Personal Technology: InstaMapper-ing

Katy Bold gets the credit for discovering this tool (free from the web) although I think she was taken aback by the intensity of my reaction and my insistence that "I want it all—web and mobile—and I want it on Tom's phone, too!"

InstaMapper permits tracking a cooperative trackee with a GPS-enabled cell phone, producing an informational screen for the tracker viewing on the web (with option for mobile version for viewing on an Internet-equipped cell phone). The information includes map, coordinates, altitude, and speed of movement.

The system requires cooperation. The trackee must make an update click, and the tracker must refresh the web page display. Does it work? Exceedingly well. (The tracking can also be embedded on a web page or blog with nearly-constant updating.)

Did we use it? We did. As Katy drove halfway across the country she occasionally updated (her click) and I obsessively refreshed (my click). On that day, I was on site working for a client and I showed the display to colleagues. They happened to be women with offspring ranging from teenage to adulthood. Most of them wrote down the name of the application. I breezily commented that I like the system because it operates on cooperation: my grown daughter was voluntarily sharing information with me and I could read a lot into speed of 70 versus speed of 0.

A colleague stopped me, "You can tell how fast she's driving?" Well, yes, that's one of the results. And I repeated that I don't feel as though I'm invading my daughter's privacy. And this colleague said, "My daughter is 16. I don't care about privacy." Another colleague formed a plan: "My husband. You have no idea how often he gets lost and calls me to read a map to him."

© 2009 Mary Bold, PhD, CFLE. The content of this blog or related web sites created by Mary Bold (www.marybold.com, www.boldproductions.com, College Intern Blog) is not under any circumstances to be regarded as professional, legal, financial, or medical advice. Or education advice. Or marital advice. Or even a tip.

Personal Tehcnology: GPS Supports to Memory

I never see young people wandering parking lots looking for their cars. But I see a lot of boomers doing just that. We typically insist that this is our only display of failing memory.

You know where this is going. After all, it's my day to write about personal technology.

Garmin Locate isn't as catchy a title as Where Am I? but both are the features of recent Garmin GPS units that can help boomers with navigation. Locate is the one for parking lots: remove the GPS unit from the car (which you just about have to do anyway to thwart theft) and it remembers from whence it came. After shopping, you consult the unit to lead you back to the car. Where Am I? sounds ridiculous but someday you will care.

3G iPhone users can add an app for free or 99¢ to find their cars. G-Park PosiMotion offers two directive icons carrying text of Park Me! and Where Did I Park? Other choices are the more literal Take Me To My Car and Car Finder, and the slightly vague BackTrack (which requires that you keep walking for the app to work).

iTunes has a wide assortment of navigation apps, including transit maps and schedules for major cities. Here's my wish: an app that I can use on public transportation to confirm that I'm on the right subway, train, or bus. This summer I spent a long afternoon making multiple train connections to work my way through New York and New Jersey. On the last leg, I asked three bystanders on a crowded platform if I were on the right track and none could confirm it for me. I dragged my bags onto the train anyway, SRO that put me literally in the open doorway of the train for however long this ride might be. After we left the station I was able to ask an employee if the train were going to Princeton Junction. His single word response was "Eventually."

(I don't just want the schedule; I want the message that says, "You are standing on the correct side of the track to get on the train to X" and then, "Get on this one.")

© 2008 Mary Bold, PhD, CFLE. The content of this blog or related web sites created by Mary Bold (www.marybold.com, www.boldproductions.com, College Intern Blog) is not under any circumstances to be regarded as professional, legal, financial, or medical advice. Or education advice. Or marital advice. Or even a tip.