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October 22, 2005
Geocaching.com Officially Supports Google Earth
Geocaching.com has finally released an official network link for supporting Google Earth. The network link lets you browse the Earth in Google Earth and will automatically reveal the Geocaches nearby. This is a VERY cool feature!
If you read my earlier story about the company stifling innovation (because someone wrote a network link to allow convenient searching of Geocaches) this new link is the reason. Groundspeak (the company which runs Geocachng.com) has done a good job with their own implementation of the network link. Except, right now it is kind of difficult to find the network link on their web site.
Here are instructions for ...
Here are instructions for getting the Google Earth network link for Geocaching.com: You have to have at least the free basic account on Geocahing.com, log-in and click on "My Account". In the lower-right of the page under "Google Mapping Features" click on "Download Geocache browser in Google Earth". This will download the network link into Google Earth (assuming you have GE installed).
Once you have the network link downloaded, you will see "Geocaching Network KML" in your Places folder. I recommend you move it from the "Temporary Places" to your "My Places" folder for safekeeping. Next, just zoom somewhere in the world below 500 miles out, pause a few seconds, and you will see geocaches for that view. Groundspeak has made nice looking placemarks for the different types of geocaches. If you click on a placemark you get a brief description and a link to the cache page with all the details, or you can bookmark it for future reference at the web site.
This is a highly useful capability (read the things you can do with this in my first geocaching story). I"m glad Groundspeak is officially supporting this capability. By the way, I'm told you are limited to 150 caches in a view and can only refresh the network link 200 times in a day. You also are able to download a static KML for a specific cache.
Posted by FrankTaylor at October 22, 2005 02:13 PM
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Geocaching.com Officially Supports Google Earth:
» Geocaching.com now also offers Google Earth support from Ogle Earth
One of the original Google Earth hacks, a network link for geocaches on geocaching.com by Andy Fowler, was taken down in September at the behest of geocaching.com's owners. The reason? Geocaching now has its own network link up. You have... [Read More]
Tracked on October 22, 2005 04:34 PM
Comments
Posted by: Iain Thompson at October 24, 2005 05:15 AM
Hi Iain,
after 'signing' the license, you should (instead of tracing Back) click again 'My Account' and at that time "Download Geocache browser in Google Earth" will link directly to the kml file, which will open in Google Earth
Posted by: Michal at October 26, 2005 04:22 PM
It worked for me except that I see only drawing pins instead of the usual geocaching placemarks.
Posted by: Stavvy at January 27, 2008 06:07 AM
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In the lower-right of the "My Account" page under "Google Mapping Features" click on "Download Geocache browser in Google Earth".
This took me to Geocahing's 'Groundspeak - Waypoint Downloads' page at http://www.geocaching.com/kml/buildnetworkkml.aspx which pointed me to the Groundspeak License Agreement at http://www.geocaching.com/waypoints/agreement.aspx?ID=-1
I agreed to the agreement and it said 'Thank-you'.
I retraced my tracks back to the lower-right of the "My Account" page under "Google Mapping Features" clicked again on "Download Geocache browser in Google Earth".
I then started the same loop as above - no sign of any kml file yet.
When I have some more time to spare I may try again.