Here for Android beta
here.com
here.com
https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answ...
Your points about open source Android etc are valid, though note that the beta channel will auto-update on each update (if user has auto-update app settings), whereas sideloaders will have to manually update it all the time. If you're releasing fast and frequent, it's unlikely testers will want to go through the manual install process on each release.
Anyway it's not mutually exclusive; you can distribute an APK as well as use the official alpha/beta rollouts. Having heard demand for Kindle usage, we sometimes post APKs in our beta community as an attachment to posts announcing a new build. So sideloaders can directly install the APK while Play users get an alert about what's incoming to their device.
I don't get how enabling side-loading is "reducing" security. Regardless of whether an APK comes from the play store or not the system still presents you with the permissions dialog and the apps still run sandboxed.
And it was completely offline (even the routing algorithm) and free.
I personally love it - it's cheap, it's polished and it works.
Maybe they're half-way in transitioning from Skobbler to Scout, and they've removed the former without adding the latter. But I'm pretty certain it's been like this for weeks if not months, because I've looked unsuccessfully before.
They had an update in September, so it's alive. You could contact them at support@skobbler.com … BTW, I care about them because the company may have been German but the developers were Romanians :)
Majority of the work the HERE guys do is behind the scenes magic for car manufactures, they are just attempting to crack the consumer market.
I met a couple of the HERE guys in Berlin, they seem quite humble and want to play a bigger part in the mapping community whilst keeping existing clients happy.
Also to note, OsmAnd is awesome and have just traveled eastern and western Europe extensively with it.
The transit overlay for pedestrians looks great with realtime tables for the stops.
I just wish it would find its way over to iOS.
On google map on the nexus 7 I managed to select a portion of an area and download it, but I could do it again on my huawei Y330. I could not make it work offline.
> export tiles and browse them as a html file
Huh no you're thinking way too difficult, just download the OsmAnd app. I'm afraid it needs a few gigabytes of storage though, at least in Europe the map is very detailed.
There are also quite some Android apps that give you offline vector maps.
If you care about privacy and offline maps, OsmAnd is the way to go. Open source software and offline maps.
Whether the UI changes are worse is a subjective claim, but the data Google has has not gotten worse. I've found all the alternative mapping solutions (Here, Bing, OpenStreet, and Apple maps) to be inferior when it comes to data quality which is the more important factor, unless you think getting directed through non-existing streets is a small concern. I'm not a Google fan, I've given up a lot of Google, but I can't quit maps or google search, although I use ddg quite a bit. Google has the most reliable map data, there is no competition and no good alternative.
About two weeks ago I was unable to switch to Street View in the android app. It simply wasn't accessible through dropping the pin, as it was in the past.
When Google's flagship app on their own platform forces me to find computer and use the web version, something is seriously wrong.
The first thing you should have seen after updating and adding an address is a message telling you to pull up to get more detail. It took me 2 seconds to figure out how to get street view in the new UI. So as I said subjective.
Two weeks ago, it didn't. I even googled it, how I'm supposed to find it. The street view strip just wasn't there.
It's unpredictable. Nothing subjective, just seek-and-hide UI, which was always hallmark of bad UI.
Unfortunately the US is not yet (consistently) one of those countries. But "there is no competition and no good alternative" is an over-generalisation.
It'll just take one half-decent app or company to take me away. Maybe HERE is the one. I will try it.
"Aren't we all just killing time until Google does it?"
I tend to use it instead of Google Maps as well.
Re. Windows Phone: I think that if a cross-platform service gains foothold (on Android) then it's good for WP. If GMaps is the de facto mapping solution (as it is more or less), then GMaps not being present on WP is a deterring factor.