NAV

Nokia wants you to know that it's one of the biggest mapping companies you didn't know about. In fact, when you add its in-car, Web, and mobile presence together, it's pretty much king of the maps.

Nokia's mapping platform powers Yahoo services and increasingly gives Microsoft's Bing its cartographic data.

Thanks to its Navteq buy in 2007, Finland's finest claims an automotive presence in more than 80 percent of in-dash navigation modules and after-market devices.

"We're basically the world's largest mapping company," Hans Peter Brondmo, head of innovation for Nokia'… Read more

We're all aware of that corner of the market filled with products targeted at elderly users: mobile phones with limited functionality designed not to confuse, remote controls with huge buttons that are easy to read, and landline phones like the FotoDialer. Could the next product in this niche be a GPS navigation system for your grandma? A £12 million grant from the U.K. government is pushing in that direction.

Newcastle University Prof. Phil Blythe, who is heading up the team researching the project, cites waning eyesight, nervousness, and decreased confidence as issues for older drivers. The navigation … Read more

TomTom sat-navs have been struck down by a "leap year" bug that sees the road-navigating gadgets failing to find their location.

In a statement on its support site, TomTom says the problem is caused by a bug in the GPS receiver's software that has left some devices unable to obtain a GPS position since March 31.

"We are working hard on a permanent solution that we will make available on our website as a downloadable software fix," TomTom assures. The company says a "limited number of models" are suffering from the glitch, so let us know in the comments below if your TomTom is borked.

Symptoms could include a gray screen, or a notice that reads, "Waiting for a valid GPS signal..." or "Poor GPS signal..."

Read more of "TomTom sat-navs broken by 'leap year' bug" at Crave UK. … Read more

LAS VEGAS--Available as an iOS app in the iTunes App Store, accessible online at Scout.me, and coming soon to Ford Sync AppLink, TeleNav's new Scout service aims to help users discover and navigate to destinations whether on foot, at home, or in the car.

On the iPhone, Scout presents users with a dashboard that gives an overview of personalized, real-time commute times to work or home and shortcuts to local search and saved favorite locations. Digging deeper, the app also offers a search-and-discovery engine for finding, for example, a local bar or restaurant. User reviews are aggregated from … Read more

LAS VEGAS--The Parrot Asteroid Android-powered car stereo is back at CES, and this time it's brought a few new family members.

First up is the Parrot Asteroid CK. This 3.2-inch-screened device installs on the vehicle's dashboard, providing Bluetooth hands-free calling, A2DP audio streaming, voice command for dialing, and digital audio playback from a connected iPod, iPhone, USB storage device, or SD card. You can Bluetooth-tether a smartphone or connect a USB 3G dongle, and the Asteroid CK can connect to the Internet to stream music from the cloud or access geolocation services. The CK does not appear … Read more

TeleNav's latest trick combines the functionality of navigation apps with the ubiquity of browser-based maps.

Of course, getting turn-by-turn directions on your phone is nothing new--just look at the Google Maps app--but it requires launching a discrete navigation app. Likewise, browser-based maps services are nothing new either--just look at the Google Maps Web page in your phone's browser--but usually they're static, lacking motion and live updates for location and directions. TeleNav announced today that it's blending these two technologies and delivering the first browser-based map service to also give turn-by-turn GPS navigation.

The HTML5-based service comes … Read more

TeleNav's new navigation platform promises to link cars and smartphones.

Drivers frequently find themselves consulting a phone for an address, then typing it into a car's navigation system. At the Telematics Munich conference, TeleNav announced a solution to this problem, seamless interactivity between smartphones and TeleNav-equipped cars.

A use case described to CNET by Mark Scalf, director of automotive products for TeleNav, involved a user getting an appointment notification on his cell phone, and easily sending the address for the appointment to the car's navigation system. After parking, the TeleNav system transfers navigation back to the phone, … Read more

TeleNav announced this morning that its GPS Navigator app for Android phones is getting a major update soon.

Designated version 7.1, this new update starts with a new My Dashboard home screen that presents a local map, commute times and traffic, shortcuts and a search bar at the user's fingertips upon launching the app. Users may not immediately notice once their trip is under way, but behind the scenes the maps feature a revised rendering engine that TeleNav claims is both smoother and faster.

Of course, no good Android app would be complete without a widget, so TeleNav … Read more

The risk of stepping on a rusty nail and contracting tetanus is nothing like the horror of spending a full week without an iPhone.

That's the sentiment of more than 40 percent of iPhone users queried in a national TeleNav survey who say they'd prefer to go shoeless for a week than give up their beloved smartphone. To be fair, the survey respondents were not informed that there is no known app for treating tetanus.

The online survey asked 514 American owners of both smartphones and feature phones a number of probing questions about their relationship with their treasured device.

iPhone owners seemed to have the strongest connection, with 40 percent preferring to give up their toothbrush over their phone, as opposed to only 22 percent of Android owners valuing their phone more than oral hygiene.

Chronic halitosis shouldn't deter an iPhone owner in the romance department though, so long as the target of his or her affection is another iPhone fan. The survey found that 83 percent of iPhone users thought other iPhone users would make the best romantic partners.

To keep that relationship healthy, it's apparently important not to force your partner to choose between you and a phone. … Read more