Google Navigation: Free Garmin Replacement 

Best Android Apps Book

Note: I’ve coauthored a book on Best Android Apps. I’m running this post simultaneously on my support blog for the book and at O’Reilly’s Answers site.

Last night, I needed my Garmin to get somewhere important, but when I reached for it in the glove box, I remembered I’d loaned it out to the other car in our family and hadn’t gotten it back yet. What to do?

No Garmin in the glove box, but I did have my G1 on me, and the directions on Google Maps had saved me on numerous occasions, so I fired it up and plugged in my destination:

Google Navigation

That Navigate option was new to me. I’d remembered hearing about Google Navigation coming to phones running versions of Android below 2.0 (my G1 is running Android 1.6, but note that Navigation is still not available for my Motorola Cliq, which is still back on Android 1.5), but I hadn’t had the chance to look into it yet. So, here was my chance. I pressed Navigate …

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