Review: Google Maps for iPhone drives competition with Apple
Given the celebratory hubbub over the release of Google Maps for iPhone, you’d be excused for thinking that Google had instead perfected some entirely new form of transportation—portal technology, perhaps.
The truth is somewhat less spectacular, though it will still delight many users of iOS 6: Google Maps for iPhone is a very good mapping application that returns some much-missed features to the platform, but it’s not without its shortcomings.
Look and feel
Google Maps's design is definitely evocative of iOS 6's Maps, though with Google's own aesthetic themes.
If you at least like the look of Apple’s iOS 6 Maps app, then firing up Google Maps won’t be so terribly jarring: The two look strikingly similar, down to the blue dot that marks your current location and the placement of the compass icon that appears in the top right corner when you use two fingers to rotate the map.
Their aesthetics are different, though: Google eschews the use of gray/silver chrome titlebars and buttons for a spartan black-and-white interface that evokes the simplicity of its websites and services. In satellite view, Google Maps overlays roads with translucent white lines, and labels more roads than Apple does at similar zoom levels. Ultimately, though, the different approaches are more a matter of personal preference than anything else.
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http://www.macworld.com/article/2021501/review-google-maps-for-iphone-drives-competition-with-apple.html
