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Reliable Directions and Data Sources

posted by Satri on Monday January 23, @11:19AM        Permalink  Trackback URI  Slashdotthis  Diggthis  Del.icio.us
from the digital-and-reality-reliability dept.

dct writes "NPR runs this story on inaccuracies (though they are apparently few) of major web mapping sites when giving direction because they depend on a single data provider. From the article: "A test of two other main map services besides MapQuest, Yahoo and Google, shows that all of them try to send drivers up the stairs. Since they all rely on the same road database company, NAVTEQ, for their road databases, the problem is duplicated on all the map sites.""

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• but not all the same

  (Score:2, Interesting)

  by briancnorton (255) on Tuesday January 24, @10:29AM (#393)

  Some of the direction engines use different network analysis engines to establish routes. Shortest is shortest, but what is generally given is the fastest route, a much harder problem. Navteq makes some pretty danged good data, so the real problem is traffic avoidance.