What GPS Apps do you want to see?

[whmurray]

Excellent question about the phone call. What if you are driving and you suddenly get a phone call? Do you answer the call and get lost or ignore the call and miss something important?

My experience is that the phone automatically answers the call and I miss my turn.

 

[alokeprasad]

I'd like to buy a software (from Garmin?) that will reproduce the Nuvi interface, with maps downloaded on the fly, voice directions, POI from the internet, constantly updated traffic.

Basically I want to avoid having to buy a PND.

I am assuming that this will be cheaper than buying a Nuvi, as Garmin saves the cost of hardware and possibly maps, if they use Google Maps as the source of their maps.

 

[xintelinsanex]

Just saw this on Electronista about GPS navigation software:

Apple may be attempting to block competition when it comes to GPS navigation on the iPhone, developers have observed. In the most recent version of the iPhone SDK, Section 3.3.7 of the license agreement tells users that "applications may not be designed or marketed for real time route guidance; automatic or autonomous control of vehicles, aircraft, or other mechanical devices; dispatch or fleet management; or emergency or life-saving purposes.

Also disturbing is the part about life-saving purposes.

 

[cmaier]

The issue there is they don't want to get sued when someone gets killed, not that they don't want competition. Note that the iphone OS is not a real-time OS, and thus is inherently unsafe for use in places where a real-time OS is required.

question is, what is "real-time route guidance?" If they mean "real-time" in the vernacular, rather than technical, sense, then there may be something to the competition paranoia. The automatic or autonomous control.... etc. is obvious. The iphone is not designed with that sort of purpose in mind, and using it in that way would inevitibly lead to death and destruction.

 

[marcol]

Well that would be totally crap of Apple. What are they thinking?

Here's the link btw:

http://www.electronista.com/articles/08/06/11/iphone.sdk..gps.nav/

 

[xintelinsanex]

The issue there is they don't want to get sued when someone gets killed, not that they don't want competition. Note that the iphone OS is not a real-time OS, and thus is inherently unsafe for use in places where a real-time OS is required.

question is, what is "real-time route guidance?" If they mean "real-time" in the vernacular, rather than technical, sense, then there may be something to the competition paranoia. The automatic or autonomous control.... etc. is obvious. The iphone is not designed with that sort of purpose in mind, and using it in that way would inevitibly lead to death and destruction.

What do you mean real time OS?

 

[marcol]

question is, what is "real-time route guidance?" If they mean "real-time" in the vernacular, rather than technical, sense, then there may be something to the competition paranoia.

The statement seems to be about application purpose not the underlying technical aspects.

 

[cmaier]

Real-time OS's are a special kind of OS usually used in things like nav systems, industrial machines, automobile controllers, medical equipment, etc.

They make sure that instructions and processes always operate on a fixed schedule, rather than allowing interrupts, garbage collection, recalcitrant threads and the like to change the amount of time it takes for things to happen.

Wind River, QNX, VxWorks, etc. are examples.

What you don't want in such situations is an OS that will pause every once in awhile to do things other than the foreground process, which is exactly what os x does.

See, e.g.: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_time_operating_system

 

[cmaier]

The statement seems to be about application purpose not the underlying technical aspects.

yes, but "real time," with regard to purpose, means something specific in the art. To customers, it means "turn by turn driving directions more or less as i am coming up on the turns." That's not at all what it means to engineers.

Lawyers tend to be pretty precise in the words they use in contracts and agreements, so it's not clear to me that the lawyers didn't mean the technical term.

 

[xintelinsanex]

Real-time OS's are a special kind of OS usually used in things like nav systems, industrial machines, automobile controllers, medical equipment, etc.

They make sure that instructions and processes always operate on a fixed schedule, rather than allowing interrupts, garbage collection, recalcitrant threads and the like to change the amount of time it takes for things to happen.

Wind River, QNX, VxWorks, etc. are examples.

What you don't want in such situations is an OS that will pause every once in awhile to do things other than the foreground process, which is exactly what os x does.

See, e.g.: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_time_operating_system

Ah excellent. That's good to know. Thanks for the information.

 

[marcol]

yes, but "real time," with regard to purpose, means something specific in the art. To customers, it means "turn by turn driving directions more or less as i am coming up on the turns." That's not at all what it means to engineers.

Lawyers tend to be pretty precise in the words they use in contracts and agreements, so it's not clear to me that the lawyers didn't mean the technical term.

Ok, and I guess we do have to consider the context and audience: it's aimed at developers. All I want is TomTom - I'll take my chances.

 

[cmaier]

Hey, their language makes me nervous, too.

Guess we'll see.

 

[marcol]

When Engadget/Gizmodo/main stream media pick this up we might get a response from Apple.

 

[marcol]

Didn't take too long for Engadget a Gizmodo to get articles up:

http://gizmodo.com/5015389/iphone-sdk-agreement-prohibits-real+time-route-guidance-and-saving-lives

http://www.engadgetmobile.com/2008/...ent-forbids-real-time-route-guidance-dancing/

Engadget makes some interesting points:

Apple's always been known for its amusingly-conservative disclaimers (you can't use iTunes to "design a nuclear weapon," for example) and it looks like the products-liability team at the Fruit has had their way with the iPhone SDK agreement as well, inserting a provision specifically prohibiting developers from creating apps "marketed for real time route guidance; automatic or autonomous control of vehicles, aircraft, or other mechanical devices; dispatch or fleet management; or emergency or life-saving purposes." Yep, that's right -- no real-time route guidance (or, uh, fleet management) allowed. That'd be a huge bummer -- except, of course, that TomTom has already come out and said that its app is ready to go on the iPhone. Assuming TomTom used the SDK and not the jailbreak toolchain, we'd bet that Apple is just covering its ass here and that it's worked out an agreement with TomTom to pass along any liability -- you can bet Steve doesn't want to get sued when iPhone users start careening into sandpiles and into oncoming trains. We'll see for sure when the App Store finally launches, though -- until then, it's all just cheap speculation.

Update: Astute commenter Austin points out that these terms are copied almost word-for-word from the Google Maps API terms -- which means that TomTom and others are probably free to use their own maps to do real-time guidance.

 

[whmurray]

Didn't take too long for Engadget a Gizmodo to get articles up:

http://gizmodo.com/5015389/iphone-sdk-agreement-prohibits-real+time-route-guidance-and-saving-lives

http://www.engadgetmobile.com/2008/...ent-forbids-real-time-route-guidance-dancing/

Engadget makes some interesting points:

The key phrase is "marketed for..." One can make one's application do anything one wants as long as one does not claim that it will do so. The idea that the user is responsible for whatever happens dates from IBM contracts in the sixties. (I remember trying to explain that idea to Boeing engineers who were using the computer to build airliners.) The TomTom splash screen says that you can only "operate" the device while parked. This is not so much the fault of the vendors as of those who expect to collect millions of dollars because they pour hot coffee on themselves and their lawyers. The nice part about software is that one can disclaim any "intended use" and thus avoid implied warranty that goes with an "intended use."

 

[marcol]

Thanks for that. It explains a lot, although I must confess I can't find any reference in the software I have (TomTom Navigator 6) or the licence that comes with it to only operating when a vehicle is parked. Could be because it's not a US version?

 

[marcol]

Update on TomTom from Darren Griffin, Editor of PocketGPSWorld.com, who has good contacts with the company:

And the official response from TomTom is:

We have made our software run on the iPhone as the reports have mentioned; it looks great and works very well. However there are currently no announcements yet, or a plan to create an announcement regarding navigation software for the iPhone. This means from our side there is no information on if or when this will be available.

http://www.pocketgpsworld.com/modul...pic&t=67851&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15

Possible translation: 'We've made it work, we want to sell it through the app store, but Apple haven't told us if we can yet'.

 

[marcol]

More:

TomTom has in fact produced real-time navigation software for the iPhone, according to one of the company's French representatives. Yann Lafargue denies allegations from other sources, which first said that Apple's SDK license forbids real-time navigation, and then that TomTom itself had no internal prototypes. "Since the SDK became available," Lafargue observes, "some of our engineers tried to put Navigator on the iPhone. And the first tests showed that it worked well for the most part."

Regarding the SDK, Lafargue believes that Apple does not have the intention of blocking third-party companies from competing in iPhone navigation. The company "must simply try to protect itself," he says, "in the case a client encounters a problem with his iPhone and a navigation application [and] has the intention of attacking them."

It is still said to be unknown, however, whether TomTom will actually be able to sell its software for the iPhone. "On this point, it's still too early to suggest this," Lafargue comments. "What's sure is that we have a solution for which experiments proved conclusive. Now it's a matter of seeing in which manner we can launch it. We couldn't for example finalize a product only to be blocked from the App Store because Apple decided to make its own program, or to favor one from its partners.

"In general, Apple has to date worked mostly with Americans rather than Europeans, which inspires caution," he says.

http://www.macnn.com/articles/08/06/13/tomtom.on.iphone.software/

I hope Apple do the decent thing.

 

[whmurray]

Thanks for that. It explains a lot, although I must confess I can't find any reference in the software I have (TomTom Navigator 6) or the licence that comes with it to only operating when a vehicle is parked. Could be because it's not a US version?

The first screen that I see when starting TomTom is the logo splash screen. This screen is replaced after about two seconds with one labeled "legal notice." To use the software I must press the "agree" button to this notice. The notice ends with the following: "Do not operate this product while driving, park the vehicle first."

In order to "agree" to these terms, I must interpret them as meaning that I can allow the device to tell me things while operating the vehicle but that I must park the vehicle to tell the device anything. However, a scrupulous reading might conclude that one could not even have the device turned on while driving.

Your observation that mine is the US version is correct. TomTom may believe that the litigious nature of the American culture makes such a disclaimer necessary here while not in Europe.

Note that TomTom does not assume that the language in the SDK license is intended to prevent them from offering a navigation product. Rather they seem to interpret it to be intended to limit Apple's liability.

 

[marcol]

The first screen that I see when starting TomTom is the logo splash screen. This screen is replaced after about two seconds with one labeled "legal notice." To use the software I must press the "agree" button to this notice. The notice ends with the following: "Do not operate this product while driving, park the vehicle first."

In order to "agree" to these terms, I must interpret them as meaning that I can allow the device to tell me things while operating the vehicle but that I must park the vehicle to tell the device anything. However, a scrupulous reading might conclude that one could not even have the device turned on while driving.

Yep, none such on the UK version I have.

Note that TomTom does not assume that the language in the SDK license is intended to prevent them from offering a navigation product. Rather they seem to interpret it to be intended to limit Apple's liability.

Good call on that!

TomTom pretty clearly want to put the app on the iPhone and what Apple do about this might tell us a bit about how they see the platform developing. Back in the March SDK event Steve Jobs said App Store limitations would be confined to specific categories. I can't remember them all off the top of my head, but things like pornography, malicious apps, bandwidth hogs, etc. It all seemed fairly reasonable at the time and I am still hopeful that those are the extent of the limitations. Apart from anything else, they get a 30% cut and nav apps are probably some of the few that could be both high price and high volume.