Category Archives: iPhone

WhateverMap on Apple Store

WhateverMap Lite v1.0, developed by Jiri Kaminek  has been today accepted for distribution through Apple Store . You can download it here (iTunes and iPhone requiered):

tms://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=326649571&mt=8&s=143441

WhateverMap is similar to Google Maps but you can use different branch-specific map sources. Those sources should be more interesting and valuable in non-navigation filed of map using. WhateverMap use Web Map Services (WMS). WMS standard specification was created by the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC). WMS may provide any geospatial data. There are many WMS severs and most of them are available for free. You can find servers with ortophoto, cadastral, soil types, migration of white storks, … simply WHATEVER.
You can add any WMS server by typing an URL address or simply use built-in catalog. There are some servers with interesting data as NASA Earth satellite photos, Mars satellite photos and many others. There is a rich list of Czech WMS servers.
You can browse a map using zoom-in, zoom-out or move. For better orientation it is possible to use actual position provided by built-in GPS module. Each WMS should map only limited area so there is a boundary of each map. It is possible to display whole map with boundary too.
It is possible to consume many sources in this application. So there is an easy way to change a source while browsing the map. You can easily compare the same area in different map sources. For example you can find out any building and then you can choose soil type map to determine stability of building’s foundation.
For better control of map there is a movement history. Sometimes GPS get lost a signal and display non-precision region. In this case it is posible to use undo and get more precision area before you get lost a signal. There is another interesting way to use the history. You can move around an area in first map layer and then use the same movements in different layers. For example you can follow a road and then you can use map layer with water or soil pollution to find out effect of road to water or soil quality.

MAP CONTROL:
・ZOOM-IN – double tap
・ZOOM-OUT – triple tap
・MOVEMENT – swipe on map

FEATURES:
– Consume any WMS server map data (ortofoto, cadastral, mars, … WHATEVER)
– Map browsing (move, zoom)
– Support history in map movements (UNDO, REDO)
– Display your current location
– Display map boundary
– Change background color
– Movement history(UNDO, REDO)
– favourite list of WMS

WHAT TO EXPECT IN THE NEXT RELEASES:
– searching by location name (city, roads, country, …) – geocoding
– caching
– saving for offline use
– better catalog
– landmarks

WHAT’S NEW IN THIS VERSION:
first release

LANGUAGES:
English

REQUIREMENTS:
Compatible with iPhone and iPod Touch
Requires iPhone OS 2.2.1 or later

What’s new

English

Screenshots

Netezza to compete with iPhone appliance

Netezza announced today availability of their revolutionary mobile device “iQuery”. “Netezza is redefining database”.

Quoted from press release: The Netezza iQuery is a fully integrated, portable, data collection device with five terabytes of queryable storage that allows users to collect and store data for ‘on the go’ analysis. Analytic functions are supplied to iQuery through downloadable applications — called “applytics” –which provide solutions to common dilemmas such as ‘should I wear a coat today’, ‘will the price of bread fall in my supermarket’ or ‘should I talk to that interesting looking person at the bar.’ When docked, iQuery connects to the Internet to search social media websites and other information providers to bring back options quickly and help decisions be reached with a minimum of debate and discussion

Definitely LOL for the 1st April , Netezza smart marketing always positively surprises me. http://www.netezza.com/data-warehouse-appliance-products/iquery.aspx

iPhone 3.0 beta -Apple still ahead of competition

Apple has announced availability of iPhone 3.0 SDK beta. With over 1000 new API and 100 improvements in iPhone it underlines Apple innovation. The innovation that doesn’t go with crowd but choose the  way appropriate for mobile devices. For example instead of background processes they are offering notification infrastructure (understand here as ‘data center’ notification infrastructure highly scalable for multimillion notification deliveries over any custom applications). In fact they are using same principles already known from mail notifications or updates at current version of iPhone. There are other new cool features – transparent (no pairing) interacting with nearby users (devices) through Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, network. In show a company funded by iFUND showed a 3D game where a player was not able to make walk through a scene – he called his friend who appeared right  in the 3D scene and helped him (played in a team with him). Apple is also opening their wired connectivity for supporting various devices  ranging from medical (imagine you view your EKG or EEG right in your phone;) to consumer media (tuning TV, audio through iPhone). Shocking was also presenting (and mostly even presence) from ORACLE – their Business Intelligence application. iPhone 3.0 SDK allows to embed Google maps into your applications with annotations, but they have not mentioned any possible add-on layers on top of the Google map. Apple strategy is clear – to have iPhone not just for consumers and fun (and phone calls) but for serious business applications too. Not just throw away superior device with superior SDK but backing this all with their data center infrastructure for AppStore, Notifications, etc. Everyone can plug into this SaaS continuum either with content, applications or interaction in social networks.

iPhone team

iphoneprogramIt is official now – we have been granted by Apple to enter iPhone Development Program for Universities. There are only two members so far, but anyone who would like to join for iPhone geospatial development  is welcome (and save time dealing with byrocrazy / restrictions of Apple while maintaining licenses and legal purity of development).  The team is located in Brno at Mendel University and virtually anywhere :). Are you interested in WMS for iPhone ? for supporting rich professional  map displays on iPhone ? What if  iPhne would serve as very good marketing  channel (while users are using some map application ?) So far plans are very simple – enable iPhone to consume maps stored in MapShake. The crazy idea is to enable OLON consumtion directly in iPhone. (since MapShake now stores OLON definitions) . mapiphoneConsider your role in this team and project and join today ! Any support is welcome.

preview of current work  is available here: http://mapserver.mendelu.cz/iphonelayers

Another good news is that this project has received start-up grant by Internal Mendel University Grant (IGA). The project has been evaluated as 16th out of 22 accepted projects for 2009.  Full version of the project proposal is available (in Czech Language) on request.

iPhoneLayers – IPhone application for displaying WMS layers

orfotofokatastrMy student Jiri Kaminek, who is in first year of postgraduate study at department of Applied Geoinformatics at Mendel University has created in very short time an impressive  prototype for accessing WMS layers within iPhone using native iPhone SDK. It looks very promissing, with natural iPhone gestures, ability to access iPhone resources (tile cache, GPS position, history, etc..) . You can see his presentation on http://mapserver.mendelu.cz/iphonelayers together with sample screencasts. Codename of the project is iPhoneLayers. The big picture is that MapShake will store all map compositions and you will have various frontedns how to consume or shake your maps, iPhone will be one possible outlet where based on your current GPS position you will get your pre-shaked maps from MapShake store.

Update November 2009: Application is called Whatevermap and can be downloaded from AppStore. please check following category on this blog:

http://blog.sumbera.com/tag/whatevermap/