I had another look into the POI search preview maps.
Currently when you select a POI of the list on the left on the POI Search dialog The search dialog gest 50% transparent, you can see the semi-transparent map and its moves to the POI in a certain Zoom setting until the POI marked with a green dot is in the center, then the map disappears. If you select the next POI it moves from the last POI to the new POI and disappears again – this means you get a rough ide of where are the two POIs in relation to each other.
The feature itself (seeing the POI on the map) I find extremely helpful, however there is the topic I started the discussion about: The map disappears before you had the time to grasp the information, and you basically have to jump between close POIs several times to get the information – so in any case they need so stay there longer and the map should be more dominant (maybe by setting the POI search Screen to 80% transparency instead of 50%, and keep it active for another 3 seconds or so?)
For some of the POI categories this might be the information you would like to have (is the camping spot close to the ocean, is the hotel in the city center – in this case you want to see the surrounding of that spot as it is right now.
However, another important use-case is taking detours from you current track for a gas station, a lunch break. In this case the current solution does not give me beneficial information. Instead I would need the information on the map: Where am I now, What is m y Track and where is the POI in relation to both. So the map should auto-zoom to cover my current position and the POI and it should plot my current route. And by going through the list I can make the decision of relevance: Do I make a detour to the closes gas station or is there time to wait another 10k’s to reach the one which is directly on my route/track.
While this two modifications would probably need less coding, the way the UI is designed always means the map needs to disappear to be able to access the POI list. Which always results in switching between POIs in order so see the map for a longer time which I find sub-optimal for the given task.
Maybe it would be possible to display a second map in the right half of the POI search dialog alternatively to the currently displayed buttons. This map would then permanently display the selected POI (and current location and route). You should be able to zoom and move the canter of the map, and for usability allowing more than 50% of the width (maybe 65 as a trade-off between list-width and map size) fior the map would help.
