Google Maps for Mobile 5 unveiled adds dynamic map drawing and offline mode




Google's Maps for Mobile 5 just got previewed. Andy Rubin has showed off Google Maps for Mobile 5 at the D:Dive into Mobile event, and it's looking pretty good. The biggest improvement in this version that everybody will be talking about is dynamic map drawing, which gives you vectors instead of flat images that scale without rendering issues and will show buildings from over 100 cities. 

More additions include the ability to use two fingers to tilt and rotate around the map (in addition to pinch-to-zoom), storage of the vectors are much smaller than the current images which leads to offline caching. Maps will now be kept on a file of the locations that you go to and search the most often - from there it'll be able to reroute while offline in Navigation.

Most modern Android phones should be able to support most or all of the new features, depending on the hardware that is running under the hood. Google sent us a list of devices that support 100 percent of 5.0's features, which you can find after the break. The update is due out in the "coming days," according to Rubin. The name of devices are:
  • Galaxy S
  • Droid
  • Droid X
  • Droid 2
  • Droid Incredible
  • Evo
  • Nexus S
  • G2




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