Side : Notes :: Triangulation my a**

Vitor Pereira

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Triangulation my a**

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Google announced they're are adding a 'My location' feature to their Google Maps for Mobile application that does not require GPS. I wonder what took them so long.
This is a pretty simple thing to do, the app reads the antenna and cell id to which the phone is connected to and then matches the information to a database they created which contains antenna/cell id and geolocation information and gives you an approximate location.

This is what they said in their own words: 'We're creating a database of cell tower locations and that database is built from people using Google Maps for Mobile'.

And this is what everybody is reading and blogging: The new feature uses some kind o triangulation magic and does some complex math equation to tell you what your position is.

Did anybody actually read the press release before writing about it?
There is no triangulation and no math here, just searching a database with a key. Pretty simple right?

Posted by Vitor Pereira On 29/11/2007 | Permalink

Comments

1 - Vitor, we appreciate you taking the time to comment on our site. You asked if we read the press release before posting. We at AndroidGuys.com did. In fact, the first sentence of the third paragraph is where we picked it up. We were simply reporting the article and used part of it in our post. It sounds as if you know much more about this than we do. Would you be interested in writing something up for us? We'd love to hear 'the other side' and would gladly put it on our site. Emoticon

Posted by AndroidGuys At 07:52:55 AM On 11/29/2007 | - Website - |

2 - @6 - Ouch!

I wish I had time, though. I bet there's some standard spec for this stuff.

Posted by Nathan T. Freeman At 02:24:09 PM On 11/29/2007 | - Website - |

3 - Scott (thats's your name right?), thanks for visiting.
Like I said in your blog you were fed horse poo and couldn't tell. I mean, if you're reporting aren't you supposed to do some research or cross check or actually know what you're writing about instead of just parroting something? Emoticon

Posted by Vitor Pereira At 08:21:06 AM On 11/29/2007 | - Website - |

4 - I'm no expert, maybe you should try reading some expert reporting sites and pass it along, and Nathan is way to busy or even interested in that. Emoticon

Posted by Vitor Pereira At 08:35:25 AM On 11/29/2007 | - Website - |

5 - You're right Nathan, I've been using an app in my last 3\4 Nokias that just switches my profile and shuts the ringer off whenever I get to the office, what they did is create a database with cell IDs and geolocation info. And it's about time they did it.

Posted by Vitor Pereira At 08:24:12 AM On 11/29/2007 | - Website - |

6 - Well, I don't know what Google is doing, but they had this in South Africa for years when I lived there. You could actually have your phone tell you what tower it was connected to.

I'm pretty sure the iPhone does this too. The tower reports an ID as text.

Posted by Nathan T. Freeman At 08:20:04 AM On 11/29/2007 | - Website - |

7 - You guys ought to write up a paragraph or so on this and email it to us. We would seriously put this on our site as we're not unapologetic Google lovers. We'd love to show people the real picture and let them know that maybe we too were sheep passing along something we just don't know better in the US. Emoticon