Super Maps for the 21st Century

Roland Piquepaille writes "After five years of trials, Craig Knoblock and his team at the Information Sciences Institute of the University (ISI) of Southern California, have developed Heracles Maps, an easy-to-use laptop package to optimize routes in the whole world for both military and business travelers. This news release, "A SuperMap for Soldiers -- Or Business Travelers," says that the application integrates various sources of geospatial information, such as satellite imagery of mapping data. From this data, soldiers can easily find a safe route between two locations without being seen or shot from an enemy in another location. this package can easily be adapted to civilian applications, such as a powerful travel planner. You'll find more details and references in this overview."

Comments

sed time

[grub]

s/soldiers/invaders/g

fast notebook?

[Tolar]

The main challenge was, the scientist earlier wrote, that information "obtained from various data sources may have different projections, different accuracy levels, and different inconsistencies. The applications that integrate information from various geospatial data sources must be able to overcome these inconsistencies accurately, in real-time and for large regions."

i wonder what kind of notebook u need for that? Athlon 64 ?

Re:fast notebook?

[jackb_guppy]

So much for hidding from IR detection...

OK, I "see" them.

No, they do not appear to locals. With that heat bloom, they are using using XXY Notebook, with AMD 64, 250G harddrive...

Oh, there is 802.11A signal, must have just rebooted...

That is it, Windows XP! They are NOT locals. NOT LOCALS! The locals in this area use SuSE.

In the future dads all over the world will say...

[jwcorder]

"Damn you super maps! Now I am super lost!"

Some restrictions apply

[Anonymous Coward]

All invading armies will have to make connections in Charlotte and a Saturday stopover is required.

One question...

[Hiro Antagonist]

Do you turn them on by saying, "I solemnly swear I am up to no good." -- ?

Who cares about soldiers and businessmen...

[coleslawjoe]

we need to give these maps to the workers of the postal service.

Then, perhaps, I could get my mail on time.

Soldiers or Business Travellers

[mabu]

Given the current state of things, isn't that redundant?

Re:Uhh, what if both sides have the product?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not a problem if you have version 6.00.2800.1409, and the enemy only has 6.00.2800.1277. J00 0wn3z d3m!

Make sure you turn off/mute the assistant! Hearing "You appear to be trying a sneak-attack.." from the bushes always causes bad reactions from people.

Civilian application?

[jellybear]

"From this data, soldiers can easily find a safe route between two locations without being seen or shot from an enemy in another location."

So, will the civilian version make it so that, from this data, drivers can easily find a safe route between two locations without being seen or pulled over from a pig in another location?

Re:Travelling saleman problem?

[Everleet]

But this is a travelling salesman problem:

to optimize routes in the whole world for ... business travelers.

</bad joke>

Best map

[nebaz]

I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.

Re:Um...great?

[SEWilco]

There's a flip side to this. If one side uses software to determine a transit route, the other side can use the same software to guess where enemy combatants might try to transit. Position dusters, quad 50's and claymores as appropriate and remember that the side marked FRONT TOWARD ENEMY points away from you.

So, knowing the enemy would know the recommended path, and that is where the enemy will be sending troops to set the traps, send troops or munitions to hit the trappers.

Of course, troops sent to trap the trappers have to be wary that the trappers would know they would be hunted and would have set traps for the trapper trappers.

Supermap instructions

[eric.t.f.bat]

Remember: this package is voice operated. To start it up you must say "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good". And to shut it down, say "Mischief managed".