Cellular data restrictions, and the issues with using Waze.
Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2013 10:22 am
Hey.
Waze is great. I loved using it;
for nearly one year, every drive, it became routine.
The thing that drew me into Waze was the fact that I could contribute to my ultimate goal of mapping out the whole of my state; (Western Australia, about 2,530,000 km2) And it was big; but there was one problem.
I felt useless; I wasn't achieving anything.
I would painstakingly add landmarks, and roads, and ensure every little detail was correct (But wasn't rewarded with points appropriatley, as people who would simply draw big lines of roads, out of alignment from the true location of a road, and add few details (Quite commonly with incorrect naming schemes) would get more.
Now I don't want to sound like a spoilt child, but that just isn't fair.
But that's fine, points are not that important; my goal is to map my state. The only problem is there is 163,000 km of road in W.A.. Only around 19% has cellular coverage. (With Telstra, other networks use the systems Telstra has established, and pay fees for using cellular towers, as a result most other providers have substantially lower coverage)
Not to worry, Waze works offline; I can still get points when I drive down these roads, and map them out with that pave tool; as if, Waze doesn't do much offline. (Not to mention navigation, if roads exist outside cellular areas, and you navigate there using Waze, it becomes very buggy)
Okay, so they don't have a cache system that works offline, it would be great if even a basic system existed, but that's fine, because there is still another way to map out roads outside cellular covered areas. (Even if these roads can't be used due to many issues that arise when using roads outside cellular covered areas.) I can use their Bing maps overlay, and make some roads when I get to a computer. Awesome!
Again, as f***ing if. Bing maps has an astoundingly poor quality outside major metopolitain areas, and that is usually out of date by 5 years or more (After it's first and only fly-over, done by some Wright brothers aircraft back in the Jurassic era) (Even in metro areas aerial images are out of date by many years). Okay so I can't map any area that 1) Has no cellular coverage 2) Is not in a major metropolitain area. That's fine, I can still map some of my state.
Okay, So I'm just going to draw this triangle shaped park here, put the name in, great! I'll just put this curved road in next to it. (Several weeks later) Looking at Waze on my phone, at a square shaped park, and the bottom left part of an octagon for my road. Okay so Waze is so bad at rendering anything other than a straight line, because it uses too much data, because the method of creating the various polygons they use is not efficient, and the alternate ways would take too much effort to implement. That's fine I can still draw out grid shaped road networks, and only add rectangle like landmarks.
No, f*** you aaronsta, Mr. Coolcat88 (Not a user) wants to change some segments of Banana Lane and the various turn restrictions and effort you put into it to Mango street, a one way road that now is positioned on the top of people's houses.
Waze to me is just comprised of many people; these people have failed to, like 98% of the rest of the population of the world, pick up many little nuances (I can list many more, I personally have found) that together have now contributed to a great problem that is not getting fixed.
Listen now, fix problems, make Waze better, good.
Waze is great. I loved using it;
for nearly one year, every drive, it became routine.
The thing that drew me into Waze was the fact that I could contribute to my ultimate goal of mapping out the whole of my state; (Western Australia, about 2,530,000 km2) And it was big; but there was one problem.
I felt useless; I wasn't achieving anything.
I would painstakingly add landmarks, and roads, and ensure every little detail was correct (But wasn't rewarded with points appropriatley, as people who would simply draw big lines of roads, out of alignment from the true location of a road, and add few details (Quite commonly with incorrect naming schemes) would get more.
Now I don't want to sound like a spoilt child, but that just isn't fair.
But that's fine, points are not that important; my goal is to map my state. The only problem is there is 163,000 km of road in W.A.. Only around 19% has cellular coverage. (With Telstra, other networks use the systems Telstra has established, and pay fees for using cellular towers, as a result most other providers have substantially lower coverage)
Not to worry, Waze works offline; I can still get points when I drive down these roads, and map them out with that pave tool; as if, Waze doesn't do much offline. (Not to mention navigation, if roads exist outside cellular areas, and you navigate there using Waze, it becomes very buggy)
Okay, so they don't have a cache system that works offline, it would be great if even a basic system existed, but that's fine, because there is still another way to map out roads outside cellular covered areas. (Even if these roads can't be used due to many issues that arise when using roads outside cellular covered areas.) I can use their Bing maps overlay, and make some roads when I get to a computer. Awesome!
Again, as f***ing if. Bing maps has an astoundingly poor quality outside major metopolitain areas, and that is usually out of date by 5 years or more (After it's first and only fly-over, done by some Wright brothers aircraft back in the Jurassic era) (Even in metro areas aerial images are out of date by many years). Okay so I can't map any area that 1) Has no cellular coverage 2) Is not in a major metropolitain area. That's fine, I can still map some of my state.
Okay, So I'm just going to draw this triangle shaped park here, put the name in, great! I'll just put this curved road in next to it. (Several weeks later) Looking at Waze on my phone, at a square shaped park, and the bottom left part of an octagon for my road. Okay so Waze is so bad at rendering anything other than a straight line, because it uses too much data, because the method of creating the various polygons they use is not efficient, and the alternate ways would take too much effort to implement. That's fine I can still draw out grid shaped road networks, and only add rectangle like landmarks.
No, f*** you aaronsta, Mr. Coolcat88 (Not a user) wants to change some segments of Banana Lane and the various turn restrictions and effort you put into it to Mango street, a one way road that now is positioned on the top of people's houses.
Waze to me is just comprised of many people; these people have failed to, like 98% of the rest of the population of the world, pick up many little nuances (I can list many more, I personally have found) that together have now contributed to a great problem that is not getting fixed.
Listen now, fix problems, make Waze better, good.