Re: OT

J. P. Gilliver <[email protected]> wrote:
[...]
> Probably apocryphal story - someone going to an address in, I think it
> was, Alice Springs. The SatNav said turn right (or left), then didn't
> say anything for the next 500 miles or whatever. ("And then I missed the
> turn ...")

  I have similar story: Driving the A7 Gregory Developmental Road from
Charters Towers to Clermont (Australia). While a bit on the road, the
navigation app shows an upcoming round-about. Nothing special, but it
shows it's still 353km away! I was shaking in my wooden boots from all
the stress. I still have the photo of the tablet's screen [1].

> I would imagine smartphones - plus the incorporation of SatNavs into new
> cars (are they a standard thing these days? I rarely buy a car - mine's
> twenty this half) - has more or less done for standalone devices, except
> for people wanting to drive old cars in areas where there's no cellular
> coverage, which can't be a very big market, so the price of standalones
> has probably rocketed.

  My car was 22 years old, so I bought a 'new' one, which is only 17
years old! :-)

  But yes, most new cars have built-in navigation systems. An exception
was a rental car in the US. That didn't have a navigation system, but it
had a display, etc., which had Android Auto (and Apple <whatever>)
functionality, so you could use your phone's navigation app and display
it on the big screen. That's actually an advantage, because you use the
stuff you know and 'love', just with a nice big screen.

[1] Note to self: 2019, IMG_4324.JPG.