Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Disneyland and the iPhone: The Apps and Video

For the holiday, my family went to first San Diego and Disneyland.  There is a lot I have to share about both trips in relation to both Apple products and Autism, but first let's talk about Disneyland.  It's fun, and it's REALLY BUSY around Christmas and New Year's.  So you will want to be prepared, both in knowing where you want to go and how long you will have to wait until you get there.  So here are a couple of apps that I can recommend. 


Skobbler US (free):  Turn by turn navigation is very important if you are not sure of where you are going, or how exactly to get there.  And Skobbler for the US is a great way to get there.  It's managed by a spinoff company from NAVIGON AG, and is completely free!  It uses the OpenStreetMap project, and is very accurate.  But, because it is open source, be prepared for some interesting events, such as being advised quite often to keep to the right on a freeway (my guess is someone wanted to keep the "fast lane" open).  Also, be sure of the spelling of your road, and aware of the iPhone's almost compulsive behavior of "fixing" your spelling.  You may also need to increase the voice volume, as it is by default very quiet.


Disneyland Maps (both free with ads and $1.99 without ads):  Once in the park, it's helpful to have a map.  You can grab the paper map, but how does that help you with wait times?  And how do you know where exactly you are in relation to a ride or restaurant?  Nope, interactive maps work great in this case, and Disneyland Maps is a great app for both. 


The map gives you locations of all rest rooms (in blue), restaurants (in green), and rides (in red).  And the rides will have wait times listed, if one has been posted.  How do they get wait times posted?  They are posted by users of the app within the app.  So, if someone else in the park is using the map, you are set.  If not, at least you know exactly where everything is located.  The only thing really missing from this is menu offerings at the various in park restaurants.  Perhaps in later renditions.


Something else I learned:  taking video with your iPhone is very dark on most rides (as you are discouraged from using a flash), but 13 minutes of video is about 550 MB of space, to that should give you about 3 hours of recording time in 7 GB of free space.  I'll talk about recording and recording options when I talk about the Autism aspect of Disneyland. 


So, does anyone else have a favorite app for the iPhone at Disneyland? 


No comments: