First, thanks to Apple for getting the release out so fast — I just submitted it last night and here it is already!
I’ve heard that review times can get as high as three weeks right around a major iOS release, so I’m guessing they’re doing everything they can to keep the queue short with this being their crunch time.
Anyway, what did I change? I’m glad you want to know!
First, this update has been “near complete” for a few weeks, but since most of the changes were for iOS 7, I held off on working on a couple of things until the final version was available to me. (It was released to developers after the September 10th event.) When I got it, I made a few final fixes, submitted it to the App Store yesterday and Apple released it today. (Yes, I’m still marveling over that!)
So, on the surface it may seem that EasyRoute simply embraces the iOS 7 look-and-feel, however there are also many under-the-hood changes that better exploit the goodies that the new OS has to offer. Altogether, it’s just a better experience on iOS 7. For example, I made some changes to the map options view to better fit with the new design. It not only looks better on iOS 7, but the cleaner, undecorated style is actually more functional as well.
When I first saw iOS back in June, I wasn’t sure the “flat and simple” design was an improvement, but I think these screenshots tell the story pretty well. The iOS 7 version is less distracting and more functional. The plain fact that all the options fit on the screen without scrolling, yet the view is hardly cramped is proof that the design is a major improvement.
Another thing I am impressed with is AirDrop. It works well and is easy to use. Simply bring up the sharing options on a compatible device and you’ll have the option to send a route to someone nearby (also with a compatible device). Just to clarify what I mean by “compatible device”, footnote 3 on that page I linked says, “AirDrop is available on iPhone 5 or later, iPad (4th generation), iPad mini, and iPod touch (5th generation) and requires an iCloud account.”
There are a couple of non-iOS 7 improvements as well…
First, I added a compass to Street View so you know which direction you’re looking in.
Second, I made the route lines a bit thicker and darker. For some reason, these lines were getting thinner and fainter as Google rolled out new versions of the Google Maps SDK for iOS. I beefed them up and restored them so they look like they did when I first released EasyRoute.
I’ve got more things I want to do with iOS 7, but wanted to get the major overhaul done and EasyRoute into the App Store so you could enjoy it when you get iOS 7.
Finally, and I hope this doesn’t inconvenience anyone, but EasyRoute 1.6 drops iOS 5 support. The last graph I saw had its usage share well down into the single-digits, so this change will likely have minimal impact.
