Re:Apple's New Map
by nazca on Thursday November 01, 2018 @10:36PM
(#18360281)
I think the author missed that the old version, and Google Maps currently, typically use green to denote certain types of public land (parks, national forest, etc.) not vegetation per se. Apple is solving a different use case by color coding by vegetation. And It's one that I think is less useful. KNowing that there is vegetation on someone else's private land isn't really that useful to me. But knowing the boundaries of a national forest is extremely useful.
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Indeed. Having hyper accurate greenery mapping may make for a cool tech demo, but has very little utility. Maps are about information density and color utility. Having 10 different shades of green doesn't really convey anything that's useful for my normal usecase.
Re:Apple's New Map
by toasterlovin on Friday November 02, 2018 @01:36AM
(#18360913)
Disagree, FWIW. Knowing how the land is shaped and what’s on it helps me navigate much better. Green things on the map that don’t correspond to green things in the environment are not super useful to me.
Don't we have aerial and satellite view for that? Disclaimer: I don't know if Apple Maps has a satellite view (never owned an Apple device) and I very rarely use Google Maps for navigation so I don't know if those views can be used while navigating.
However I've got the feeling that the new and less detailed maps are made for the use case of navigation, with a voice telling us what to do. Road names are important only when we are discovering what's around us or where we want to go. If this is a less important use case now, street names go away. Still it should be possible to build an app that works on a sensible way in both navigation and discovery mode.
The satellite view is great to look at, but it provides way too much information to be useful in a spur of a moment. It also usually requires a few taps to get to (Menu > Layers > Satellite). Apple is betting on a hybrid approach it seems.
If you want that, switch to Satellite view; then you have even more detail.
Re:Apple's New Map
by dlivingston on Friday November 02, 2018 @04:58PM
(#18366688)
Disagree in the sense that utility shouldn't be the only deciding factor in whether or not to add a feature. Apple, of course, cares about aesthetics, and having contrasting - though still minimalist - vectorized topology makes Maps much more pleasing to look at, and therefore to use.
Re:Apple's New Map
by zongitsrinzler on Friday November 02, 2018 @02:07AM
(#18361005)
I would argue that seeing vegetation on a map makes navigation easier. Which is the purpose of Apple Maps, right?
Apparently not. See the threads about missing street names.
Also weird that in the very first picture they added a blue lake (next to Pyramid Lake) that is currently and has been dry for a while... I guess they're betting on rain?
For some reason the national forest boundaries on google map seem to be frequently wrong and also change over time (at least I've noticed some changes). Trinity (CA) looks to be completely missing, as is a large portion of Gifford Pinchot or Okanogan-Wenatchee and maybe Snoqualmie (WA). Not sure why this happens.