Webdesigners: please make text readable - <AUTHOR> http://contrastrebellion.com/ <comment><USER3> Even worse (or probably related) than the general contrast problem is the absolutely crazy suggestion to use

-webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased;

in your CSS (<http://maxvoltar.com/archive/-webkit-font-smoothing>)

I've yet to come across an instance where antialiased is better than using subpixel hinting.

In addition, I think it's crazy that the browser would allow a site designer to alter such a highly OS- or even machine-specific setting.

Heck - there's even special tuning wizards in most OSes to configure the subpixel hinting perfectly for a specific monitor.

Dear designer, turning that off for everybody just because you didn't manage to configure it correctly on your machine is egoistic and, IMHO, plain stupid as you make everyone suffer for a thing you should fix at your end.

/endrant

<comment><USER4> Yeah, well... you know... that's just, like, your opinion, man.

I think subpixel hinting looks terrible. I think letterforms are really interesting and beautiful and I actually want to see them when I use the web.

That said, I do agree that web sites shouldn't override the browser settings for body text. But turning off hinting of titles is probably reasonable.

<comment><USER5> There's a number of tech blogs linked here regularly which use anti-aliased html5 fonts that end up looking spidery/ghostly and really hard to read. I have to use Readable or text highlighting just to read them.

Campaigns like the OP that raise awareness are very much needed, there's no downside to them.

<comment><USER6> The downside is that the argument is not very effective.

Those designers believe that anti-aliased fonts look better and no tirade will convince them. It's just ineffective to try and convince them that anti- aliased fonts should not be used. It's the wrong argument.

Here is what the argument should be: Most users of the web (nearly everyone not using XP and everyone using Internet Explorer 7 and XP) have anti-aliasing turned on by default. There is no need to worry about them. Additionally, the property designers are using to turn anti-aliasing on doesn't even work for many browsers. It's mostly targeting users of Chrome or Safari and XP. That's a really small subset of users and the benefit of enabling anti-aliasing for them is doubtful. Most other websites won't be anti-aliased for them, the one that is will likely stick out and somehow look "wrong" to them – not because anti-aliasing is objectively worse but because they are just not used to it.

Who will be very angry is everyone who explicitly disabled anti-aliasing. That's a small minority, for sure, but I don't see how the benefits are worth that tradeoff in any way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There's a second problem that's popping up lately: font-face on the body text.

System fonts have been painstakingly hinted to make them more readable on- screen. Most web-embeddable fonts don't have appropriate hinting or are just plain bad choices for body text. Hoefler & Frere Jones (one of the most respected foundries around) haven't released embeddable fonts because they've been working on it _for years_.

The result is fuzzy text at small/medium text sizes. It's huge pain to read. It seems some designers forget that good typography is concerned with readability too.

<comment><USER8> Core fonts don't necessarily equal good web typography. Arial, for instance, is pretty mediocre for the _web_. You could say the same about Helvetica (it is still better designed than Arial).

As for web fonts, Adobe and other foundries have large collections of gorgeous fonts specifically designed for the web.

<comment><USER7> Helvetica on Windows is terrible, see <https://github.com/paulirish/html5-boilerplate/issues/42>. This is because Helvetica comes from Linotype instead of Microsoft, and they care more about print than screens.

Arial might not be a good _typeface_ , but as a font it's pretty damn well hinted for screens.

Except for Minion Web and Myriad, I haven't seen a really legible web font from Adobe that is usable at 11-15px. Heck, even Typekit uses Georgia/Arial for long copy.

<comment><USER9> Because Helvetica looks so bad on Windows, a good compromise for a CSS font stack is something like:

      font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,sans-serif;

Helvetica Neue (a minor reworking of Helvetica from 1983) is a Mac system font, but few Windows PCs have it. So Mac users get nice fonts and everyone else gets Arial.

Many CSS font stacks list Helvetica _after_ Arial, but that is silly because nearly all computers (like 98%) have Arial, so Helvetica will never be selected. :(

<comment><USER10> Mark Hurrell has blogged some of his testing on Helvetica font stacks (including Neue) at [http://blog.mhurrell.co.uk/post/2946358183/updating-the- helv...](http://blog.mhurrell.co.uk/post/2946358183/updating-the-helvetica- font-stack) which is worth a read. Current recommendation is to specify sans- serif but with additional specifications for Linux:

      font-family: Helmet, Freesans, sans-serif;

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> >designers need to think of elderly users with bad vision

There are plenty of us young folks with terrible low-contrast vision, too :) I've personally got HN turned up to 175% zoom, and even that's a bit on the low side if I want to read the text of self-posts.

IMO, this is an important distinction -- I once heard a friend indicate that, because their app was targeted at people aged ~20-30, accessibility wasn't an important focus. I thought that was a very short sighted decision.

<comment><USER9> A short sighted decision, indeed! :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> It started out promising. Then the author states, apparently without irony, that "aesthetics are important but aren't the ultimate goal of design", making particular reference to people reading with tiny screens, when his/her own site is quite unusable on a small screen!

I normally keep my browser windows at half the width of my screen, around 700-800 pixels wide (give or take). Just looking at the "page" where the author discusses aesthetics, if you've got a narrow window, a few letters and words are cut off on the left, and while you do get a scrollbar to move to the right, everything to the right of the original view is plain white. (On my screen, the cutoff actually runs right through the "reading tiny screens" text and icon, for added irony.)

</comment><comment><USER13> The author's focus on just 2 things, contrast and font, are not only overly simplistic, but are not even universally true for all people. For my eyes, reading high contrast black on white all day causes eye fatigue, while HN level of contrast (and the contrast on my site) causes less fatigue. I have no idea what percentage of people feel that way, but clearly some do.

I am a huge proponent of designing web sites for readability, and discuss my thoughts on optimizing site design for reading here:

<http://www.filterjoe.com/2009/03/23/site-design-for-reading/>

So many sites have too much clutter or layout problems that using Readable or Readability has become a requirement for me. For anyone not sure which to choose, I reviewed the latest versions of them here:

[http://www.filterjoe.com/2011/04/11/web-page-reformatting- se...](http://www.filterjoe.com/2011/04/11/web-page-reformatting-services- readable-and-readability/)

I'd be curious for thoughts from HN readers on my own site's readability. It's what I optimized for, though I'm always open to improvement.

EDIT: reorganized, added eye fatigue

<comment><USER14> The black-on-grey is hard to read for me, especially at default zoom. I'm bumped up 4 steps (just checked) which gives a bolder text.

Garrett Hardin (the Lifeboat Ethics / Tragedy of the Commons guy) actually had several of his books published with a deep brown ink on cream-colored paper, for maximum readability (c.f. _Stalking the Wild Taboo_ referenced here: [http://books.google.com/books?id=jT- pl1LQTIIC&lpg=PA101&...](http://books.google.com/books?id=jT- pl1LQTIIC&lpg=PA101&ots=lGfwYRCoIf&dq=garrett%20hardin%20ink%20paper%20color&pg=PA101#v=onepage&q&f=true) ) Note that that particular reviewer didn't care for the effect.

HN _does_ have a simple layout that's highly amenable to resizing, to its credit.

<comment><USER13> You mention black-on-grey. Are you referring to HN or my site, www.filterjoe.com? My site is close to the color of a faded paperback novel, a yellow/beige. HN looks halfway between beige and grey on my monitor - so I'm guessing you're referring to HN. I've noticed that the higher the resolution is on a monitor, the easier it is to read lower contrast text.

I've noticed large color variance on different monitors. When I first started my site I went for very low contrast link color with no underlines (trying to reduce links as a source of distraction) but some people on some monitors couldn't see the links at all. So I put back in the underlines.

<comment><USER14> I meant HN, sorry about the ambiguity.

And yes to color variance on monitors. Early-gen laptop screens were horrible for accurately rendering subtle shading differences.

My stylesheet explicitly highlights links, and at least for a while there would add a yellow background on mouse hover, bolding on click. This was really useful especially for distinguishing closely-placed links, or links partially obscured by other page content.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> That's all fine but doesn't go far enough, focusing only on contrast problems (related problems to contrast are using shadow engraving style on small fonts and clashing foreground/background color schemes).

A really big problem on many sites is the length of lines.

It is very difficult to read text that has too many words per line.

A recent abysmal nightmare is Apple's decision to make Mail.app (and other apps) in 10.7 oriented towards full screen as if it was running on vertically oriented mobile, but on large wide screens. Small font sizes here and we have scan lines with up to 30-40 words in some cases, which is complete insanity.

Count the words per line. If the average is much more than 12, either your columns are too wide or your fonts are too small. Here on HN is a typical example with around 24 words per line on top level articles. Bad design, but very typical on the web. However, it is at least manageable, many sites are far worse.

HTML Solution? Some advocate that columns be around 30em width: <http://www.maxdesign.com.au/articles/em/>

<comment><USER16> Solution to mail.app problem: either make the middle column bigger, or don't use it in full screen.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Beautiful site.

HN is called out as a site with poor contrast (the text in a self post). I do find myself frequently tilting my monitor back to improve the contrast of posts here, but I think only on the downvoted ones, which, I suppose, is the point.

But now, looking up at the now-clicked-on story link, I see that visited links have rather low contrast, too.

<comment><USER18> pg has said that self-posts have low contrast font to discourage people from using HN as their blog. So, similar reasoning to < 0 posts.

But I also have difficulty finding stories I already read on the front page.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> The text on that site is so damn large it's actually hard to read.

<comment><USER20> Exactly. Some used fonts are also very narrow and therefore hard to read.

But ofcourse they are called Contrast Rebellion. Not Readable Rebellion.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Propaganda by photoshop clone developers who don't want to design opacity layers into their interfaces.

In all seriousness, if everything was high contrast, everything would be SCREAMING AT YOU FOR ATTENTION. Webdesigners: use your personal judgement when identifying what should be high contrast (higher visual recognition priority) and what should be lower contrast (lower visual recognition priority) and all will be well.

FYI: the HN example on your site actually makes perfect sense. The high contrast content is almost always the thing I consider most important. Index: Titles of threads, Subpages: Comments.

<comment><USER22> > if everything was high contrast, everything would be SCREAMING AT YOU FOR > ATTENTION

Simply not true. There's many more factors besides contrast that determine attention focus.

See this excellent series on gestalt principles of design: [http://www.andyrutledge.com/gestalt-principles-1-figure- grou...](http://www.andyrutledge.com/gestalt-principles-1-figure-ground- relationship.php) (it's five parts you need to click to get to the other 4)

Also see <http://24ways.org/2007/typesetting-tables> which shows a very nice way of adding structure to a table using contrast, instead of making everything scream for attention equally. (Additionally, the site used a different layout when this article was written in 2007, and currently it seems 24ways is a good example of low-contrast crappy readability :) )

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> It's not just contrast that makes text legible or not, there are many other factors:

\- Width of the text area \- Line spacing \- Font-size \- Correct use of headings, paragraphs, emphasis etc ...

Actually low contrast is a great tool to have. You can't have high contrast all over the page otherwise various elements will be shouting for your attention. Controlling the volume of your copy is just as important as the factors I mentioned above.

</comment><comment><USER24> Well maybe. But at least I can run sites with low contrast through Readability. No such luck with this Heath Robinson powerpoint-a-like they've built.

</comment><comment><USER25> Dear webdesigners: please don't use huge images and CSS3 magic that makes your site ultra slow to scroll.

</comment><comment><USER26> Redux of this comment thread: "But it's not perfect!" _enumerate minor flaws_. _sneer_.

Sometimes it's worthwhile to tackle _one_ issue at a time, especially if it's something many people (designers) a) don't care about b) don't want to do c) possibly don't understand.

So yes, perhaps they fall down on graceful degradation / progressive enhancement, but to be fair the target audience is _exclusively_ web designers. In that respect they are playing well to the audience, which in turn makes it more likely that they'll get their point across.

As for "large text is too hard to read" & "I can't read centered text:" seriously? Deep breaths, everyone. ;)

</comment><comment><USER27> I Find it strange they're only talking about contrast and not line-height. That's the real dealbreaker for me. I am personally constantly changing line- height on other websites much more than type colour.

</comment><comment><USER8> I've gotten into the habit of modifying the CSS of web sites I frequent to improve the readability and usability in general. I do this using a plugin for the web browser. For instance, this is how the HN home page looks like: <http://i.imgur.com/WaTQq.jpg>

This is the most perfect design because it's tailored to _my_ needs.

Here's how YouTube looks like: <http://i.imgur.com/eZAsx.jpg>

Reddit: <http://i.imgur.com/rnaxb.jpg>

<comment><USER28> YouTube is very clean. I don't suppose you would share your CSS? If not, I'll do it myself...but it's always nice not to re-invent the wheel.

<comment><USER8> It would be my pleasure: <https://gist.github.com/1106842>

This CSS fix for YouTube removes a lot of functionality like the search form but since I can search youtube using extensions and the browser address field this isn't a huge issue.

<comment><USER28> Thank you. I agree re: the search bar; not such a big deal. YouTube will be much nicer now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> There is such a thing as too much contrast when it comes to text. When typesetting it is advisable to never use pure black for text because it simmers on the page. I normally design the base text on the page to have between 15% and 30% brightness because it makes it more pleasant to read.

There is a place for light gray text. It is all about maintaining a hierarchy of information. Some text should be hidden away and harder to read because it is less important than the copy around it.

</comment><comment><USER30> Any idea how this site was made? Was some kind of framework used or was it all hard coded?

</comment><comment><USER31> Their script went wrong towards the end, with the following text on the dark gray background with the fist on it:

"Usability expert Jakob Nielsen has shown many, many times that reading on the computer screen is harder than reading printed material even without making the font illegible. And mobile is worse.

.. and many have written about why gray text is a crime here, here, here and here...

So what we're trying to say is..."

which did rather undermine their point.

</comment><comment><USER32> There was an article that did well on Hacker News a few months ago that said while high contrast is good, it shouldn't be 100% contrast. Instead, you should _very slightly_ hint toward the theme color. So if you have a bluish background, your text could be #112 or something. I've followed the advice since and it definitely makes things easier on the eye vs #000 everywhere.

</comment><comment><USER33> I find it easier to read some of the low contrast sites than the linked - <USER2> MUCH contrast is often worse than too little (for me).

</comment><comment><USER34> So glad that Hacker News is on the list. I thought I was the only one who thought that comments are unreadable.

<comment><USER35> You're not. I confess I made a Safari extension just to be able to read those comments that are greyed-out cos they're not interesting enough (and it was a nice test case to start with).

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I can't (read won't) take these guys seriously because they commit one of my biggest design 'sins". They use tiny typefaces in places which can barely be read (at least by me) on a standard 13 to 14 inch laptop screen.

you know what they say - "People in glass houses should not throw stones"!

<comment><USER37> Yeah, I have a minimum font size set on my browser (necessary because my eyesight is bad and virtually every site wants to use font sizes that I simply can't read) and this site looks like crap as a result.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Interesting you say about high contrast, all the examples are black on white. Do this mean all content related websites should be white backgrounds and black text?

<comment><USER39> I think the reason they used so many colors in their bombastic website is to demonstrate non-typical contrast solutions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> In Fireforx: View -> Page Style -> No Style.

<comment><USER41> In Opera (depending how you designed yours): Page -> Style -> Accessibility Layout.

<comment><USER42> Or Shift + G to completly disable CSS.

You can of course create shortcuts for any of those styles in Page -> Style:

      Select user CSS file, # | Deselect user CSS file, #

where # is a number of a style in styles/user/ (ls -U, starting from zero).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> [http://andyrutledge.com/images09/newsSite/images/iphone_nyt_...](http://andyrutledge.com/images09/newsSite/images/iphone_nyt_new.jpg) \-- in here lower-contrast is used properly, I think. Low-contrast allowed to hide the low-priority details allowing the brain to quickly navigate through important, high-contrast titles. Not all text is important.

</comment><comment><USER44> One man's poor contrast is another man's uncalibrated monitor.

:)

<comment><USER43> Put black text on black background and no calibration in the world will help you read it ;-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> On a side note, it's ironic that mobile versions of sites are usually far less readable than regular versions, at least on my Droid X. On a regular page, I can set the zoomed-in text size to large in the settings. Mobile sites tend to make text tiny and un-zoomable, decreasing usability, which defeats the whole purpose of a mobile site!

</comment><comment><USER42> You should not forget about compatibility, i.e. make sure the site works across various browsers and platforms. Why I'm talking about this? I can't use the lt/gt arrows to view more examples. The compatibility problem translates as an usability problem to the user.

edit: Also, the tooltip text went missing after some actions/time.

</comment><comment><USER46> I followed the links in the credits to the two designers who made this site (<http://richard.gazdik.name/> and <http://www.kirowski.com>)... to my surprise, both sites were using tiny low-contrast text. Huh.

</comment><comment><USER47> So glad you use Reeder in your example ... I bought the Reeder app on Sunday and the low contrast thing really put me off (among other things). The app looks really sexy, but sitting there reading tons of articles when you're struggling with the low contrast headlines, can get tiring.

</comment><comment><USER22> <http://timecube.com/>

\- high contrast? check. \- giant letters? check. \- readable? ummmm ...

That said, it's a good suggestion, but the giant letters make this site hard to read on my 1024x600 netbook screen. And they did mention readability on smaller screens.

</comment><comment><USER41> tldr: Do not waste your time on this.

\-----

Webdesigners: please make sites usable.

The non-javascript fallback display is somewhat broken but at least it works. With javascript enabled the site is stuck on the second slide (Opera 11.50).

And then there is the part where the site says "Content ≠ Illustration". Well, yeah, you first. And by the way, centered text is hard to read. And I can't use my browser's back button nor does the site provide such a function. And dear god, it gets even better on this slide:

 _Let's put an end to this low-contrast, light gray nonsense and use typography for its purpose:

MAKING TEXT READABLE.

AGREE? LET'S CHANGE THE WORLD TOGETHER!_

Never heard about all uppercase text being hard to read?

This might just be an elaborate joke or sarcasm, if so, I do not get it.

<comment><USER48> Whenever I see a piece like this on Hacker News anymore (one that is going to provoke discussion), I am expecting a comment like this one. One that is equally as provocative in itself and taking the opposite stance.

People upvote these comments and they tend to make it to the top. This says something about HN.

What's wrong with comments like these ones is that they are being overly aggressive and argumentative for the sake of being overly aggressive and argumentative. Sure, being critical of others' opinions is a good habit to have, but disrespect is not.

In this comment, you tell the other site users to _not waste your time on this_ and that _this might just be an elaborate joke or sarcasm._ That's pretty harsh for something that someone wrapped up together in their spare time and evidently put effort into it. Whether or not you agree, at least try to find the light in the piece of the work.

I know that a lot of people would be more inclined to read and accept an answer if you made it into less of a one-sided argument. Acknowledging both side and taking time to point out the strengths before the weaknesses go a long way and add to the overall politeness of the comment.

</comment></comment><comment><USER49> OmniWeb's site preferences feature is my weapon of choice against illegible Web pages. My default colors often make the hard work of the Web designers look totally ridiculous but then again, I'm reading the page to read, goddammit.

</comment><comment><USER50> I'm guessing the reason this got up voted so much was because this site was featured as one of the offenders. It is pretty hard to read the text on a sunny day on my phone. Maybe the revolution could start with HN?

</comment><comment><USER51> Why don't they show some high contrast designs that aren't just black text on a white background?

Some of the low contrast examples they gave were low contrast to draw attention away from them, not just for aesthetics.

This guy is overreacting.

<comment><USER52> Can you think of any well done websites with high contrast designs that aren't just black text on a white background? I was thinking the same thing but I couldn't think of any good examples off the top of my head--and to me that's a bit of a let down because all this time I've thought the text and style you use on your website can be an identifier of your brand or website. I mean if I could clearly read a site written in dark purple or something, I'd remember that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> I think what we need is a balance.

If everything in your website is in high contrast, big font-size, black & white - it is also a problem.

But I agree the idea behind the "Contrast Rebellion" - the accessibility of web content.

</comment><comment><USER54> Surprised he didn't link to Reichenstein's essay on the topic: <http://www.informationarchitects.jp/en/100E2R>

</comment><comment><USER55> Webdesigners: please make the back button work on scroll sites.

</comment><comment><USER56> Dude: get glasses.

I not even squinted to read the text on his examples. I mean, contrast is important but the guy needs glasses. Or a readability bookmarklet.

</comment><comment><USER57> Can't help but think that this is directed at Andy Rutledge...

Anyways, line-height is as important for my eyes.

</comment><comment><USER58> It looks really nice, but it didn't render properly in Opera with zoom.

</comment><comment><USER59> It's amusing that a website arguing for readability makes extensive use of all-caps, well known to be difficult to read.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_caps#Readability>

<comment><USER6> No it's not. There is nothing whatsoever wrong with sparingly using all-caps in headlines.

This page certainly does not make extensive use of all-caps.

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> I like the site.

</comment><comment><USER61> Nice site. Years ago, we used to determine the luminosity of a colour to determine whether we should use white text or black text.

Now, there are calculators to help determine whether a pair of colours contrast each other effectively. Here is one that kind of works:

<http://www.colorsontheweb.com/colorcontrast.asp>

</comment><comment><USER62> Do they print books with black pages and white text?

No, they do not.

<comment><USER63> With good reason. If I read white on black for more than 5 minutes, whenever I look away there are negative lines floating across my vision.

<comment><USER64> I don't agree that it's good reasoning, and indeed most (or all?) early monitors used to be green/amber/white-on-black because it's easier on the eyes.

It's not a common problem I know but I have countless floaters swooshing around in my vision so for me staring at a mostly white screen all day is absolutely horrible and a great way to give myself eye strain.</comment></comment></comment>


Facebook tells how it makes its MySQL cluster 'almost run itself' - Kilo-byte http://gigaom.com/2013/10/23/facebook-offers-a-peek-at-how-it-keeps-mysql-online/

<comment><AUTHOR> Actual link: [https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-engineering/under- th...](https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-engineering/under-the-hood- mysql-pool-scanner-mps/10151750529723920)

</comment><comment><USER2> Yup, it's blog spam. Go here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6597256](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6597256)</comment>


reform: a better ORM for Go, based on non-empty interfaces and code generation - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/AlekSi/reform <comment><AUTHOR> GitHub tells me:

> One of our mostly harmless robots seems to think you are not a human. > Because of that, it's hidden your profile from the public. If you really are > human, please contact support to have your profile reinstated. We promise we > won't require DNA proof of your humanity.

I use GitHub since 2008 and pay for it since 2010 – and that's what I get. Crazy, just crazy. I hope it will be resolved soon, but announcement is really messed up.</comment>


Nitrogen-fixing trees "eat" rocks, play pivotal role in forest health - <AUTHOR> https://today.oregonstate.edu/news/nitrogen-fixing-trees-%E2%80%9Ceat%E2%80%9D-rocks-play-pivotal-role-forest-health <comment><USER2> Nitrogen fixation is an important part of permaculture. Oregon State offers an online certificate in the subject. [https://pace.oregonstate.edu/catalog/permaculture-design- cer...](https://pace.oregonstate.edu/catalog/permaculture-design-certificate- online)

<comment><USER3> Permaculture is going to become a very important subject for study. I have recently gotten interested in the subject and the results have been amazing even in very unpromising conditions. Geoff Lawtons work in Jordan is inspiring: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xcZS7arcgk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xcZS7arcgk)

<comment><USER4> Greening the desert, I've been following that for months, after watching the Oregon YouTube channel on permaculture. I've just spent an hour following up on Managed Aquifer Recharge, albeit not entirely relevant in my part of Europe.

To bring it back to HN, I keep thinking there must be ways to model landscapes, and planting strategies to increase permaculture efficiency, although probably the antithesis of permaculture.

The issue seems to be putting plants together so they can support each other in close quarters, sounds like an optimisation problem to me, I've called it augmented permaculture before.

<comment><AUTHOR> Your description of an app for designing / modeling edible landscapes with permaculture principles in mind is exactly what I am working on: [https://automicrofarm.com/app/](https://automicrofarm.com/app/)

In fact, I thought about creating a "digital twin" for your edible landscape, and wrote about it here: [https://automicrofarm.com/blog/2018/11/digital- twin.html](https://automicrofarm.com/blog/2018/11/digital-twin.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Underground rocks are not static. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saprolite](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saprolite)

</comment><comment><USER6> In the lowland northwest, red alder is typically the first tree to get established after a disturbance.

</comment><comment><USER7> Interesting fact is that red alder trees are used for fancy furniture, and it's the wood used in Fender Stratocaster guitars. It's also probably the best wood for smoking fish.

</comment><comment><USER8> Boy what clickbait! :)

 _" red alder ... through its symbiotic relationship with nitrogen-fixing bacteria"_

That's more like it. No such thing as a nitrogen-fixing tree, as far as we know; only micro-organisms perform nitrogen fixation.

<comment><USER9> Its not clickbait, its just efficient language. We have a symbiotic relationship with bacteria in our gut but don't explicitly distinguish it every time we refer to human digestion.

Actually this article and study is not intending to reveal anything new about how trees and other plants fix nitrogen (using microbes). It is revealing that the symbiotic arrangements (far from entirely understood) also cause the breakdown and release of scarce nutrients from rocks, enabling increased growth and building soil fertility over time.

<comment><USER8> We wouldn't say that a people perform some very specific, detailed process that is attributed to gut bacteria. E.g. "humans break down oligosaccharides".

Digestion, as such, is a concept independent of gut bacteria.</comment></comment></comment>


Ubiquitous Firefox, Part 1: How Do You Design a Debris-Less Browser? - <AUTHOR> http://mozillalabs.com/conceptseries/2011/05/24/community-concepts-ubiquitous-firefox-part-1-how-do-you-design-a-debris-less-browser/

<comment><USER2> There are some nice ideas here, but the general approach has me worried, for two reasons:

(1) Web pages, and the current crop of browsers that enable them, form a hugely successful interface, one that non-technical people find very easy to learn & use, in my experience.

Ever helped a non-techie use a word processor? Personally, I find (say) MS- Word to be quite intuitive. But they don't. Questions every 30 seconds. Similarly with graphic file browsers, drawing programs, spreadsheets, etc. But I've never had to give anyone more than a very brief intro to the web, and off they go.

So: the interface we have, _works_. Don't break it!

(2) I want to stay in control of my experience on the web.

> For this exercise, I take as guiding principle the idea that content should > be its own interface while administrative debris should be minimized or > wholly eliminated.

That's a fine principle in a world in which skilled web designers are trying to make their sites easy and convenient for me. But in the real world, I need the ability to say "no" to a web page at a fine-grained level. I need Readable and Flashblock and severe limitations on what JS is allowed to do. Take away my "administrative debris", and you might be giving away my power to run my own computer, to web designers who are unscrupulous, careless, or just stupid. I realize that much of this article is all about how to re-enable the kind of functionality currently available via all the stuff framing the content in a browser window. However, he doesn't even mention the concept that the user should be in control. And that scares me.

So: redo the interface if you must. But do it with a view toward keeping the user in control.

</comment><comment><USER3> Is it bad that I want to browse using this bare idea? I had Ubiquity installed in FF3.6, and it was quite handy. The inline maps and other website commands were more and more useful as you got used to them. Integrating it into the browser like this would be at least a neat experiment, if not a useful fork/revamp of Firefox.

</comment><comment><USER4> If you find it TL;DR -- this video at the end of the page is very descriptive: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG3tLxEQEdg>

</comment><comment><USER5> Where is the search box? That's the first question the vast majority of users will ask when first presented with this UI.

Like it or not, the search box is how most users navigate the web.</comment>


Silicon Valley after a Microsoft/Yahoo merger: a contrarian view - <AUTHOR> http://blog.pmarca.com/2008/02/silicon-valley.html

<comment><USER2> Marc <3 I, but here's an even more obvious reason:

it looks like MSFT wants to use YHOO's infrastructure to launch its own cloud computing platform (that doesn't suck). That means more competition for AWS and GAE, and _that_ would be a massive net positive for startups that want to lower their fixed operating costs and consequently increase their freedom to dip their toes in risky waters.

(JMHO, as always)</comment>


How `curl -L cueup.com/jobs` works - <AUTHOR> http://tech.cueup.com/blog/2013/03/06/how-our-terminal-friendly-jobs-page-works/

<comment><USER2> I dumped it into a file out of habit, which sort of ruined the effect. I did wonder why a ~300 line textfile took so long to DL, though.

<comment><AUTHOR> Any hacks you can think of to detect this from the server?

<comment><USER3> Start out by sending dummy data as fast as you can. Once you've sent a few TB you can be relatively confident that it's going to a terminal instead of a file (which would have filled up the disk by now). Then you can start slowly sending the real data.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm afraid my system does not have yet support to http protocol

This server does not apparently has any service listening on port 23 so unfortunately I can't telnet to it (I'm not sure what's this /jobs as well, is this a Gopher page? oh well...)

<comment><USER5> Port 22 is SSH. Telneting to it wouldn't do much good aside telling you which sshd was listening.

I'm also a little confused by what you mean when you said your system doesn't support "HTTP protocol", _curl_ has been a staple for Unix and Linux for over a decade. Or are you trying to run _curl_ from cmd.exe in windows?

<comment><USER4> I meant port 23, sorry

And maybe you're too young to understand the joke ;)

<comment><USER5> Possibly. I know good jokes are ruined if they have to be explained, but would you mind on this occasion :)

<comment><USER4> Well, here goes:

Once upon a time (around 1995, first time I tried this 'internet' thing) the internet already existed. But this newfangled http protocol was not very popular (it existed since 1991)

You see, Curl was created in 1997, Wget in 1996

The way to access systems was through telnet mostly. Some modern clients, like lynx, also supported Gopher <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_(protocol)>

(Yes, lynx got http support at a later time)

So, their choice for a page readable from a terminal ends up being kind of an Anachronism =)

<comment><USER5> Oh, I know all that (I was building websites in the mid 90s, so I'm old enough to remember a life before the WWW).

I assumed you were referencing an old meme or a famous quote from some notable UNIX greybeard. I hadn't realised you were just joking about being old (that wasn't clear from your original comment).

Sorry mate, I just misunderstood the context of your joke. (my epic lack of sleep probably didn't help)

<comment><USER4> Ah it happens, don't worry =)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> OP here. I'm curious to learn of any other creative uses of ANSI and curl. Does anyone know of websites that use it as an easter egg?

<comment><USER6> One thing that I often use is

      curl ifconfig.me

But this is so damn cool!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Maybe it's just me (using PuTTY), but it is next to impossible to read while it scrolls up my screen. Once it's done scrolling I can't see most of the listings because by default my terminal doesn't save that many lines of history.

Awesome idea though

<comment><USER8> I'm pretty sure there's a setting in PuTTY to increase the size of the scrollback buffer. Memory is cheap these days.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> With HTTPie (master):

       http --pretty=none https://www.cueup.com/jobs User-Agent:curl

(`--pretty=none` is needed because the server incorrectly sends `Content-Type: text/html`)

</comment><comment><USER10> Works with Wget too:

wget -q --user-agent="curl" -O - cueup.com/jobs

</comment><comment><USER11> Reminds me of an old dialup BBS. Can I post a comment on the wall?

</comment><comment><USER12> Where are these colorMarkdown and htmlToMarkdown functions?

</comment><comment> iso-8859-1 Sadly there seems to be no MIME type for ANSI art. Of course this should depend on the "Accept" header and not the User Agent. But it seems infeasible.

</comment><comment><USER13> Is anyone else unable to see this due to tech.cueup.com not resolving?

<comment><USER8> You know the worst kind of DNS problem? The kind that only affects some people. Yeah, I can't resolve the domain name either. _Ugh._ For now, the Coral Cache hack works:

[http://tech.cueup.com.nyud.net/blog/2013/03/06/how-our- termi...](http://tech.cueup.com.nyud.net/blog/2013/03/06/how-our-terminal- friendly-jobs-page-works/)

EDIT: Looks fixed now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Your /jobs link in your sites footer is 404ing

</comment><comment><USER15> This is a cool idea, but anyone who needs "how it works" explained is really not the target audience.

</comment><comment><USER16> Honestly, fuck anyone who does this for a job posting.

<comment><USER17> Why? There's a normal (nice looking) page for other user agents. You haven't lost anything.</comment></comment>


SpaceX Crew Dragon Touchscreen UI Uses JavaScript and Chromium - <AUTHOR> https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/9243/what-computer-and-software-is-used-by-the-falcon-9/9446#9446 <comment><USER2> The answer is from 2016 though.</comment>


AIL Framework – Open Source Analysis Information Leak Framework - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/CIRCL/AIL-framework <comment><USER2> I found the title/name a little bit confusing. "Information Leak Analysis Framework" would have been much more clear IMO.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good point... The origin of the acronym is a bad joke at the office (AIL) because in French AIL means garlic and we had another project called Potiron [https://github.com/CIRCL/potiron](https://github.com/CIRCL/potiron) which means pumpkin and then AIL was used as ingredient to make a pumpkin soup. Sorry, we are bad at naming projects.

<comment><USER2> > Sorry, we are bad at naming projects.

Like they say, "there are only two hard things in Computer Science: cache invalidation, naming things, and off-by-1 errors" ;)

Also, when I read the name I actually came to think of France. I don't know if it's incidental in this case or not but I have noticed that in France you sometimes put words in different order than what is usual in English. For example, United Nations (UN) is called L'Organisation des Nations unies (ONU) in French, the Olympic Games are called Jeux olympiques, and the European Union (EU) is called Union européenne (UE). So I suppose that in French, Analysis Information Leaks might be the natural way to name it?

<comment><AUTHOR> Indeed, it's a common confusion for French-speakers. Nevertheless for AIL, we came with the acronym first...</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Teenage Sex - The Sleepover Question - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/opinion/sunday/24schalet.html?_r=1&src=rechp <comment><USER2> It is important to note that the age of consent could have something to do with the differences in attitudes in the US vs Netherlands. In many states in the US, the age of consent (sexual) is 18. There are a few states where it is 16, or even 14, though. It would be interesting to compare responses from parents of 16 year olds in these states. In the Netherlands, from what I was able to find online, the age of consent is 16, but with the consent of parents, it can be as low as 12. Given that, it would make sense that attitudes of parents would be different.

<comment><USER3> I suspect the cultural attitudes shaped the law, and not the other way around.

<comment><USER2> _I suspect the cultural attitudes shaped the law, and not the other way around._

You're right...these laws were likely written during a more conservative age, but even though attitudes have changed, it is difficult to change the laws. Just do a search for "Blue Laws" to see plenty of examples of this. I think that it's quite possible that now the situation is reversed, that the laws are influencing attitudes. Just look at the drinking age. I'm sure there are plenty of parents who don't give their kids wine simply because the drinking age is 21.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Seriously asking, does no one care how many people their spouse slept with?

<comment><USER5> Why does it matter? I met my wife when I was 20 and she was 23. Does it matter what happened when she or I did at age 16, given there are no STDs or children in the mix?

I know I don't particularly like to be judged on things I did before I was 19 or so, because the me at 18 was a very different individual (less responsible, more petty, etc.) than the me at 20. So, turning the question around: are you seriously going to judge a person based on what he/she did a number of years prior?</comment></comment>


GIMP 2.10 released - <AUTHOR> https://www.gimp.org/release-notes/gimp-2.10.html <comment><USER2> I'm glad that the transition to GEGL is complete and the benefits that come along with it. High bit depth color (32-bit channels) is a nice improvement too.

I've used GIMP for a long time, and find it more intuitive than either PhotoShop or competitors like Affinity Photo. I'm glad to see it making strides in features and quality.

<comment><USER3> I love GIMP as well and have used it for a long time, but it does feel like a stretch to call it "intuitive" :-)

I'm excited by this new release. An updated UI will hopefully make it an easier sell to people that don't care about FOSS as much as functionality.

<comment> m-p-3 I switch between Gimp and Krita once in a while. I knoe that Krita focus isn't the same, but I find myself "at home" more with Krita.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> HiDPI support is super exciting. I've been squinting at GIMP on a 15" 4k laptop for a while now, and it's almost unusable (I started switching to 1080p whenever I really needed to use GIMP, or used some other software for simple edits like cropping and rotating and such).

</comment><comment> phoe-krk This is a massive release with a lot of new and improved features. Congratulations!</comment>


A modern, zero-trust security model - <AUTHOR> https://threatpost.com/practical-guide-zero-trust-security/151912/ <comment><USER2> Definitely a good introduction but defining it a "A Practical Guide to Zero- Trust Security" is an over statement</comment>


Clay Shirky has perfected the art of the bold, meaningless epigram.  - <AUTHOR> http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/future-guy_513321.html?nopager=1

<comment><USER2> What is the author's objective? This is a lopsided rant against an internet 'spokesman'.

I had an opportunity to talk with Shirky; he is so not the arrogant person portrayed in the article. Before mechanical turk,cambrian house,crowdspring came by - he 'predicted' (for the lack of better word) CrowdSourcing.</comment>


Good IRC channels? - <AUTHOR> Hi, I've been trying to find some interesting IRC channels to hang out in. What are some of your guys favourites? <comment><USER5> On Freenode.net there are a few good ones.

#hn is, well, HN. But nobody ever really seems to discuss anything, so most of the traffic is just a bot that posts new links that show up on HN. Still, no reason in principle people couldn't discuss things there. Possibly they would if more people were in the channel?

#startups - populated by a lot of HN users, but the discussion is pretty random, and not necessarily limited to (or even often) about things you see on HN.

##machinelearning - fairly low volume, but pretty focused on ML

#ml-ot - for off-topic discussion / idle chit-chat, vaguely related to machine learning.

#ai - very low volume, but good every now and again, in spurts

##agi - even lower volume, so please join and contribute if you're interested in Artificial General Intelligence!

#cyberpunk - <USER2>

#postcyberpunk - <USER3>

#tensorflow - <USER4>

#wikidata

#swig - Semantic Web Interest Group

##cypherpunk

etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks man. These look really good.</comment></comment>


Google Maps for iOS - <AUTHOR> https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/google-maps/id585027354?mt=8 <comment><USER2> Wow. New GMaps totally annihilates Apple Maps in every which way. Not that this comes as a surprise...

Navigation is great, so much better than Siri's dreadful voice, easy to navigate from A>B with a tap of your destination. Let's not even mention the street data.

Great 3D flyovers, but no satellite-3D flyovers (if you're worried about that you probably have too much time to waste during the day - this is a maps app, to take you places, not give you a tour of Los Angeles).

UI feels great - intuitive, fluid, multi-touch works fantastic. Heard someone mention that it "lacks polish" or feels "laggy" - not sure I agree with that - feels fast on an iPhone 5 and on a 4S side-by-side. UI is clean and not cluttered, that's a plus. Someone else mentioned that it's simply GMaps in a UIWebView - no chance for that.

Of course, the public transport data is second to none. The data in general - we won't discuss that.

Great release - welcome back

<comment><USER3> Does living in the Bay Area color my view of Apple Maps? Because honestly, I use it nearly everyday to navigate and it's never let me down. It's actually a pleasant surprise and works pretty well with other apps I'm using at the same time, like Spotify in the car.

<comment> jon-wood In the UK (although just outside and around London, so data is probably quite good) my experience has been that if your driving the directions work about as well as Google Maps. If you're traveling by public transport its useless, since it just doesn't support it. Finding places is also really hit and miss, sometimes it works fine, and other times I'll get pointed to some place in Texas despite there being an identically named place within a few miles of me.

<comment><USER4> Based on my anecdotal experience in the UK outside of London it's fine.

I'm not going to say I can't see what the fuss has been about as I've seen enough examples to know that there are real and significant problems, but I can say where I live (west of Scotland) for my use cases (basic searching and navigation) I've not had anything to complain about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is leaps and bounds better than Apple Maps and even the original maps client on iOS that used Google Maps. I didn't even think Apple maps were 'that' bad. The huge hole was POI data, in London at least. Most POI's seemed to be approximated and the rest of them were missing, old or incorrect.

After playing with this app for 10 minutes I think this is far superior to the iOS5 Maps experience. It's an extremely refined and clean app that is extremely fast with lots of features. Start typing a street or location and it'll know what you mean within a few letters.

<comment><USER6> My impression is the opposite - Google Maps' data is so much better that it hardly matters, but this app seriously lacks polish. For instance, it's laggy - iOS 6 Maps doesn't always make 60fps, which is a shame, but this app doesn't even try. Simply panning around (on my 4S) is enough to produce serious stuttering; even the simple transition to the side menu is not smooth. Or consider Street View, which is missing the signature transition as you "move" from one place to another.

edit: Opening the side menu, for its matter, visually seems to depend on hitting a tiny tap target; there is hidden space to the left of the target but not above it, which is the natural place I tried tapping. The menu itself is weirdly designed (giant spacing) and prone to accidental dismissal by someone trying to scroll it.

No bookmarks either.

<comment><USER7> Is the lag any better on an iPhone 5?

<comment><USER8> It's very smooth on my iPhone 5, but it does have moments where you can notice a bit of frame drop (only if you've read this comment thread beforehand).

From a UI/UX perspective:

\+ Fonts and text entry are _great_ \+ Search speed and interface speed are fantastic

\- The pull-out menu on the right (akin to a hamburger menu) feels a bit odd and it's not immediately clear as to what it does (they are layer toggles for traffic/transit routes/satellite) \- I can't figure out how to bookmark my home or work addresses (whilst being logged in) - if there is a way it is not intuitive.

<comment><USER9> You're right - it's not intuitive. To set your work and home while logged in, click the person on the upper right and then the gear then edit home or work?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> So a question I have for some people more knowledgable than me in the iOS system:

Now that we have an apple maps program, and various competitors including and not limited to google; we also have a chrome (and other) iOS browsers to compete with safari (and yes, I understand it's really just skinned web kit) and a new default video player,

Is this situation not akin to the anti-trust wars that threatened to consume Microsoft a decade ago?

For instance, they (the apple defaults) are all installed by default, and they remain the default option: for example if you receive an address (either physical or web) in messenger or whatsapp or whatever, iOS will attempt to recognise it and make it a hyperlink, but it will then open in the _apple default app_ \- if you want it to open in say chrome or google maps you have to copy and paste it.

So- is this the same as the anti-trust case against Microsoft? Will apple ever change the default program? Or will my next phone be an android..

<comment><USER11> Just buy an Android. You can configure what browser opens links. You can configure what map application opens maps. You can configure what video player opens videos.

Yes, this is much like Microsoft a decade ago; in fact, it's worse, the iOS offers significantly less choice than Windows did back then; you could develop your own software for your own computer without joining a restrictive developer program from Microsoft.

If you don't like it, my recommendation is that you don't buy into it. Get an Android. I've been perfectly happy with mine.

<comment><USER12> The thing is, Apple makes really nice hardware. Really, really, nice hardware. There are some pretty good Android phones, but Apple nails it in a way that nobody else seems quite able to pull off.

I'd love to have an iphone 5 running Android! :]

<comment><USER10> Hmm.. Are there hardware level-blocks on jail breaking an iPhone so far as to run android on it?

<comment><USER13> No, surprisingly.

And yes, the Android port is well underway: <http://www.idroidproject.org/>

<comment><USER14> According to the site, the project is pretty much dead. Shame, as I agree with the OP that Apple hardware is better than anything an Android manufacturer has turned out - or is interested in turning out. I can't remember the last time I saw an Android phone under 4.3" big.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It looks great, the fact that it has 480 upvotes on here shows that a lot of people wanted it.

The transport directions are _slightly_ better, it'll find actual options for me now but does still occasionally go "Nope, no public transport around you!" when I live near a bus stop. And a train station.

It's _slightly_ laggy on my iPhone 5, I popped it up with a high view when I was on the train and it was very visibly jerky, Apple Maps was much, much smoother.

Hey guys, SIGN IN. You want your search history? SIGN IN. That's really annoying, and given when the whole Maps shift started it was rumoured that Google was demanding more and more information on the searches it points to Google _really_ wanting that search history with your account.

POI stuff spanks Apple, easily. Apple sucks at that at the moment, the fact that Google can autocomplete a hell of a lot of it is much nicer.

I don't like some of the UX choices, the 'tutorial overlay' says the bottom right button is tappable but it's actually a slide over, tapping did nothing for me. Accessing Street View is non-intuitive. Occasionally it felt like there was a few too many taps to get me where I needed to be. This is all stuff they can work on though.

All in all, it's pretty good. I'll have it as a secondary Maps app, I'm going to try stick with Apple Maps though. Not because I'm a glutton for punishment but because it has _genuinely_ started getting better for the use case I need it in. Choice is always nice though.

<comment><USER16> Bottom right button is tappable. I avoid sliding/swiping on the phone unless I have to.

<comment><USER15> I've tried it a few times and it doesn't seem like the tap zone is quite as big as it could be. Or my fingers are tapping the wrong place, possibly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'm not seeing a lot of comments about how good for Apple this is.

Yes Apple want to own maps on iOS but given how their own launch went the ship has sailed on that for a while at least. But given the position they found themselves in this goes a long way to undermining the criticisms of mapping on iOS because if you think Apple maps sucks you just go and get Google maps for free.

One of Apple's big gripes supposedly was that they couldn't get Google maps turn by turn navigation on the iPhone and here it is (and without them paying for it it seems) plus they get to work on Apple maps with some of the pressure off which protects them some if Google start messing around.

I'm not in any way saying that this was Apple's plan all along - that plan went badly wrong in the summer - but as of this morning iOS, for regular users at least, just got more attractive.

Yes it's a win for Google, but it's a win for Apple too.

<comment><USER17> So when Apple decides drop Google Maps as their default, they probably thought that it'll bring more value to their iOS platform. But obviously that didn't happen.

Now that Google Maps is back on iOS, I agree that it's a win for Apple as well. But someone please explain it to me how it could have been a win for Apple to drop Google Maps in the first place?

<comment><USER4> Relations between the two companies were hardly cordial. I suspect Apple didn't want to be beholden to a rival over what was becoming an increasingly core service.

Remember Apple already give Samsung, another competitor, a shed load of each money for components. Why enrich someone you're competing with?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> So far, it seems very awkward...

Two-finger slide from the right _sometimes_ opens up a sidebar that apparently contains settings (not sure what the magic incantation is).

Zooming in works, but there's no street view, you just keep zooming waaaaay in.

No bike directions. :|

I might like the map drawing better, can't really say which is quicker on my relatively slow device, and it does work quite well. But so far I'm not impressed at all. The previous iOS 5- version was better, if less new-Google- aesthetic-y.

<comment><USER19> > No bike directions. :|

Yes, what is up with that? Android app had that for ages. I guess I am not supposed to have an iPhone if I bike.

<comment><USER20> Unless you want to have the phone attached to the bike, I haven't found any good mounts for my galaxy nexus, but there's plenty of mounts for iPhone. I've considered a switch just because of that.

<comment><USER21> Bluetooth headphones any use?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> IOS SDK released as well: [http://googlegeodevelopers.blogspot.com/2012/12/a-new-way- to...](http://googlegeodevelopers.blogspot.com/2012/12/a-new-way-to-add- google-maps-to-your.html)

<comment><USER23> I hope this get's more use than the "Open in Chrome" button does. Both are awesome, my only gripe with iOS 6 is not being able to set default apps for browser, email, and maps. (coincidentally I'd switch them all to Google or google owned items)

<comment><USER24> I don't think it is coincidental; I think that is precisely the main reason why Apple chooses what apps can be used for these purposes, instead of the user being allowed to choose.

<comment><USER25> As long as you buy Apple hardware, I don't think they care what default mapping software you use. I think there is a different reason why they don't have settings for this.

<comment><USER24> Such as?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Also, double tap and hold, move up and down to zoom. Full one handed operation FTW.

</comment><comment><USER27> I can finally upgrade to iOS 6.

<comment><USER28> Yes, but keep in mind you can't make Google Maps the default mapping application, so links to addresses (e.g. in calendar, web browser, contacts) will open in Apple Maps.

<comment><USER29> I expect there to eventually be a jailbreak tweak for this. Though of course having an iOS6 jailbreak would help first.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> What I found really interesting is how after playing with Google Maps for a couple minutes, then hopping out to the Settings app to change something, the standard iOS look instantly felt really dated, with the bubbliness, heavy gradients and pinstripes.

<comment><USER31> I get that every time i use an iphone. Feels like the "Web 2.0" era or some shitty flash-game where everything consists of rounded corners and gradients. The sms-view really makes me cringe.

Not in line with apples otherwise timeless designs at all.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Voice guides, street view, search/favourites syncing...oh and the maps are actually correct.

<comment><USER33> Edit: yeah, it's a cheap shot, but my point is "correctness" is not binary

[http://au.news.yahoo.com/technology/news/article/-/15610781/...](http://au.news.yahoo.com/technology/news/article/-/15610781/police- warn-of-safety-concerns-from-google-maps/)

 _Now police in Colac, west of Melbourne, say faults with Google maps are putting people's lives at risk along the Great Ocean Road and in the southern Otways._

 _Sergeant Nick Buenen says trucks, buses and tourists are being directed down Wild Dog Road, which is a one-way track, not built for heavy traffic._

 _He says VicRoads has denied responsibility and Google Maps has not responded._

<comment><USER34> [http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57558777-93/police- google-m...](http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57558777-93/police-google-maps- giving-dangerous-directions-too/)

"Update, 12:41 p.m. PT A Google spokesperson said that Google Maps routes drivers onto Wild Dog Road only if the driver searches for a destination located on that road. For directions to other nearby locations, Google Maps routes drivers onto Forrest-Apollo Bay Road/Skenes Creek Road. "

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> So, I find this out, I go directly to the App Store on my phone, and I do a search for "Google Maps".

First five results:"Google Earth", "My Places for Google Maps", "My Maps Editor", "Road Tripper", and then finally "Google Maps"

Seriously, how difficult is it to bump an exact string match to the top of the list?

Seems to me that iOS is just getting worse and worse.

<comment><USER4> Ranking based on a number of factors, not just a string match is generally a good idea.

When someone searches on the term "maps" do you want the "best" (highest rated, most popular, whatever) app to be the top hit (give it a week and that'll likely be Google Maps), or the one from the person who had done a bit of SEO and thought to call his app "maps" to hit the exact string match?

I contest that what's happening is actually a good thing and what you propose would be a field day for those who look to game the system.

<comment><USER35> Does that hold true when the exact string match is already #1 on the Free Apps list? Because to me, if it's an exact string match, AND it's wildly popular...

<comment><USER4> The shorter the period of time you use to measure popularity, the more volatile the order will be.

I think it's clear that this is a transient issue, that the apps popularity will kick in shortly so I'm not sure it's a big deal regardless.

UK App Store at least it's up to fourth now so it's moving.

<comment><USER35> Okay, how about, it's an exact string match, it's wildly popular, and it's from a well known and long time developer whose apps have always been wildly popular? Is that enough yet, to make search not suck?

PS, Google Maps is now the third search result instead of the fifth. After how many days should search not suck?

<comment><USER4> Given that that app is going to be there for years, how about what percentage of the time? At the moment it's likely that it will be a small fraction of 1%.

And search doesn't suck - it's still easy to find, you just need to look a little bit more. Given that it's the number one free download discovery really doesn't seem to be an issue here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> Is Apple Maps really completely terrible?

OR

Does it have a few problems that, when compared with all the progress Google has made in that arena, makes its performance untenable?

I say this because I have used Apple Maps to navigate the rural southeastern U.S. with absolutely no problems. I even had my dedicated GPS to make sure Apple Maps wasn't leading me astray.

<comment><USER37> My theory is that people want it to be worse than it actually is. I've put ~1000 miles on it via turn-by-turn and I like it a lot better than the old maps app.

What I dont get is that people were/are willing to wait for google to get it together with the "next release," and crucify apple for doing the exact same.

Either way, we win because apple removing google maps from ios forced google to work hard on providing a good app and google's app will force apple to polish up their maps.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Notice the cheeky use of London and Japan in the screens. Two locations Apple maps had real difficulty with.

<comment><USER39> It had real difficulty everywhere _except_ (parts of) California :)

<comment><USER40> A bit of a hyperbole...it's been fine everywhere in Georgia. I've been using iOS6 Maps since the first beta, and I honestly didn't notice any of the issues people have with Apple Maps until people pointed them out after the public release.

<comment><USER38> It isn't hyperbole at all. Tim Cook himself apologised for its shortcomings. The fact that Google is getting so much attention for their maps app speaks volumes as to how problematic Apple Maps is.

<comment><USER40> Tim Cook responding to bad press makes sense, but having bad publicity doesn't necessarily mean a product is awful. "Apple Maps fail hard after Steve Jobs dies" is a big headline, and it's no surprise that news agencies pick up on that regardless of how much substance it has.

And realistically, I don't think it says much. First, tech sites are obviously going to pick up on this release. It continues the narrative they've had going for months. Second, even if there had been no stories about Apple Maps, we'd be seeing tons of stories about this release. Very few people had issues with mobile Safari before Chrome came out, but the response to that was huge as well.

<comment><USER38> There's no getting around it. For most of the world Apple Maps was truly awful, it was particularly bad here in Australia to the point that it was useless and even life threatening. I'm not sure why you're even trying to argue the point, it has been written about and commented on everywhere around the world, and the overwhelming consensus is; Apple Maps was a step backwards.

You can't just dismiss the criticism because it made for a good headline.

<comment><USER40> All right. Outside of the US, it may have been bad. I don't have any personal experience with that, so I'll concede that point. The original comment was "It had real difficulty everywhere except (parts of) California". I pointed out that that was a hyperbole. Apple Maps is fine in the vast majority of the United States, and fine with a significant portion of iOS users.

<comment><USER41> I am in Florida and use Apple Maps to travel all over the state. It was wrong countless times, from location of restaurants to taking me to wrong addresses because I did not spell "northeast" as NE. Worst of all it did not find most local businesses. Unless you have personally used it to travel all over the US, how can you say it works everywhere?

<comment><USER40> I can say it's been fine in Georgia, South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin. I've been using it since June, and I just haven't encountered any problems that seem to plague everyone else on the Internet. Maybe it's just good luck on my part, but whatever. At least everyone can be happy now :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> I'm shocked how fast the UI is. I'm on an iPhone 4S and every UI gesture, view load and transition has absolutely no lag. For example, from the sliding info sheet, tap on the street view button and it loads instantly.

Even requests that are hitting the server seem to return almost instantly.

Is it just me?

<comment><USER43> Looking at the UI I can see why it's fast - everything is set up in a way to maximize performance if you're willing to put in the work.

Which is to say, simple text, simple lines, simple shadows - all of which, so long as you take the time and draw smartly using Core Graphics, is _well_ within the capabilities of any iOS device. Combine with a few dashes of smart UI caching and the whole thing will _scream_.

iOS UI optimization is a topic I wish more devs knew about. So many relatively simplistic apps are dog slow because no one has bothered to do even the most modest amount of optimization.

<comment><USER44> We definitely had a blast optimizing the app :) Gotta love Instruments.

<comment><USER42> Any chance you can do a blog post on your process and what you learnt?

<comment><USER44> I'll look into it.

tl;dr Use Instruments while running on the device (not the simulator) to pinpoint the highest avoidable CPU usage and then optimize the relevant code. Repeat until the scrolling is buttery smooth on a 3GS :)

<comment><USER45> It's far from smooth on iPhone 4 and 3GS

<comment><USER44> Which parts aren't working well for you?

<comment><USER46> Could I also ask, lots of people are asking about the FPS. I notice the app seems to have zero hiccups/ latency spikes throughout the UI, however the framerate does seem to be around 20/30 FPS in the map view on my iPhone 5. Is this intentional? It is a very consistent framerate it is just that it is noticeably lower than most every other part of the iOS experience.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> On a cursory glance, The panning performance is disappointing (looks like 20fps) on my iPhone 5, whilst Apple maps is buttersmooth at 60fps.

I like the overall look of Google maps more, having more detail and and the 3d buildings that pop-up are cute. Apple maps are right down bare looking in comparison.

I was sorely missing streetview, I was amazed myself how used to I was checking streeview of various places.

Can't offhand remember places Apple maps couldn't address-locate so I don't have any good comparison off the map data quality, but both have been mostly fine, with google having slightly better heuristics finding an address even if it doesn't know the exact street number.

I like the rotation with two fingers in google maps is less sensitive, I often rotate in apple maps accidentally. But then again, Google maps has this menu that comes up when sliding with two fingers (by placing two fingers and then dragging) and that came up accidentally few times.

In google maps, sometimes a quick tap tells you the address of that place, but sometimes it needs a tap-and-hold, feels erratic.

Google maps driving directions didn't say a word while staying still, so I can't say much about that. The finnish voice in apple maps is very understandable, but quite harsh. The US voice of course failed to read any finnish names in a comical way (but had to change phone language to get finnish voice, I usually prefer my electronics in english).

Public transport stuff has always been useless in finland, so nothing to say about that either..

</comment><comment><USER48> Just one Data Point - My first query (from my office in Redwood City) was "Directions to Lake Merrit" - it found Lake Merrit, but, unlike IOS 6 Maps, couldn't get me transit direction there. IOS 6 Maps one-clicked me over to "HopStop" which gave me a choice of Walk/Caltrain/Bart.

Prior to the uproar around IOS 6 maps not having Transit direction, I wasn't even _aware_ the IOS 5 Map had transit directions. In San Francisco, Tokyo, New York and other places this is a big deal. But, if you want to get Transit Direction from Redwood City, CA to Oakland, CA, IOS 6 Maps currently beats out Google Maps.

With that said, I'm blown away by how quickly the interface can guess what I'm looking for as I start typing into it. Apple has a long way to catch up in that department. I suspect for much map searching, Google Maps is going to become my "Goto" client on the iPhone.

[Edit - Love the speedy Swipe Left/Right interface. Also Offline Maps. Just Cached all of California, Switched to "Airplane Mode" - and all my mapping data is cached. Awesome.]

[Edit 2 - Wow - this map is fast. IOS 6 Maps wasn't particularly slow, but switching back and forth shows me Apple has a long way to go. Have to Love Competition]

[Edit 3 - Jumping into StreetView is silky smooth, and, they make use of the accelerometer so you can look around]

<comment><USER49> Is there a way to manually cache areas for offline use (i.e., how could I cache all of California like you said you did)? When I go in airplane mode I can see that it's cached the areas I had been browsing online, but I can find any explicit UI to add areas to the cache.

<comment><USER20> There is on the android version, there's an option "Make available offline" you just draw out a square of what part of the world you want offline. Not sure if it's available on the iOS version though.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Coming up as "Temporarily Unavailable" when I try to download it. Not yet appearing in search results either—maybe it's just still processing?

<comment><AUTHOR> Possibly. I found it by chance on the page which lists all the apps by "Google, Inc." in the App Store. It's listed there, but agree it doesn't show up in search results yet and I can't download it. It just seems this is definitely the permalink to it.

<comment><USER51> Woop, karma for you! Good job.

<comment><USER52> You don't need to tell people you are upmodding them. Just upmod them.

<comment><USER51> I wasn't really telling him, I was just acknowledging the fact he gets to collect credit for finding this first. Unnecessary? Sure. I apologize.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> The item is not available anymore in the US App Store :|

<comment><USER54> Are you sure? I just downloaded it (30 seconds ago).

<comment><USER55>
      This item is temporarily unavailable.

      Try again later.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Again no iPad native version on the initial release, just like their YouTube app? That's a little disappointing.

<comment><USER57> Notice the last screenshot preview of the app? Interestingly, it is the iPad aspect ratio. So I'm sure it's just simply not yet ready for public release.

<comment><USER30> It might also just still be in review

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER58> Finally, I'm happy that this app is released. I refused to use Apple Maps any further.

The one major drawback from the Original Google Maps app is that the original one did an excellent job showing every single street name on even a deep zoom level. The new Google Maps one does a poor job on this and you have to hunt back and forth to figure out what zoom level you need to get to in order to read the street name. Once they get this right, things will be back to normal.

</comment><comment><USER59> Yes!!! finally.

I expect Apple to see a drastic increase in iOS5->iOS6 upgrade over the next few days. Hahah!

<comment><USER40> Maybe a small bump. They hit over 60% adoption in October, and when you take out devices that can't upgrade to iOS6 and people who don't even realize updates are available (my grandma, for one), I'd have to think people who have intentionally held out this long make up a small but vocal minority.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> Apple had an interesting choice here, they could allow it, or they could not allow it. If they didn't, Google had a very good opportunity to slam Apply publicly and get users riled up, and enemies more ammunition. They chose the latter, which I think is the best choice as they now have real competition and they'll have to step up their game. This is app number two that will probably take place over the natively installed apps now by Google.

<comment><USER60> What is app number 1?

<comment><USER51> It's actually Chrome, I use it 90% of the time. The other 10% is when things open in Safari. Apple could be a little looser about setting which apps to open by default.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> I'll throw my voice into this maelstrom.

1) Search for "Google Maps" and it is the 5th result. The app is literally called Google Maps. The results before: Fine Maps, PD Maps Worldwide Edition, Google Earth(?!).

2) 300 comments and the topic of Apple anti-competitive behaviour with regard to App availability is hardly touched. In fact the top most comments are on UI and nitpicking over details such as Bookmarks and response speed.

<comment><USER15> The search algorithm isn't necessarily predicated on name, which is silly in _many_ ways but I wouldn't say it's anti-competitive.

<comment><USER61> I don't believe the Search algorithm to be malicious, but it is definitely off.

And anti-competitive maybe a bit strong. But wasn't it Google Voice that has been stranded in review for a while now?

I think Apple's mono-culture is beginning to fail: using the App Store as a gateway to their devices (touched on briefly above), etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> It's great, but nothing on the iPhone will open the app, which is very annoying.

</comment><comment><USER63> I used the new Google Maps for my GPS on the way to work this morning to do a side by side comparison with my regular GPS software from Navigon. A couple of things I love:

1). It connects to my car stereo via the phone bluetooth profile so even though my car can't stream music by bluetooth, I can still get my turn-by-turn directions. My Navigon uses the whichever audio profile is used for music, so I only get the turn-by-turn over the car stereo if I'm plugged in by wire. Kudos Google, that's a really nice touch. Thank you.

2). I like the way it displays the streetview when you arrive at your destination so you can see where you should be. Another great touch.

And a couple of things I really don't like at all:

1). "In 300 metres...[pregnant pause]... turn left".

2). I don't like that it doesn't provide the street names in the audible turn by turn directions. So in cases where you have two streets in close proximity, unless you actually look at the screen, you're left guessing which is the correct one.

</comment><comment><USER64> Not sure what's going on...I get "the item you tried is no longer available" but a friend did manage to download it.

<comment><USER65> Yeah, I copy pasted the link into Chrome on iPhone 5, it opened the install page on the iTunes app (instead of the App Store app). Possibly because of the itunes.apple.com/... in the url. What are regular app link domains anyway?

</comment></comment><comment><USER66> nobody commented about this. any opinions?

"Google Maps Navigation is in beta. Use caution.

Please keep your eyes on the road and obey applicable laws. Do not manipulate this application while in motion. Directions may be inaccurate, incomplete, dangerous, or prohibited.

Traffic data is not real-time, and location accuracy cannot be guaranteed

"

<comment><USER67> Isn't it a standard disclaimer? Even if you buy Tom-Tom or Garmin they'll have something similar.

<comment><USER66> my point is if we had to agree to this disclaimer, there was nothing wrong with apple maps then

<comment><USER67> Well you shouldn't bet your life on the accuracy of these maps but there's great distance between hugely inaccurate maps and maps with millimeter precision.

My guess is if Apple maps were introduced 5 years ago (or even earlier) people wouldn't complain as there wouldn't be any other better alternative that used to be available.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Voice Navigation and turn by turn!

Now to see about offline access.

<comment><USER68> Does voice navigation work on iPhone 4? I currently use a telenav app due to them having voice nav. I'm not in a position to upgrade my phone yet, so my girlfriend and I are stuck with the 4 for a bit. I downloaded the app and gave it a test but it didnt seem to do any voice -- that may be because I wasn't moving, though. It did give me the option to mute the voice navigation -- which I found odd.

<comment><USER69> Yes, voice navigation should work fine on an iPhone 4. Enjoy :).

<comment><USER68> Thanks! You were right. Apparently it didn't do anything when I wasn't moving but I finally had a chance to try it on the move and it worked flawlessly. Thanks for correcting my initial assumption.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER70> This app is fantastic. And now I can finally upgrade to iOS 6. Thanks Google Maps team!

<comment><USER71> It will be interesting to see if there's a spike in iOS upgrades now. I suspect a lot of people will have been holding off.

</comment></comment><comment><USER72> Wow! This is a very slick and sexy app, I am impressed. I am going to give it a try for my commute to work tomorrow. Very fast, responsive, and the voice is nice (but a little too fast as compared to iOS)

</comment><comment><USER73> It's certainly a great alternative for Apple's maps, which lack data in many parts of the world. It also appears to be vector maps, like Apple's, unlike Maps in iOS 5.

Some things that lack or incomplete in the meantime:

\- iPad version, which is less critical, of course. \- Access to contact addresses \- Street view doesn't load high-resolution images when zoomed in.

The performance on iPhone 4S is good enough but zooming in and out is sometimes too fast and hard to do with precision.

Still, I already replaced Apple's Maps with this one of my iPhone's home screen.

</comment><comment><USER74> The new Google Maps' shake to give feedback feature is so genius. Shake your phone in frustration, and get to yell at Google :)

Is this feature in any other app? Maybe I just haven't seen it yet.

<comment><USER75> You can also find this feature in the PayPal Here app.

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> Reviews mention street view; anyone figure out how to enter it?

<comment><USER22> Tap a named location (such as a business), or tap-and-hold on a location to drop a pin, tap the name plate that appears at the bottom of the screen, then tap Street View.

<comment><USER76> Thank you kindly.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER77> It is available at: <https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/google-maps/id585027354>

</comment><comment><USER78> So, I'm really disappointed. The thing I was most looking forward to was the return of public transportation schedules on my iPhone. But this new app simply says, "Unavailable in this region." They were there before and they are still available for my area on a desktop computer. I don't understand why they are missing.

EDIT: I take that back, as others have noticed, it's there... just unavailable from the sidebar. Not sure why.

</comment><comment><USER79> No iPad version. Seems like Google is playing it's cards.

</comment><comment><USER80> I thought this was for both iPhone and iPad but it's only for iPhones.

Not to be sour or anything but I would have been fine with a stretched version for the iPad.

</comment><comment><USER81> Already 967 reviews on US iTunes Store, 4.5 (?) average. Surprised iTunes didn't break down under the downloads. Only 6.7 MB, quite small!

</comment><comment><USER82> The good thing is that OS on my iPhone can now be upgraded to iOS6... The interesting conclusion for me as a user is that: (1) I value the additional services like Maps more than the base OS... (2) I don't care about Apple loyalty - my loyalty is towards iPhone and any app provider who continues to provide me an excellent iPhone experience

</comment><comment><USER37> Will maps put the idea of unchangeable default apps on the radar of anti- competitive practices? The people clearly want their mapping from Google, but if you dont implicitly open the google map and type an address (by way of hyperlink in another app, etc.), all mapping will be routed to apple's app.

</comment><comment><USER83> Presumably the app icon does not have you drive off an overpass onto highway 280 near Apple HQ in Cupertino.

<comment><USER50> That's a fantastic catch. I always knew something bothered me about that icon.

</comment></comment><comment><USER84> Yea, vector graphics.

That was originally the main reason Apple stated why they developed they own maps data, didn't they?

<comment><USER85> That or the thermonuclear war on Android.

</comment></comment><comment><USER86> As a timed test, I wanted to see how long it would take me to search for my favorite Phoenix, AZ coffee shop (Lux). I did the test from start up to clicking on the pin on an iPhone 4.

Google Maps: 22 seconds Apple Maps: ??? It took me to Luxembourg

I think I know which map app I'll be using from now on.

</comment><comment><USER87> It is not available on all countries. In example, Uruguay. Not available here yet.

</comment><comment><USER88> Not seeing this in the Australian App Store either. Can't wait, my girlfriend will be especially pleased she relies on having maps on her iPhone because she's a hopeless navigator and the iOS 6 maps frustrate her.

<comment><USER32> <https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/google-maps/id585027354?mt=8>

<comment><USER88> Thanks man. I just realised the app is so new Apple's app store search index probably hasn't been refreshed just yet, so went onto the HN homepage on my phone and it opened up in the store.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER89> Best review so far "I almost died in Australia, thank god this is out."

<comment><USER90> Burst out laughing at this!

</comment></comment><comment><USER91> I wonder how this thing with Apple App Store works, and why some items appear in US store only, and in other (Croatian, and i see from comments Uruguay and Turkey) hours or even days later.

</comment><comment><USER92> Now we just need a jailbreak tweak to make this the default map app.

<comment><USER93> Or you could use Android, which lets users select default apps for handling different user intents.

<comment><USER94> Whoa, whoa, whoa, let's not get too crazy here!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER95> A shame you can't delete apple maps icon from the homescreen.

<comment><USER96> Oh for fuck's sake. Tap and hold on the icon. It will wiggle. Now drag it across the screen with your finger and put it on a secondary page.

</comment></comment><comment><USER97> The first thing I did after reading the headline was go to the app store on my iphone and search for "google maps" - 328 results, and google maps isn't one of them.

<comment><USER96> It's showing up as the eighth hit for me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER98> Death rates of misguided tourists are plummeting!

But seriously, this is just great news for us folks outside the US and who use public transit. I can now get an iPhone 5 today! :D

</comment><comment><USER99> Google dominate this area, obviously.

It's great we are happy to have working maps, but let's just hope other companies can break the monopoly on our location data at some point.

</comment><comment><USER2> Thank God we're done with Siri's miserable fucking voice...

<comment><USER100> Which one ? It's different depending on the region.

<comment><USER2> Siri U.S. voice is the worst thing in the history of AI, if you can even call it that...

<comment><USER100> Then switch. 5 other English voices available.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER101> Whoohoo! I can finally dump Apple Maps in my iCrap folder.

</comment><comment><USER102> You've got to wonder how much Apple are paying Google to support maps on iOS....or what other kick-back (more valuable to Google than cash) there might be.

<comment><USER4> Why do you think they're paying them anything given how the transition from one mapping application to the other has gone?

Apple clearly wanted Google maps to be relegated to an also ran.

This works for both of them - the complaints about Apple maps are undermined by the existence of Google maps for iOS, Google get to retain their position as the best maps on any platform.

I see no evidence for an exchange of money in any direction.

<comment><USER103> But I still don't see what motivation Google had for releasing an iOS 6 app. I mean they are already the undisputed kings in maps - and had they not released an iOS6 maps app, wouldn't have more users converted to Android phones? Just trying to understand all this, I'm not a business expert. Though I agree there wouldn't be any money exchange for this between the two.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER104> I live in Atlanta and Apple maps let me down numerous occasions. I like their interface and integration but, the data quality & quantity is bad.

</comment><comment><USER105> I'm unable to download on phone and mac - anyone else?

<comment><USER106> "This item is temporarily unavailable."

"Try again later."

<comment><USER105> And now its saying "no longer available"...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER107> Rendering is slow on the iPhone 4. Interface looks nothing like an iOS app. It's like some Android alien has landed in my iPhone.

</comment><comment><USER2> Wonder if this will hit 1,000,000 download in one night...

Unavailable for me still, I see in the App Store and within iTunes but no go on the D/L.

<comment><USER108> With the way their CDN is getting hammered, it's gonna be a million downloads in the first hour.

</comment></comment><comment><USER109> I wonder if Apple is still willing to pay the 80/20 piper with iOS maps? It must be awfully expensive to keep up on data quality.

</comment><comment><USER110> A customer review: "Boring UI, slow data and seems pretty feature-free. I'll stick with Apple Maps."

This strikes me as funny and suspicious.

</comment><comment><USER111> All Google needs to do now is make a way to open the app from within Google search (the Web app), and I will be happy again.

<comment><USER112> That's not for google to decide unfortunately, not for safari anyways but with the new SDK, it might work in Chrome for iOS.

<comment><USER113> They could replace all links with a Google Maps URI.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER114> If you are having trouble installing on phone, try using iTune to search for it, then download it and sync it to the phone.

</comment><comment><USER115> I can't seem to look at an angle, except for my current location. Is this a bug?

Rest is nice, glad to have Google Maps back on my phone!!

</comment><comment><USER116> But Apple is evil, they wouldn't allow this!

<comment><USER117> Your smarminess is cute, but Apple eased up on the "duplicate functionality" stuff a long time ago. You have to look no further than the fact that Chrome exists.

<comment><USER118> Which is still just a UIWebView in the Chrome dressing because Apple won't permit Google to run their own Javascript or document rendering engines on iOS.

<comment><USER119> That's a totally separate issue, with completely valid security concerns (although sounds like an implementation issue that should be rethought).

It very much duplicates the core functionality of Safari, just as Google Voice does for the Phone and Messages apps. And GV was what both started and eventually ended that whole "duplicate functionality" debacle.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER103> It's still not completely clear if they're vector maps (I'm hearing different things). Can someone confirm?

<comment><USER120> They are vector based maps. Confirmed on their blog post about the SDK release alongside the app. [http://googlegeodevelopers.blogspot.com/2012/12/a-new-way- to...](http://googlegeodevelopers.blogspot.com/2012/12/a-new-way-to-add- google-maps-to-your.html)

also if you watch the loading closely you can tell.

</comment></comment><comment><USER121> Weird that bike directions are missing.

</comment><comment><USER122> disclaimer.. I'm a little (a lot) drunk but still... Searching for 'google maps' does not bring up this app.. I could only find it by clicking on the link... Is visibility this poor on the App Store... The name I'm searching is identical to that of the app, what's going on here..

<comment><USER123> I am seeing the same as you (ctrl+f'd for 'search').

"Google Maps" in App Store showing nothing for both iPhone and iPad. (Canada?) Had to go though this link. I understand it is new but that seems a bit underhanded...

<comment><USER100> Underhanded ?

The more likely explanation is that Apple is caching the search index. Which given the traffic volumes, number of apps and the fact they are using Lucene makes sense.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER124> I don't have iphone but my friend who does can not install it because it is not available in my country

</comment><comment><USER31> Can this be used inside other apps that rely on maps? Otherwise only half of the problem is solved.

</comment><comment><USER125> How does this compare to Google Navigation (or Navigate?) from Android? A viable replacement?

</comment><comment><USER126> Finally! I get back my street view and my public transit schedule. Welcome back!

</comment><comment><USER127> Hallelujah!

</comment><comment><USER128> Anyone know if we've got real-time transit directions yet for MUNI and BART?

</comment><comment><USER129> I supposed that backspace was implemented as ``punch all holes''.

</comment><comment><USER130> Beautiful app. They've clearly been working on this a long time.

</comment><comment><USER131> WTF: you have to sign in with your Google account to use this?

<comment><USER132> No. Press 'skip'.

</comment></comment><comment><USER133> This never would have happened if Steve Jobs was alive.

</comment><comment><USER134> A sigh of relief! Finally I can upgrade to ios6.

</comment><comment><USER135> Excellent! I am downloading the app right now

</comment><comment><USER136> They need to add one way street indicators.

</comment><comment><USER137> Not available in Turkish market, yet :-(

</comment><comment><USER138> they should have launched it just after xmas. this news will increase apple sales for xmas period!

</comment><comment><USER139> Merry Christmas to you too Google.

</comment><comment><USER117> THANK YOU JESUS/GOOGLE

Come save me from IOS 6 hell

</comment><comment><USER140> WTF is it in the US store only?

</comment><comment><USER141> It's good, it's really good!

</comment><comment><USER142> love google map. i think its beet apple map.... Great work by google.

</comment><comment><USER143> Competition === good

<comment><USER144> > ===

So it's not just equal, but actually _identical_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER145> The crime rate in Victoria is dropping by the minute.

</comment><comment><USER146> Pros: 1\. You can pinch to zoom while during turn-by-turn navigation 2\. You can select a point anywhere in the map and it instantaneously gives you the time to drive there from your current location (which is also a link to the navigation details/options. 3\. Feels like a real map compared to the barren- ass land that Apple's Map shows. 4\. Streetview (that is even smoother than the browser version)

Cons: 1\. No integration with the address book.

Pros >>>> Cons.

</comment><comment><USER147> Inevitable comeback. And a great example of why I don't develop for iOS on principle.</comment>


Is The Clock Ticking on Skype? - <AUTHOR> http://gigaom.com/2009/09/18/is-the-clock-ticking-on-skype/ <comment><USER2> Like most stories, there are two sides to the issue.

It seems like the P2P tech was a big "insider info" advantage that enabled Volpi to close the deal. The fact that he knew Skype could be implemented without the P2P backend was reassuring enough to the investors that they purchased Skype.

My understanding is that the very fact Volpi had that information is kindof sketchy, kindof "insidery." In other words, Skype might never have been sold if the buyers didn't already know they could cut out the P2P backend, but they would never have had that knowledge if Volpi hadn't worked so closely with Skype's tech.

<comment><AUTHOR> So, the real question then is why does that matter ? If they decide to cut out the P2P backend shouldn't that be their freedom to choose to do so ?

If ebay wants to unload skype I can imagine that the best candidate to unload it to would be the one that knows the most about it.

Most parties that want to buy something will want to know everything there is possibly to know about it before they buy it. Technical due-dilligence would normally look exactly at factors like this, and as far as I know it is ebay that is selling, not J&F.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Wow how ruthless. If this is true then I wonder if it will make people more weary of doing business with them. Especially, their venture fund.

<comment><AUTHOR> I agree, maybe they think that it won't make any difference to them in the future but I'm not so sure.

This does not reflect very well on them. They cleaned up pretty good when they sold their project to ebay, these lawsuits are very ugly indeed.

Kazaa was spun out in a pretty sneaky fashion as well, they jumped all over the place to stay ahead of the law, then they made skype on the back of the tech they wrote to make kazaa work. So effectively all this harks back to the kazaa days.

Ebay messed up royally when they bought it, but as far as I know it was paid several times over, no need to try to do another round of extortion.

Skype is a pretty good product on top of a nice piece of networking code but nothing that could not be done again.

By risking the future of skype (and possibly even ebay) they really show they don't care about anybody but themselves.

Not the best tag to have on you as a business person.

In Europe everybody that wants to be somebody is still fawning over them though, I wonder how long that will last.

<comment><USER4> > _Skype is a pretty good product on top of a nice piece of networking code > but nothing that could not be done again._

It's about the network effects. That makes it almost impossible to duplicate.

<comment><USER5> Unless it shuts down.</comment></comment></comment></comment>