Ten Essential... iOS Travel Apps Well, the footy’s over and Wimbledon was the usual damp squib for the Brits, but at least the holiday season is here at last, so we can head for sunnier climes and drown our sorrows in cheap Sangria for a few days. Of course, the well-armed Reg Hardware reader wouldn’t set foot outside the front door without a good selection …
Can't believe you didn't mention TripIt. Not the sort of app I would normally use, but I gave it a go about a year ago (I do a lot of business travel overseas), and now I can't get enough of it.
The contents of my iOS Travel Folder:
TripIt
Currency
CityMaps2Go
thetrainline
Translator
GeoLogTag
(and a few others that aren't as generically useful)
Pleco is one essential for me, although it's obviously only useful in Chinese-speaking countries.
It's free (with extra dictionaries and bits that can be paid for), and allows translation to and from Chinese (Traditional and Simplified).
You can enter Chinese characters by building them up from components, or drawing them on the screen (although they have to be drawn in the right stroke sequence, which means you need some knowledge of the script).
It's not really perfect for quick translations when you need to buy a cup of coffee - but it's excellent for helping while you are learning the language or curious about the meaning of a sign.
The only other essential travel app I'd mention is a currency convertor - but there's plenty around, so I don't know particularly which one to recommend.
..is Sygic mobile maps.
Its half the price, yet apparently uses the same mapping companies maps, TeleAtlas or something.
Sure the navigation isn't as good as TomTom, but satnav should never be relied on 100% anyway, you should always treat it as one interpretation of a journey and fill in the gaps yourself as you come across a particular issue, such as roadworks, car crashes, blocked lanes, etc.
Sygic has all the main features of TomTom without all the gumph nobody actually uses and finds themselves paying extra subscription fees for!
Are you sure it doesn't require data roaming? Last time I took my iPhone to Europe, I tried it, and TomTom insisted I switch on data roaming. I don't know why - as you say, the maps are internal. But it still insisted on my switching data roaming on, which I didn't want to have to do.
It still gets a GPS fix quickly with roaming turned off. I presume it only needs to _receive_
signals from basestations to assist the GPS. I've just done a couple of thousand miles in France and Spain, with roaming turned off, and it never failed to get a quick fix. Mind you, when you're on a motorbike with your gloves on, it's bloody annoying that a minute or so after setting off the iPhone plasters a "Could not activate cellular data network" box over the map, forcing you to stop, take a glove off and touch the screen. So how can I alter the tip of a glove to make the capacitative screen
detect it? Would a bare braided wire sewn over the tip and led up to my wrist do the trick? (Ok,
I'd better try it and report back.)
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