Reviews
OSTIA
GPS Navigation and Routing Software for the Pocket PC
Get lost no more
GPS is quickly
becoming an indispensable part of modern life. It's everywhere:
Fancy onboard GPS systems are no longer exclusive to luxury cars;
you can get one as an option in many reasonably priced automobiles.
Handheld GPS receivers are being used for anything from fishing
to geocaching to orienteering and more. Prices have come way down
and GPS receivers have become viable add-ons even for PDAs. As
a result, mapping software that was once the province of notebook
PCs is increasingly becoming available for handheld computers
as well. To see how well mapping works on handheld computers we
took a look at one of the more popular applications.
Pharos
Science & Applications, Inc.'s OSTIA software for the Pocket PC
platform is a full-featured GPS/mapping application with full
street level map coverage of the US (Canada is available as well).
The software comes on four CDs, one for installation, and one
each for US Northeast, Southeast and West maps. After installation
to a PC, the software will be loaded onto your Pocket PC at the
next ActiveSync session.
OSTIA maps
are generally between five and 15MB in size. Each state is subdivided
into between as few as three (Nevada) and as many as 20 and more
maps (California and Texas). To select maps for downloading you
either click on them, or you can select whatever maps are within
a certain radius from a city or zip code. Maps can be downloaded
via ActiveSync or they can be saved onto a memory card. The Pocket
PC software can have as many as ten maps open at a time, though
for best performance it shouldn't be more than three. Locations
can be by address, intersection, or they can be points of interest.
The software interacts with Microsoft Pocket Outlook and locations
can be saved as Pocket Outlook contacts. We consider that a very
important feature. When used with a GPS receiver, you can select
either the fasted or the shortest route, or one that avoids freeways.
Like all mapping
and routing software, OSTIA heavily relies on points of origin
and destinations. Although there are several ways of finding/creating
them, initially it can be a bit frustrating to create origins
and destinations. After a while you get the hang of it, especially
since already used points are available again via Recent Destinations,
and they can be saved in a user-defined Favorites database. OSTIA
helps with a neat feature where you enter the street number first,
then the street name. As you enter each letter, the software narrows
down the list. Soon you'll be able to select the location by just
clicking on it. OSTIA then asks if you want to save it as a Favorite
or Contact. Unfortunately, this doesn't always work. While OSTIA
acknowledged the street name of our editorial offices, it insisted
that our street number did not exist. Once you have an origin
and a destination you can compute a route. You can set the display
to show just directions, half directions and half map, or mostly
maps. Tapping the compass toggles between north up and north actual.
There are zoom-in and zoom-out buttons or you can drag open a
rectangle and zoom in that way. A voice gives directions. If you
want to enter stops along a route, you can do that.
One problem
is that you can't enter addresses that are not on loaded maps,
or even addresses that the software's database thinks do not exist.
You can get around that, but it is one of the inherent limitations
of small-platform software.
Once you're
underway, OSTIA proves an able helper. It shows close-ups when
you're approaching a point where you have to make a turn, but
switches to larger scale maps when you're just cruising along.
A beep alerts you to upcoming turns, in addition to the voice
that announces what you need to do. The voice commands are basic,
ãLeft turn ahead,ä ãright turn ahead,ä etc. The system does not
tell you how far ahead, or names the street you have to turn onto.
The routes picked were usually very reasonable, pretty much what
I would have picked myself. Other software we've tested had often
selected odd routes and turns. The triangle that indicates your
position moves jerkily at times. It also tends to get off-track
when you make a sharp turn. Sometimes an exit comes up and the
software simply reacts too late. If you decide to go a different
route than the one plotted for you by OSTIA, the system will politely
wait a bit and then chide, ãYou are off-route.ä It will do that
several times, but quietly recalculates the route so that you
get there from where you are. It will not demand you make a U-turn
to trace back your steps as is the case with some other mapping
software. Once OSTIA thinks you have arrived, it simply says ãArrived
at destinationä and offers to either reverse the route or clear
it.
One of the
weak points of mapping software is that it only offers static
information. It doesn't know about traffic conditions, accidents,
and so on. Pharos addresses this by offering additional subscription-based
services to OSTIA users. The ãSmart Trafficä service provides
real-time traffic information. You can see how quickly traffic
flows via color-coded highway sensor data. Real-time speed and
incident data is available for about 30 metropolitan areas, and
incident-only data for another 30. In order to take maximum advantage,
the data needs to be updated every few minutes, which requires
an internet connection. A Pocket PC Phone Edition device would
do nicely, or an 
internet
connection via a Bluetooth phone. The service costs US$5 per month
or US$44 per year. Pharos also offers Smart Finder which lets
you look up locations, addresses and phone numbers. This sort
of information is, of course, generally available on PC-based
mapping systems. However, it takes massive amounts of storage
and that's where the Smart Finder comes in. The information is
not only always up-to-date, you can also get it on the fly without
taking along disks for additional downloads to the Pocket PC.
Pricing is the same as for ãSmart Traffic.ä You can subscribe
to both for US$7 per month or US$66 per year. Depending on your
needs and internet connectivity options, this may be a real bargain,
as is the OSTIA software itself.
÷Kirk Linsky
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