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Comment by TowerTall | Hacker News Reader

I really hate that too. You are in a intersection and the voice says "Drive north for x miles/km". What is wrong with "turn right and drive for x miles/km"? I normally have zero clue in what direction north is especially when I am in a location i have never been before. I drive a bike and have the phone in my pocket and can therefore not see any arrow that the app might display. I only have the audio to navigate from.

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It will do that if it doesn't already know what direction you're travelling, which is usually because you've just activated navigation and you aren't moving yet. Unless I happen to know which direction north is or which way to towards my destination I'll just pick a random direction and it will adjust the route if I guessed wrong.

> You are in a intersection and the voice says "Drive north for x miles/km".

Does that really happen? I have never experienced it. How do they tell which way is north?

Highway 101 runs through San Jose pretty much due east/west, but because it also runs up to San Francisco, it is officially a north-south highway. So you check your position on the map and you're traveling due east along an east/west road. Is that "north"? (Of course not. It's "south".)

That’s Google maps for you. Try another one, most have way better voice cues (amongst other things!).

That's odd. My Google Maps tells me to turn left or right. It doesn't use compass directions.

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