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January 03, 2008
Is it 2008 Already?
While most of you were welcoming the new year, I was laid up with the flu and barely able to get out of bed. But, I'm finally on the mend, so I thought I would get a blog post or two out today. Here are some links to interesting GE content/news:
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Dragging Directions for Google Earth - A few months ago, Google released the very cool feature allowing you to intuitively grab your directions and re-direct your route to get it to go the way you want. That feature still isn't available in Google Earth, but Barry Hunter has written a cool little program that lets you grab the directions you create in Google Mpas, and view it in Google Earth. That way, you can use the 3D terrain and faster rendering to get a better feel for your route. After creating a route in Google Maps, simply go to the "Link to this page" and copy the link, then go to Barry's multi-destination routing in KML web page and paste the link. Then click on the "Get it now" button and you get a KML file back to view it in Google Earth.
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Clear Skies - Stefan at OgleEarth has discovered a very cool map mashup for those of us who enjoy looking at the night skies. Clear Sky Clock uses numerical meteorological data from the Canadian Meteorological Centre to predict when in the next 48 hours you might have good seeing conditions for areas in North America. And, as Stefan points out, you can get the resulting map in KML also so you can view it in Google Earth. Next time I get my telescope out, I will definitely try this out.
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Google Earth Multi-touch Screen - It appears Google Earth will be the application everyone will use to show off their new multi-touch screens when they first introduce them. Check out this story from engadget and you can see how sexy Google Earth looks on this large 52-inch screen. Try to look at the screen, not the show girl demonstrating it.
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Alaska Oil Field Development - Joey Wade has posted a KML file
showing the growth of Oil Field development in Alaska (particularly highlighting the area of the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge) from 1899 through 2050. His post also provides some other interesting data about the issues of oil consumption out-running the availability of oil.
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Chile Border Problem Fixed - Last April the news media picked up that some officials in Chile were upset because the border between Chile and Argentina showed a town of historical importance to Chile was showing up in Argentina instead of Chile. In one of the recent layer updates to GE, Google has improved the border and it now shows Villa O'Higgins on the right side of the border.
Posted by FrankTaylor at January 3, 2008 09:29 AM
Comments
Posted by: Kevin at January 3, 2008 06:17 PM
The touch screen on the tv is cool. I have a SMART Board in my geography classroom that I use to teach with. The students love using Google Earth on the SMART Board to show various regions of the world.
Posted by: shippyj at January 3, 2008 11:04 PM
You and me both on being sickly through the holidays, though I was fortunate enough not to catch anything seriously uncomfortable. World View 1 imagery was a priority as well, which is why I haven't been around much lately.
I do like what Joey Wade's up to -- it wouldn't be a bad thing by any stretch to see more of these types of datasets out there, what with the focus on the primaries this year, which there is an entire year of opportunity to make these issues more widely known. Afterall -- it is our future.
Posted by: Daniel at January 7, 2008 03:03 AM
Why can't I get picture that is not fuzzy in other word it is just a blurr.
What am I doing wrong
Posted by: Patrick Smith at January 13, 2008 06:35 PM
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On a similiar note to this, Google recently updated the 26 county borders in ireland. They did a great job and they are accurate to within a 100 metres or so. However they made County Meath (pronounced Meade)which is just north of Dublin "Coastless". Our 10 kilometres of sandy beach and our coastal villages have apparently been subsumed into one of our neighbouring countys. I reported it (twice) but its been like that for about 3 months now. We want our beach back!