Rating: Steam age relic protects its IP
Some of us have long memories so we were particularly pleased to hear this news from National Rail Enquiries in the UK. In a blog, Chris Scoggins – CEO with National Rail Enquiries, said, “We’ve got a record number of developers creating applications for a host of mobile devices at the moment. We have granted 70 licences to third party developers of which 30 are for mobile apps on the market or in development.” So, we’ve come a long way from June 2009 when The Guardian carried a story entitled, ‘National Rail Enquiries investigated for threatening app developers’. See here. The furore seems to have passed and there’s now plenty of official mobile apps you can get fory your smartphone.If you visit National Rail Enquiries web site you can get loads of information about which apps use the company’s licenced data on its Travel Tools page here.
These apps provide real time information which allows you to find out if a train is running on time, delayed on route or cancelled.
Here’s a list of some of them: -
Agant’s UK Train Times for iPhone; Avanade’s Train Travel app for Windows Phone 7; Croworc’s Train Times UK for Android; Mobile Commerce’s National Rail Enquiries for Vodafone; Mobile Commerce’s TrainTimes for Nokia; Sprite Dynamics’ Rail Planner for Windows Phone 7; Thales’ Rail Planner Live for Android; Thales’ Rail Planner Live for iPhone.
Strange how BlackBerry users seem left out here.
What’s interesting is that updates for the London Underground (Tube) network are now appearing on what is the UK’s information site for the country’s overground train networks.
All you have to do is visit this Tube Service Updates page to see real-time information and what’s happening at the weekend (engineering works, etc.)
More information on (the UK’s) Nation Rail network blog here.
