First, Fodor's didn't ask for my email or ask me to establish an account, which is a nice plus. Second, the Fodor's listings are curated. That means that there were editorial decisions made in what to include, and what to exclude, and the listings only contain those things that Fodor's found of sufficient interest to warrant telling you about. The listings are separated into categories (sights, restaurants, shopping, performing arts, nightlife, and hotels), but there's also the "all" category, so in a bind, you can always revert back to seeing everything. This means that you have less items listed in total than in open-source apps such as Triposo, but it also means that you don't have bad listings.
When you find something that you are interested in, you simply click the heart icon to add it to your favorites. Once added, the favorites can be viewed on a map. I did find that map locations were not necessarily fully accurate. For example, I missed Bonaventure Cemetery the first time around because the map location made it look like it was somewhere else. Listings contain the same blurb that is in the published travel guide (and once the app is downloaded, this does not require wifi access), in addition to website and contact info.
When you find something that you are interested in, you simply click the heart icon to add it to your favorites. Once added, the favorites can be viewed on a map. I did find that map locations were not necessarily fully accurate. For example, I missed Bonaventure Cemetery the first time around because the map location made it look like it was somewhere else. Listings contain the same blurb that is in the published travel guide (and once the app is downloaded, this does not require wifi access), in addition to website and contact info.
The app also allows you to make bookings at restaurants (using OpenTable), tours (using Viator), and hotels. While I didn't use any of this functionality, I'm already familiar with both OpenTable and Viator. I did like the ability to see community ratings and reviews within the Triposo app, so that would be something that I would consider as a point for improvement in this particular version.
The app is essentially self-contained, meaning there's no additional website for the app, although there are the external links from within the app that I've previously mentioned. Another nice bonus is that the app contains the "Greater Savannah" area, which means that it includes listings for places in the general vicinity, and not just Savannah itself.
The app was well designed and easy to use. It's simple enough to mark your favorites, see places on the map, or just find the nearest restaurant.
So between the Triposo app and Fodor's, Fodor's gets my vote. Fodor's takes up less space, and is generally more intuitive. I also think that Triposo's open sourcing leads to issues, as I mentioned in my prior post. I prefer the curated listings, and I also like that it means that the quality of the descriptions I get for any location are reasonably consistent. Although Triposo did add a few things to my "want to see while I'm in Savannah" list, these were not significant enough to warrant heavy use. One final point before I go - both apps were battery heavy when using the map function. On longer days, this led to a few problems in the evening when my phone was essentially dead because of battery usage.
Next time - one final Savannah summary, and we'll move on.
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