traffic posts

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Software, iPhone, App Review

A trip around town with Traffic Live from Navigon

by Mel Martin (RSS feed) on Nov 12th, 2009

I've already reported on the updated Navigon iPhone app, [iTunes link] and noted that live traffic info was now included as an in-app purchase. I've spent the last 2 days driving around town testing it, and it works as advertised -- but perhaps in not as many places as I would have hoped.

Here in Southern Arizona, there were very few traffic updates, so I set a destination for Phoenix and had lots of information. Clearly, Navigon is not always sourcing information from smaller U.S. cities.

As a comparison, I tried the traffic info built into my car nav system, and it displayed 9 nearby traffic incidents, some as close as 4 miles away. At the same time, the nearest traffic incident I got from Navigon was 94 miles away in the Phoenix metro area.

It was odd, because both systems source a lot of the same places (like Clear Channel Radio) for information. On the other hand, the traffic info from Navigon was more detailed, with nice close-up maps of the trouble areas.

I like everything about the Navigon app. The graphics are first rate. It automatically changes to night view, the text to speech voice is very clear in a noisy car, and the map doesn't lag from my actual position.

The traffic option is US$19.99 as a one time payment, and not overpriced in my view. My only caution is you may not get much information if you are not in the large metro areas, and it would be nice if Navigon posted where good traffic information is available.

For those in the bigger cities, it's a nice addition at a reasonable price.

Tags: GPS, iPhone, navigation, Navigon, traffic

Filed under: iPhone, App Review

YANA - Yet another navigation app (MapQuest Navigator)

by Mel Martin (RSS feed) on Oct 12th, 2009

If choice is a good thing, iPhone owners have a veritable bounty of navigation apps in all price ranges and features. MapQuest has now released their own navigation app, and frankly it's a mixed bag.

Like the AT&T nav app, MapQuest Navigator [iTunes link] needs the internet for its data, so if you frequently drive where even the Edge network is a sometime visitor, forget using this app.

If you are more of an urban driver or stick to Interstates, the app has some promise.

Here are some of the touted features:

Streamlined 3D Interface: Features voice-guided, turn-by-turn navigation that speaks directions and street names.

Regular Data Updates: Search 16+ million points of interest and utilize up-to-date street maps.

Full Route Corridor Download: Quick route re-calculation for missed turns as well provides continued service in areas of no cellular coverage.

Traffic Incident Based Routing: U.S. routes are optimized to avoid traffic incidents that might delay your travel.

A MapQuest Place Carousel: Easily displays locations for hotels, movie theaters, gas stations, and more with a single tap.

The interface is different from almost all the other GPS apps I've used. There is a ribbon, or Carousel as MapQuest calls it, lets you click on hotels, gas stations, food, etc.., and see icons where these points of interest are. To get to one of these places, you have to click on the destination icon, which often requires enlarging the map. I would have preferred a list, because clicking on a map icon can be some extra trouble when various icons are close together.

Continue reading “YANA - Yet another navigation app (MapQuest Navigator)”

Tags: app store, downloadable data, DownloadableData, GPS, iPhone, MapQuest Navigator, navigation, text to speech, traffic

Filed under: iPhone, iPod touch

No need for an app with Sig Alert's maps

by Sang Tang (RSS feed) on Aug 16th, 2009

As TUAW's own Steve Sande noted, one of the neat features of Safari on iPhone OS 3.0 is its ability to leverage the HTML 5 geolocation API. One of the more prominent web-based services to use geolocation is Google's Latitude, which allows one to see where their friends are located and what they're currently up to. Whereas Latitude provides you updates on where your friends are and what they're up to, Sigalert.com provides you updates on what's holding up all the traffic at your current location (for California and Arizona only) as well as when you should be expecting it to loosen up.

During a recent weekend afternoon drive from Los Angeles to San Diego, I was stuck in heavy traffic -- unusually heavy considering the day and time I was traveling. Sure, I could have relied on dedicated apps, such as iPhone's built-in map app or MapQuest 4 Mobile, to see exactly where the traffic would loosen up, but I wanted to know exactly what was causing the traffic. So I turned to sigalert.com instead.

Continue reading “No need for an app with Sig Alert's maps”

Tags: geolocation, html 5, Html5, iphone, ipod touch, IpodTouch, maps, sigalert, traffic, traffic jam, TrafficJam

Filed under: Apple Corporate, Internet, Surveys and Polls

Apple blows past other hardware web sites in May

by Mel Martin (RSS feed) on Jun 30th, 2009

Wow. It isn't even close. Apple blew by HP, Dell and even MagicJack (!) with the most visits to a website in May. According to the people who compile such statistics at Nielsen, Apple drew 55.7 million unique viewers, more than double what next ranked HP did. Much of that may have been driven by anticipation of the new iPhone. Here's the chart.

Also interesting is that Nielsen computes the average visitor stayed on the Apple site an average of 1 hour and 14 minutes. That's a lot of reading and watching demo videos.

Nielsen also took a look at blog mentions of the iPhone in early June, and the numbers are pretty striking there too. You can see the peak as the release date approached, with another peak on release day June 19.

They say if people are talking about you it's a good thing. By that measure things are really great at Apple.

Tags: Apple web site, blog posts, iPhone 3GS, Iphone3gs, Nielsen survey, statistics, traffic

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Internet, iPhone, iPod touch

iPhone nabs 59% of smartphone 'net traffic, 43% of mobile web traffic

by Mike Schramm (RSS feed) on May 29th, 2009

Fortune has the results of an AdMob survey up, and they're pretty surprising -- Apple has apparently taken over 59% of smartphone traffic on the Internet, and in the mobile category in general, they've got a giant 43% of 'net traffic surveyed. But there's another side here: the report doesn't just point out that Apple accounts for the lion's share of mobile 'net traffic, but it states that smartphone traffic, and specifically the iPhone in general, hugely overshadows the actual sales numbers. The iPhone has 8% global market share, but accounts for 65% of HTML traffic. And smartphones in general overshadow their sales to a lesser degree: smartphones represent about 12% of mobile device sales, but AdMob calculates them at around 35% of their traffic last month.

What does this mean? AdMob suggests it's a phase -- right now, because we're so early in the development stages of this platform, mobile web makes up the main chunk of traffic. But in the future, we may go through applications to get data, or use push notifications, and/or come up with other, more streamlined ways to get information out to mobile devices. But for now, iPhone and iPod touch users are still browsing the web, and as a result, they are accounting for way more traffic than their sales hint at.

Tags: admob, html, internet, iphone, ipod-touch, overshadow, results, smartphones, survey, traffic

Filed under: iPod Family, Odds and ends, Apple

Nano crushed by highway traffic

by Mike Schramm (RSS feed) on Aug 29th, 2007

We've finally found something that can kill an Apple product: 30 minutes of highway traffic. Sam O. wrote in to tell us what happened to his brother's 2G Nano-- his grandmother apparently found it in the driveway, and decided to pick it up and put it on the hood of his car. He didn't realize this had happened, however, until he'd driven out for some errands, so after swearing profusely for a bit, he got back in the car to follow his route and see if he could spot it.

It's hot pink, obviously, so he did find it-- just in time to see an 18-wheel semi run it over. The gory results are below. We've seen Apple products take quite a licking and keep on ticking before, but apparently sitting on the highway for 30 minutes in Boise, ID will shut them down for good. Good to know.

Of course, the real question is: did AppleCare cover it?

Gallery: Nano vs. Highway Traffic

Tags: apple, boise, crushed, highway, nano, traffic

Filed under: Software, Internet Tools, Widget Watch

Widget Watch: Dashalytics 3.0

by David Chartier (RSS feed) on Jul 22nd, 2007

Google's Analytics service is a great (and free) tool for anyone who wants to track website visitor statistics. How many visits, who and where they're coming from, what OS and browser they're using, how long they stay - nearly the whole enchilada. To view your statistics in a place other than Google's site, Dashalytics from Rob Scriva is truly your best choice. With access to what seems to be all the stats Analytics has to offer, Dashalytics wraps everything up in a gorgeous UI that has received a wonderful update for this new v3 release. While the changelog states there are simply too many changes to list, I notice the widget itself feels snappier, especially when switching between viewing stats from multiple sites under the same Google Analytics account (i.e. - yes, you can view all sites registered on your account). Dashalytics is also smart in that it stores your login credentials in Keychain, making it easy to use multiple instances to track sites under multiple Google Analytics accounts.

Provided as donationware, Dashalytics is a truly great choice for staying on top of what your visitors are up to. I highly recommend you drop Mr. Scriva a few bucks for his good work.

Tags: analytics, dashalytics, google, rob scriva, RobScriva, statistics, traffic

Filed under: Software, Freeware, Internet Tools

Monitor your broadband traffic with SurplusMeter

by Dave Caolo (RSS feed) on Apr 19th, 2006

Let's say you've got a broadband connection at home, but your provider puts a cap on your monthly download allotment. That's all well and good until it's the end of the month and you find yourself strapped (you torrent addict, you). Wouldn't it be nice to get a warning before everything goes kaput?

Check out SurplusMeter. It simply monitors all of your traffic (both up and down) and reports on how much you're using. You can view a daily average and more. Note that SurplusMeter only monitors traffic, not content, and doesn't "phone home" in any way.

SurplusMeter is free, and you can get the source code here.

[Via FreeMacWare]

Tags: broadband, internet, surplusmeter, traffic

Tip of the Day

Use Spotlight as a reference tool. Type any word in the Spotlight box and one of the top entries will be a definition. Click on it, and it will bring up the dictionary application to check the word in either the dictionary, thesaurus, Apple database, or Wikipedia.

Learn More

TUAW flickr Pool

www.flickr.com

Featured Galleries

TUAW bloggers (30 days)

#	Blogger	Posts	Cmts
1	Steven Sande	44	3
2	Dave Caolo	35	4
3	Mel Martin	31	0
4	Mike Schramm	28	0
5	Josh Carr	18	24
6	Michael Rose	18	26
7	Victor Agreda, Jr.	17	6
8	TJ Luoma	15	27
9	Joachim Bean	12	3
10	Ken Ray	11	2
11	Erica Sadun	11	1
12	Sang Tang	10	0
13	Aron Trimble	9	3
14	David Winograd	9	4
15	Chris Rawson	8	0
16	Megan Lavey	7	9
17	John Burke	6	3
18	Lauren Hirsch	4	0
19	Brett Terpstra	4	5
20	Tim Wasson	3	0

More Apple Analysis

AAPL on BloggingStocks The Apple category feed from BloggingStocks.com
AAPL Quote, News & Summary The AAPL financials page from AOL Money and Finance
iPhone analysis from BloggingStocks iPhone tag feed from BloggingStocks
Macintosh news and reviews on Download Squad The Macintosh category feed from Download Squad

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)