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This is an Android application I have made for my company. It is a Messaging replacement with a twist: You can include your location in the message, while stil

This is an Android application I have made for my company. It is a Messaging replacement with a twist: You can include your location in the message, while still using standard SMS or MMS without any special requirements on the receiving end. To make a location human-readable, the app uses a global landmark database that we have developed and are constantly updating. Our database was originally developed for communicating tracking device location over SMS, and we are now looking for other ways to utilize it. I am somewhat ashamed of the current state of the application, so this should fit the "release early" philosophy. We have tons of further development ideas ourselves, but would love to get some feedback from real users to figure out what to do next. Any comments are highly appreciated (on the app, the Market copy, the look&feel etc.).

roel_v 15y ago
Do you have to enter your location manually on each text? If not, how does it know where you are? If yes, how is this better than just typing it in yourself? I think answering this point on the website is crucial.
- asmosoinio 15y ago
  I guess the answer is two folded: 1. To get your location (as in coordinates), it uses the default Android APIs that utilize GPS, cellid and WLAN. 2. To make these two numbers human-readable and instantly understandable, it uses our landmark database to look up the nearest landmark. So that's how we go from 37.422,-122.084 to at Googleplex Headquarters, Mountain View, Sta. Clara, US You can naturally select another landmark manually if you want to, or edit the landmark text. Do you think the text we have on Android Market fails to explain this "magic"? What would you add there? (update: formatting, added question)
  - roel_v 15y ago
    I guess the part about your phone already being able to determine where you are. It's quite common to have GPS turned off to save battery afaik, and I'm not sure how Android would get my coordinates from the other two, unless they maintain a database of all wlan networks in the world. I'd add an explicit 'no need to enter your location, that's what our application does' text.
    - asmosoinio 15y ago
      Have you used an iPhone / Android device? Because Google and Apple have pretty much nailed this. That is exactly what they have: a database with ENOUGH of the GSM (CMDS) basestatio cellids and WLAN identifiers, linked to real coordinates, so that most of the time things "just work". So all the phone needs is to use some mobile data to get this database, at least once before it caches the local id => coordinates information. After this, a rough location is available even without GPS. How can they do this? Because everytime someone somewhere uses Google Maps with GPS, they are also submitting data to Google's cellid and WLAN databases. So it works really well in countries and areas with lots of smartphone users, and less so when you go to the outskirts of the Philippines. Also: Landmarks work pretty well even with the non exact cellid location, you definitely don't need to have GPS enabled to use the app. This is basic platform functionality, which is why we didn't emphasize it in the text: However maybe we should add some information about this as well.
      - roel_v 15y ago
        Yes, I've had and actively used an Android for about a year and half now. I use it quite extensively, have bought a number of applications and I guess I'm basically the audience you're targeting - people who actively go out to find, and potentially buy, applications (this group is imo a relatively small subset of all Android users, I know many more Android users who have never used the Market than those who have). Anyway just to make it clear that it is, imo, not to be considered 'well known' information amongst the general Android-using population. Heck, I've even written toy Android applications, and I still didn't know.
        asmosoinio 15y ago
        Thanks for the insight! I guess I've been to involved in location stuff for a while. You'll get a feel of the location system with Google Maps quite easily: You get a big light blue circle around "own location" when location comes from mobile network cellid, and a smaller one when it uses WLAN-based location. That signifies the accuracy. And it does indeed find this location even when GPS is off. And this works even when "Mobile network"-setting is off, i.e. the phone is not sending or receiving any data, if you are still connected to a previously known mobile cell. Anecdotally: I moved a few months ago, and didn't change my WLAN network id. At my new place, when GPS was not available, Google Maps was showing my location to my old place. This continued until I renamed the WLAN and used Google Maps with GPS near my new place. This shows the weakness of crowdsourced location data, but such incidents are rare enough that it basically "just works".
auganov 15y ago
On your website you say "Our landmark database is the most accurate in terms of quality, coverage and updates ". That's a pretty big claim. What's so special about it? Where does the data come from? As for the app, I don't know, maybe I'm missing something but doesn't sounds too exciting. In all cases when I would like to put a "landmark" in my message I would do it myself.
- asmosoinio 15y ago
  We select each landmark "by hand", and can spend time on the quality of the data while still keeping the data gathering/updating process effective. Quite different compared to how traditional landmark databases, with focus on quantity, are built. Another one of our strong points is data in areas where there are no digital maps available (but still lots of people with cellphones) -- landmark data is so much easier to gather than traditional map data. Sources of the data depend on the country: 1. For example in the US or Europe, we can work mainly by combining information from a number of online sources with only some checkups from people actually "on the scene". 2. For a lot of developing countries (Nigeria is one of our strong areas for differentiation from other datasources), we will have some local guy physically go around the city and gather the raw data that we then process for accuracy and quality. I'll dig up some examples where the usual digital maps fail and we succeed. I am the head tech guy of the company, and am not so accustomed to preaching about the power of landmarks. So thanks for the opportunity to work on my arguments! Re the app: Try it! It's much faster with the built-in landmarks compared to writing it yourself, and will change your texting behavior. Once you get used to it, texting without a location feels just so... last season. :)
  - auganov 15y ago
    95% of the time if I put a location in my message it's most likely a location that I and the receiver are familiar with, so such a standardized name is not too desirable. But of course it's just me. I can definitely see, a lot of couples using that all the time (beware cheating girlfriends!). Does it work backwards? So that if somebody uses it too and sends me a message using that can I look up the place on the map? That would be a big plus. But yea, now that I thought of it. In very big cities where people move around a lot in a fairly constrained area that is very nice. If you can add more features and market that better I can see some people using it. Not quiet revolutionary, but nice. Of course provided that this landmark database is really really, really good.

roel_v 15y ago

Do you have to enter your location manually on each text? If not, how does it know where you are? If yes, how is this better than just typing it in yourself? I think answering this point on the website is crucial.

asmosoinio 15y ago
I guess the answer is two folded: 1. To get your location (as in coordinates), it uses the default Android APIs that utilize GPS, cellid and WLAN. 2. To make these two numbers human-readable and instantly understandable, it uses our landmark database to look up the nearest landmark. So that's how we go from 37.422,-122.084 to at Googleplex Headquarters, Mountain View, Sta. Clara, US You can naturally select another landmark manually if you want to, or edit the landmark text. Do you think the text we have on Android Market fails to explain this "magic"? What would you add there? (update: formatting, added question)
- roel_v 15y ago
  I guess the part about your phone already being able to determine where you are. It's quite common to have GPS turned off to save battery afaik, and I'm not sure how Android would get my coordinates from the other two, unless they maintain a database of all wlan networks in the world. I'd add an explicit 'no need to enter your location, that's what our application does' text.
  - asmosoinio 15y ago
    Have you used an iPhone / Android device? Because Google and Apple have pretty much nailed this. That is exactly what they have: a database with ENOUGH of the GSM (CMDS) basestatio cellids and WLAN identifiers, linked to real coordinates, so that most of the time things "just work". So all the phone needs is to use some mobile data to get this database, at least once before it caches the local id => coordinates information. After this, a rough location is available even without GPS. How can they do this? Because everytime someone somewhere uses Google Maps with GPS, they are also submitting data to Google's cellid and WLAN databases. So it works really well in countries and areas with lots of smartphone users, and less so when you go to the outskirts of the Philippines. Also: Landmarks work pretty well even with the non exact cellid location, you definitely don't need to have GPS enabled to use the app. This is basic platform functionality, which is why we didn't emphasize it in the text: However maybe we should add some information about this as well.
    - roel_v 15y ago
      Yes, I've had and actively used an Android for about a year and half now. I use it quite extensively, have bought a number of applications and I guess I'm basically the audience you're targeting - people who actively go out to find, and potentially buy, applications (this group is imo a relatively small subset of all Android users, I know many more Android users who have never used the Market than those who have). Anyway just to make it clear that it is, imo, not to be considered 'well known' information amongst the general Android-using population. Heck, I've even written toy Android applications, and I still didn't know.
      - asmosoinio 15y ago
        Thanks for the insight! I guess I've been to involved in location stuff for a while. You'll get a feel of the location system with Google Maps quite easily: You get a big light blue circle around "own location" when location comes from mobile network cellid, and a smaller one when it uses WLAN-based location. That signifies the accuracy. And it does indeed find this location even when GPS is off. And this works even when "Mobile network"-setting is off, i.e. the phone is not sending or receiving any data, if you are still connected to a previously known mobile cell. Anecdotally: I moved a few months ago, and didn't change my WLAN network id. At my new place, when GPS was not available, Google Maps was showing my location to my old place. This continued until I renamed the WLAN and used Google Maps with GPS near my new place. This shows the weakness of crowdsourced location data, but such incidents are rare enough that it basically "just works".

auganov 15y ago

On your website you say "Our landmark database is the most accurate in terms of quality, coverage and updates ". That's a pretty big claim. What's so special about it? Where does the data come from? As for the app, I don't know, maybe I'm missing something but doesn't sounds too exciting. In all cases when I would like to put a "landmark" in my message I would do it myself.

asmosoinio 15y ago
We select each landmark "by hand", and can spend time on the quality of the data while still keeping the data gathering/updating process effective. Quite different compared to how traditional landmark databases, with focus on quantity, are built. Another one of our strong points is data in areas where there are no digital maps available (but still lots of people with cellphones) -- landmark data is so much easier to gather than traditional map data. Sources of the data depend on the country: 1. For example in the US or Europe, we can work mainly by combining information from a number of online sources with only some checkups from people actually "on the scene". 2. For a lot of developing countries (Nigeria is one of our strong areas for differentiation from other datasources), we will have some local guy physically go around the city and gather the raw data that we then process for accuracy and quality. I'll dig up some examples where the usual digital maps fail and we succeed. I am the head tech guy of the company, and am not so accustomed to preaching about the power of landmarks. So thanks for the opportunity to work on my arguments! Re the app: Try it! It's much faster with the built-in landmarks compared to writing it yourself, and will change your texting behavior. Once you get used to it, texting without a location feels just so... last season. :)
- auganov 15y ago
  95% of the time if I put a location in my message it's most likely a location that I and the receiver are familiar with, so such a standardized name is not too desirable. But of course it's just me. I can definitely see, a lot of couples using that all the time (beware cheating girlfriends!). Does it work backwards? So that if somebody uses it too and sends me a message using that can I look up the place on the map? That would be a big plus. But yea, now that I thought of it. In very big cities where people move around a lot in a fairly constrained area that is very nice. If you can add more features and market that better I can see some people using it. Not quiet revolutionary, but nice. Of course provided that this landmark database is really really, really good.