Almost five years ago, we launched Google Maps for mobile to help you get where you needed to go from your phone instead of a paper map. Today, more than 100 million people a month are now using Google Maps for mobile to get from point A to point B, find nearby places, and more.
Over the past five years, Maps for mobile has changed quite a bit, adding more ways to help you explore the world around you. With My Location, you can quickly find where you are on the map with or without GPS. You can put your friends on the map with Latitude. Navigation even turns your phone into a free internet-connected navigation system with voice guidance and Street View imagery.
Google Maps for mobile through the years (click to see larger image).
Lately, we’ve been especially focused on helping you find the right place at the right time. With recent additions such as Place Pages, you can now pick a nearby place by browsing information such as opening hours and review snippets for the places around you. It’s easier than ever to find those places with
Search by voice or the
new Places icon on Android. With this latest Android version, we’re happy to see that you’re now searching for places almost three times as often, doubling how many Place Pages are seen a day.
We hope this is just the start of how Google Maps for mobile will continue to evolve and let you explore the world right from your phone. We’re always inspired by how you’re using Maps, and we’d love to hear about a time when you found the nearest mechanic for a flat tire or discovered that hidden gem of a burger joint. If you have a Google story about when Maps for mobile has helped you, please tell us about it. You can also share quick stories on Twitter @googlemobile, and we’ll share our favorite ones. From all of us here on the Google Maps for mobile team, 100 million thank yous for getting your Google Maps to go!
If you’re a business owner, help millions of people find you by claiming your free Place Page available in Google Maps and our most used mobile “app” — Google Search. Get started at places.google.com/businesses.
Posted by Vic Gundotra, Vice President of Engineering
Written by Chris Nguyen on August 19th, 2010 with no comments.
Read more articles on google maps.
We understand that typing on phones isn’t as easy or fast as talking into them. As a result, we’re big fans of letting you search in Google Maps for mobile in the most natural way possible — with your voice! Not wanting the BlackBerry and Android folks to have all the fun, today we’re happy to announce Search by voice in Google Maps 4.1 on Windows Mobile and Symbian S60 phones.
Search by voice lets you easily search for anything by simply speaking your search terms instead of typing them. Just open Google Maps, press your phone’s “call” button, and clearly speak your search term like “Park Plaza.” Search by voice works with all the kinds of searches Google Maps for mobile already supports, including places, addresses (1600 Amphitheatre Parkway), specific businesses (The French Laundry), or types of businesses (sushi restaurants new york).
You may also notice a few other additions, including a redesigned settings page with Search by voice language choices. Choose your preferred language from the supported options, including multiple English accents and Mandarin Chinese. Also, if you find a problem with any information in Google Maps, you can use the “Report a problem” option to let us know.
To get started, install the latest version of Google Maps for mobile 4.1 for Windows Mobile and Symbian S60 by going to m.google.com/maps in your phone’s standard web browser (e.g. Internet Explorer on Windows Mobile). This update is available in all the countries and languages where Google Maps for mobile is currently available.
Visit our Help Center to learn more or tell us your feedback and questions in our Help Forum. Give us suggestions and vote on other people’s on the Mobile Product Ideas page.
Posted by Yuliang Wang and Yifei Zhang, Software Engineers, Google Mobile Team
Written by Chris Nguyen on April 21st, 2010 with no comments.
Read more articles on Symbian and Windows Mobile and google maps and nokia.
(Cross-posted from Google LatLong)
With Google Buzz for mobile, you can choose to post publicly and include your location, providing context for your followers and allowing others to see what you have to say about a place on a map. We’ve received a lot of requests to make the Google Buzz layer available on desktop Google Maps, and today we’re doing just that.
Now you can use Google Maps from the comfort of your computer to find out what people are saying about places near and far. If you’re new to the public Google Buzz layer, check out some tips for exploring the Buzz layer on Google Maps for mobile to see a few of the fun ways people have already been using it on their phones, sharing everything from breaking news to restaurant recommendations.
To view the Google Buzz layer from your computer, go to Google Maps in your web browser and select Buzz from the More… menu in the top right corner of the map. Find an interesting area like your neighborhood and select any available icon to see what’s going on there. In the post’s window, click on the name to see the author’s public profile, the timestamp to comment on the post, or the place to see it in Maps. The Google Buzz layer is available for maps.google.com in all currently supported languages.
The desktop layer is view-only, however, you can post using Google Buzz for mobile from the web app (buzz.google.com) on your phone, Google Maps for mobile, the Android widget, and more.
Posted by Ana Ulin and Evan Parker, Software Engineers, Google Mobile and Maps teams
Written by Chris Nguyen on April 21st, 2010 with no comments.
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We’ve been rolling out new versions of Google Maps for mobile at a fast pace lately, and the first Google Maps for BlackBerry update of 2010 is a big one. For version 4.0, we’ve added new features to help you find places faster, post from those places with Google Buzz, star them for quick access, and more.
Search by voice
For starters, we’ve added Search by voice to all BlackBerry devices to save your overworked thumbs. Simply press and hold the green “call” button, speak your search, and see your results quickly appear without typing a single letter. Try it now for any search, like the name of my favorite hometown pizza place, “Punch Pizza in Minneapolis.” You can also search by voice for addresses like “802 Washington Avenue Southeast” or search for other another pizza place to try by speaking, “pizza restaurants.” Currently supported languages include multiple English accents and Mandarin Chinese.
Google Buzz
Google Buzz for mobile also makes its debut on BlackBerry phones in Google Maps 4.0 (see availability). Use the Google Buzz layer to see what’s going on around you or to post to the layer yourself. Check out the many ways to explore the Buzz layer in Google Maps for mobile, including sharing pictures, news, and more. From the Maps main menu, select Layers > Buzz to enable the layer; open the menu and select “Post Buzz” to add your own public post from a location or place.
Take your searches and starred places to go.
Just like in Google Maps on Android, the BlackBerry version now provides personalized search suggestions from your maps.google.com search history. If I previously searched for “Punch Pizza” at home, I can simply type “pun” into Maps on my phone to see “Punch Pizza” at the top of the suggested search terms. Make sure you’ve signed in to your Google Account (Menu > Sign In) and have Web History enabled for your account.
Signing in to your Google Account also synchronizes starred items between maps.google.com on your computer (My Maps > Starred items) and phone (Menu > Starred Items). I’ll do my heavy pizza research at home, star several pizzerias I want to try, and browse the list in Google Maps on my phone when I’m ready to eat.
Wait, there’s more!
Also check out other new features added with 4.0:
- Use Labs to try experimental features like the Scale Bar or Terrain layer (great for hiking enthusiasts!).
- See nearby businesses at an address or location by selecting a point from the map.
- Report a problem with the map data or a business listing.
To get started, install the latest version of Google Maps 4.0 for BlackBerry by going to m.google.com/maps in your BlackBerry’s Internet Browser. The update for BlackBerry Enterprise Server administrators and users, including support for BlackBerry OS 5.0 phones, is available here.
Visit our Help Center to learn more or tell us your feedback and questions in our Help Forum. Give us suggestions and vote on other people’s on the Mobile Product Ideas page!
Posted by Ole CaveLie, Software Engineer, Google Mobile Team
Written by Chris Nguyen on April 7th, 2010 with no comments.
Read more articles on BlackBerry and google maps.
Here at Google we’re really excited about the promise of tablet computers, which will be great for browsing the web and using apps. We’ve been working hard to optimize our services for the new format - larger touchscreens, increased portability, rich sensors - and we’d like to share some information about our progress so far.
While surfing the web on your iPad, we expect many of you will want to check your Gmail. If you go to gmail.com in your browser, you’ll see something different than what you’re used to on the desktop. We’re releasing an experimental user interface for the iPad built on the Gmail for mobile HTML5 web app that we launched last year for the iPhone and Android devices. Those devices have large screens compared to other phones, and tablets like the iPad give us even more room to innovate. To take advantage of the iPad’s large display, we’ve created a two-pane view with your list of conversations on the left and messages to the right.
To try this new interface, go to gmail.com in your browser. We recommend adding a homescreen link for easy access. As this interface is experimental, expect changes as we continue to develop and optimize. Also, please let us know any ideas or feedback that you have. You can also access Gmail on the iPad through the native Mail app using the IMAP protocol.
Additionally, the iPad ships with a number of Google services pre-installed. As with Mac computers and the iPhone, you’ll find Google Search in the top right corner of Safari. The YouTube app for iPad is built-in, so you can watch HD videos and read and write comments. The new Maps app on iPad takes advantage of high-resolution satellite and Street View imagery, includes a new terrain view, and lets you search for local businesses and get directions. Just like on the iPhone, you can also go to the App Store to download Google Mobile App with search by voice. Of course, Google Mobile App was originally designed for the iPhone’s screen dimensions, but we’ve adapted it to work on the iPad and we’re looking into new ideas to make the app even better.
As you use Google’s web-based applications on iPad, you’ll notice that you sometimes see the desktop user interface and other times you see the mobile interface. We’ve evaluated the behavior of each Google web app using the iPad Simulator, and we are serving the interface we feel works best. If you’d like any help using our products on iPad, please click the ‘Help’ link within the product.
We’re particularly excited by how tablet computers create the opportunity for new kinds of user interaction. Here on the mobile team, we often talk about how mobile devices are sensor-rich: they can sense touch through their screens, see with a camera, hear through a microphone, and they know where they are with GPS. The same holds true for tablet computers, and we’re just starting to work through how our products can become even better on devices like the iPad.
Update on April 4, 2010 @ 12:30 AM: The new Google Mobile App for iPad is currently not yet available in the App Store. The version that you can download now is the iPhone/iPod touch version.
Update on April 13, 2010 @ 11:40 AM: The new Google Mobile App for iPad is now available in the App Store.
Posted by Punit Soni, Product Manager, Google Mobile
Written by Kai on April 2nd, 2010 with no comments.
Read more articles on YouTube and gmail and google maps and tablet.
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