Apple has chosen not to publish images of Google’s mapping data on the new iPad. This could be taken as more evidence that Apple plans to transition away from Google Maps in iOS. The removal apparently took place at the last minute.
On the “Features” section of Apple’s website promoting the new iPad, the company has a side-by-side comparison simulating the iPad 2 display as compared to the Retina display on the new iPad. The site showcases three iOS applications: iBooks, Photos and Mail.
Viewing the file names of the “Retina Gallery” images shows that they are identified with numbers. AppleInsider reader Pierre-Arnaud pointed out on Tuesday that the iBooks images are labeled as “1” and screenshots of “Photos” are “2,” but the images of the Mail application are saved with the “retina_gallery_4” filename.
The theory is, that JPG files labeled “3” were originally planned as part of the display, but were left out of the material on the finalized website.
Hughes continues, “However, the filename for “retina_gallery_3” can be manually entered into a Web browser to access the images that Apple uploaded to its website. These show that the files labeled “3” were actually screenshots of the Maps application running on iOS.
“The uploaded-but-unpublished screenshot shows directions from the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, to the Eiffel Tower via Google Maps for iPad.”
There have been numerous clues that Apple plans to move away from Google Maps in iOS toward its own mapping solutions.
In its new iOS version of iPhoto, Apple did not use Google Maps for mapping data. It instead used data from the OpenStreetMap Foundation.
Apple has acquired a number of mapping companies in recent years, Poly9 in 2010 and Placebase in 2009 are among Apple’s acquisitions.