Lost? Just dial a friend

I am writing this article from Mysore and am pretty much lost. I don’t know the language, and since I did not bring my car here, I don’t have my GPS handy. Though my Blackberry has an inbuilt GPS, it is useless because Airtel’s GPS software does not work that well. I wanted to fire up my laptop to check the Web for directions, but the battery was nearly drained out. I wish I had a friend who I could call up and ask for directions.

And then I remembered, I do have a friend, Map My India’s new Dial 62 feature. All you have to do is dial 011-62626262 and a patient concierge at the Map My India office will help you with the directions. They will ask for landmarks in the vicinity to pinpoint your location and then send you directions via SMS. They can also email you the information you are looking for, be it something trivial like an ATM or petrol pump.

The service is still in the beta stage and shaping up. Rohan Verma of Map My India, however, commits that the full launch in about four weeks will include a 24x7 call centre and local numbers for more cities. As of now, the service is limited to between 8 am and 7 pm on all days, and with just the Delhi number.

Dial 62 also has local city information. But this service is now available only in Delhi. So the next time a friend calls you for directions, you can just ask him to Dial 62 instead of taking him on conducted tour to the restaurant he is looking for.
I wish operators tie up with the service and offer a short code that one can dial into, irrespective of the city one is in, to seek directions.

Though Dial 62 in a way is one of the first to offer you directions on the phone, and bridges the digital divide in a brilliant manner, another service worth mentioning is Routeguru. This service is also available through SMS and the Internet, though limited to Delhi as of now. The service from both companies is free. But you have to pay for the call charges in case of Dial 62 and the SMS charges in case of Routeguru.

The biggest problem on Indian roads, especially unfamiliar ones, is the frequent changes in names of roads, lack of proper signages and political parties pasting their posters on road signs. That’s why things can’t can’t get simpler than this. I know I can always roll down the window and ask, but then, I am an Indian man and it is beyond me to roll down the window and ask for anything. This is why it always helps to have a friend, just a phone call away.

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The above article appeared in the Indian Express, on Sunday July 04, 2010

Open Magazine Volume 1 Issue 52

The Open Magazine is 1 Year Old, Yippee. This week in my Open Magazine Gadgets Page:

* Spring Desig's Alex E Book Reader
* Map My India Road Pilot
* The G-Fone (No, Nothing to do with Google)
* And Philipe' Starcks, Lacie Alumnium Hard Disk

To view this article, click here for the PDF or visit Open Magazine Website to view the high resolution e-mag page.

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The Above article appeared in the Open Magazine , Volume 01, Issue 52, Dated 2 April 2010

Review of the Sat Guide Moov Mio GPS - Not one for the road

SatGuide is one of the pioneers of the GPS market in India, making units available as early as 2005. But I never had an opportunity to evaluate their units until last week, when I took their Moov 200 on a trip to Amritsar and back.
To start with, I loved the build quality of the hardware — the plastic finish was nice, so was the brilliant car charger bundled with it. I also loved the windshield mount, it was not only small and just the right size, but also very well made. It was a pleasant surprise to find an AC to USB charger too.

But when I mounted the unit the time zone set was incorrect, so I had to correct this and other basic settings like the display format (2D v/s 3D and day or night). The display was sharp and bright but it seems their graphic designer doesn’t understand that brown fonts don’t work on blue and yellow backgrounds, they just end up hurting your eyes.

On the trip, I took my favourite GPS along too. While it took my GPS less than a minute to lock on Golden Temple, Amritsar, Moov took about three minutes. I don’t know why it asks the user if you want to use it as a video player, audio player, picture viewer or navigator when the last one is its primary function. But the interface was slightly better than what I have seen on other Windows CE devices, though the hardware felt under-powered while doing a search.

The two units showed a slight difference, about three kilometers, to the destination. It seemed each one had its own way of getting there within the city. With the distance at 481 km, the units showed that our ETA would be around 18:30 hours. But as we moved on, the ETA kept changing on both units. For some reason the moment we left Delhi, the Moov wanted me to take the old highway and not the new one. Even on selection of an alternate route, it pointed me towards the old route. At every turn it kept telling me how I could rejoin the old highway. Strangely, this stopped only about 100 km from my destination.

Once in Amritsar, we started looking for points of interest, like places to eat and landmarks, and the Moov failed miserably. Though SatGuide claims there have about two million points of interest, I was unable to find a single one and had to resort to the other GPS and local knowledge.

On our way back, the Moov wanted me to turn towards Chandigarh and then turn to Delhi, a 200-km detour. Back in Delhi, my home is next to a famous landmark, but sadly the Moov located the landmark about four km from my house.

Despite the problems, at Rs 13,990 the Moov 200 is a good buy if you are looking at city to city navigation. With the bad quality of road markings, half of them covered photographs of politicians and milestones that are not there, a GPS unit makes sense, but if you are looking to explore your city, the Moov might not be what you are looking for.

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The above review appeared in the Indian Express on Sunday 21 Feb, 2010

The ideal navigator - Review Garmin Nuvi 215

On my last weekend trip to the Himalayan foothills, I decided to try some alternative routes, giving my ‘navigator’ wife a rest and depending entirely on the new Garmin GPS from Map My India.

I have always had a preference for Garmin, and during a meeting with Map My India’s Rohan Verma last year had told him how people like me would love to see his maps on a Garmin device. So I was more than delighted when the company recently launched Garmin products pre-loaded with their maps.

Any in-car device can be a bit of a distraction while driving on dangerous Indian roads. This is where the Garmin Nuvi 215 gets it edge. Every time I tried to feed in co-ordinates, it reminded me that I should stop the car if I wanted to do so—however, this function can be disabled if your co-passenger is looking after the device.
Most other GPS devices I have used to take around three minutes to start up, lock into the satellite positions and get its coordinates right. But the Nuvi locks in under a minute, telling you exactly where you are.

I loved the interface too. You can search destinations in a free field, or in a specific state—when you start entering the destination the device pops up choices, making life much easier. Plus, it shows a list of points of interest around where you are, right from star hotels to ATMs and hospitals. Though by default all GPS equipment shift from a yellowish interface to a green and black interface at night, Garmin allows users to choose the display they like. The Nuvi can easily fit into your pocket; arm/bike straps can be bought separately. Moreover, the matte finish screen makes it easier to read in sunshine.

In case you don’t want the GPS to prompt you, use the power switch to shift the unit into a lock/safe mode, enabling you to focus on your driving. A mute button, to allow you to listen to just your songs, would have been welcome—as of now, users have to choose mute through the menu.
The device comes preloaded with Map My India for 401 cities and there is the provision for an SD Card to load maps for other countries or update when new maps come out. Since Garmin is an international brand, you can easily buy maps for the device, though most country maps are not free.

The unit came with a disc to mount it on the dashboard, but I failed to do so despite my best efforts and had to get used to the windscreen position. So make sure you ask the dealer to fit the device on your dashboard.
The battery on the Nuvi lasted about four hours, so I suggest you keep it plugged in for longer drives. It features a good trip meter and shows your maximum speed, average speed, total moving and stoppage time. However, the device has to be on at all times during the trip for it to calculate time. A trip planner is not built-in, but if you key in you destination and click detour it will show all alternative routes available.

Map My India on Garmin GPS is a brilliant combo if you are looking to buy yourself a GPS device. Though it may seem expensive compared to the other options, I still believe my preference towards Garmin has valid reasons. The Nuvi 215 is available for Rs 14,990 on mapmyindia.com.

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The Above review / article was printed in the Indian Express, Issue Dated 16th August 2009

MapMyIndia Light - A Candid Review

MapMyIndia got popular last year, when they launched their NAV 300 priced at Rs 22,900. The journey over the last one year has been both to reduce the price and also to make it a bit more efficient and friendly to the user. They did this with the MapMyIndia Light Edition. It is not only light on the pocket, Rs 11,900 for the unit and all-India maps, but also very nicely made, and comes with one of the best GPS mounting kits that I have used in a long time. It features maps of 401 cities in India on a street level and a very fast locking GPS, which left me amazed.

The usual GPS features that tell you your current running speed and the points of interest around you (ATMs, hospitals, emergency services, restaurants) are all built-in. A unique feature which I saw for the first time on a GPS is the snooze feature—you can snooze your GPS when you exit the car, and wake it up from sleep when you return, to cut out the boot up and lock time. At just about 12.5 mm thickness, you can fit it in your back pocket, or take it with you hiking (though no kits for using it as a wrist mount are provided).

The major problem that I had while testing this piece was that the battery would not last more than 2 hours. Also, one misses a safe mode (this means you should not be able to key into it to locate a destination while driving).

The plastic body is finished well and the display is nicely done (in very bright sunlight this may have a problem, but night- and daytime views are great). The Bluetooth is gone and the video player is also missing—I think they were useless features anyway, and were just loading up the price.

The micro SD card that holds the data just pops out at a flick, which is a bit dangerous, but overall the Navigator (Light) is built brilliantly and comes at a price point that makes it affordable for all car users. If you were waiting for GPS prices to fall, here is what you were waiting for.

For More Information, http://bit.ly/open-light
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The above review appeared in the Open Magazine, Issue Dated 7th August 2009

Wifi + Solar Power - Great Use - Tracking Turtles

A few months back a program on the National Geographic Channel about the Red Panda's going missing, and scientists still using radio tags to catch them, put me into thinking, on why they were stil not using Wi-Fi technology. Well, my answer was not far off, today's posting on Tree Hugger, about MIT Scientists (who else), putting solar powered wi-fi devices on the back of turtles, to track there whereabouts, and also to study the behaviour of a diminishing population, had me sit up and read.

A very interesting reading, click here, to read the full article.

GS

When did you last use Google Earth

I have been a big user of Google Earth since the day it came out, I played around with all that came and went, and now well into it's version 4, a great thing that has happened, India is mapped, yes street's, buildings, parks, and not by the community which was always there, this is done by google. Though some small mistakes, but National Highways marked as NH, streets' named and everything going online, in a Few days my next hill station holiday may just get planned here online using Google Earth.. If you haven't seen it / used it in sometime, I think it is time you checked it out.

G

Google Maps - India also working, but not as detailed

A day or so back, I wrote about the Yahoo Maps India site being available. I thought why not take the google Maps India for a try out, and it worked. Above is a snapshot of the Same area as below, the Moolchand Flyover / Underpass (both the satellite images, don't show the Underpass which was opened this October 2006), but there are more markings on the Map on Yahoo, maybe because it is being sourced locally, while Google is depending on some other company. But a noteable fact is, that the clarity on google maps and the zoom level is much higher.

Love to wait and watch how they will evolve.

GS

Finally, Good Street Maps for India

I have been an avid user of the Google earth for about 2 - 3 years now, and I have used it to perfect my ways around Delhi and also to plan trips when I have travelled across India. The Portal Map My India, when it came out, became one of the trusted map sites that I would look at before I would leave town for another city, but the search in Map My India was not as good. The Recent announcement of Yahoo India Our City made me sit up and reivew it again, the Search is finally working, the streets are well marked, and the images are clear, sadly the preview box is small for a hybrid image. I think we are not far, when all this information will be mapped into Google Earth to get a full screen view.

Brilliant.

G