Google Maps introduces some nifty new features for its users in the form of Labs (as in their famous Gmail Labs). The new features are accessible on the toolbar on the top right of the screen, labeled as “New” (look like this: 
). There are many features for all map geeks available, including Drag and Zoom (allows you to draw a rectangle on the screen to zoom in it), Aerial Imagery (a much finer resolution imagery than satellite), Rotation (rotates the map, making up South or East), and others. My favorite one is of course the option to introduce the Beta label to Google Maps, for those that suffer from nostalgia.
Feb 12
Dec 21
MapChat 2
MapChat 2, a wonderful spatial mapping web-based application has been publicly released. This tool enables spatial discussions to enhance the production of local knowledge and public discourse. A demo version is set up for users, so go ahead and give it a spin. There are many features in this release, documented below.
Oct 23
Oct 16
According to Chris Pendleton of Bing Maps, the new Digital Globe WorldView-2 satellite has been launched with probably some funding from Microsoft. The satellite will capture imagery of the Earth that will eventually end up in Bing Maps. The first image has seem to have been returned, and Chris promises data updates to Bing Maps in the near future. To view imagery from the launch, visit their public gallery on SkyDrive. Congratulations to the Bing Maps developers for this wonderful news they are giving us. Here is a quote from Chris:
[..] our Bing logo is floating in the ocean evangelizing to scuba divers [..]
Oct 13
According to the Google GeoDevelopers Blog, the Google Maps API now supports multiple languages (list here). There is no need for developers to do anything, Google will simply translate all map controls based on the location of the user (geo-ip location). Wonderful news for all of you travelers which will end up seeing the local language at your location rather than the language you speak. Google does offer a way to define a specific language, but is that enough?
Oct 08
As mentioned on the Google Geo Blog yesterday, as well as by James Fee in his blog, Google’s spatial offerings (Google Maps and soon Google Earth I assume) will include comprehensive parcel data that has been collected somehow from Google. While the Geo Blog entry is sparse, there is a mention of the “Report a Problem” link added to maps, allowing users to make suggestions (and perhaps corrections) to the data served by Google. What many people have noted is that the copyright notice in the United States has changed, and now the notice reports as a copyright holder Google.
Oct 06
There is been some discussion over the internet about ESRI’s decision to drop Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) support after the ArcGIS version 9.4 release. There are blog entries about why this shouldn’t happen, so I decided it is time to introduce an entry on why it should go, and what you can do about it. Continue reading »
Sep 26
Paolo Corti has a very fascinating article I just stumbled upon on how to use PostGIS geometries with ArcSDE in 9.3. Head over to his website for the fascinating article detailing 4 different methods of using PostGIS with ArcGIS.
