Apple Moves on Native iPhone Navigation App

Apple Reveals Up-to-Date Commute Time App Pages for iPad

Yesterday we told you about a new Apple patent for a native social application called iGroups. Today, brings word of Apple’s move to bring native support to a strong application market; turn-by-turn navigation. An article in Patently Apple describes Cupertino’s plans for this as yet unnamed native navigation app.

While the app described is said to focus on alleviating the frustration of commuting workers, it of course could be used in any traveling circumstance. The user of the application would log in before departing in the morning and enter their forthcoming trip. Conceivably, regular movement like a morning commute along an established route could be saved or scheduled as a sort of recurring event. Along the way the application would analyse the route to suggest deviations that avoid traffic congestion. If the user did find themselves unavoidably trapped in gridlock, the application would reschedule appointments and meetings in the iPhone calendar to coincide with the adjusted arrival time it has calculated.

The sheer idea of such an app is brilliant, ambitious, and audacious. Not only would it trump a lot of navigation apps by the sheer fact that it came pre-installed on the iPhone, its ability to integrate useful functions outshines the rest. While the other big name navigation app companies are battling with each other over simple navigation, Apple is looking past that and how navigation integrates with the other things in an iPhone user’s life.

This is also obviously another shot in the growing war between Apple and Google. Google has vastly improved the mobile Maps application in the latest versions of Android without allowing or adding similar functionality to the iPhone. Apple seems to be moving away from its long standing relationship with Google Maps on the iPhone with this move. I wouldn’t even be surprised to see an Apple native maps application supplant Google Maps as a first step in the move to this new navigation application.

Is this just another move by Apple to take market share for itself in another lucrative App Store space? Is this another brilliant, far sighted move by a company known for them? Share your opinion in the comments.

Image: Credit

Advertisement

Leave a Reply