The 2.0 update to Google Earth for iPhone lets you view your saved maps, more easily browse linked location data, and adds 13 new languages.

Google announced Wednesday that Google Earth for iPhone has been updated to version 2.0. Though the major version number has incremented, the update is rather minor except for a new ability to connect to your saved Google Maps and view them overlaid on its virtual globe.

The main reason to grab this update is in integrated ability to view maps that you have saved to “My Maps” using Google Maps or the desktop version of Google Earth. Google offered the examples of checking maps for Lonely Planet co-founder Tony Wheeler likes to travel or where chef Ferran Adrià likes to eat. However, it could also be used for viewing things like tracking a recent road trip, hike, or even a bike ride. Just enter your Google account login credentials, and you can select from any of your saved maps to overlay on the Earth.

In addition to the new map viewing feature, viewing information related to the current location has also been improved. While browsing the current area, location-linked data such as photographs and Wikipedia entries are displayed using icons. The updated Google Earth will show a glow around where you click, so you know which icon was chosen. If you click on an area with multiple icons bunched together, you’ll get a list of possibilities to choose from.

And finally, the language support for Google Earth for iPhone has been expanded from 18 to a total of 31 options. You can now choose from English, English (US and UK), French, German, Traditional and Simplified Chinese, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese (Brazil and Portugal), Danish, Swedish, Finnish, Norwegian, Korean, Japanese, Russian, Polish, Turkish, Ukrainian, Arabic, Thai, Czech, Greek, Hebrew, Indonesian, Malaysian, Romanian, Slovak, and Croatian.

I experimented briefly with the updated version, pulling up a (fictional) bike ride around Chicago. The interface for choosing a map could use some work—it involves a trip to the app’s options, and takes a few clicks to pick the one you want. A separate option to pick this from the main screen would be preferable, but would break the four-corner control layout. The other updates worked as advertised, though the auto-tilt feature—a fun way to easily impress your less-tech savvy friends—seemed far more sensitive than the previous version, making the view jump around quite a bit.

Source: Arstechnica

Facebook for iPhone has just the big 3.0 – the new version is a major update to the social networking app, with lots of new features. read on for more details of one of the premier timewasting apps for the iPhone.

The new Facebook app has just hit the App Store, bringing with it some great new features and some improvements to the existing one.

The new iPhone app has much better photo handling – you can zoom into opics, create new photo albums and upload photos to any album. 3GS owners will now be able to upload video directly from thei phones too.A new home screen will let you arrange profiles into different pages that you can flip between just like the iPhone home screen.

The app also integrates better into the ‘phone’ function of your iPhone. You will be able to call or message people directly from your Friends list and you will no longer lose messages that you were typing when you get an incoming call.

Some users are reporting that the App Store is still listing version 2.5 as current – if this happens to you, you can delete the app from your phone and then download it again – you shuld get the correct version 3.0.

Source: Mirror UK