Google launched its indoor maps feature in Singapore Tuesday, making the city state the second country in Asia to have it.
Android
phone users will be able to use the online mapping system to help
themselves find their way inside shopping malls and large buildings,
reported Xinhua citing Straits Times.
Such information includes
floor plans and basic walking directions for any building which has
submitted its indoor maps to Google. It uses existing Wi-Fi access
points to pinpoint a user's location and follows his movement as he
travels across different floors.
In Singapore, 22 malls have signed up for its launch. Changi Airport is not on the list.
The
application was launched in the US in November 2011, with shopping
malls and airports among the first to be mapped. Japan was the first
Asian country to use it in heavily populated cities such as Tokyo and
Osaka.
Indoor maps for malls, however, were not new in Singapore.
In 2010, SingTel launched an application which pinpoints a user's
location and gives directions to shops on its detailed floor plan and
store directory.
With Google Maps, however, there is no need to
launch a separate application to view an indoor map. It swops seamlessly
from outdoor maps to indoor floor plans when users zoom into the
building on the screen. To keep the application updated, businesses can
upload their floor plans to Google.