Garmin has finally made a real Android play by releasing a standalone Android app called viago. Garmin has dabbled with Android before when it created the defunct nuvifone. At that time Garmin couldn't shake their fixation on producing hardware. Many of us argued that the Garmin name wasn't strong enough to dictate the consumer's smartphone hardware and mobile carrier choice and eventually that reality played out. The nuvifone was discontinued. Many critics said Garmin needed to start thinking like a software developer. After having an iOS app for some time Garmin appears to be moving into the pure software development world head-on with this new Android play.
I've downloaded and used the viago app for a short time. I've explored the features and settings. I've taken some drives. The viago app is a nice looking, solid v1.0 entry into the market. The problem is that this is a v1.0 entry and it is 2014. This app would be a great play if it were 2012. It isn't. For that reason, it underwhelms given where Garmin's competitors are at with their product plays.
Competitors Google Maps, TomTom, Waze, Scout (Telenav), MapQuest, CoPilot and Sygic are all multiple generations into their product offerings. I'd expect the supposed industry leader, when it finally makes a market play, to do so with force - to blow away the current offerings with something new, fresh and unique. Instead, what Garmin has given us is a "me too" app that lacks in basic features. At the same time, they include things that attempt to differentiate like Real Directions. What good is that kind of differentiation however, when you haven't nailed the basics yet?
Lacking in basically features is fully expected with a 1.0 product some will argue. Unfortunately with Garmin being this late to the game, they needed this 2014 release to be their 2.0 attempt. A 1.0 release from Garmin doesn't cut it in 2014.
I'll hit the deal-breaker (for me) first. Garmin has failed to register the viago app as an Android intent handler for any 3rd party apps. Intent handling (the ability to open one app with specific content obtained from another app) is the beauty of Android smartphones. It is also a fantastic feature in every Android navigation app I've used (and I've used every one of those mentioned above). All of them allow you to click on an address in Contacts, Calendar, Yelp, Tripadvisor, etc., and pick their navigation app as the destination of that address search. You get one-click navigation to that address with the navigation app of your choice. Sadly, Garmin has missed the boat on that important feature. I clicked on an address in my Contact app and the image below is what I received. (I've removed most of the navigation apps noted above from my phone). Garmin viago is not listed as a choice and that is a huge oversight. Who decides to release this without that simple, core Android feature?
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| Garmin's viago not shown as an Android intent handler |
The next biggest "what are they thinking" issue with viago is that it doesn't have "Search Along Route" functionality. Granted, this is a missing feature in Google Maps too, but Google Maps is free. It doesn't have to be better, it just has to be "good enough" to beat Garmin. The comparison is TomTom, CoPilot, Scout, and the other paid apps. All of them have this important feature and Garmin decided to leave it out for this v1.0 release. I can't attempt to understand the logic of that decision.
Yet, Garmin did decide to implement a trip planner where you can enter multiple via points along a route to your destination. Now, my typical use of a trip planner may be different than the norm, but I like to calculate a route from my origin to my destination. From there, I like to "search along the route" just calculated to find gas stations, food stops, hotels, or maybe even attractions along the way. Alas, there is no way to do that because Garmin left out search along the route. Perhaps others use the trip planner in another way but I find that it completely misses the mark without this search capability.
Visually, I like this app. It is clean and the user interface has the potential to be straightforward.
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| The nicely done UI of Garmin viago |
I don't like how Garmin has split up various features and settings between two different menus. The traditional Android menu (the three horizontal lines at the top right) doesn't actually contain Settings. Instead, Garmin has placed settings in a second menu that is accessible by clicking on the blue triangle in the upper left. I can see the upper left blue triangle being the place to put navigation specific commands and features but it should not contain Settings (or Shop or Tools), especially when Garmin is also using the standard Android menu symbol. If they are going to use it, then that is where you should put Settings.
This is all Garmin is using the standard Android menu for:
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| Garmin's use of Android's standard menu command |
Clicking on the Traffic option gives you an incident list.
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| Traffic incident list |
It is disappointing to find that you can't see traffic incidents when casually browsing an area overview map.
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| No traffic shown at the scale of a metro overview map |
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| Google Maps, in comparison, nicely shows overall traffic conditions on a metro overview map |
The traffic information that is displayed during a route was not a great experience. As you can see in the image below, the traffic information area takes up a lot of screen real estate. When you combine that with the inefficient use of space for the next turn text you end up with a very small map area. There is an blue 'x' next to the display of the current street (106th St) but when you click on it instead of closing the current street line it closes the traffic section instead.
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| The UI becomes much less functional and the map much smaller, with traffic content displayed |
I've tried to understand the traffic bar implementation on this app and I just can't make sense of it. Clearly I understand that there are 2 traffic incidents that are causing a 2 minute delay. However, I don't understand the information being conveyed in the traffic bar that contains the yellow line. If the traffic bar represents my total route and the yellow bar represents the "location" of the traffic slow down along my route then it would be helpful if the bar actually moved while I progressed on the route. It didn't though. It stayed static. So I really have no idea where that yellow section was compared to my actual location in the route. I also am not sure if the yellow bar and the orange symbol represent 2 different incidents or not? Is the yellow bar traffic flow data while the orange banner is a construction incident? I also don't know if the 1 mile represents the distance that the construction is away from me now, the distance the construction is away from the start of my route or the length of the construction "section" in the road itself? It is a very confusing implementation of traffic given that there is no movement of or along the bar while driving.
Below is a screen shot that is even more confusing. I am 0.2 miles from my destination (literally about 1 minute). There is no construction or traffic involved in the route any longer. Yet, the display still shows 2 traffic issues with a 2 minute delay. It no longer shows the yellow bar but does show the orange construction icon. None of this makes any sense to me. Why is it showing traffic that is in the past? It doesn't mean anything to me any more because I'm already through it. I just am not understanding Garmin's thought process on how they are presenting traffic information at all.
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| Very confusing traffic implementation showing traffic conditions in the past |
For comparison, here is Google's presentation along the same route. There is quite a difference in the space made available for the map. To each their own on this issue but I don't believe that Garmin has done much to optimize their use of screen real estate, mainly due to the unnecessary amount of space dedicated to the traffic information.
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| Google Maps' use of screen real estate as a comparison |
This is what is found in Garmin's blue triangle menu. They've got the placement of Tools, Shop and Settings in the wrong menu in my opinion and I hope they change it.
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| Garmin's blue triangle menu options |
My Destinations is the place to find your saved favorites as well as your recently found destinations. Contacts is a nice feature to see however it was implemented without search capability so it is almost useless. The only option within Contacts is to browse a list - useless for someone with hundreds or thousands of contacts.
I did use the Contacts feature of the app though and browsed to various contacts. It failed 100% of the time to reconcile the address. These addresses are in the Android People app found on the Nexus 5 with Android 4.4.3 and the People app is synchronized to an Exchange server. The screenshot below shows one contact that I tried which, like all my other contacts, reconciles nicely in Google Maps.
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| Reconciling a Contact's address in Google Maps |
However, like every other contact I tried, the address did not reconcile in Garmin's viago app. It appears that Garmin is not parsing the address text correctly and is attempting to put the entire address in the street name cell. Of course this wouldn't be an issue at all if Garmin wasn't using such an archaic means of address entry in the first place.
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| Garmin's viago can't parse the same Contact |
Settings offers a nice selection of things to avoid on the route. The inclusion of carpool lanes is a big plus and an omission from Google Maps (but not TomTom) that is very convenient in a few major cities. I much prefer the TomTom implementation to avoidances though. TomTom asks you on every route if it detects that item on the route during calculation. This approach matches reality as there are some routes that I know about an unpaved road or a toll and I also know the consequences of avoiding them. I will decide to use those items for that route while wanting to avoid them completely on a different route. TomTom is unique in that regard. All other vendors, including this Garmin viago app require you to change the settings each time in order to have that flexibility.
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| Navigation avoidance options |
The shortcomings of this app begin to be evident as soon as you start exploring the navigation features within the blue triangle menu. Selecting the "Where To?" option brings up a very nuvi-familiar list of choices:
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| Garmin viago's Where To? menu options |
I was disappointed to see that the Address entry process was an old-school process of separate text-entry fields for each portion of the address. Yes, that is correct. Despite knowing the ease of address entry in other products that have been available on Android for a long time, the screenshot below is what you get to "fill out" when using Garmin viago. To make matters worse, there is no text auto-complete so you can't start typing and have the app start to guess the remainder of what you intend to enter. You must type the whole thing. Only then, after filling out this 2010 style form do you get to see if what you entered is in the database when you go to the next screen. Quite frankly I'm stunned that Garmin settled for this archaic method of address entry in this product. Why viago is not a robust voice recognition platform as its main user interface is beyond me.
It is hard to understand the thought process, when you know that you can literally speak "OK Google, Navigate to 123 Main Street in Anytown, IA" when using Google Maps (and not much more than that with Waze), that someone inside Garmin decided that the method of address entry below was worthy of going live with in 2014. Stunningly misguided.
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| Garmin's address entry process |
This screenshot is a nice representation of the screen while navigating during a calculated route. You can see the route statistics at the top (see below for how this can be customized). You can also see that traffic is being reported within the app and shown on the map. I've turned on the display of some POI's on the map (you can see the gas station icon). This does not appear to be working as described by the menus however. More on that below. You can also see the speed limit and my current speed.
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| A nice UI displaying many pieces of information |
The three route statistics at the top of the screen are user selectable. The choices include:
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| Customization of route statistics in the map view |
There are a couple of disappointments to note when looking at the map above. First, the POI's are not selectable from the map. Think about driving down the freeway and wanting some lunch. There is no way to see the Food icon, click it, and see what restaurant it is. The POI's are displayed and are not interactive. And of course with no "search along route" functionality, you can't determine what any of those POI's really are when navigating.
The menu shows the screen where you can select the POI categories to show on the map. You can see the phrase "Unselect All" which implies more than one could be selected. However, when you select one category from the menu below, it deselects the previously one selected. That makes little sense given the wording of this menu and is likely a bug that needs to be fixed.
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| A potential bug prevents multiple POI categories from being selected |
You can also display POI categories on the map while browsing the map without navigating. However, this feels like a feature that isn't finished. First, the categories don't have visually recognizable icons. Instead, they have this meaningless blue icon seen below. Worse, when you click on the blue dot it doesn't tell you what the POI is. It simple shows the latitude and longitude which is completely worthless.
Like the POI issue show below, you can also long press anywhere on the map to select a location. However, when pressing on a road, Garmin does not reverse geocode that location and display an address. It only shows the latitude / longitude. Reverse geocoding and showing the address would be a much more user friendly feature.
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| Useless display of POI's in map browsing mode |
Even when clicking on the 'i' icon you still are not given anything useful. Here is the result of that click:
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| Additional info is not helpful |
You'll notice in the image above that the standard Android menu icon is present in the Destination screen. Here is what you get when you click it in this screen though:
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| Inconsistent menu content results in nothing displayed |
Clicking on the speed limit graphic on the map, I expected to be given a menu to indicate an incorrect speed limit. Instead, I was given the setting below, which is an odd place to hide a setting. Why not just include it in the main setting menu? I set this to on, then proceeded to speed up to 50 mph and was not given an alert.
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| A random setting that doesn't appear to work and isn't in the main app Settings |
So, where do I think this Garmin viago v1.0 app positions itself at launch? It will make Garmin enthusiasts who still use their nuvi but wish they didn't have to very happy. Google Maps, Waze, Scout and MapQuest users will be underwhelmed by the archaic text entry interface and lack of any voice recognition features. TomTom users will find the feature set (such as lack of detours, multiple route options, etc.) to be unimpressive. In the end that leaves Garmin joining the Android club without outmaneuvering anyone and not capturing anyone's attention other than customers that need offline navigation or who still navigate to Garmin for the name. That is a small and shrinking audience. The situation will just get worse upon the release of some new competitor's app updates that are currently in beta. If Garmin was swinging for the fences with viago's release - they missed.
