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Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

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Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#41

Post by QSIITurbo »

mmastrac wrote: post #11
Animats wrote: post #9

I saw Etak back in its early days, and Stan Honey gave me a demo. I still have one of their rate gyro/2D level units, and a compass unit. There's a motor driving a spinning disk, which warps slightly when the unit is turned, and sensors to detect the warp. The level, for sensing which way is down, is a sealed cup of liquid with the liquid height sensed with four capacitor plates outside the cup. The liquid was propri…

> about 20% of the population could not cope with a map that wasn't aligned with the direction they were going That's me. I have a tough time orienting maps in my head. I still use a mnemonic for compass directions and (occasionally) use my left hand as an L to make sure I'm not screwing it up. I don't know if there is any research into what the structural differences of brains that suffer from this might be, let alo…

As for orienting the map, it's common practice in sports and army at least. You're _supposed_ to orient the map according to your surroundings and the direction you are facing. It's faster and less prone to errors.

Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#42

Post by Arizhel »

learn_more wrote: post #18
mmastrac wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> about 20% of the population could not cope with a map that wasn't aligned with the direction they were going That's me. I have a tough time orienting maps in my head. I still use a mnemonic for compass directions and (occasionally) use my left hand as an L to make sure I'm not screwing it up. I don't know if there is any research into what the structural differences of brains that suffer from this might be, let alo…

If you train yourself to use a static orientation however, you develop a much better "big picture" awareness of the city you drive in, eventually freeing yourself from requiring navigational assistance. The additional cognitive load is worth it for me.

I can't imagine why you wouldn't want navigational assistance. The only time I drive without my GPS is if I'm going somewhere I go frequently, along a route I normally travel, and it's a short distance. Any place new, and I'm using GPS, and even if I'm going someplace familiar, and I'm familiar with the route, if it's a good distance away I use the GPS anyway to make sure I don't miss a turn and also, very importantly, to reroute me according to traffic conditions. I don't care how good you think your knowledge of the roads in a city are: there is no possible way that you can know that there's a traffic jam or accident along your normal route (unless you're like Paul Atreides). A traffic-aware GPS system will alert you to these things and reroute you if possible.

The thing that's valuable about having that "big picture" awareness of your city is in being able to second-guess the GPS when it gives you bad information, which is rare but it does happen because they're not perfect, or to know that the route it's chosen will only save you 10 seconds but will take you through a residential area with speedbumps instead of a larger road meant for through traffic.

Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#44

Post by LordKano »

nix0n wrote: post #36
LordKano wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have had my Android phone continues to plot my travel through a tunnel when it couldn't receive GPS signal. It's usually off by a small margin when I reach the end of the tunnel but everything syncs once the signal is acquired again.

Is your car connected to your Android in some way?

Just providing power.

Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#45

Post by sedachv »

Arizhel wrote: post #42
learn_more wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you train yourself to use a static orientation however, you develop a much better "big picture" awareness of the city you drive in, eventually freeing yourself from requiring navigational assistance. The additional cognitive load is worth it for me.

I can't imagine why you wouldn't want navigational assistance. The only time I drive without my GPS is if I'm going somewhere I go frequently, along a route I normally travel, and it's a short distance. Any place new, and I'm using GPS, and even if I'm going someplace familiar, and I'm familiar with the route, if it's a good distance away I use the GPS anyway to make sure I don't miss a turn and also, very importantl…

> I can't imagine why you wouldn't want navigational assistance.

Here is why I look up directions in advance in almost all situations:

* GPS is a distraction to maintaining awareness while driving, motorcycling, and bicycling.

* Navigational assistance does not help you when walking, taking public transit or taxis. Using GPS while driving prevents you from learning the layout of the place you are in which transfers to navigational competence for these other modes of transportation.

* You miss fun roads when following GPS navigation.

* GPS navigation is useless when planning long bicycle and motorcycle tours. I pick waypoints and routes between them in advance.

* GPS will route you into sketchy situations (like to phantom bridges) that you could have predicted by looking at a map.

* GPS does not take weather conditions into account when routing. People have gotten into floods (easy to see when looking at rivers and topo on a map in advance), stuck in snow, and have even died in the desert: http://www.sacbee.com/entertainment/living/travel/article257...

I do not know very many competent drivers who rely on GPS navigation. I see plenty of "GPS zombies" obliviously plowing through intersections and ignoring crosswalks every day.

The most use I get out of having a GPS dash unit is on trails and off-roading in my truck or motorcycle, where there is usually no signage for forest roads and trails.

Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#46

Post by learn_more »

ChristianBundy wrote: post #38
learn_more wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you train yourself to use a static orientation however, you develop a much better "big picture" awareness of the city you drive in, eventually freeing yourself from requiring navigational assistance. The additional cognitive load is worth it for me.

Could it be possible that this may be easier for you than it is for the person you're replying to? Here's my understanding of the conversation that just happened: A: I have trouble doing Z. B: Many people have trouble doing Z! Interestingly enough, many X and Y also have trouble doing Z. C: I'm able to do Z, and I can tell you that the benefits are worth the cost.

I'm simply pointing out there is an often overlooked benefit to using navigation with a static map orientation. For folks who are "bad at directions" this may help them fix that deficit.

Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#47

Post by Arizhel »

Lx1oG-AWb6h_ZG0 wrote: post #24
teddyh wrote: post #2

Interesting to read about alternative, non-centralized, forms of navigation. I wish modern cars which already have all the necessary sensors would use this method as a fallback, since GPS reception is not always available.

Every single mapping app has to implement some kind of mapmatching, since you can't rely on the GPS sensors to always be accurate: the GPS position is frequently wrong when you're moving between cell towers , and can be lost for several seconds in cities. Nokia/HERE's implementation (which I was told was very similar to tomtom/garmin's implementation) was written more than a decade ago, and IIRC, every time it encoun…

>which btw is hideously incomprehensible -- I'm talking old c++ with almost no comments

What does "old" have to do with it? Modern code is all like that too. Every time I complain about it, including just a day or two right here on HN, I get a bunch of responses saying "I don't need comments, my code is self-documenting". In my experience, most programmers do not use comments much at all, and it's entirely incomprehensible to anyone new to the project.

Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#48

Post by learn_more »

sedachv wrote: post #45
Arizhel wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't imagine why you wouldn't want navigational assistance. The only time I drive without my GPS is if I'm going somewhere I go frequently, along a route I normally travel, and it's a short distance. Any place new, and I'm using GPS, and even if I'm going someplace familiar, and I'm familiar with the route, if it's a good distance away I use the GPS anyway to make sure I don't miss a turn and also, very importantl…

> I can't imagine why you wouldn't want navigational assistance. Here is why I look up directions in advance in almost all situations: * GPS is a distraction to maintaining awareness while driving, motorcycling, and bicycling. * Navigational assistance does not help you when walking, taking public transit or taxis. Using GPS while driving prevents you from learning the layout of the place you are in which transfers t…

Well said. To clarify my point, GPS maps can actually be a learning tool instead of a crutch. But it seems to require static map orientation. When the map is always oriented north, it teaches you about the city as you see your location move within it. When it's constantly shifting the map orientation around, it seems it's too confusing to extract "big picture" knowledge. I don't think most people realize this, since mapping systems often default to the "driver-centric" viewpoint, and if they don't, it's the first thing people change.

Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#49

Post by sedachv »

learn_more wrote: post #48
sedachv wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can't imagine why you wouldn't want navigational assistance. Here is why I look up directions in advance in almost all situations: * GPS is a distraction to maintaining awareness while driving, motorcycling, and bicycling. * Navigational assistance does not help you when walking, taking public transit or taxis. Using GPS while driving prevents you from learning the layout of the place you are in which transfers t…

Well said. To clarify my point, GPS maps can actually be a learning tool instead of a crutch. But it seems to require static map orientation. When the map is always oriented north, it teaches you about the city as you see your location move within it. When it's constantly shifting the map orientation around, it seems it's too confusing to extract "big picture" knowledge. I don't think most people realize this, since…

Good point. I always have to set whatever GPS I am trying to use to fixed scale (no auto-zoom) map view with "north is up" before things feel right.

Re: Who Needs GPS? The Story of Etak's 1985 Car Navigation System

#50

Post by twic »

> That "heading-up" technique reminded Honey of ancient Polynesian navigation concepts that he had read about during his studies of navigation in previous years. The ancient mariners of that region navigated the seas by relying on a series of environmental cues, such as the positions of islands around them, combined with a mental perception of themselves in the center of the conceptual navigational space in their heads. With that in mind, Honey decided to call his new company Etak, which is a Polynesian term for moving navigational reference points.

Ah yes, the Polynesian stick charts:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11522372

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