Next North American Map Update?

[neil]

Whoah there RouteBuddy!

Today is conference day! Tomorrow is day one of the expo, and all will be revealed.

From all of the feedback we've received, and all the wanted items we've listed in ToDo's as asked for by RouteBuddy users, there's been one overwhelming request made of RouteBuddy.

Tuesday, January 15th, we deliver.

Neil

[jkosinsk]

I know it's only been a month since MacWorld08 but is there any new information about the map updating? I just purchased RouteBuddy 2 and the North America maps only to find the Detroit MI Area maps over 2 years old. I plan to use this on our next road trip vacation (Detroit to Vegas and Back) as a route logger on my 13" MacBook.

Thanks for creating a Navigation platform for the Mac.

[neil]

I know it's only been a month since MacWorld08 but is there any new information about the map updating? I just purchased RouteBuddy 2 and the North America maps only to find the Detroit MI Area maps over 2 years old. I plan to use this on our next road trip vacation (Detroit to Vegas and Back) as a route logger on my 13" MacBook.

Thanks for creating a Navigation platform for the Mac.

We're just about to release the new website and forum (expect these to temporarily go down over the next 24 hours), once that's out of the way we can get on with the new data sets.
(You may wonder why they were worked on before the new maps but that will become apparent later this year...)

FWIW: It can take as little as 6 months for new roads to get released by the major providers of raw map data but can be up to 2 years. We can see ways that this will start to speed up in the future though.


Neil

[neil]

Hi,

the new 2008 NAM map is now available and USA will be available by Monday.


Neil

[Geocat]

Hi,

the new 2008 NAM map is now available and USA will be available by Monday.


Neil

How do I get the update? I went to Purchases in RB, highlighted North America and clicked on Update... nothing. Don't see anywhere on the website to download an update, either.

[neil]

Hi,

This data is so new it's been rushed from the Tele Atlas delivery and then through our system to prepare the new maps. Jannion's building a new store page for the 2008 map updates and she'll be sending out bulk emails to all of the RouteBuddy customers over the next week. She's just told me the upgrade page should go live on Monday 21st April.

The upgrade offer will close on 30th June.

We would advise all users who have changed their email address to enter their new details here: http://www.routebuddy.com/info/mailing-list/index.html


Neil

[DaveD41]

Hi,
What will the upgrade cost for those who, like me, just bought the USA map a few days ago, not having discovered this forum at that time?
Thanks,
Dave

[neil]

F.O.C.

You'll be receiving an email from sales shortly.

Neil

[Geocat]

You'll be receiving an email from sales shortly.

Got the email today. Placed the order. Unclear whether a DVD is being mailed as the RB site seems to indicate or I need to download it (UGH) as implied by the Kagi email.

[neil]

Hi,

the disks are being mailed.

Neil

[DaveD41]

F.O.C.

You'll be receiving an email from sales shortly.

Neil

Hi,
Still haven't received that email, when should I expect it?
Thanks,
Dave

[Geocat]

Hi,

the disks are being mailed.

Neil

Got the disks today, installed the "new" maps and... the data is my area is over 2 years old! Please explain why RouteBuddy, or Tele Atlas, keep providing old maps. Is Tele Atlas really that far behind? If so, you need a new source. By comparison, the NAVTEQ maps provided to Garmin and sold as a 2008 version appear to be less than a year old (with more POIs) and the NAVTEQ data on Google is current as near as I can tell.

[neil]

F.O.C.

You'll be receiving an email from sales shortly.

Neil

Hi,
Still haven't received that email, when should I expect it?
Thanks,
Dave

Sales are working through the historical purchase lists (oh for automation sooner!), let me know via support when you bought and we'll move it along.
(Refer this post.)


Neil

[neil]

Got the disks today, installed the "new" maps and... the data is my area is over 2 years old! Please explain why RouteBuddy, or Tele Atlas, keep providing old maps. Is Tele Atlas really that far behind? If so, you need a new source. By comparison, the NAVTEQ maps provided to Garmin and sold as a 2008 version appear to be less than a year old (with more POIs) and the NAVTEQ data on Google is current as near as I can tell.

Appearances to the end user can be very misleading with NAVTEQ, Garmin, Tele Atlas or Google Maps or any map data.

As you know the two main map suppliers in the world are NAVTEQ and Tele Atlas, and speaking from an industry perspective they both continually leap-frog each other in whoever provides new data for an area first. (We know people quite well from both companies - it's a small world - and I think they would - on a personal basis - say exactly the same to you.) Both of them, whilst still large companies, only have so many physical resources they can put to collecting data, cartography, and updating their maps, so it may be so in "your" area that the roads (out of millions) from NAVTEQ maps seem up to date but candidly speaking they just "won't" be elsewhere!

Google is different in that being online it can edit road data if it gets a report back from a user but that really is likely to be minimal compared to the huge road networks in industrialised countries.

The processes of collecting data, and the sheer amount of cartographic work involved, as well as getting the new product to P.O.S, generally prohibits revised data appearing before 18 months at best from-any-consumer-provider. Two+ years is an average though three years is more likely, and if you take the huge road networks into account you can easily see why no one company is ever better overall than another. Of course in a micro area it may seem so, but in real life that doesn't add up.

You go on to say "By comparison, the NAVTEQ maps provided to Garmin and sold as a 2008 version appear to be less than a year old (with more POIs)" - Hmm, so you mean you really counted all the POIs and compared them like for like...

Let's have a look at the facts...
Garmin's latest NAVTEQ based NT map (http://www8.garmin.com/cartography/mapS ... ynavnt.jsp) lists a whopping six million POIs in North America.

Now I have to own up and say there's something I've been totally remiss in letting RouteBuddy's users know about the POIs we supply with our RouteBuddy Map for North America. Fact: It is true that RouteBuddy's North American Road Map, based on Tele Atlas data, does NOT contain six million POIs.

From RouteBuddy's launch Tele Atlas offered us either the standard POI set or the Premium POI set for our maps. Now the Tele Atlas Premium POI set costs us a good deal more, but then again Mac users demand perfection, so the Premium POI set is what we purchase on their behalf.

So to lay out the facts:
Garmin (NAVTEQ based) North American Map comes with 6 million POIs

RouteBuddy (Tele Atlas based) North American Map comes with 12+ million POIs


Neil

[Geocat]

Appearances to the end user can be very misleading...

Sorry to back you into a corner over the maps. Certainly the user's location and purpose can change the perspective but from where I sit the appearances are not good. You can appreciate that data over 2 years old are not going to satisfy many customers and it is little consolation that other areas may have more recent data--if even 18 months can be considered recent!

This brings to question the entire data mining and delivery methods of the mapping companies and how that data are used by products like RouteBuddy. It may be nearly impossible to supply current data for a single area as large as North America. The data should be broken down onto smaller sizes while increasing the frequency of updates. When I used Mapopolis they had data by U.S. county--probably too small an area!--and told me that NAVTEQ could update these up to quarterly although Mapopolis bought less frequent updates. I can live with some old POIs but out-of-date maps make navigation difficult if not dangerous.

Speaking of POIs--where you say RouteBuddy has an advantage over Garmin--in a sample around my neighborhood, a Garmin handheld returned 50 "Food & Drink" results within 0.95 mile complete with address, phone number and distance from current position. RouteBuddy returned only 43 results within 1 mile with no information whatsoever--what good is that?

Granted, another person may find RouteBuddy's maps great for their travel area and may not care about the lack of POI info. For me, the data are disappointing.