Microsoft has teamed up with Nokia a lot in the past year, especially with Nokia"s Lumia line of smartphones becoming the flagship products of Microsoft"s Windows Phone OS. Now Microsoft and Nokia are teaming up again to offer a united design for people who want to use Bing Maps and Nokia Maps.
In a post on Bing"s web site, Microsoft states that it has worked with Nokia since 2011 to "unify our map elements, improve contrast and usability to ultimately create a more beautiful and functional map." The final results can be seen in both the mobile and PC versions of Bing Maps as well as Nokia Maps.
The changes include making sure the road colors in the maps look very different to rivers and other landmarks. The maps" font have also been improved for "font updates, improved readability and contextual labeling."
Finally, there have been changes in the level of detail a user sees when they zoom in and out of Bing Maps and Nokia Maps. The blog site states:
At each level, there’s an appropriate amount of information conveyed to the user. Too little or too much information can lead to overload and thereby an unpleasant user experience. We’ve redesigned with this in mind, so a very different level of information is presented to you when you zoom compared to when you pan out. Go in for detail, pull back for context.
Bing Maps and Nokia Maps have also added new and additional content to make maps in a number of countries, such as Egypt, Israel, Malta, Philippines, Uruguay and Venezuela, more accurate.
Image via Microsoft