In+ersec+ion for Spatial People

Here's the recent Google-related geonews. From official sources:

• Google announced the release of My Track 2.0, the open source app on Android to generate GPS/GNSS tracks and share them in Google Maps and Google Earth
• Biking directions in Google Maps expands to several countries in Europe and Australia, a topic also discussed on Slashdot
• In the latest Google Earth for Android (and upcoming for iOS), they included a new tour guide feature for visual trips using the great new 3D imagery they are adding. There is 11,000 tours available covering 110 countries!

• California's National Parks are now available in Street View
• Walking directions made its way in Google Maps for Africa
• In the latest Google Maps for Android, you now get indoor maps of 20 popular museums, added to the 10,000 other indoor maps they already provided
• Related, there's an entry on going indoors at locations across the United Kingdom
• There is new 45° imagery available for 31 cities including 26 cities in the U.S. and 5 international locations
• Google also offers an entry on Map Makerpedia, their community tool for Google Map Maker (but you already know I prefer OpenStreetMap, for openness reasons)

Before tomorrow's event, here's the recent Google-related geonews.

From official sources:

• Google launched Google+ Local, "a simple way to discover and share local information featuring Zagat scores and recommendations from people you trust in Google+"

• There's New 45° imagery available for 26 cities:
  • US: Albany, GA (outskirts); Atascocita, TX; Clarksville, TN; Columbia, MO; Corpus Christi, TX; Fayetteville, NC; Fort Collins, CO; Fort Smith, AR; Greensboro, NC; Jackson, TN; Lafayette, LA; Plaquemine, LA; Pueblo, CO; Santa Fe, NM; Texarkana, AR; Tyler, TX
  • International: Bern, Switzerland; Cracow, Poland; Dublin, Ireland; Gdansk, Poland; Lugo, Spain; Ourense, Spain; Poznan, Poland; Warsaw, Poland; Wroclaw, Poland; Zurich, Switzerland
• You can now Explore historic sites with the World Wonders Project
• There's now Street View data over the Indianapolis Motor Speedway
• And if you're in Europe instead, Explore the football stadiums of Poland and Ukraine as they prepare to host the European Championships
• If you're a fan of bridges in the U.S., check out this entry named Band of Bridges: Celebrating the Golden Gate Anniversary

From other sources:

• Here's tonight's Transit of Venus in Google Earth
• Nate Irwin shares an entry named Google imposing more restrictions on Google Maps API, and since he mentions "For example, you are not permitted to: (i) use or provide any part of the Service or Content (such as map imagery, geocoding, directions, places, or terrain data) in an API that you offer to others", I wonder what it means for OpenLayers and other similar tools?
• Here's a SearchEngineLand article named Google Places Is Over, Company Makes Google+ The Center Of Gravity For Local Search
• You will see mostly talk and no actual demo, but here's Sergey Brin Demos Google Glasses Prototype
• The GEB shares an entry named How Google Earth is being used by the Philippine National Police
• Another rumors going in the same direction, Apple Replacing Google Maps On iOS With Its Own Solution Later This Year
• The GEB shares the incredible 3D buildings of Istanbul, Turkey

• And of course, there was new imagery too

Some pretty interesting Google geonews in batch mode.

From official sources:

• Google announced Photo tours in Google Maps: "Photo tours are available for more than 15,000 popular sites around the world [...] To produce these photo tours, we use advanced computer vision techniques to create a 3D experience from public, user-contributed Picasa and Panaromio photos."
• The new 3D buildings announced last month are now available in Google MapsGL
• There's new 45° imagery available for 19 cities, International: Avignon, France; Reus, Spain; Rotterdam, Netherlands; L'Alcudia, Spain; Gandia, Spain; Sueca, Spain; Burgos, Spain; Los Palacios Y Villafranca, Spain, US: Albany, GA; Omaha, NE; Baytown, TX; Miami, FL; Amarillo, TX; Monroe, LA; Manchester, NH; Alexandria, LA; Rapid City, SD; Loudon, TN; Farmington, NM
• Street View is now available in Ukraine

From other sources:

• It's James that made me aware that the Google Maps game 'Maps Cube' is available, I couldn't test it yet on the Linux machine in front of me. Here's how James describes it: "Basically you use your mouse to tilt a 3D cube and have a ball travel down the transportation networks (road, trails, subways, etc). Since we in GIS all know about topology in these networks, the game isn’t as hard as you might expect. Still it’s a pretty amazing example of using HTML + WebGL for web mapping." APB also links to a short PC Mag article on the Maps Cube Game.
• The GEB shares an update on the impressive Data Appeal visualization tool for Google Earth
• Slashdot also ran the story named Google Releases FCC Report On Street View Probe
• If you want analysis of Trimble's acquisition of SketchUp from Google, read more from the GEB, from Spatial Sustain,
• Here's Plymouth, Michigan in 3D
• And to end with something funny, here's UFO Sightings in Google Earth

Google is clearly one of the most news-generating entity in the geospatial industry. Here's the recent Google-related geonews.

From official sources:

• Google now uses live traffic data alongside with historical data  for trip durations in Google Maps, they use the My Location feature on Google Maps for Android to extrapolate live traffic conditions. This news was also discussed over Slashdot
• And if that isn't enough, we now get typical traffic for roads, not just highways
• Here are the finalists for the Google Model Your Town Competition 2012
• Google Maps for Android got a fresh look with version 6.5
• Google released the Google Maps Floor Plan Marker app, to help orient customer in businesses 
• Mix art and Street View and you get the Google Art Project
• You can now see service alerts for the London Underground in Maps
• Traffic and Transit Come to Google Maps in Malaysia
• And there's new 45° imagery available for 15 cities: US: Atlanta, GA; Canyon Lake, TX; Charleston, SC; Dallas, TX; Houston, TX; Lakeland, FL; Lubbock, TX; Orlando, FL; Port Charlotte, FL; Roanoke, TX; San Luis Obispo, CA; Smyrna, TN; Walker, LA. International: Adelaide, Australia; Cordoba, Argentina
• The Weather Layer is now available in the Google Maps API

From other sources:

• The GEB found out about the latest imagery update in Google Earth yesterday
• The GEB also shares an entry named Exposing Shantytowns in India with Google Earth

Here's the recent Google-related geonews.

From the official sources:

• Two days ago was announced Google Earth 6.2 for Android and iOS, which includes support for KML files and the Google Earth Gallery is available from within the app
• There's new 45° imagery available for 56 cities: 23 U.S. and 33 international locations
• There's New Satellite Imagery of Japan’s Disaster Areas in Google Maps
• There was an official entry named Google and Historypin launch online gallery to celebrate The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee
• And if you feel like it, you can explore San Francisco in 1938 through aerial photography in Google Earth
• And finally, an entry on protecting the world’s coral reefs through mapping

From other sources:

• Thierry links to an article about a new section of the Great Wall of China discovered in Mongolia thanks to Google Earth
• Ogle Earth answers the question whether Google is showing India’s Assam state as part of China or not, and the answer is 'no'
• Spatial Sustain has a short entry on Google Street View images on ski slopes

Here's the recent Google geonews.

From the official sources:

• Here's the 3-minutes launch video of Google Earth Builder at the Google Geo summit, I like it when Ed Parsons says "Geospatial technologies is moving away from [...] the specialist, it's now available to everyone", since you're reading Slashgeo, you probably are a specialist, should we be afraid or is this just our jobs' natural evolution?
• There's new 45° imagery available for 16 cities: "Europe: Caceres, Spain; Graz, Austria; Montreux, Switzerland; Zurich, Switzerland; US: Bakersfield, CA; Boise, ID; Canton, OH; Centennial, CO; Columbia, SC; Davenport, IA; Des Moines, IA; Enumclaw, WA; Grand Rapids, MI; Kansas City, KS/MO; Lawrence, KS; Los Angeles, CA; Merced, CA; New Orleans, LA; Omaha, NE; Payson, UT; Portland, OR; Springfield, MO; St. Louis, MO; The Woodlands, TX;"
• There's new StreetView imagery of the Swiss Alps, taken from railways
• The tool that allows you to get notified when new imagery is available, Follow Your World, is now available in 43 new languages
• We've been invited to Explore the history of Mexico with Google Earth

From other sources:

• The GEB shares the location of the Turkey earthquake and Gaddafi's death
• The GEB also describe YoubeQ, a 3D social network using the Google Earth plugin: "YoubeQ puts you on a Segway to drive around the globe, with the option to quickly teleport to any location that you wish to visit. You can click on other users to chat with them, collect stamps as you travel the globe, and it has a variety of other features (with many more coming)."
• A week ago the same site offered an entry on what Google Earth can do for responding to the Thailand Floods
• Here's a round-up of the great (American) Football resources in Google Earth
• If you have interest in it, here's how to tweak the Google Earth Flight Simulator
• Last Wednesday, there was new imagery released to Google Maps / Earth

Here's the recent geonews in batch mode. As we can see by the lower number of stories shared recently, a lot of people are on holidays.

From the open source front:

• In an entry on GIS salary results, GeoChalkboard mentioned that after Esri software at 93%, open source GIS came second at 14% as their primary platform
• Two entries on QGIS, one on the upcoming massive improvements to raster performance and the second the upcoming new hatching modes

From the Esri front:

• If you like betas, ArcGIS 10.1 Beta 1 is now available

From the Google front:

• Google offers new 45° imagery for 35 cities: "Augsburg, Germany. Barstow, CA. Bartlett, TX. Big Bear, CA. Blackstone, VA. Catalina Foothills, AZ. Córdoba, Spain. Delano, CA. Desert Hot Springs, CA. Richmond, VA. Elgin, TX. Healdsburg, CA. Helendale, CA. Hemet, CA. Houston, TX. Mendoza, Argentina. Midlothian, VA. Napa Valley, CA. New Braunfels, TX. Ojai, CA. Ottawa, Canada. Pensacola, FL. Porterville, CA. Plant City, FL. Rancho Del Lago, AZ. Rosario, Argentina. Santa Clarita, CA. Sarasota, FL. Taylor, TX. Temecula, CA. Treasure Island, CA. Troy, IL. Twentynine Palms, CA. Wakefield, VA. Yucca Valley, CA."
• I also liked this example, using Google Earth to preview what you'll see from your seats at a Paul McCartney show

From the Microsoft front:

• We mentioned Microsoft exposing the location of PCs and devices,  they took action and their wifi location database isn't publicly available anymore

In the miscellaneous category:

• APB mentions tablets in grocery stores using RFID to provide location-based information, and instant deals, to shoppers
• C3 Technologies has been acquired by an unknown but presumably big company, they focus on generating impressive 3D  "maps" from aerial imagery, such as this example in Oslo
• Slashdot reports that working UAV aircrafts can be built by 3D printers within minutes
• V1 mentions GeoHive, a website offering world statistics on various themes, including population, and India will surpass China in population pretty soon

In the maps category:

• SS mentions that the online CORONA Atlas of the Middle East, based on spy imagery from 1968-1972, is now available  
• O'Reilly mentions the oldest surviving map of Great Britain, from the 14th century, now digitized. Also for the same region, there's a new Great British Picnics maps

Here's the recent Google-related geonews.

From the official sources:

• Google shared yesterday another entry on the resources for those affected by the Japan earthquake and tsunami, including a mapping section
• The Google Maps APIs over SSL is now available to all
• The Google Maps API now supports oblique imagery at 45 degrees, there's also a map to show you where in the world oblique imagery is available
• The official LatLong blog have an entry on the map-related coverage of the U.S. basketball games

From other sources:

• The GEB offers its own list of resources for post-Earthquake Japan
• There's new imagery in Google Earth since yesterday, bringing updates in mote than ten countries
• And there are tools to preview your hotel room with Google Earth

Here's recent Google Geonews.

From the official sources:

• There's new oblique imagery for several U.S. cities in Google Maps
• There's an obligatory entry named Haiti, one year after the earthquake
• Google offers an entry named Rebuilding L’Aquila in 3D with Google SketchUp, referring to the April 2009 earthquake in Italy
• You can now Discover New Places From Your Hotpot Friends on Google Maps, and the related iOS new feature, Google Places with Hotpot for iPhone
• Google is proposing Map Maker to build a better map of Southern Sudan, OpenStreetMap efforts for Sudan doesn't seem very active
• In the Augmented Reality realm, Google Goggles gets improved and can even solve your Sudoku

From other sources:

• Via Ogle Earth, we learn from Google that there is now 800 million Google Earth 'activations', that's a very significant amount. In August 2009, they we are 500M, up from 400M in July 2008. How is that calculated? See this 2008 entry
• The GEB has an entry on viewing SketchUp models in your hand with augmented reality
• Here's the USCG MISLE public database in Google Earth, MISLE standing for 'Marine Information for Safety and Law Enforcement'