New Android Beta Version - 1.8.99.106

[muchski]

Great news! Can't wait for Version 2.0! The name alone sounds like it will be something monumental! Hopefully Beta is out before month's end!

[ozhound]

I don't have that problem with any other company.

I'm down to one star on the market for waze. The next step will be hitting the deinstall button 'any day now'.

You don't pay for it, you can always go and pay a subscription or once on $100 for a Nav software that you have not input of control over.

or you can wait for the dev's to sort the problems out.

[StefanSarzio]

I have no control over Waze, too.

So I decided to opt for the $0 Google Navigation which does not only the navigation part much better, but also the traffic information better than Waze does - plus Trapster, which does the speed trap part much better than Waze does...that's additional $0.

Plus I'm getting rid of the app with the worst support on Android that I've had.

Bye Waze, it has been a nice idea.

[DAmaNIac]

Sad to see users quitting this app, however it's quite understandable. I haven't touched Cartouche for a few weeks because it became annoyingly unusable and there surely was no way of communicating the issues from Waze.
As for the Android app, it just seems like the dirty little stepchild of the iPhone app... No beta version coming soon, no real issues fixed like the always annoying phone freeze. Who cares about e.g. FB integration if the application freezes
a) just from running
b) when connected to the power plug in the car
c) when put into the car mount
d) just by starting it
Especially with the free Android environment where you can install freely without the market and have total access to the data on the sd card, I'm sure a lot of users are willing to try a new beta or alpha to help improve the software. So far I only remember one beta version and one survey. That was a good sign but nothing came after this...

I don't mind when an alpha version crashes, but come one, it's version 1.9 from the market and even this has issues. Have you ever tried to user your finger and scroll the map? No? Better not do so as the app will freeze the phone. If you use the few seconds you have to kill the app with a task manager you will still have to reboot your phone, as at least on my MS the sd card became unreadable (and yes, I've tried a few)

Why not offer nightly builds, at least then you get some log files with progress and not the same errors over and over again.

If you want this to be a community based service, just let the community help you.

[myld]

I don't recognize that description at all. I've used waze quite intensively for about a month, mostly just in "viewing mode" while driving, but also for bulldozing new roads and for navigation to an address. So far I've only had one single crash.

I'm using HTC Desire with Android 2.2 now (2.1 the first weeks). Waze has been version 1.9.0.0 all the time (downloaded from the Market).

My biggest issue is the slow update of drives from the phone to cartouche, and from cartouche edits to live map and to phone (but that's off topic - sorry).

[DAmaNIac]

I have two phones, one is the Samsung Galaxy with Android 1.6 and the second is the Motorola Milestone with Android 2.1 (v.36). Both show an very unstable behaviour, so I won't blame it on the phone(s) itself.
I've been using Waze for several month now and I was hoping to get a working version until Friday because I have another trip to an region which is not good covered yet. Unfortunately I already consider this a lost opportunity because I know that the app will crash and I will loose a lot of data and edit rights along the road because it's quite difficult to remove the battery while driving, reboot the phone and start the software...

But as they said today in their blog... they are big Apple lovers, so what do you expect

[grebble]

Yes it is a shame to see people quitting. It depends how much patience users have with the project. I for one love the concept, and that is the only reason why I'm sticking with it. We're indeed not paying for it, and it is still early days so issues will occur. However, that said, I have stopped using Waze on my phone until the new beta arrives, because of the stability issues. I won't go into how and why it crashes on my HTC Desire because I've said it before, and the devs say they are working on fixing the problem. It does, however, seem to be far worse when auto brightness is switched on, but one thing with Froyo is that it doesn't seem to freeze the phone any more, it just reboots it instead

Going by what has been said on the blog, the number of Waze users has absolutely skyrocketed recently, which is why the drives are taking so long to show up, and the guys need time to get the infrastructure sorted out to cope with it. I'm prepared to give them that time.

But Waze guys, please, ease off on the love for the sodding iPhone! You may argue that 'most' of your users are on iPhone, but even if, for example, 40% of your user base uses it (which I find hard to believe), that's still 60% - the majority - that don't. Issuing updates for the iPhone long before anything else, and really making a big deal of it, serves only to annoy the users of other platforms that don't have - and probably don't want - the overpriced, overhyped POS. Spotify (European music streaming service) have the same kind of philosophy, and really get flamed on their blog comments for it. It would be far better to have simultaneous releases for all platforms, and if that's not possible, at least have a beta available (even better, nightly builds as damaniac suggests), that we can try out and give useful feedback on.

I'm hoping for the new Android beta to be available for Thursday as I have a 250-mile round trip to make. Unfortunately, I'm not holding out much hope.

[tskramp]

But Waze guys, please, ease off on the love for the sodding iPhone! You may argue that 'most' of your users are on iPhone, but even if, for example, 40% of your user base uses it (which I find hard to believe), that's still 60% - the majority - that don't. Issuing updates for the iPhone long before anything else, and really making a big deal of it, serves only to annoy the users of other platforms that don't have - and probably don't want - the overpriced, overhyped POS. Spotify (European music streaming service) have the same kind of philosophy, and really get flamed on their blog comments for it. It would be far better to have simultaneous releases for all platforms, and if that's not possible, at least have a beta available (even better, nightly builds as damaniac suggests), that we can try out and give useful feedback on.

Even if they're largest base is iPhone, I would imagine that the number of users on Android is catching up. There are several articles about how much/fast Android is growing, it's only a matter of time before the Android user base surpasses the iPhone user base...
http://androidcommunity.com/200k-android-phones-sold-every-day-20100805/
http://androidcommunity.com/npd-android-passes-blackberry-in-second-quarter-20100804/
http://techland.com/2010/07/08/androids-market-share-continues-to-climb-while-everyone-else-slips/

[unwallflower]

It IS a shame that waze has been losing quite a few followers lately.

I feel like I'm the only android user who ISN'T encountering stability issues. Waze has maybe crashed on my phone twice, if that. However, I have a friend who stopped using waze because it was unusably unstable on his android phone. Wonder why we aren't experiencing the same problems? Both of us have 1.9 installed.

I'm mostly satisfied with waze, although I am disappointed in its unreliability in other areas. I'm still missing a route that support said was lost, then claimed was found... but it never showed up. *shrug* It is what it is. I no longer spend the same amount of time editing maps as I used to. It just doesn't seem worth my time when everything is so unreliable. I just hope it becomes more stable eventually.

[Ayindi]

Hi,

for the guys who want to leave Waze: My suggestion is, to run it in background and use Google Nav instead. Thats the way I do it currently. Have not had a single crash running it in background, but a lot when I ran it in foreground.
You will at least gather data and can choose to take over a more active role once everything runs better...
I do not expect that Waze will be usable for the "big public" in Germany for the next one or two years, but at least I gather data and do updates in the editor from time to time. Navigation is still almost completely unusable here...