Windows Phone Thoughts: DIRECTIONS on-the-go Reviewed

Miscellaneous Points
I've mentioned a few times that the software can use a GPS receiver. This is controlled through one of the map options, as shown in Figure 13. If you haven't got GPS, you can still manually set your position, but this possibly isn't that useful. There are only two things that the software does with your position - show where it is on the map and show the distance between the currently selected location and your position. Even that latter feature isn't as useful as it might sound because all that happens is that the software zooms the map out until you can see both points on the map at the same time.


Figure 13: My position options.

On the GPS side, I wasn't able to get this to work. I've got the Navman Bluetooth GPS receiver. I'm used to setting this up with Bluetooth, but DIRECTIONS on-the-go simply wouldn't connect to the serial port that was associated with the GPS device.

The final feature that could come in useful if you visit certain places often is the ability to set bookmarks, as shown in Figure 14. It is then easy to click on the bookmark entry and the software displays that location. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a way of deleting the bookmarks ...


Figure 14: Setting a bookmark.

Conclusions
There is no doubt that this product offers a cost effective routing solution and, if it meets your needs, it's great value for your money. However, despite the offer of free downloads of additional maps, there is a lot of competition out there for this product, not least of which is Pocket Streets 2005. Where this product does beat products like Pocket Streets is the routing. The product is limited to metros but within those confines, the routing works well ... so long as you've got a navigator or the sense to pull over instead of driving whilst looking at your PDA.

Philip Colmer is Head of I.T. for a global electronic publishing company. In his spare time, he enjoys researching his family history, developing his videography skills and going shopping with his wife.