Google Maps 5.8 for Android has been tweaked for improved Places and Latitude features. Users can now upload photos as well as describe places that they have been to and add new places to the check-in list. These enhancements will provide them with more tools to share content with their friends.
For people who wish to show their friends the places they have been visiting, the app now enables them to upload pictures from their mobile phones for sharing. The photos which can be attached to Places also stand a chance to become the profile picture for that page. Users can view or delete any of the photos on Places through the ‘Photos for Google Maps’ album on their Picasa accounts.
There are two new features called My Places and Descriptive terms making their entry into this Google app. As the name suggests, Descriptive terms basically describe various places for users to search for places more easily. These descriptions are also put up by users who have visited these places earlier. These terms like ‘known for’ or ‘worth the wait’ appear in search results for Places and offer users a better sense of the place.
My Places provides quick access to starred and recent Place pages users have looked at. My Places feature can be used by pressing the phone’s menu button while in Google Maps. This app also enables users to add a new place to the list of places existing if they want to share the place they have checked-in at with other users. This is beneficial for those who haven’t set up their Place page or have started new businesses.
There is a new ‘Add place’ option at the bottom of suggested places. By selecting this option, users can enter the place they have checked-in at, to the list of other places, even if that particular place did not exist in the list before. This place will then be available for others to check into as well from Latitude, but will however not appear as a search result in Google Maps or Google Places.
The updated Google Maps 5.8 for Android can be downloaded for free from the Android Market. This update requires an Android OS 2.1+ device.