Like I said, I try each version in earnest and I've used everything out there for the past two years, pretty much round the clock I might add so I've got a lot to compare Alturion to ;-) I'm looking forward to using v6, but the fact that you say that "most" of the problems I mention where fixed with v5.3 is not very encouraging as they weren't in my experience. Maybe the v6 I was shown by Mio on Wednesday was a beta but I didn't see much change apart from the 3/4 addition menus (weather, traffic, etc..), that zoom box stil doesn't zoom what you select!
What I mean by "not optimized" is that there's been no visible effort to optimzi the GUI for mobile use to make for easy operation while on the road for instance. Intellinav (iGuidance, Prymenav, Dell, HP, etc...) benefits from a natural flow that maked for one tap operation and so does TomTom, even Navigon. Honestly, if you can, try any of the above and you'll see where Alturion is "missing the boat" and not giving their users the "GPS pleasure" they deserve.
With "most" I mean that I did not check every item on your gripe-list. But as a regular user I can honestly say that it really has improved a lot.
I know what you mean with your definition of optimized, and you are correct that some other gps applications are more user friendly. But then they lack in other areas.
Have you ever tried driving from Holland to France with TT? At every border you needed to switch maps and load different routes. Now TT's ui might be better, but it is not user friendly to make different routes to the border.
Alturion gps is a fully loaded gps application targeted mainly at the mobile professional, imho.
A lot of usability "problems" that some users experience also come of the fact that they hardly know the application. The professional version of agps has user-definable hardware buttons, and user-definable quickpick-screen with big buttons. They have keyboard with bigger buttons that automatically filters streets and cities with what you've typed.
I can operate the whole application while driving, because I enter my destination before I drive off (as everyone should do) and all major functions are operatable with your finger.
The version you saw is definitely not the most recent, as in the last couple of days there have been at least 2 releases to fix some small issues. Current version is 6.0.0.2.
Well time will tell, again I've been using this stuff pretty much around the clock for the past two years both in the US and in Europe so I definitely know my way around and regardless of your level of experience a "mobile" app should work for you, beginner or expert and the fact that as an expert I find Alturion terribly confusing and "messy" at the UI level is certainly not a good sign and I can't imagine how a beginner must feel, probaby just think that "GPS on PDAs just isn't there".
I'm aware of the TomTom "region" limitation, and clearly all the apps have pros and cons ENGLISH - FRENCH but that's a limitation (you've got MRE or MRUSA as you know) I can live with because I still feel the program is usable. The problem with Alturion is that they're throwing in tons of features (traffic, weather, traffic history, POI rating, etc..) with seemingly no concern for overall usability without realizing that this is a prerequisite withouth which the rest is only good on paper...and with the large companies that buy stuff based on specs most of the time...I can't see this lasting too much longer though.
Again I'll be the first one to say that v6 meets this prerequisite, but I'm not holding my breath.
I also discussed the usability issue with the owner of alturion two weeks ago. They did hear about this complaint about the 5.x versiosn a lot, and they did make a lot of improvements. I've played with a beta-version of it two weeks ago and i must say it has improved a lot.
Great thing i like about Alturion is that you can select your region you want to use. It is a lot more flexible than TomTom is.......
Jaap
__________________
For getting the most out of Windows Mobile, go to our Windows Mobile WiKi
Ok, I think we should stop coming back to this TomTom region limitation all the time ! It's a known and well identified problem and only exists because it's an otherwise very usable program ;-)
On v6 did you get to drive around with it? From what I saw without driving, the UI appears to be exactly the same, so I'm not sure how it could have improved a lot and that zoom box still doesn't zoom the area you select :-( What did you see as being improved?
I'm glad that the Alturion guys are finally listening to the usability issues as they've just brushed them aside until now from what I can tell. Was that Eric? We exchnaged emails a few times in the past.
Since Peter does not trust me with his car (perhaps he has seen my driving style), i could not testdrive it. I must admit, it is no super-fluid TomTom with a perfect GUI. The zoom-function you mentioned worked fine when i tried it. The buttons have become better and i undertood them better than version 5. I'm a TomTom user myself, so i'm brainwashed to their GUI, but had the feeling it was less complex than it's previous GUI, which was my primary concern with 5.0
Jaap
__________________
For getting the most out of Windows Mobile, go to our Windows Mobile WiKi
I've driven a lot around with v6 (both beta and final).
The UI for route planning is totally changed, and is very user friendly now.
I don't know what you mean by zoom area, but if I drag a zoom rectangle on the map with my finger, the map zooms in to that region. I have mapped ZoomIn and ZoomOut functions to the Up/Down buttons of the D-pad and can then easily zoom in/out. What more do you expect from zooming? Maybe you should explain what you were trying to do.
It has autozoom on speed, autovolume on speed, auto night map, features TT does not have (you need a 3rd party plugin costing 18 € or something). Also, I don't see why we shouldn't mention the region problem with TT anymore, you keep on repeating UI problems with Alturion :roll:
No evaluation version that I know of no. Other than Mapopolis and their downloadable maps model no one offers that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by oVan
I don't know what you mean by zoom area, but if I drag a zoom rectangle on the map with my finger, the map zooms in to that region.
Well that's never worked for me up to now whether on a PocketPC or a PC. Seems like they've fixed it with v6, then.
Quote:
Also, I don't see why we shouldn't mention the region problem with TT anymore, you keep on repeating UI problems with Alturion :roll:
As I've explained previously, this is only a problem (and for people living on a border mostly) with TomTom because it's an otherwise very usable navigation solution, which cannot be said about Alturion up to now, i.e it's a flawed logic IMHO to say, xyz does this better thans abc, when xyz is not "usable" in the first place. If I need cross-border driving, I'll use Navigon (or Engin in Benelux).
I guess we're not looking at this from the same angle, since you're a beta tester and clearly very close to the team at Alturion, not that there's anything wrong with that mind you. I'm just an experienced observer testing all the solutions out there and looking at the pros and cons so that my readers can get they info they need to choose to solution that will fit their needs.
I can agree with what gpspassion is saying. Last year before I bought a gps unit and software, Socket BT OEM and Mapopolis, I relied on the gpspassion forums pretty extensively. Especially when trying to decide between Mapopolis and CoPilot for software.
With the exception of not having large buttons on the GUI I've been very happy with Mapopolis.
You can choose if you want to drag the map or zoom the map via a button in the toolbar. If it is on zoom draw a rect on the screen. That has always worked for me...even in v5.2 and v5.3.
I fully agree though that this is not perfect software, but reading the various other forums on gps (pocketpc-club.nl has a good load of them), all gps software on ppc have some problems... finding the right balance between usability, stability, functionality and performance is a difficult exercise that not one software package has yet solved completely.
I do not agree with your finding that border-routing is only for people living near the border. Belgium is a mere 150km width I believe, so nearly every Belgian inhabitant has driven either towards France or towards Holland & Germany.
I fully appreciate your look from various angles, but believe me they are not different than my angles on it. I agree with your observations about usability, but I truly believe you did not have the best experience with the software as it might have been. If I'm biased because I'm a beta tester than it is really only marginally. I'm a realist and have a very good understanding of the limitations of this and other software. In fact, for some target audience (the dummies) I would recommend a different package, but for the experienced mobile professional I can recommend it with my eyes closed. Does it have problems? Sure it does, like any other program. But is it as bad as you depict, or are the others way better? Definitely not.
Try driving with TT in the centre of Antwerp, or any town center with small streets close to each other. Result: because of the snap-algorithm and less than optimal reception, your position on screen sometimes snaps on parallel roads, instead of the road you drive on.
Or try driving with any vdo/becker/panasonic/sony 1-din navigation system that has only an arrow on display...maybe less confusing for the average user, until you need to switch highways from e40 to e17 in Gent...then you'll know that it is not sufficient for good visualisation.
Linear Mode
