Summer is almost here and so is PC*MILER 26! I am excited by our recent developments at ALK. We are headed in some directions that will be good for our customers and the industry and I wanted to share that information with you here today.
PC*MILER 26 includes several new extras. Of course there is an updated Highway and Street network database. As most of you are aware, ALK’s Geographic Information Systems team is improving our network every day. It’s a very big continent out there so they have a lot to keep them busy.
The team completed analysis and maintenance of detailed truck routes and attributes in about 40 additional metropolitan areas. We had a larger focus on Canada this year, upgrading our coverage in the most populated areas. Updated toll information across the board is included as usual. This year’s network has just finished exhaustive route testing to ensure that ALK’s routes remain accurate and of the highest quality.
One of the most exciting new features in PC*MILER 26 is Fastest routing. This is a new routing type that sits alongside Practical and Shortest. In PC*MILER 25, ALK blended INRIX Historical traffic information with our network. This was available for free to users so they could try it out and I hope you did. You were able to see traffic on the map, and get more accurate ETAs. In PC*MILER 26 we are now generating routes based on these historical speeds. When you license this feature you can pick the day of the week and time of the day that your trip will run and PC*MILER will find the fastest route using INRIX traffic speed information.
ALK does more than just routes. ALK has also been providing maps for years. This year we decided to make our maps look better and make it easier to integrate those maps into other products that use PC*MILER. So, we will be launching ALK Maps in the near future. This is a JavaScript implementation that allows developers to add maps to their web based applications in a matter of minutes. I think you will really like the map style improvements. Look for the Beta release early this summer.
I hope everyone out there is aware that ALK offers an in-vehicle navigation product, CoPilot, in addition to PC*MILER. If you operate vehicles on the roads, then you need CoPilot in those vehicles helping the driver get where he needs to be more safely and more efficiently. But we know that the routes many operating departments create in the back office are very important and they spend time customizing those routes using Avoid/Favors in PC*MILER. You want the truck to follow those routes which means you need a navigation product to follow those routes. Well, we are now launching a feature named RouteSync that makes that easy. You can create your back office routes in PC*MILER and send “the green line” down to CoPilot Truck and tell CoPilot Truck how strictly to stay on that line. CoPilot Truck takes care of the rest guiding the driver back onto the line and reporting back to the office how much they went out of route along the way.
I hope you find PC*MILER 26 useful and enjoy your summer!
Mike Bodden
Chief Technology Officer