Apple Maps as an option in Arc

Hi, I’m a fairly new user of Arc, and I tried it when it was free. I was happy to support the app by paying a lifetime subscription.
I installed both the Arc mini and Arc apps on my phone and I saw that Apple map is the default on Arc mini and I use Apple more than anything else. I was wondering if this could be given as an option in the main app also.

Hi @ukvallabha!

Unfortunately supporting both map services would be too much maintenance work for me as a solo indie developer. I’m getting too old to balance that many plates at once anymore :grimacing:

The main reason Arc App uses Mapbox maps instead of Apple Maps is that Apple Maps data isn’t as good on average, across the world. Apple Maps data tends to be very good in countries that Apple has paid attention to, but then ranges from poor to terrible everywhere else.

Mapbox map data comes from OpenStreetMap, which is an open source collaborative project similar to Wikipedia, with maintainers all over the world. As such, Mapbox data (or rather OpenStreetMap data) is much higher quality on average, meaning that the maps will be at a useful quality level for Arc’s users spread out over the world.

I would dearly love Apple to up their standards across the world for Apple Maps data, but they’re just not getting there :disappointed:

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I understand. The reason I asked that question is that I see Apple Maps on Arc mini. Is it temporary?

Arc Mini is an open source project, hosted on Github. I also do periodic builds of Mini to ship on the App Store, but a large reason for Mini’s existence is to provide a complete example app for third parties to use as example code when making use of LocoKit (Arc’s core recording engine) in their own projects.

With that goal in mind, I’ve kept Mini’s external dependencies to a minimum - if it doesn’t absolutely need a third part extra, then Mini won’t have it. Which means using iOS’s built in tools, such as the Apple Maps framework, even when a third party option might be better for more users.

So Arc App is the commercial product, where I strive for the most/best functionality across the board, while Arc Mini is the minimalist open source project, where a primary goal is to avoid all unnecessary extras.

Aside: For the programmers in the audience, Arc Mini’s Github repo (as well as LocoKit’s repo) is an easy way to keep an eye on any changes I’m making to the core of Arc App. I keep Arc Mini up to date with all that’s happening in Arc App proper, even before Arc App updates go live on the App Store.