Navigon Adds Google Street View To Maps App

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Street View comes back to iOS

Navigon has added Google Street View to its iOS navigation app, as well as a few other enhancements — including the dangerous sounding “cockpit” mode. This probably won’t be the last independent app to include Google’s essential service after Apple kicked it out of iOS6, but it does at least mean we can keep using it when the new iOS ships this fall.

I have installed the iOS 6 beta on my iPad a couple times, and both times I have restored within a few hours. Partly this was due to app incompatibility (I use my iPad to work on), but also because of the lack of Street View.

Apple’s new 3-D maps are great if you live in an area with coverage, but Street View will let you take a virtual tour almost anywhere. I make bike tours, and being able to see the kind of roads there are on a potential route, or to check out how dangerous a big junction really is, are pretty essential.

Navigon doesn’t seem to offer full Street View. The blurb says it includes a “Google Street View screen of the destination when indicating and when reaching the destination,” but it’s a start.

Other new features are a Cockpit Mode, which will display a HUD with “g-value, altitude, compass, roll and tilt angle” and more, guaranteed to distract even the most serious driver, improved Retina graphics for the new iPad, a better map manager and general speed improvments.

Expect to see all the map app makers up their games in the next couple months. When Apple rolls out iOS6 with built-in turn-by-turn, they’re going to have their work cut out for them.

Source: App Store

Via: TUAW

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