Apple reportedly knew of iOS Maps troubles well before launch - Page 3

Because they know better about it than you do?

When what developers say go with your own opinion, it's gospel, else "why do you care about it"? Come on.

I think that the same search won't give exactly the same result to different people. That's always been a problem with google maps too, but the consistency of maps seems even worse. Even trying myself the same search at different times or with the view centered on different parts of the world, I get different results. Even for a search like "mount everest, tibet". I noticed that Apple Maps seems to ignore the existence of Tibet, too, they are so close to China now, that's a shame.

It has antenna problems. I know, I own it. Now, it might be that you read in the newspaper that the problem doesn't exist, or that you own  Apple Stock and don't want to admit to Apple lying flat-faced about it, or that by a stroke of luck you have (had?) an iPhone 4 that had no issue, or you just have some Android phone but want to pretend you're an Apple user. Whatever, but please don't say the iPhone 4 had no antenna issue. Whenever there is debate about some Apple product having a flaw, it makes people who have had the antenna issue take side with the people who pretend to have an issue, due to people like you's behavior.

It is quite unusual for most vocal users not to be very forgiving and simply extol the map wow factor

the interesting thing is, i just went to the same place in apple maps, and it shows some additional roads already.

 

seems they are fixing it quickly.

 

i would not be surprised if they collect movement data to complete and correct the map more fast.

 

http://maps.google.com - drop a pin and a streetview button magically appears, so how is this lost? Create a shortcut on your homescreen and you don't even have to keep typing it in.

 

The streetview data is part of the google maps data set. Apple made it quite clear right from the first iOS 6 announcement way back in May that they were no longer going to be using the google maps data so why you would have expected streetview to still exist in the Maps app when none of the rest of the map data was coming from google?

Edited by DaveMcM76 - 10/10/12 at 2:44am

 

Apple is unlikely to do this because, as any software engineer knows, it is a really really bad idea. Even assuming that this kind of input hijacking is that simple (your little fix does not take into account spaces, capitalisation, misspelling, different uses of punctuation in different locales, special characters...), where does it end? We can start with Columbia, SC and then add a couple of thousand more for the other errors that each user in each country decides is 'high visibility'. 

 

And as any software engineer will tell you, imperfect fixes then turn into the foundation for other imperfect fixes. Before you know it, your software is a massive cludge of these nasty little edge cases that cause performance and maintenance bottle necks.

 

Apple knows how the press works: they'll bleat on about the errors to draw Apple fans into a fight with Android fans. This creates page hits, until the Mac fans get bored and move on to something else. Then the press will start running positive stories (as we are already seeing) to draw the Apple fans (who are more likely to spend money on whatever product the site is whoring) back again.  This happens every single time. So from Apple's point of view, high visibility errors cause a temporary run of bad press;  certainly not worth introducing poor engineering practices just to appease folk who hang around IT forums all day. 

 

Might be true of small applications. Certainly doesn't apply to anything as complex as an operating system or a mapping application.

 

I used to work for a utility company who had vendors come in and quote for a piece of software work. Two of the vendors really stood out: the first claimed that their software would be 100% bug free on release; the second claimed that they would not release it to us until every single known bug was ironed out. Neither of them got the contract, and when the programmes manager was asked why, he saId:

 

"Vendor 1 demonstrated a tenuous grip on reality. Vendor 2 had a better grasp of reality but would never make a delivery."

 

I have no idea why AppleInsider thinks that Apple releasing software with known bugs is worthy of an article. Now if Apple had released Maps and had no idea it needed a lot more work, then that would have been news.

Edited by Rayz - 10/10/12 at 3:03am

 

Your right.

Google maps didn't even get the name of the street I live in correct, not even after 5 years.

Its satellite view is also 5 years old and completely inaccurate.

Apple's maps on the other hand has the correct name and view.

 

J.

 

Lots of software is released with known bugs (usually disclosed with a known bugs list in the release notes) because otherwise it would never get released at all... So long as the bugs are something reasonably rare or not data critical most customers will either never notice them it or be able to live with them until a fix is released via an update. I know the company I work for does this all the time with no real complaints from our customers and it's also pretty normal in a lot of open source project releases from what I've seen on the ones I use. There has to be a cut off point where a program is deemed good enough and actually released because unless it is a ridiculously simply "Hello World" type program it is never likely to be completely bug free.

 

Also it strikes me that most of the issues with the Maps are down to data rather than coding so do they still technically count as a bug?

No, that's not even a bug. Bugs relate to software, that's a data error.

Next stupid question?

 

Agreed on points 1-3. I tried using the Maps app a couple of times on road trips when my brother was driving. We were on the outskirts of major cities and the map tiles did a terrible job keeping up. Sometimes you could see the map and sometimes it was the nothing-pattern. And the first time I used it was in the city of AT&T's headquarters (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AT%26T#Corporate_headquarters_move), where I never had connection issues.

Believe it or not but I don't feel the urge to fight this back, so I'll let you win the argument because it is indeed true that in that post I was not completely honest with the audience. I did not feel like it was needed at the time, my only point was to destroy your argument that people should be forced to officially report problems in order to enroll in the developer program. I have no problem admitting defeat as I'm sitting on my own piss now.

Nicely spotted though.

 

So, technically, then, there may not be bugs in the Maps app if they are related to data errors?

 

You haven't been honest in a single post at this site. No one believes a word you write.

There are software issues with the app, too. For instance, it does not recognize that an accentuated glyph and a non-accentuated glyph correspond to the same letter, the search data is not in sync with the map data, the search is very bad at recognizing abbreviations as well as search context, etc. These are all software issues.


Whether people believe me or not is of little relevance since my posts appeal to logic.

PS: My mailbox at this site would also prove your generalization wrong, though I'm not about to share private communications, so feel free to not believe me.

 

I don't think there's much in the way of logic in your posts, especially since you contradict yourself constantly, but, while logic is wonderful, when you know how to apply it, appealing to facts, which you haven't done, is generally considered the best way to get at the truth.

 

And, I'm so happy that you and the other trolls, shills and haters have bonded. Isn't that special.

I find your claim that I contradict myself quite odd. If you've witnessed contradiction, I'm sure you could have pointed it out for debate, so why haven't you? Secondly, I am actually one of the very few people on this who actually back up their claims, so what exactly are you referring to? Do you have any evidence of your own to validate any of these accusations?


Yeah, no way in hell reasonable people could agree with me, right? Because to you, I'm wrong by default, isn't it? You know what that is? Prejudice! Bigotry!

Writing programs is not a perfect art.
Then there is data to consider.
Unless you are a programmer, you would not understand nor appreciate the complexity of it all. More importantly, how much confidence do you have in nuclear weapons?
More specifically the delivery systems, decoys, targeting etc.
There are several million lines of code involved, do you think these are bug-free.
The permutations involved in the user cases are vast in number.
Did you know that there are more combinations in a game of chess than there are atoms in the universe.
Maps is not perfect, nor is Google's. if the argument is which is better then the answer is obvious. Just like if I take up Tennis, am I better than Federer? Of course not.
Give it time, it will only get better, although its not too shabby at the moment.
Why did Apple do maps? Simple, to wean themselves of the Google's tit.
They want their data, why give it to Google?
I think they should have done this earlier though, especially when it was obvious that there would be no turn-by-turn.
I do hope Apple bans any future Google maps app, morally they have full right.

LOL, awesome.

If "admitting defeat" is your way of apologizing, then apology accepted. :o)

"Destroy your argument" I suppose would be referencing my simple suggestion, albeit naive, on how to improve the developer program. I'll still hold that thought. It needs to be improved somehow. Even a minor change would make it better. I do understand your point that it would lead to a rather large amount of useless submissions. However attacking me because of my naive view wasn't very heroic on your part.

I'm still confounded by you even eluding to the fact that I'm promiscuous simply because I stated my gender.

Anyway, if that was a long way around an apology.... Accepted!

 

Your contradictions have already been pointed out to you on this site, along with the illogic of your various conflicting statements. It's not necessary to rehash that every time you pop up.

 

But, no, there is no way in hell "reasonable people" could agree with you. Not because your wrong by default, simply because you're wrong.

 

Guess you decided to throw logic out the window there with your cries of prejudice, bigotry and persecution. Contradicted yourself again. You can't even make it to the next page where maybe no one will notice.

This is what I have been stating here. You have finally noticed the low resolution pixel density of the satellite imagery. The "road" data may be correct and the GPS will show it as such. The problem exists in the pixel density of the satellite image. When one mapping pixel = 1000' instead of 100' you will have inconsistencies such as you experienced. However, once you traveled to the new base point pixel and checked again it realigned the map. You actually have to travel to the pixel base point.

This anomaly only exists in the satellite view and hybrid view. The mapping resolutions are very low and I have been stating this since iOS 6 was originally released. This is also a scalable problem and obviously varies depending on your zoom level.

As I also stated, it a minor issue. Unless your landing a rover or probe for N.A.S.A. However at some scale points the maps are visually horrendous.

And yes, Googles satellite imagery is far superior in pixel density. I believe it's almost double, which is quite an improvement for a map. "Double" is only an educated guess however.

Because like Apple never mentioned they were incapable of providing it themselves ?

 

Interesting analysis, I hadn't thought of that at all.  

 

I don't think this is quite what was happening to me though because the distance was "a couple of blocks" instead of miles and miles, the pixel density of the images was quite high (individual trees could be seen), and I never changed resolution (zoomed in or out).  If the satellite imagery is that bad or that badly aligned that the position of a road can change by a block or so when measured at two points that are themselves only a few blocks apart, then all hope is lost and navigation is impossible. 

 

I am prepared to entertain the possibility that I was simply mistaken as I think I said in the first post, but I don't think you're explanation really fits for what happened in this particular case.  Thanks for the insight though. 

For starters, I don't recall ever mentioning warranties or legalese, and secondly we're talking about a company that is known to attempt to deceive EU consumers about their warranty rights.


You may wish to take a look at the specifications then, where GPS is clearly listed as a function, and for a time they were even advertising the best maps on the block.


While I can understand Apple being happy, I can not understand you being happy... Why would apple's partnerships be of relevance to you as a consumer? I've blamed Google of not playing well with others in the past because they've essentially antagonized Facebook, Twitter, Appel, Microsoft, you name it; and the Apple I liked wasn't like that; they understood that if they wanted the best services for which they don't have in-house expertise, they should partners with the best providers of those services; it is now clear that this idea died with Jobs, so what makes you so happy about the new MO?


There isn't really much complexity involved in a mapping app; most of the work revolves around database development, and that's work you are expected to have completed by the time the app goes live (I'm talking about defining schemas, storage, and retrieval algorithms, not data). When you launch an application whose searchable data isn't even in sync with the browsable data, you have a fundamental problem that should have been addressed long before production. That can't be excused. Even things as simple as matching an 'a' to an 'â', or a 'c' to a 'ç' fail in Apple's maps, and those aren't slight oversights.


You're missing the point. The problem is not the bugs themselves but rather announcing their solution as the best, replacing a working solution that people trusted without an option to go back, and not communicating the known bugs to the public. That's deception. Even the first beta release didn't mention anything about known Maps bugs despite mentioning small things like the keyboard clicking sounds not always playing, implying that their Maps app was perfect.


It is not, it was just the recognition that your observation in this thread was right and I do not wish to subject you to unnecessary arguments. Usually I only keep up arguments when I'm either facing someone who likes to argue or someone demonstrating ill intent; lighthearted people who don't like to argue and aren't there to belittle others are not supposed to be targeted, and sometimes I may even stand for them. I mistook you for the former two groups combined when you actually belong to the third, and this mistake was caused both by your position and the way you replied to me in that thread. The reason why I'm not apologizing is because I don't think there was a procedural error in the way I acted, as I acted based on the information I had at the time and would do it again under the same conditions, so apologizing would be an hypocritical act.


And I still hold to my opinion that Apple does not give a shit about my feedback unless I'm exposing a security hole or a fundamental flaw, and even then they are known to downplay or outright ignore reports until those situations are picked up by the media, at which time they resort to charging their legal LASER cannons. While I don't and didn't officially make any reports about Maps issues, I did make reports through my connections at Apple and was told that iOS 6 without Google Maps would happen either way and nothing could stop or delay it.


I see no logical or even moral reason to consider promiscuity a bad thing.


While it was not, knowing what I do now, I'm sorry if I've caused any kind of emotional distress. It is not my intent to cause any kind of harm to those who do not deserve it.

 

Mmm… no. Anyone with Beta 1 could have been polled and a story drummed up. Anonymity is meaningless here.

I was using large numbers i.e. 1000' for simplicity of the point, not accuracy of the point. I can see if I can have someone get the actual breakdown, but its different for every scale point.

However if you bring it down to a more realistic standpoint, say 4'per pixel, you will get exactly what we have. While your actual spot on the map may take up 1.5 - 2', the pixel resolution is 4'. Over the course of three or four city blocks it's a rather large discrepancy. Which you noticed. Indeed that's very noticeable! You would still see trees with a 3' or 4' pixel density. Actually I still think it's higher than 4'.

As I said also, the problems scales so the discrepancy becomes larger as the image is zoomed out.

Again, it's not a huge issue. But I noticed it the very second I looked at the new maps. I believe my reaction was "oh no!".

It's worse because my beautiful Weather Channel app isn't as beautiful anymore....

You have burden of proof and are throwing baseless accusations, of course it's necessary, so either demonstrate my contradictions or stop posting bullshit. Your current argument is based on an appeal to popularity fallacy, you have zero logical grounds to stand on!


Can you please state the nature of the contradiction? What were my contradictory stances in that example? Please, by all means, analyze that statement and tell me!

I do understand your points, and.... Thank you! :o)

I don't see the issue. The developers are there to check to see if the software works and Apple maps (as software) does work.

Why would Apple spend years and millions of pounds checking and sorting errors when they can make it half decent and let the public check stuff and report it.

Seems like the obvious, fastest and best thing to do.

This is not uncommon in aerial imagery. It happens in Google maps as well. The roads are drawn using KML data which is geometric and plots on the curvature of the earth. The photo is imaged on a flat sensor through a curved lens and then the tiles are stitched. There is both parallax error and lens fall off on the edges that account for some distortion. There are other factors as well such as the altitude at which the image was taken and the latitude of your location. Depending on how far from the center of the map tile your location is will determine the amount of misalignment.

For all those complaining about the lack of streetview without going to the web version, try the free APP called Live Street View (or the $0.99 version).  I have not tried it or used it, but I know it exists. 

Edited by bkerkay - 10/10/12 at 9:41am

I've been working on an app to put Google Maps back on iOS6 devices. It's called Egg Maps. It's been submitted to the app store, but hasn't yet been approved. It's very fast, and does directions and tracking. It uses google maps. Check out:
http://www.eggmaps.com/
I'll let you know when it's been released.

Funny this article should come up when it did.

I had been discussing something like this just the other day on another forum.

 

This very issue happens to me whenever i go to Beijing (about 6 mos. of the year).  Google had the satellite image about 1800 ft. West and 600 ft. South of the map overlay and subway lines.  Very frustrating.  I have reported to Google on this, but they don't make it very easy to report problems in China...so I had to send a general report from a US location instead.  Since then (about 16 mos. later) Google has now removed the hybrid view in Beijing.  So now you get only Standard View or satellite view.  Which is probably a stop-gap for them until they get it resolved.   Only problem is, the Subway lines still show up in the Satellite view.

 

At this point, I'll take that as a quick fix.  Given the fact that Apple Maps don't even show Subway lines overlaid at all, and don't show the station plans in standard view either...needless to say i'm going to be using my 3GS with iOS 5.1.1 from now on in China.  Dumb of me to blindly update my iP4 and iPad2.

The fact that they knew their new product was crap and decided to release it anyway is disgraceful and an insult to their customers! Adding more insult to injury they still had a whole year left on their contract with Google. So they could of held off releasing it for that year until iOS 7 was out to fix all the major bugs that existed and release a solid and maybe superior product to Google Maps that everybody would of been happy with. In Steve's bio it was mentioned that Tim Cook wasn't a product guy and this Maps debacle together with the continuing issue of the IPhone 5's 'scuffgate' is testimony to that. I'm a huge Apple fan but if they continue to screw up like this Google and maybe even Microsoft with Windows Phone 8 are going to surpass them, with Apple becoming just another HP! I really don't want this to happen so I hope the company gets its act together. But its genius is gone and its starting to show...

 

This is a rumor. That is subjectivity.

 

That's not how it works.

 

Do you really believe this? 

 

 

O.k. I finally sent an e-mail to someone with a Phd. in satellite imagery just because I knew I wasn't crazy that my view of New England has changed. It turns out I'm only partially right. (REALLY condensing his email here...). Apparently Google uses many different types of images at varying altitudes for their maps, and most of New England is actually photographed by plane at an altitude of around 1000'. Apple is only using satellite imagery except for their 'Flyover' feature. So the resolution in my area did change, but probably not everyone's. :o)

That explains why I noticed an immediate change and others may not have seen a difference.

Oh we'll... I'll shut up about maps now.

I'm away on vacation for a couple of weeks so I will have to wait until I get back to get the full explanation. Of which I'm sure will be legnthy!