Google is buying the crowdsourced mapping app developer Waze, in a move geared toward adding more real-time navigation tools to its own Maps software, the company announced Tuesday.

The terms of the deal were not disclosed, though early reports had said that the price could be as high as US$1.3 billion.

The Waze mobile app is designed to offer "smarter" real-time navigation by letting users share road reports on accidents, police checkpoints or other obstacles along driving routes.

The idea behind the app, which is available on a range of mobile devices, is to give people a "heads-up" of what's to come on the road. On its homepage, Waze claims to have 30 million users.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Google is adding a new level of personalization and a cleaner interface to its popular Maps product.

The next version of Google Maps, which will begin a limited rollout this week, will automatically add a layer of personalized landmarks for each user as long as they are logged into the service. For example, a restaurant a user frequents will be added as one of the landmarks. It might not appear to a different user, who may see a store they visit often instead.

The familiar pins used to mark locations are less widely used. In a demonstration at Google I/O Wednesday, a map showed different icons for different types of establishments. And when a user clicks on, say, a restaurant, they're presented with a panoramic photo of the interior -- though it wasn't clear how many places that feature will be available for.

Each map adjusts itself based on what the user is trying to do. If they're looking at a museum, the map will highlight the roads that approach it. The public transit data has also been improved, and Google will now report a weeklong schedule instead of just the next few trains.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

SAP has expanded its foray into corporate sustainability with the release of a carpooling application called TwoGo.

The cloud-based software uses Nokia’s Here mapping technology and has been in use internally at SAP since July 2011, according to the announcement released Monday. SAP and its employees have derived about $5 million in benefits from the application thanks to lower fuel usage, employee travel reimbursements and other savings, SAP said.

TwoGo has benefited SAP’s corporate culture as well, helping to rack up thousands of days’ worth of “networking time” among employees who have used the service, according to SAP.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

It's that time of year again. Prepare to weep for your well thought out bracket.

Stay up to date with all the most current March Madness news with these awesome apps for the iPhone.

Click here to check them out!

One of the great ironies of the Internet is that it is meant to connect everyone together and break down barriers, but at the same time media companies erect location-based barriers around their properties. This practice is known as geo-blocking. For example, web services like Hulu, Pandora, Google Voice, and Google Music are not available outside of the United States, while BBC iPlayer and Grooveshark are blocked to anyone outside of the UK. Then there's all the music uploaded to YouTube, which is blocked in various parts of Europe, depending on the strength of the music industry lobbyists. To some people however, these constant attempts by the media industry to segregate users according to geographic location seems unfair The way around this issue is to use a VPN (which stands for Virtual Private Network) program, such as TunnelBear

TunnelBear is one of the exceptions. This lightweight software app is able to access both US and UK websites with literally the flick of a button and so far, there doesn't seem to be a website it can't handle. There is no lag, it's very fast and it is extremely simple to use. There's zero set-up required which means even the most tech-ignorant user can handle it with ease.

For those who like their software goodies free, TunnelBear provides everyone with 500MB free every month (and an additional 1GB per month free if you tweet about them on Twitter). But regular usage of the app means that this 1.5GB is soon gone. Which means that if you intend to use TunnelBear for more than listening to some songs or watching a couple of TV programs every month, you will have to look at upgrading to the unlimited plan which costs a mere $5 a month. For the high-quality app you're taking advantage of, $5 a month is a great deal.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

You can now explore the world from the comfort of your couch with Google Maps’ new mountaintop Street Views.

On Monday, Google released images from four of the world’s highest summits: Everest Base Camp in Nepal, Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, Russia’s Mount Elbrus, and Argentina’s Aconcagua. The latest addition to Google Maps lets you scale those famous peaks without an extensive training regimen or an expensive plane ticket.

Google’s team—not expert mountain climbers by any means—painstakingly documented each mountain’s ascent using just a tripod and a digital camera with a fisheye lens. The documentarians detailed their expeditions in a behind-the-scenes blog, Google Lat Long.

Google

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Hackers can influence real-time traffic-flow-analysis systems to make people drive into traffic jams or to keep roads clear in areas where a lot of people use Google or Waze navigation systems, a German researcher demonstrated at BlackHat Europe.

Google and Waze both offer turn-by-turn navigation in smartphone apps and use information derived from those phones for real-time traffic analysis. However, because of the tradeoff between user privacy and data gathering, hackers can anonymously influence navigation software to trick the real-time traffic system into registering something that isn’t there, said Tobias Jeske, a doctoral student at the Institute for Security in Distributed Applications of the Hamburg University of Technology, during the security conference in Amsterdam.

“You don’t need special equipment for this and you can manipulate traffic data worldwide,” Jeske said.

Both Google and Waze use GPS as well as Wi-Fi in phones to track locations. If Wi-Fi alone is enabled, only information about wireless access points and radio cells in the surrounding area will be transferred, which lets the navigation systems approximate the location of the user, Jeske said.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

WorldMate is one of those travel-planning apps that threaten to push the endangered travel-agent species into full-on extinction. Simply register an email address, and forward any pertinent travel messages such as flight confirmations or hotel reservations to WorldMate’s website. The app will do the rest, setting up a user-friendly itinerary complete with maps.

If you need to make reservations, the WorldMate website can help you find hotels, flights, and automotive transportation, using Kayak's booking service in the background. Or, you could just cut out the middleman and use the similarly excellent Kayak Windows 8 app to make your travel arrangements, and then stick to WorldMate when you're actually on the road.

Smart business travelers keep an arsenal of apps at their fingertips to help with any situation. Hence, HipMunk for booking flights, Hotel Tonight for booking hotels, TripIt for keeping tabs on all your travel reservations, and so on.

Here's one more to add to your travel folder: Airport Guide - iFly (available for Android and iOS). True to its name, the app provides information for over 700 airports worldwide—ideal for anyone who spends a lot of time schlepping through terminals.

Airport Guide's primary function is, well, an airport guide. Choose any airport from the list to see options like status (ground, departure, and/or closure delays), a terminal map, a list of airlines that service that airport, parking info, ground transportation options, airport amenities and food/bars/shops, and even layover ideas.

In other words, there's a wealth of useful airport-specific information here. And if you pony up $3.99 (via in-app purchase), you can get real-time flight status and tracking. (There's also a $6.99 Pro version that includes those options and dispenses with ads.)

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Windows and Mac users may already be familiar with Splashtop's Streamer remote desktop software, but until just recently Linux users didn't have that option for accessing their PCs from a mobile device.

Instead, Virtual Network Computing (VNC) has long been the primary solution for Linux users.

On Wednesday, however, Splashtop announced the release of its remote desktop Streamer software for Ubuntu, giving users of Android and iOS Splashtop 2 client devices the ability to connect to a remote computer running Ubuntu to use Linux applications and access their data.

"For a while now Linux users have been clamoring for a version of Splashtop that supports Ubuntu,” said Mark Lee, founder and CEO of Splashtop. "We're giving the user a few ways to tweak the configuration files to stream at different frame rates, which we think Linux folks will appreciate."

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The new version of Google Maps for Android includes public transport information for almost 500 cities around the world, the company announced last week in a blog post.

MORE MAPS: Awesome interactive map shows global Internet usage stats

"Google Maps has public transportation schedules for more than one million transit stops worldwide, in nearly 500 cities including New York, London, Tokyo and Sydney," writes software engineer Christopher Van Der Westhuizen.

What's more, Google provided several new features intended to make Maps more useful as a guide to public transit, including an updated transit lines layer that lets users differentiate between several different types of transportation.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Google is launching indoor maps for Android devices in the U.K., to enable smartphone users to easily find their way around train stations, sporting venues, art galleries, shopping centres and department stores.

More than 40 venues in the UK have so far submitted their indoor floor plans to appear in the Google mapping system. Google said any building owner can now upload their maps for future inclusion in Google Maps.

To use the system, Android smartphone users open Google Maps on their device, zoom in to the location they're in, and the indoor floor plan will automatically appear. The indoor maps function of the software launched last fall with a selection of U.S. venues.

Users will also see where they are in the building via a blue dot on the map -- if they have enabled the My Location feature on their phones. Kings Cross station, the Barbican Centre, and the Peter Jones department store in Sloane Square are among the indoor locations currently supported, said Google.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Weird cranberry sauce recipes, rambling stories from drunken uncles, and crowded freeways aren't the only perils of traveling away from home for the Thanksgiving holiday. Finding a working Wi-Fi connection can be a pain even in these widely web-enabled times, and that holds true even if you're walking around a major metropolitan area.

Indeed, you can't even be sure your relatives will have a wireless router.

So what's a poor, laptop-lugging traveler to do? Fear not: You don’t have to wander the streets searching for a signal like a nomad seeking the next oasis in a desert. In this story, we'll cover everything you need to know about jumping online while traveling, whether that means paying a cellular provider for a Wi-Fi connection in your pocket, or searching for that next Wi-Fi hotspot on the road.

Tethering your smartphone

For most travelers, simply tethering your PC to your smartphone is the most economical and straightforward option for staying connected on the road. "Tethering" means broadcasting your phone's cellular data signal (3G, 4G, whatever) as a Wi-Fi signal, letting other electronics (like your laptop or tablet) siphon off your data connection. If your phone supports tethering, you basically have a Wi-Fi router in your pocket.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Missed out on a summer vacation this year? Take heart: With cooler weather and smaller crowds, autumn is a great time for a vacation getaway—and you can find some terrific travel deals online. Whether you want to book a two-week European adventure or a simple weekend in the country, here are some tips to help you plan a thoroughly refreshing retreat, without breaking the bank.

Shop around: The Web has so many travel-related websites that you may be tempted to avoid the bewildering throngs of newer sites and use an old standby like Expedia or Travelocity. But you'll benefit from taking a few extra minutes to compare prices at four or five (or more) sites.

For example, Orbitz rankled users recently by displaying the most expensive hotel-room options higher in the search results of iOS users, apparently reasoning that fans of Apple's pricy hardware would be likelier to shell out for higher-end digs.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here