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Using Current location in Apple Maps

| | Blog, iOS Development

I was updating one of my iOS apps that used to open up the Maps Application to show directions from the current location to a set of coordinates.

Before Apple Maps was introduced we could use “Current Location” as a way for Maps to use the users current location (http://maps.google.com/maps?saddr=Current%%20Location&daddr=51.535455,-0.247557) this no longer works in Apple Maps.

To get round this problem I had to use CLLocationManager to get the current location and then use that in the URL.
Start off by adding the CoreLocation framework.

MapViewController.h

@interface MapViewController : UIViewController<MKMapViewDelegate, CLLocationManagerDelegate>{
CLLocationManager *locationManager;
}

MapViewController.m

-(void)viewDidLoad{
locationManager = [[CLLocationManager alloc] init];
    locationManager.delegate = self;
    locationManager.desiredAccuracy = kCLLocationAccuracyBest;
 
    [locationManager startUpdatingLocation];
}
 
- (void)locationManager:(CLLocationManager *)manager didUpdateToLocation:(CLLocation *)newLocation fromLocation:(CLLocation *)oldLocation
{
    NSLog(@"didUpdateToLocation: %@", newLocation);
    currentLocation = newLocation;
    [locationManager stopUpdatingLocation]; //Added to prevent continuous updating as we only needed the location once.
}
 
-(IBAction) viewinMaps {
    Class itemClass = [MKMapItem class];
    if (itemClass && [itemClass respondsToSelector:@selector(openMapsWithItems:launchOptions:)]) {
        // iOS 6 MKMapItem available
        NSString *locationQuery = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"http://maps.apple.com/maps?saddr=%f,%f&daddr=51.535455,-0.247557", currentLocation.coordinate.latitude, currentLocation.coordinate.longitude];
        [[UIApplication sharedApplication] openURL:[NSURL URLWithString:locationQuery]];
    } else {
// pre-iOS 6
        NSString *locationQuery = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"http://maps.google.com/maps?saddr=Current%%20Location&daddr=51.535455,-0.247557"];
        [[UIApplication sharedApplication] openURL:[NSURL URLWithString:locationQuery]];
    }
}

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