your SD card, which can take many
> minutes to complete. I get caught out by this quite a bit as you
> drive to your approximage location, get the address book out to call
> your contact or look up the house number and then have to sit there
> for 5 minutes while it flashes "please wait" with no progress
> indicator... I never remember this until it's too late and I think
> "Why didn't I write that address down!!"
>
> Mapsonic also has absolutely no "avoid area" facilities or "route
> via", so you can't get it to take known traffic hotspots or map
> inaccuracies into account, and there's a fair few of these. The
utter
> inability to influence the route it suggests (other than by road type
> preference) is a major PITA as far as I'm concerned.
>
> Finally if an alarm goes off while Mapsonic is running, it crashes
the
> machine and you have to reset it, re-program your route and go
through
> all the recalculation again...
>
> Some of these problems can be worked around, but I've certainly
> learned what is important from Mapsonic. The manufacturer is
> unresponsive to problems. TomTom's technical support isn't any good
> either from past experience, but if Navigator had been available for
> Palm when I wanted a navigation app I'd not have given Mapsonic a
> second look.
>
> Having said all that, Mapsonic is much better than nothing, it's
still
> very useful, but they could have learned something from the many
years
> of navigation apps on the PC.
>
> --
> For every expert, there is an equal but opposite expert

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops.pilot (More info?)

Has anyone ever tried "Directions on the Go" software from the Palm
Store (MDM makes it)? I have tried to find out how it does, stacked up
against Mapopolis Navigator for OS5.

Ian Rawlings wrote:
> On 2004-12-10, Glenn Proctor <none@null.com> wrote:
>
> > Check out ViaMichellin's MapSonic. It's pretty good (IMO TomTom is
> > better but you can't buy that without buying a whole GPS bundle).
>
> I have Mapsonic and wouldn't buy it again. If only TomTom would nix
> this stupid rule they have where everything they produce for the Palm
> is twice the price of the PocketPC version.
>
> Mapsonic wasn't really designed to work with large maps. You can fit
> the whole of the UK onto an SD card of 256 megs in size if you don't
> add polygons (sea, rivers, woods etc) but it's a little clunky to
> use.
>
> Mapsonic has two calculation modes, "Complete" and "Partial", the
> former calculates the route to the destination from any point on the
> map and allows instant route recalculations but it takes about 5
> minutes to calculate even if the journey is only about 1 mile long as
> it calculated all routes to any part of the country (probably using a
> travelling wavefront algorithm).
>
> The other mode is "Partial" in which it calculates the route from the
> start to end only, and is quicker, however as soon as you go into
> navigation mode it clears the route and only recalculates when you
> start moving (so it can tell which direction you are travelling in).
> This recalculation can take about 2 minutes on some routes and as it
> only happens once you're driving then it can be a PITA if you are in
> the middle of a strange city, you have to stop as soon as it's
started
> calculating or risk driving onto one of the daft one-way systems that
> infest the cities. Sometimes during the journey it decides to re-run
> the calculation even if you're not off-route, so you lose the nav for
> a few minutes.
>
> Both methods of calculation eat memory, and when you try to quit
> mapsonic it tries to save the route, which involves writing what is
> sometimes an 8 megabyte file to your SD card, which can take many
> minutes to complete. I get caught out by this quite a bit as you
> drive to your approximage location, get the address book out to call
> your contact or look up the house number and then have to sit there
> for 5 minutes while it flashes "please wait" with no progress
> indicator... I never remember this until it's too late and I think
> "Why didn't I write that address down!!"
>
> Mapsonic also has absolutely no "avoid area" facilities or "route
> via", so you can't get it to take known traffic hotspots or map
> inaccuracies into account, and there's a fair few of these. The
utter
> inability to influence the route it suggests (other than by road type
> preference) is a major PITA as far as I'm concerned.
>
> Finally if an alarm goes off while Mapsonic is running, it crashes
the
> machine and you have to reset it, re-program your route and go
through
> all the recalculation again...
>
> Some of these problems can be worked around, but I've certainly
> learned what is important from Mapsonic. The manufacturer is
> unresponsive to problems. TomTom's technical support isn't any good
> either from past experience, but if Navigator had been available for
> Palm when I wanted a navigation app I'd not have given Mapsonic a
> second look.
>
> Having said all that, Mapsonic is much better than nothing, it's
still
> very useful, but they could have learned something from the many
years
> of navigation apps on the PC.
>
> --
> For every expert, there is an equal but opposite expert

Archived from groups: comp.sys.palmtops.pilot (More info?)

Has anyone ever tried "Directions on the Go" software from the Palm
Store (MDM makes it)? I have tried to find out how it does, stacked up
against Mapopolis Navigator for OS5.

Ian Rawlings wrote:
> On 2004-12-10, Glenn Proctor <none@null.com> wrote:
>
> > Check out ViaMichellin's MapSonic. It's pretty good (IMO TomTom is
> > better but you can't buy that without buying a whole GPS bundle).
>
> I have Mapsonic and wouldn't buy it again. If only TomTom would nix
> this stupid rule they have where everything they produce for the Palm
> is twice the price of the PocketPC version.
>
> Mapsonic wasn't really designed to work with large maps. You can fit
> the whole of the UK onto an SD card of 256 megs in size if you don't
> add polygons (sea, rivers, woods etc) but it's a little clunky to
> use.
>
> Mapsonic has two calculation modes, "Complete" and "Partial", the
> former calculates the route to the destination from any point on the
> map and allows instant route recalculations but it takes about 5
> minutes to calculate even if the journey is only about 1 mile long as
> it calculated all routes to any part of the country (probably using a
> travelling wavefront algorithm).
>
> The other mode is "Partial" in which it calculates the route from the
> start to end only, and is quicker, however as soon as you go into
> navigation mode it clears the route and only recalculates when you
> start moving (so it can tell which direction you are travelling in).
> This recalculation can take about 2 minutes on some routes and as it
> only happens once you're driving then it can be a PITA if you are in
> the middle of a strange city, you have to stop as soon as it's
started
> calculating or risk driving onto one of the daft one-way systems that
> infest the cities. Sometimes during the journey it decides to re-run
> the calculation even if you're not off-route, so you lose the nav for
> a few minutes.
>
> Both methods of calculation eat memory, and when you try to quit
> mapsonic it tries to save the route, which involves writing what is
> sometimes an 8 megabyte file to your SD card, which can take many
> minutes to complete. I get caught out by this quite a bit as you
> drive to your approximage location, get the address book out to call
> your contact or look up the house number and then have to sit there
> for 5 minutes while it flashes "please wait" with no progress
> indicator... I never remember this until it's too late and I think
> "Why didn't I write that address down!!"
>
> Mapsonic also has absolutely no "avoid area" facilities or "route
> via", so you can't get it to take known traffic hotspots or map
> inaccuracies into account, and there's a fair few of these. The
utter
> inability to influence the route it suggests (other than by road type
> preference) is a major PITA as far as I'm concerned.
>
> Finally if an alarm goes off while Mapsonic is running, it crashes
the
> machine and you have to reset it, re-program your route and go
through
> all the recalculation again...
>
> Some of these problems can be worked around, but I've certainly
> learned what is important from Mapsonic. The manufacturer is
> unresponsive to problems. TomTom's technical support isn't any good
> either from past experience, but if Navigator had been available for
> Palm when I wanted a navigation app I'd not have given Mapsonic a
> second look.
>
> Having said all that, Mapsonic is much better than nothing, it's
still
> very useful, but they could have learned something from the many
years
> of navigation apps on the PC.
>
> --
> For every expert, there is an equal but opposite expert