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Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 2:03 pm Post subject: Am I crazy, or is my i3 "learning"?
I was about 50 miles away from home, finished with business, then pressed "Go Home" and off I went. In settings I had selected "Fastest time" instead of "Shortest distance". A few miles away from home I took a route different from the one suggested by i3, it re-calculated quickly and brought me home the way I expected. The next day I was at the same location and once again selected "Go Home". This time it laid out a route which included the "detour" I had taken the day before!!! Did my i3 learn my preference?
Joined: 24/06/2003 00:22:12 Posts: 2946 Location: Escaped to the Antipodies! 36.83°S 174.75°E
Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 2:52 pm Post subject: Re: Am I crazy, or is my i3 "learning"?
binetp wrote:
Did my i3 learn my preference?
I think it did!
Seriously though, I think you will probably find that the difference between the two routes was quite small and it was close to a 50/50 decision anyway.
What happens is that the i3 "learns" your average speed on different classes of roads and uses that to tweak the calculations. By taking a different route home you might have altered it's average speeds for different road types slightly and this has tipped the balance towards your favourite route.
That's my theory anyway. _________________ Gone fishing!
Personally, I don't believe the i3 has the capacity or current ability to do any "learning" over multiple sessions / journeys.
Over the current journey, if you're speed is greater or lesser than it expects, it modifies your ETA, but beyond that, I'm highly skeptical that it has any abilities to do anything pro-active for the future.
I suspect any differences in behaviour are due to either inconsistencies in performance or calculation or variation in position or sat coverage, or a warm soothing blend of all.
Thinking about it's other features or configuration in terms of navigation and routing, wouldn't it seem entirely incongruous that it could silently, and without advertising claims, learn from historical activity, and route accordingly?
Occam's razor... that or never ascribe to malice what could be explained by incompetence ;-)
Joined: Aug 31, 2005 Posts: 15258 Location: Bradford, West Yorkshire
Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 6:30 pm Post subject:
i still think they can learn a bit...
for example - if i have ivy for a week then the eta's are pretty accurate. once my wife has it after that the eta's are way out for a few days but then more accurate later in the week. then if i have it again after that then the eta's are out again.
makes me think that me and the mrs drive at different speeds (true) and that ivy actually detects speeds we're doing and after a few days the eta's improve!
for example - if i have ivy for a week then the eta's are pretty accurate. once my wife has it after that the eta's are way out for a few days but then more accurate later in the week. then if i have it again after that then the eta's are out again.
makes me think that me and the mrs drive at different speeds (true) and that ivy actually detects speeds we're doing and after a few days the eta's improve!
MaFt
I tend to use mine daily, mainly just for the morning journey (the morning seems to be the time of day I'm most likely to need it, if I need to deviate due to some traffic problem). Same route, and some days, the speed may be well down - for example, rain affects the average speed over motorway journeys by quite a bit.
So there can be quite some variance in the speeds I'm averaging on the motorway(s) and the actual time taken for the journey.
Accepting that, the ETA at the start of the journey, is always 59 minutes, and only then varies during the journey due to either being delayed / slowed by traffic / mood, or managing a better pace ;-)
And in all fairness, with no delays, or doing the journey at a time where there's little traffic to impede, I have to say that the ETA can be on the money.
I just don't buy that the i3 is that sophisticated, or has that capability, given the relative simplicity of it's operation (especially where routing and navigation are concerned).
I mean, after all the discussions about the vehicle types and affects on routes, the account given by a Garmin bod, said that the only purpose of the selection, was to help ETA times, by having more of a good estimation of the likely average speed on various types of roads.
Joined: Nov 04, 2003 Posts: 2225 Location: Bedfordshire, UK
Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 7:07 pm Post subject:
MaFt wrote:
for example - if i have ivy for a week then the eta's are pretty accurate. once my wife has it after that the eta's are way out for a few days but then more accurate later in the week.
I've seen a forum article on another forum from someone who has talked this through with Garmin, and they confirmed that the unit does learn your average speed on different road types, and will use that in it's calculation of the route and the ETA.
However, dealing with the point made by the original poster, although I felt I've seen similar, there is no evidence (nor statements from Garmin) that any Garmin is capable of learning your preferred routes, and I suspect the changes you saw were based around the learning of your speeds on the different types of road.
for example - if i have ivy for a week then the eta's are pretty accurate. once my wife has it after that the eta's are way out for a few days but then more accurate later in the week.
I've seen a forum article on another forum from someone who has talked this through with Garmin, and they confirmed that the unit does learn your average speed on different road types, and will use that in it's calculation of the route and the ETA.
Can you post a link to the post?
'cos mine has never shown any evolution with ETAs, given repeated calculations and driving of exactly the same route - with varying speeds for the journeys.
Everything I've read, including the odd reported quote from Garmin has shunned any such sophistication.
swing wrote:
However, dealing with the point made by the original poster, although I felt I've seen similar, there is no evidence (nor statements from Garmin) that any Garmin is capable of learning your preferred routes,
But didn't you just say above, that you'd read from Garmin's comments that it learns your average speeds and uses it for route calculation (as well as ETA)?
swing wrote:
and I suspect the changes you saw were based around the learning of your speeds on the different types of road.
OK, if you're convinced it learns your behaviour - let it build up this assumed intelligence from a regular route.
Then do a hard reset, and see if the ETA changes (assuming the exact same route is calculated).
Joined: 24/06/2003 00:22:12 Posts: 2946 Location: Escaped to the Antipodies! 36.83°S 174.75°E
Posted: Thu Sep 21, 2006 11:22 pm Post subject:
Lester_Burnham wrote:
OK, if you're convinced it learns your behaviour - let it build up this assumed intelligence from a regular route.
Then do a hard reset, and see if the ETA changes (assuming the exact same route is calculated).
Hmm, I just tried that and the route now comes up with a completely different distance and ETA. Must have reset the routing preferences but I can't remember what I had them set to. _________________ Gone fishing!
Joined: Oct 25, 2005 Posts: 111 Location: Nottingham
Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 8:32 pm Post subject:
To prove the point... on a set day at a set time navigate a route you do on a regular basis with your i3, note the ETA accuracy. Now reload the firmware and try again with the same conditions the following week and note the ETA...
I have done almost 15k miles since downgrading from v3.1 back to v2.7 and my i3 knows I speed on motorways but not on minor roads. Quite scary really.....
Familiarity breeds contempt it will navigate me off a cliff soon!! _________________ -----------------------------------
Enjoy? WTF?
(S)ad
(A)nd
(P)roud
-----------------------------------
i3, V8, V2.7, WAAS EGNOS.
Audio V2, Simpsons Voice File
-----------------------------------
Joined: Nov 04, 2003 Posts: 2225 Location: Bedfordshire, UK
Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 6:53 pm Post subject:
Lester_Burnham wrote:
Can you post a link to the post?
Unfortunately I can't find it right now, but I'll look again tomorrow.
Quote:
swing wrote:
However, dealing with the point made by the original poster, although I felt I've seen similar, there is no evidence (nor statements from Garmin) that any Garmin is capable of learning your preferred routes,
But didn't you just say above, that you'd read from Garmin's comments that it learns your average speeds and uses it for route calculation (as well as ETA)?
Yes, I did. Although it may learn your speed over different types of roads, it doesn't learn your preferences for 1 road over another.
Quote:
OK, if you're convinced it learns your behaviour - let it build up this assumed intelligence from a regular route.
I did something similar on Friday - when I first got my Nuvi, it offered the same route as Mapsource did for a particular journey (100 miles, which I do twice a week). On Friday Mapsource still offered the M4 / M1 route, whereas the Nuvi offered a cross country route. Now this route was close to my preferred route, but not the same, which supports the information that it learns the speeds, and not the exact route preference.
Quote:
Then do a hard reset, and see if the ETA changes (assuming the exact same route is calculated).
Way too much configured / installed / customised to do this right now
Joined: Nov 04, 2003 Posts: 2225 Location: Bedfordshire, UK
Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 12:34 pm Post subject:
Here's the post contents:
Quote:
I have the advantage over most of you in that I can talk to Garmin's programmers about how things work, don't work or should work. I've had this speed thing up to discussion a lot, when I evaluated the iQue 3600/3600a, since there it didn't work properly, in the beginning.
The speed thing works like this:
There are eight different road categories on the maps, from ferry lines to German Autobahn.
Each type of road is associated with a certain speed. If you have Mapsource, you can see five of them in the routing preferences, provided you load the default speeds.
When the GPS calculates a route for you, where you want a shorter time, it will use these default speeds.
However, when you drive along these routes, the GPS will learn which speed you usually drive at, for each different road category. These learned speeds will be used for the ETA. The reason for not using them for routing is that then the routes would not be consistent from one day to another, since the learned speeds change a little, depending on conditions along the road.
You can easily see that this is true, in case you don't believe me (!), if you have two or more Garmin GPS units at hand. Make them start from the same position, turn GPS off, calculate a route to the same destination. Since GPS is off, they'll allow you to simulate driving along the route. Do that, and observe which speed they use, when following a road. Assuming your GPS units have been in use, they'll most likely have different learned speeds, and they'll reveal them, by simulating the drive at these learned speeds.
The learning process takes a while, so just because you get stuck behind a farming tractor for a few kilometers, it'll not ruin your database completely. But if you let your son drive your car for the weekend, and then find out on Monday morning that your commute to work is estimated to be twelve minutes quicker than normal, then you ought to investigate how he has been driving.
Another issue is that the default speed for ferries is rather slow, slower than most ferries do travel. Hence, it may disregard a ferry route for a bridge, even if you think the ferry is smarter. On the other hand there may be a need to wait for the ferry, so perhaps it doesn't matter. It's also difficult to learn another speed for a ferry line, since they often don't sail exaclty along the "road", as the ferry line is drawn on the map. Hence the GPS will not know which road type to associate the speed with. Apart from that, having the unit track the ferry trip is a good idea, since it will improve the ETA.
When you then select some slower vehicle, like a truck, the associated speeds used for route calculation are clipped by some estimated top speed for the truck. I don't know if there are separate learned speeds for each vehicle type; I haven't asked.
Joined: Nov 04, 2003 Posts: 2225 Location: Bedfordshire, UK
Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 12:42 pm Post subject:
This post, however, says it does not use the learned information for routing, only for ETA, and certainly I've seen different routes between my Nuvi and Mapsource, so I think there is some intelligence going on in there...
Mind you, I've felt similar thoughts about early PDA versions of TomTom, that on a return journey seemed to favour the route you have just driven to get somewhere, even if it wasn't the route it recommended...
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I think it did!
