I'm not so sure we'll have that for a very long time, if ever. Live satellite data would be extremely expensive to implement. How many satellites would be needed around the globe for that to be accomplished? And we'd need to be able to receive data directly from them, I would imagine.
I'd love it to happen, but maybe for the military.
Yeah, video is probably the most wasteful way to do it -- especially considering how high resolution the video would need to be to get that level of detail.
Using 3D modelling like this is a much more efficient and scalable way to do it. And, given enough data for the simulation (wind, lighting, weather conditions, etc), it could be almost as realistic.
Typically a patent has to be pretty will defined and it's probably specific to actual maps and satellite data to prevent competitors like Google from ripping them off. Your games are safe.
My point is: in the real world, you can patent the patent of a patent. You can slice a sandwich diagonally and call it proprietary. It get's ridiculous. Apple has patented the "touching the screen, makes fake water move". If the video game industry operated this way, Nintendo would own the rights to every moving sprite. "Press X to jump" - patented.
My point is: in the real world, you can patent the patent of a patent. You can slice a sandwich diagonally and call it proprietary. It get's ridiculous. Apple has patented the "touching the screen, makes fake water move". If the video game industry operated this way, Nintendo would own the rights to every moving sprite. "Press X to jump" - patented.
The thing is, the software/hardware companies which make their money from real products tend to only go after other companies with patent lawsuits if they find someone is creating a clone product that's eating into sales of the products they spent R&D money creating (which the cloner company gets to avoid, allowing them to sell their products for cheaper). If you have a completely different product which happens to be using the same algorithm, it's highly unlikely Apple would go after you.
It's the patent trolls which are the real problem -- those who set up a shell company which essentially just buys up patents from failing tech companies and then looks for others who are infringing on them. They contribute nothing to the industry and drain money from legitimate companies. This is where the patent system really needs reform.
Apple has taken a lot of mapping work in-house since the disaster of the initial release. But, it needs to be remembered that Apple hasn't been responsible for their mapping data, that's Tom Tom. Apple just renewed their licensing of that data. I think it was a mistake to not buy the mapping division of Nokia earlier this year instead. For such an important function to them, another $3.5 billion, particularly since it would be from overseas cash, that amount would be nothing. Then it could all be done in-house.
But from what I've read, Apple now has several hundred people working on upgrading mapping data.
In all fairness, I think he was replying to me, and I was referring more to the flyover stuff (which I really like), and I assume he was referring to the same. As far as being generally accurate, Maps has become much, much better (at least for me). When Maps was first released, the fixes seemed to never come, but more recently when I report something it is fixed within 5 business days.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ignomini
Or maybe they should instead ad something useful, like a street level view.
No doubt in my mind that they are working on it. The first time I've opened up Google maps in the past year was the other day, and it was to take a quick Street View screen cap. Apple's version can't come soon enough.
Or maybe they should instead ad something useful, like a street level view.
Arguably one of my favorite features of Google Maps.
Before travelling to a new city it is extremely useful to "walk around" the area at street level beforehand. There is then a sense of familiarity with the area that just isn't conveyed with the traditional birds-eye view or flyover view.
Exactly. And add more businesses and tourist sites to the database. And more local transit information, although I know they're working on it. And better overall programming. I can't tell you the number of times I've been driving and will search for "pizza" or whatever and it gives me back data on restaurants a thousand miles away.
Although data acquisition is a completely separate function from a programmer developing animation models, it's really frustrating when Apple gives more priority to something fun but completely useless like animated water than to making Maps practical and accurate to use. This is part of their continued obsession with form over function. They want to do "cool" - they care a bit less about "useful". What are the going to do next: give us animated clouds in flyover so we can't see the streets and roads?
So let's say I search "Fire Island" because I want to see the street layout there or how far a potential rental is from the beach. It shows me what I want to see. Am I really going to put my finger on the screen where the Atlantic Ocean is just to see it ripple? I don't think so. But it might entertain a three-year-old who is in the car with me for 30 seconds or so, which also might be the emotional age of the programmers who think it's a good idea to design such nonsense.
Forget about this and give us better and more comprehensive street view instead or find a better way to display different levels of traffic backups. Or an option where Maps automatically gives routes taking traffic or construction into consideration. All those would be useful. Etc.
Vancouver, BC is under two million and has had flyover for well over a year now. Check again.
OK, I was exaggerating a little, flame me. Under 500,000? Stonehenge has a population of 0. It can't take more than a few hours to do a flyover, I just wonder why it's taking so long to add cities. Is it really that hard to get the permits? Or maybe they have all the data and doing the back end work takes tons of time. Who knows. I was just wondering why it's taking so long.
Rather they fix the search algorithms as a priority. Getting sick of Siri finding me directions to an address 1800 km away in Melbourne when in real life it is about five blocks away.
Exactly. And add more businesses and tourist sites to the database. And more local transit information, although I know they're working on it. And better overall programming. I can't tell you the number of times I've been driving and will search for "pizza" or whatever and it gives me back data on restaurants a thousand miles away.
Although data acquisition is a completely separate function from a programmer developing animation models, it's really frustrating when Apple gives more priority to something fun but completely useless like animated water than to making Maps practical and accurate to use. This is part of their continued obsession with form over function. They want to do "cool" - they care a bit less about "useful". What are the going to do next: give us animated clouds in flyover so we can't see the streets and roads?
So let's say I search "Fire Island" because I want to see the street layout there or how far a potential rental is from the beach. It shows me what I want to see. Am I really going to put my finger on the screen where the Atlantic Ocean is just to see it ripple? I don't think so. But it might entertain a three-year-old who is in the car with me for 30 seconds or so, which also might be the emotional age of the programmers who think it's a good idea to design such nonsense.
Forget about this and give us better and more comprehensive street view instead or find a better way to display different levels of traffic backups. Or an option where Maps automatically gives routes taking traffic or construction into consideration. All those would be useful. Etc.
You don't seem to get the point. These are all subtle differences that make the entire experience feel fluid.
It's no different from the split second animations you see when opening apps or unlocking your iPhone.
You don't seem to get the point. These are all subtle differences that make the entire experience feel fluid.
It's no different from the split second animations you see when opening apps or unlocking your iPhone.
There's a difference between operational UI enhancements and this particular animation. The difference may be subtle and it's fine if you disagree, but I think putting effort into making water animate on a mapping app borders on insanity and if it's like those tools that do the water reflection bit on images, it quickly becomes tacky, like those Jesus figures with blinking eyes. This is even less useful than the animations in the Weather app.
If they want to do something more useful, they should create a way in 3D maps to animate a building out of the way that's blocking a view of the street.
But yes, I suppose that 'animated water' will make it seem fluid.
There's a difference between operational UI enhancements and this particular animation. The difference may be subtle and it's fine if you disagree, but I think putting effort into making water animate on a mapping app borders on insanity and if it's like those tools that do the water reflection bit on images, it quickly becomes tacky, like those Jesus figures with blinking eyes. This is even less useful than the animations in the Weather app.
If they want to do something more useful, they should create a way in 3D maps to animate a building out of the way that's blocking a view of the street.
But yes, I suppose that 'animated water' will make it seem fluid.
......" but I think putting effort into making water animate on a mapping app borders on insanity "..... Obviously your understanding of what Insanity means is quite different than mine. Animated ripples in a water image may be wasted on you and I, but others may be overly impressed and, let's face it, Apple is in the business of trying to sell to everyone, not just to you and me.
I remember a few years ago when a friend of mine was showing me his new Honda Odyssey and you know what was his most talked about "feature"? .... "it's got 6 cup holders, can you believe it ? 6 cup holders". He was so proud. Who knows why people buy what they buy? It doesn't always make sense, but it's usually "interesting". " src="http://forums-files.appleinsider.com/images/smilies//lol.gif" />
......" but I think putting effort into making water animate on a mapping app borders on insanity "..... Obviously your understanding of what Insanity means is quite different than mine. Animated ripples in a water image may be wasted on you and I, but others may be overly impressed and, let's face it, Apple is in the business of trying to sell to everyone, not just to you and me.
I remember a few years ago when a friend of mine was showing me his new Honda Odyssey and you know what was his most talked about "feature"? .... "it's got 6 cup holders, can you believe it ? 6 cup holders". He was so proud. Who knows why people buy what they buy? It doesn't always make sense, but it's usually "interesting". " src="http://forums-files.appleinsider.com/images/smilies//lol.gif" />
OK, I agree with you on the cup holders. I don't know why car owners are so obsessed with cup holders, but I'm not a coffee drinker and living in NYC, I don't actually drive that much, so I don't care. I suppose if you're car pooling and driving people to work early in the morning, everyone is going to want their coffee, so cup holders are important and since it's just some molded plastic in most cases, it costs the manufacturers almost nothing to implement.
But I think there are lots of impressive UI improvements Apple can make, especially ones that are passive (don't need user interaction to trigger) that would be far more impressive than looking at a map, touching the ocean and seeing it ripple. As just one example, I can see a future UI that uses passive 3D, so that there are obvious separate planes - buttons pop, emails rise from the surface and buildings in flyover and truly 3D (and as long as it doesn't introduce eye fatique). How about Maps that more clearly shows elevation - I do a lot of bike riding and detecting hills is important to me. How about showing a scale when viewing a map? How about (for those who don't sync to Apple Mail), junk email filtering? How about restoring the song-related UI that was removed from iTunes - I see no way to get a list of all songs and shuffle them all as I used to be able to do. (Now I have to use Siri to shuffle all). Etc.
If you drive a lot, cup holders are crucial. Gas station coffee is served in lidded paper cups, fast food drinks are in paper cups, and you almost always have a bottle of water or something with you for longer distances. You can't even put down the cup once it's empty, as the remaining liquid will leak out onto the flooring as it rolls around. So even if you're not driving, no cup holder means that you're holding on to that damn thing for the next hour or two, until you take a break.
(First thing I did when I bought my current car was to reinstall the stock cup holders, which somebody had removed.)
Yeah and if you're my wife a refrigerator, closet, crock pot and bathroom cabinet are crucial also. And if some of the trolls around here are to be believed, 2GB of RAM and 32GB of storage are crucial too. I guess crucial is relative.
My point is: in the real world, you can patent the patent of a patent. You can slice a sandwich diagonally and call it proprietary. It get's ridiculous. Apple has patented the "touching the screen, makes fake water move". If the video game industry operated this way, Nintendo would own the rights to every moving sprite. "Press X to jump" - patented.
Nintendo trademarks and copyrights everything in their games. Copyright is much more insidious, because it pretty much never runs out. You can't just patent a patent of a patent. It's not that easy. You need to extend the usefulness of the original patent with something new. And guess what? Anyone else can do that to your patent as well. But you can trademark an effect. Then, no matter what the code, no one can duplicate it. Apple haven't done that.
Comments
I'm not so sure we'll have that for a very long time, if ever. Live satellite data would be extremely expensive to implement. How many satellites would be needed around the globe for that to be accomplished? And we'd need to be able to receive data directly from them, I would imagine.
I'd love it to happen, but maybe for the military.
Yeah, video is probably the most wasteful way to do it -- especially considering how high resolution the video would need to be to get that level of detail.
Using 3D modelling like this is a much more efficient and scalable way to do it. And, given enough data for the simulation (wind, lighting, weather conditions, etc), it could be almost as realistic.
Typically a patent has to be pretty will defined and it's probably specific to actual maps and satellite data to prevent competitors like Google from ripping them off. Your games are safe.
My point is: in the real world, you can patent the patent of a patent. You can slice a sandwich diagonally and call it proprietary. It get's ridiculous. Apple has patented the "touching the screen, makes fake water move". If the video game industry operated this way, Nintendo would own the rights to every moving sprite. "Press X to jump" - patented.
My point is: in the real world, you can patent the patent of a patent. You can slice a sandwich diagonally and call it proprietary. It get's ridiculous. Apple has patented the "touching the screen, makes fake water move". If the video game industry operated this way, Nintendo would own the rights to every moving sprite. "Press X to jump" - patented.
The thing is, the software/hardware companies which make their money from real products tend to only go after other companies with patent lawsuits if they find someone is creating a clone product that's eating into sales of the products they spent R&D money creating (which the cloner company gets to avoid, allowing them to sell their products for cheaper). If you have a completely different product which happens to be using the same algorithm, it's highly unlikely Apple would go after you.
It's the patent trolls which are the real problem -- those who set up a shell company which essentially just buys up patents from failing tech companies and then looks for others who are infringing on them. They contribute nothing to the industry and drain money from legitimate companies. This is where the patent system really needs reform.
Apple knows that razzle-dazzle sells.
Apple has taken a lot of mapping work in-house since the disaster of the initial release. But, it needs to be remembered that Apple hasn't been responsible for their mapping data, that's Tom Tom. Apple just renewed their licensing of that data. I think it was a mistake to not buy the mapping division of Nokia earlier this year instead. For such an important function to them, another $3.5 billion, particularly since it would be from overseas cash, that amount would be nothing. Then it could all be done in-house.
But from what I've read, Apple now has several hundred people working on upgrading mapping data.
In all fairness, I think he was replying to me, and I was referring more to the flyover stuff (which I really like), and I assume he was referring to the same. As far as being generally accurate, Maps has become much, much better (at least for me). When Maps was first released, the fixes seemed to never come, but more recently when I report something it is fixed within 5 business days.
Or maybe they should instead ad something useful, like a street level view.
Or maybe they should instead ad something useful, like a street level view.
Arguably one of my favorite features of Google Maps.
Before travelling to a new city it is extremely useful to "walk around" the area at street level beforehand. There is then a sense of familiarity with the area that just isn't conveyed with the traditional birds-eye view or flyover view.
They need to expand coverage a lot more first.
Exactly. And add more businesses and tourist sites to the database. And more local transit information, although I know they're working on it. And better overall programming. I can't tell you the number of times I've been driving and will search for "pizza" or whatever and it gives me back data on restaurants a thousand miles away.
Although data acquisition is a completely separate function from a programmer developing animation models, it's really frustrating when Apple gives more priority to something fun but completely useless like animated water than to making Maps practical and accurate to use. This is part of their continued obsession with form over function. They want to do "cool" - they care a bit less about "useful". What are the going to do next: give us animated clouds in flyover so we can't see the streets and roads?
So let's say I search "Fire Island" because I want to see the street layout there or how far a potential rental is from the beach. It shows me what I want to see. Am I really going to put my finger on the screen where the Atlantic Ocean is just to see it ripple? I don't think so. But it might entertain a three-year-old who is in the car with me for 30 seconds or so, which also might be the emotional age of the programmers who think it's a good idea to design such nonsense.
Forget about this and give us better and more comprehensive street view instead or find a better way to display different levels of traffic backups. Or an option where Maps automatically gives routes taking traffic or construction into consideration. All those would be useful. Etc.
Cool... Could we get flyover in cities under two million please?
Vancouver, BC is under two million and has had flyover for well over a year now. Check again.
Vancouver, BC is under two million and has had flyover for well over a year now. Check again.
OK, I was exaggerating a little, flame me. Under 500,000? Stonehenge has a population of 0. It can't take more than a few hours to do a flyover, I just wonder why it's taking so long to add cities. Is it really that hard to get the permits? Or maybe they have all the data and doing the back end work takes tons of time. Who knows. I was just wondering why it's taking so long.
Rippling and such, are USELESS to me...along with peek/pop, flyover, fart apps, lighted-selfies, apple pencil, and apple watch.
So in conclusion, why don't they fix street view and adobe flash instead of all those useless things and such?
Signed,
-I'm not a troll
Own: iPhone, iMac, Macbook Pro, iPod Shuffle.
Oh, and I used to be an Apple sheep but not anymore!
/s
You don't seem to get the point. These are all subtle differences that make the entire experience feel fluid.
It's no different from the split second animations you see when opening apps or unlocking your iPhone.
You don't seem to get the point. These are all subtle differences that make the entire experience feel fluid.
It's no different from the split second animations you see when opening apps or unlocking your iPhone.
There's a difference between operational UI enhancements and this particular animation. The difference may be subtle and it's fine if you disagree, but I think putting effort into making water animate on a mapping app borders on insanity and if it's like those tools that do the water reflection bit on images, it quickly becomes tacky, like those Jesus figures with blinking eyes. This is even less useful than the animations in the Weather app.
If they want to do something more useful, they should create a way in 3D maps to animate a building out of the way that's blocking a view of the street.
But yes, I suppose that 'animated water' will make it seem fluid.
There's a difference between operational UI enhancements and this particular animation. The difference may be subtle and it's fine if you disagree, but I think putting effort into making water animate on a mapping app borders on insanity and if it's like those tools that do the water reflection bit on images, it quickly becomes tacky, like those Jesus figures with blinking eyes. This is even less useful than the animations in the Weather app.
If they want to do something more useful, they should create a way in 3D maps to animate a building out of the way that's blocking a view of the street.
But yes, I suppose that 'animated water' will make it seem fluid.
......" but I think putting effort into making water animate on a mapping app borders on insanity "..... Obviously your understanding of what Insanity means is quite different than mine. Animated ripples in a water image may be wasted on you and I, but others may be overly impressed and, let's face it, Apple is in the business of trying to sell to everyone, not just to you and me.
I remember a few years ago when a friend of mine was showing me his new Honda Odyssey and you know what was his most talked about "feature"? .... "it's got 6 cup holders, can you believe it ? 6 cup holders". He was so proud. Who knows why people buy what they buy? It doesn't always make sense, but it's usually "interesting".
" src="http://forums-files.appleinsider.com/images/smilies//lol.gif" />
......" but I think putting effort into making water animate on a mapping app borders on insanity "..... Obviously your understanding of what Insanity means is quite different than mine. Animated ripples in a water image may be wasted on you and I, but others may be overly impressed and, let's face it, Apple is in the business of trying to sell to everyone, not just to you and me.
I remember a few years ago when a friend of mine was showing me his new Honda Odyssey and you know what was his most talked about "feature"? .... "it's got 6 cup holders, can you believe it ? 6 cup holders". He was so proud. Who knows why people buy what they buy? It doesn't always make sense, but it's usually "interesting".
" src="http://forums-files.appleinsider.com/images/smilies//lol.gif" />
OK, I agree with you on the cup holders. I don't know why car owners are so obsessed with cup holders, but I'm not a coffee drinker and living in NYC, I don't actually drive that much, so I don't care. I suppose if you're car pooling and driving people to work early in the morning, everyone is going to want their coffee, so cup holders are important and since it's just some molded plastic in most cases, it costs the manufacturers almost nothing to implement.
But I think there are lots of impressive UI improvements Apple can make, especially ones that are passive (don't need user interaction to trigger) that would be far more impressive than looking at a map, touching the ocean and seeing it ripple. As just one example, I can see a future UI that uses passive 3D, so that there are obvious separate planes - buttons pop, emails rise from the surface and buildings in flyover and truly 3D (and as long as it doesn't introduce eye fatique). How about Maps that more clearly shows elevation - I do a lot of bike riding and detecting hills is important to me. How about showing a scale when viewing a map? How about (for those who don't sync to Apple Mail), junk email filtering? How about restoring the song-related UI that was removed from iTunes - I see no way to get a list of all songs and shuffle them all as I used to be able to do. (Now I have to use Siri to shuffle all). Etc.
If you drive a lot, cup holders are crucial. Gas station coffee is served in lidded paper cups, fast food drinks are in paper cups, and you almost always have a bottle of water or something with you for longer distances. You can't even put down the cup once it's empty, as the remaining liquid will leak out onto the flooring as it rolls around. So even if you're not driving, no cup holder means that you're holding on to that damn thing for the next hour or two, until you take a break.
(First thing I did when I bought my current car was to reinstall the stock cup holders, which somebody had removed.)
Yeah and if you're my wife a refrigerator, closet, crock pot and bathroom cabinet are crucial also. And if some of the trolls around here are to be believed, 2GB of RAM and 32GB of storage are crucial too. I guess crucial is relative.
More power to ya. Or maybe more *fluid*.
Nintendo trademarks and copyrights everything in their games. Copyright is much more insidious, because it pretty much never runs out. You can't just patent a patent of a patent. It's not that easy. You need to extend the usefulness of the original patent with something new. And guess what? Anyone else can do that to your patent as well. But you can trademark an effect. Then, no matter what the code, no one can duplicate it. Apple haven't done that.