GE Plugin

Google Earth drone control

September 24, 2014

After our post on drones, GEB reader Satyen Sarhad (creator of Geoception that we looked at back in 2012), pointed us to a couple of Ground Control Station systems for drones that make excellent use of the Google Earth plugin.

Open source software HappyKillmore’s Ground Control Station is focused on being easy to use and working well on low resolution screens. The primary purpose of the software appears to be to monitor a drone in flight. It displays the data that is received from the drone on the various instruments displayed and also shows the position, attitude and path of the drone in the Google Earth plugin display. You can also download a number of 3D models of drones for use in the software. It can show a live video feed from the drone. Although it can be used to set up a mission with way points, it doesn’t appear to allow direct manual control of the drone.

Chase Camera view

Above: HappyKillmore’s Ground Control Station in action.

Another YouTube video with a vertical perspective showing the flight path can be found here.

Open source project QGroundControl allows you to create a mission by setting way-points by clicking directly on the Google Earth plugin.

Above: QGroundControl Ground Control Station features.

Check out their website for more videos showing its capabilities.

Both programs make good use of the capabilities of the Google Earth plugin, including different perspectives, the ability to work offline and the ability to display 3D models. Also of note is that they use the plugin directly and are not dependent on web browser support, so they should continue to work even if web browsers start to drop support for the plugin.

Destiny – Google Street View in a game world

September 5, 2014

With our recent story on the possible demise of the Google Earth plugin – at least in the Chrome browser – it begs the question, what is currently possible with the Google Maps API?

Paul van Dinther of PlanetInAction.com, whose many great Google Earth Plugin creations we have featured over the years, is developing a new version of his ship simulator, Ships 2 Career, based on Google Maps. The previous version is based on the Google Earth plugin and is still available at PlanetInAction.com. You can get an idea of what the game will be like from this YouTube video.

Upcoming console game Destiny will be released in 3 days. Game developer Bungie, who also created Halo, has created a website showing the worlds of Destiny – Moon, Mars, and Venus.
Although the intro does give the illusion of a 3D experience reminiscent of Google Maps ‘Earth Mode’, the website is really much closer to Street View than the Google Earth plugin. The website says “created with Google Technologies”, and appears to be more sophisticated than simply using the Google Maps API.

The worlds of Destiny.

Street View on Venus! I think they used the ‘Trekker’ for this one.

Street View on the Moon, looks much more exciting than the Google Maps version.

64-bit Chrome drops support for Google Earth Plugin

September 3, 2014

We told you in July about the Chrome team’s announcement last year that they planned to remove NPAPI support from Chrome by the end of 2014. This includes the Google Earth plugin that uses NPAPI.

Last week, on Tuesday, August 26, 2014, Google released a 64-bit version of Chrome which does not support 32-bit NPAPI plugins, including the Google Earth plugin. I have tried out the new 64-bit Chrome and can confirm that the plugin does not work. It does let you try to install it, but to no avail. And there are no appropriate error messages, so presumably sites using the Google Earth plugin can expect an increase in support calls.

So, if your website uses the Google Earth plugin, what alternatives are available? Well, it seems that at present, there are not many. You can offer your data as KML files, which users can download and view in Google Earth. But then you lose all the benefits of embedding it in a web page, including all the functionality that the plugin’s JavaScript API allows. So although this might suffice for sites merely using the plugin to display data, for the majority of sites it will not do.

Google Maps now has ‘Earth Mode’, which allows you to view satellite imagery and tilt the view to see it in 3D. It is based on WebGL, which is the modern way to do things. But it is not yet a replacement for the Google Earth Plugin:

Its performance is terrible in comparison to the plugin.
It lacks the ability to display KMLs other than via a complicated route through Google Earth Engine – which requires a licence, except for very small data-sets.
Although Maps has a JavaScript API, it has very different functionality from the plugin’s API.
It does not show 3D models – only the new type of 3D imagery that consists of a single mesh.
Navigation is difficult, with less sophisticated controls than the plug-in.

It is likely, however, that improvements to the WebGL 3D in maps will be the way forward, although I have not seen any statements from Google as to what their plans for the future are.

Great sites like:

Google Earth Flight Simulater Online, which we told you about in 2009
A ship simulator from Planet in Action, which we also reported on in 2009.
Also from Planet in Action the Apollo 11 Moon Lander game that we told you about in 2009.
YoubeQ, a 3D social network in Google Earth we first featured in 2011 and they have been continually adding features since then.
A driving simulator from Frame Synthesis we showed you in 2012.

and many others we have talked about over the years, will be impossible to make without the Google Earth plugin.

Flight Simulator Online

youbeQ, a free multiplayer driving and flight simulator

So if you are still using a browser that works with the plugin, then try them out while you still can! [UPDATE by Frank Taylor: you can install the 64-bit version of Chrome and also still keep the 32-bit version of Chrome installed. So you can keep running the GE-plugin on Chrome. Or, you can run another compatible browser such as Firefox.]

Using Google Earth and goats to combat wildfires.

August 26, 2014

We have brought you many stories in the past involving Google Earth and wildfire. For example, stories about people and organizations using Google Earth to monitor wildfires in progress, coordinate rescue operations, map global fire data and simulate forest fires.

But, prevention is better than cure, so to take it a step further, here is a story about how Shea Broussard and business partner Tony Shafer created FlameMapper.

Using historical data of fire paths, they map out the ideal places to graze the goats so as to stop wildfires from spreading. They use the Google Earth plugin to display the map on their website and use GPS and the map to decide where to place electric fencing which is moved around to control where the goats graze. The electric fencing also helps to keep mountain lions from eating the goats, but despite this they have lost 5 goats to a local mountain lion over the last 2 years.

The site also shows the current location of the goats. They do not track the mountain lions….

Has it worked? According to Shane:

We have yet to have a big wildfire come through the community. We are about 2 years overdue for a wildfire when you look at the fire history.”

Carefully planned grazing is not the only thing they are doing to prevent fire, they are also planting lots of Oak trees.
Shane:

We are currently growing 12,000 Oak trees with the Los Angeles County Fire Department Forest Division. Oak trees simply reduce fire intensity. Reduced fire intensity can save lives.”

For more, watch this YouTube video by Smile TV or read this story

My sister is a farmer in Livingstone, Zambia, and she too uses goats for creating fire breaks. She doesn’t have anything as sophisticated as FlameMapper, but does use Google Earth and GPS for planning where to put the fire breaks.

The 100th anniversary of the start of World War I

July 28, 2014

Today marks the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I, and Erik Hellstedt at Geo-Animate.com has built an excellent visualization of the early stages of the war.

In Erik’s words:

Today marks the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I. Within a week, the world’s great powers had mobilized and begun sending their armies to the frontiers. This GE animation begins August 1st and follows the daily movements of each army’s units through October 31st, by which time a near-continuous belt of trenches along this Western Front prevented any significant movement for nearly four years. At the end of this War of Movement animation, there were already millions of war casualties and countless shattered communities.

He’s continuing to develop the project, but what he has completed so far is extraordinary. Check it out for yourself at www.geo-animate.com/War-of-Movement.

Great work, Erik!