Personal navigation assistant - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

A Personal Navigation Assistant (PNA) also known as Personal Navigation Device or Portable Navigation Device (PND) is a portable electronic

Electronics

Electronics is the branch of science, engineering and technology that deals with electrical circuits involving active electrical components such as vacuum tubes, transistors, diodes and integrated circuits, and associated passive interconnection technologies...

product which combines a positioning capability (such as GPS) and navigation

Navigation

Navigation is the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another. It is also the term of art used for the specialized knowledge used by navigators to perform navigation tasks...

functions.

Some PNA devices are PDA

Personal digital assistant

A personal digital assistant , also known as a palmtop computer, or personal data assistant, is a mobile device that functions as a personal information manager. Current PDAs often have the ability to connect to the Internet...

s with limited features and can be unlocked.

History

The earliest PNAs were hand-held GPS units (circa mid 1980s) which were capable of displaying the user's location on an electronic map

Map

A map is a visual representation of an area—a symbolic depiction highlighting relationships between elements of that space such as objects, regions, and themes....

. These units included simple navigation functions such as course-to-steer and course-made-good. This first generation of PNAs were used by the US military.

Market developments

According to the analyst firm Berg Insight, there were more than 150 million turn-by-turn navigation

Turn-by-turn navigation

Turn-by-turn navigation is a feature of some GPS navigation devices where directions for a selected route are continually presented to the user in the form of spoken and visual instructions. The system keeps the user up-to-date about the best route to the destination, and is often updated according...

systems worldwide in mid 2009, including about 35 million factory installed and aftermarket in-dash navigation systems, over 90 million Personal Navigation Devices (PNDs) and an estimated 28 million navigation-enabled mobile handsets with GPS.

The term PNA has come into widespread use with the growing popularity of automobile navigation systems. The latest generation of PNA have sophisticated navigation functions and feature a variety of user interfaces including maps, turn-by-turn guidance and voice instructions. To reduce total cost of ownership and time to market, most modern PNA devices such as those made by Garmin Ltd.

Garmin

Garmin Ltd. , incorporated in Schaffhausen, Switzerland, is the parent company of a group of companies founded in 1989 by Gary Burrell and Min Kao , that develops consumer, aviation, and marine technologies for the Global Positioning System...

, Mio Technology Ltd.

Mio Technology

Mio Technology Corporation, a subsidiary of Mitac Int'l Corp., is a Taiwanese electronics maker that manufactures and markets Pocket PCs, Personal Digital Assistants , smartphones and Personal Navigation Devices...

or TomTom International BV.

TomTom

TomTom NV is a Dutch manufacturer of automotive navigation systems, including both stand-alone units and software for personal digital assistants and mobile telephones. It is the leading manufacturer of navigation systems in Europe. TomTom's customer service is located in Amsterdam, Netherlands...

are running an off-the-shelf embedded operating system

Embedded operating system

An embedded operating system is an operating system for embedded computer systems. These operating systems are designed to be compact, efficient, and reliable, forsaking many functions that non-embedded computer operating systems provide, and which may not be used by the specialized applications...

such as Windows CE

Windows CE

Microsoft Windows CE is an operating system developed by Microsoft for embedded systems. Windows CE is a distinct operating system and kernel, rather than a trimmed-down version of desktop Windows...

or Embedded Linux

Embedded Linux

Embedded Linux is the use of Linux in embedded computer systems such as mobile phones, personal digital assistants, media players, set-top boxes, and other consumer electronics devices, networking equipment, machine control, industrial automation, navigation equipment and medical instruments...

on commodity hardware with OEM versions of popular PDA Navigation software packages such as TomTom Navigator, I-GO 2006, Netropa IntelliNav iGuidance, or Destinator.

Other manufacturers like Garmin and Magellan

Magellan Navigation

Magellan Navigation, Inc. is a producer of consumer and professional grade global positioning system receivers. Headquartered in Santa Clara, California, with European sales and engineering centers in Nantes, France and Moscow, Russia, Magellan also produces aftermarket automotive GPS units,...

prefer to bundle their own software developed in house. Because many of these devices use an embedded OS, many technically inclined users find it easy to modify PNAs to run third party software and use them for things other than navigation, such as a low-cost audio-video player or PDA replacement.

Meantime, Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

, Samsung Electronics

Samsung Electronics

Samsung Electronics is a South Korean multinational electronics and information technology company headquartered in Samsung Town, Seoul...

, Motorola

Motorola

Motorola, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009...

and other handset makers will sell 162 million GPS phones in 2007, dwarfing the 20 million units Garmin and TomTom have forecast they will sell combined, according to iSuppli, a leading market researcher in California.

The inclusion of Google Maps Navigation in the iPhone

IPhone

The iPhone is a line of Internet and multimedia-enabled smartphones marketed by Apple Inc. The first iPhone was unveiled by Steve Jobs, then CEO of Apple, on January 9, 2007, and released on June 29, 2007...

and Android devices such as Motorola Droid

Motorola Droid

The Motorola Droid is an Internet and multimedia enabled smartphone designed by Motorola, which runs Google's Android operating system. The Droid had been publicized under the codenames Sholes and Tao and the model number A855...

, and Nokia

Nokia

Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational communications corporation that is headquartered in Keilaniemi, Espoo, a city neighbouring Finland's capital Helsinki...

's announcement of free Ovi Maps, suggest that PNA will be rapidly integrated into smartphones.

History

Market developments

See also