Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Mapping Google Maps

Posted by timothy on from the topography dept.

jgwebber writes "Google Maps is starting to cause a bit of a stir as Google makes the browser do still more backflips than most expected. In the tradition of dissecting Google Suggest and GMail, I've done a little dissecting of this newest service."

9 of 442 comments (clear)

  1. Re:what about plotting waypoints on the map? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Have you tried usaphotomaps from JDMCOX?

    USAPhotoMaps downloads aerial photo and topo map data from Microsoft's free TerraServer Web site, saves it on your hard drive, and creates seamless maps from it. You can:
    1. See the latitude/longitude
    2. Add waypoints, routes, and text
    3. Jump to any waypoint or latitude/longitude in the U.S.A.
    4. Transfer waypoints, tracks, and routes to and from most GPS receivers
    5. See your GPS location
    6. Scroll and zoom

    And it's free.

  2. Re:Old info by networkBoy · · Score: 3, Informative

    It fairly successfully mapped Folsom, CA to Wilsey, KS which is not on many maps. It even has the friggen farm roads in it's database!

    I love how you can clock on a waypoint in the directions and it pops up a bubble window in the main map with a closeup detail!
    -nB

    --
    whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
  3. Re:backflips? by TedTschopp · · Score: 4, Informative

    Trust me, getting PNG transparancy / Alpha Channel support in IE is a backflip.

    --
    Fantasy remains a human right; we make in our measure and in our derivative mode... -- JRR Tolkien
  4. It's just an expression.. by JPelorat · · Score: 3, Informative

    A metaphor for accomplishing a difficult or complex task that the object or system generally wasn't thought of as capable of doing.

    Settle down, Beavis.

    --
    Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
  5. Re:Google + DOM = Mozilla Juggernaut by ad0gg · · Score: 4, Informative

    You forgot to thank Microsoft for going outside of the standards and implementing XMLHttpRequest in IE5.0. Got so popular everyone started copying it. You see how gmail and google maps can change the content page without loading up a new page? Thats XMLHttpRequest, non standardized browser object.

    --

    Have you ever been to a turkish prison?

  6. RTFA by j3thr0 · · Score: 4, Informative

    Google Maps is using a hidden iframe to send messages back and forth

    --
    I'm schizophrenic; no I'm not.
  7. Re:Still doesn't work with Safari by Em+Adespoton · · Score: 3, Informative

    The problem isn't with javascript, it's with XSLT. If you read the article, you'll notice that the XML transforms are done using XSLT -- and Safari is currently the only browser I've used that doesn't support XSLT. Supposedly it will be in the next version of Safari, so it looks like Google has decided to use it now, and let the browser catch up, instead of using an older technology hack. I hope this provides some incentive for the Safari team to get XSLT working soon, as I have a number of projects that depend on it. http://www.plattiblog.com/2004/08/16.html seems to hint that there has been some progress.

  8. Re:Safari support by prockcore · · Score: 4, Informative

    it is too bad that even Google can't get a webpage to render properly on any modern browser, such as Safari.

    Safari doesn't support XSLT. It's not google's fault that Safari is behind even IE6 in this respect.

  9. Re:what about plotting waypoints on the map? by fishicist · · Score: 3, Informative

    Multimap here in the UK does a good job of combining maps with aerial photographs. It even overlays a transparancy of the map.

    The photos are at least a few years old, but it's still pretty, if not particularly useful.