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Important GIS applications

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 10:04:33 +0000

Geographic Information System (GIS) has been widely used in real estate, geographic mapping, remote sensing, cartography and so much more. More recently, this application has been used to solve problems involving natural and man made disasters.

Anyone who has access to computers can use free softwares such as Bing and Google Maps. The public can gain access to worldwide data which just a click of a button.

Here are some other important applications of GIS:

Used to study climate change.
Earthquake mapping
business marketing techniques; get demographic data
analyze census data
provide aid in research
allows government to map out jobs based on location
for security and law enforcement
urban planning and development
natural resource mapping
technology tools for education (geography science and mathematics)

Source: Practical Application of geographic information system by Adriana A. Norton

There are so many other important GIS applications. If you would like to add more to the list, please feel free to give us a comment below.

How to create a free business listing using Google places

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 09:43:19 +0000

Google Latlong blog released its first installment on how you can effectively set up a business listing via Google Places. This is vital especially for local business owners who are aiming to reach potential customers. First on the list is forming business listing titles.

Here are the simple steps that you can follow. (Taken from Google Lat Long)

1. Claim your business listing

2. Enter exact name of business

3. Enter information in proper format

Company/Organization:
Street Address:
City/Town and Postal Code:
Main Phone:
Website:

4. Ensure that the title of your business reflects the exact name of your company. Avoid unnecessary additions otherwise your account might be suspended.

GOOGLE PLACE QUALITY GUIDELINES:

Ownership

Only business owners or authorized representatives may verify their business listings on Google.

Business Name

Represent your business exactly as it appears in the offline world. The name on Google should match the business name, as should the address, phone number and website.
Do not attempt to manipulate search results by adding extraneous keywords or a description of your business into the business name.
Do not include phone numbers or URLs in the business name.

Physical Location

Do not create listings at locations where the business does not physically exist.
PO Boxes do not count as physical locations.
Do not create more than one listing for each business location, either in a single account or multiple accounts.
Businesses that operate in a service area as opposed to a single location should not create a listing for every city they service. Service area businesses should create one listing for the central office of the business only.
Businesses with special services, such as law firms and doctors, should not create multiple listings to cover all of their specialties.
The precise address for the business must be provided in place of broad city names or cross-streets.
A property for rent is not considered a place of business. Please create one listing for the central office that processes the rentals. If you'd like, you can add your real estate properties to Google Maps so that they are available on our Real Estate layer.

URL & Phone

Provide a phone number that connects to your individual business location as directly as possible. For example, you should provide an individual location phone number in place of a call center.
Provide one URL that best identifies your individual business location.
Do not provide phone numbers or URLs that redirect or 'refer' users to other landing pages or phone numbers other than those of the actual business.

Custom Attributes & Description

Use the description and custom attribute fields to include additional information about your listing. This type of content should never appear in your business's title, address or category fields.
Please see this page of Google Places User Guide for examples of acceptable custom attributes.

Best Practices

Use standard capitalization & punctuation, unless your business name or address in the real world contains unusual capitalization & punctuation.
Use a shared, business email account, if multiple users will be updating your business listing.
If possible, use an email account with a domain that matches your business URL. For example, if your business website is www.giraffetoys.com, a matching email address would be you@giraffetoys.com.

For more information visit Google Places.

How to use Google Latitude the easier way

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 10:59:48 +0000

Location location location. This is not just an important factor in Real Estate but nowadays, sharing your location is becoming more common. Now Google latitude gives you the location information you need through your mobile phones and computers.

Not everybody uses smartphones so Google made a desktop iGoogle gadget to help you connect with all of your friends. Here are the simple and easy steps:

1. Go to the dedicated website.

2. On the Friends tab you can see your friends' location on Google Maps, accept requests and choose privacy setting.

3. Proceed to History or Apps tab to turn on optional tabs.

For more information visit Google Mobile and get started!

First Ever Aerial Imagery Marks its 150th birthday

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 10:31:52 +0000

James Wallace Black took the first aerial picture in the United States 150 years ago. The image entitled "Boston as the Eagle and the Wild Goose See It," proves to be beautiful as it was taken more than a hundred years ago. Since then, aerial imagery has changed the lives of the entire human race. From using balloons 1,200 ft in the air to high tech and advanced aero and satellite technology, imageries have become far more accurate to date. Geoint is celebrating its birthday and as Boston Globe said, this is an occasion worth celebrating.

Check out this amazing video comparing Boston 1860 to Boston today.

The photo is archived at the venerable Boston Public Library. Most of the structures from this picture were wiped out by the Great Fire of 1872.

Google Earth 5's Historical Imagery Feature

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 10:36:28 +0000

How does historical imagery feature in Google Earth 5 works? Do you know that the newest imageries in Google Earth are available through this feature? Are the images "good enough?"

How to use it:

1. Launch Google Earth 5

2. Click on the clock icon or View>Historical Imagery

3. Choose images through time slider

As easy as that! You can see the developments (through the years) right in front of your eyes as seen from the video above. Some images may not show great quality because of certain factors like weather but still it is worth your time. So go ahead and try it out!

How many times does google update imagery?

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 10:16:04 +0000

One common question that pops up in forums regarding Google Earth is how often Google Earth updates its imageries to retain accuracy. According to the Google Earth Blog, Google usually updates imageries twice a month (around the 6th and 20th). However updates do not cover the whole world.

The next question is, which portion of the globe gets updated? Google reveals that a small portion of the world gets updated. If your area is more or less three years old, it is quite likely that Google is updating the images already. There is no definite answer on which area will be updated next except for major worldwide disasters that need immediate imagery update. (Haiti earthquake, Pakistan flooding)

If you want to get the freshest imageries, you can use historical imagery.

Hope this post answers some of your questions. For more information Frank from Google Earth Blog made a more detailed post that you might want to check out. Click here.

HOW TO USE GOOGLE MAPS TO INCREASE BUSINESS EXPOSURE

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 06:58:44 +0000

So you have a website that's been sitting in the virtual web for so long but your business doesn't seem to be progressing. You might ask yourself, "What have I been doing wrong?" Have you tried using Google Maps?

There are several steps that you can take to ensure that your business gets the exposure that it deserves. A great article from Mashable discusses how easy it is to use the Google Maps service. Here are some excerpts.

1. Check whether your business is already listed on Google Maps.

2. Add information about your business. Start with name, address, phone number, website, hours of operation and which payment options you accept. Then you can upload photos directly or videos via Youtube.

3. Offer Coupons and advertise

4. Measure your success

For the full article click here.

Geofencing via Tasso Roumeliotis

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 09:22:15 +0000

Continuing with the Locations Business Summit USA 2010 talks, Tasso Roumeliotis CEO of Location Labs discussed the need of geofencing and its applications like safety, security and compliance.

Some of his key examples are (via Slashegeo.org):

Example 1: Verifying that a credit card purchase is taking place at the same location as the mobile device of the credit card user.

Example 2: Notifying a parent when a child’s mobile device has left the school grounds.

Example 3: Confirming that a user is within the State of Nevada before he is allowed to place a bet on his mobile device using a gambling application.

What is geofencing?

Geofencing is basically setting up a boundary around a geographic area based on the users location in relation to that fence

For more information related to Mr. Tasso you can follow him via Twitter.

Elevation for Maps API v3

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 08:41:21 +0000

You make me feel like I can fly
So high, elevation - U2

Nope, this entry is not about U2's song "Elevation." This is about a new feature that's been added to the Maps API this year: Elevation for Maps API v3.

The Elevation service allows you to obtain elevation for individual points, or sample elevation at equally spaced intervals along a path, such as that generated by the Directions service. - Thor Mitchell, Maps API Project Manager.

The developers also added the MaxZoom service to Flash that allows you to get the highest zoom level of available Satellite imagery on a specific location. A mandatory parameter, sensor for Maps API for Flash is needed for v1.19.

For more information, visit the Google Maps API for Flash Google Group.

10 Google Earth Myths Busted: A Must See!

mglv.27@gmail.com (Margaux) — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 08:24:47 +0000

If you are new to Google Earth you might have encountered a lot of online reviews. Beware, not all of them are true. According to Rich Traves of Google Earth Design blog, there are ten myth busting facts about Google Earth. Here are his list. (Taken directly from Rich's post)

1. You can make your own map in GEarth. You can add points, lines or areas to Google Earth marking anything you want.

2. Google Earth isn't just satellite images and roads. There are lots of sets of data (called 'layers' because they are like a layer of see through plastic that can be turned on or off at will) you can look at draped over the background imagery of Google Earth. Examples include ; weather, Panoramio photos and shipwreck locations (Layers > Ocean > Shipwrecks) . Some of these layers come on automatically when you use Google Earth, you can turn layers on or off in the layers column as you wish. To cut down screen clutter I usually turn everything off apart from terrain.

3. Any map you make in Google Earth is not visible to anyone else unless you publish it. Just because you write a document in Microsoft Word it doesn't mean Microsoft can see it, it's exactly the same with anything you create in Google Earth. Background elements such as satellite images, roads and town names provided by Google are visible to all but add elements to Google Earth yourself and only you can see them.

4. You can publish your own map without going through Google. The layers column (bottom left of the screen in Google Earth) is a selection of materials that Google think lots of people will find useful but if you want to publish your own map by emailing it to people, or putting it on your web page you can just do it without checking with Google first.

5. The satellite data in Google Earth is historic, i.e. its not imagery taken today. Usually its a pretty recent image taken in the last 3 years.

6. Google does not censor satellite imagery. I can't say this for certain but stories appearing about Google censorship in the press are usually a misunderstanding based on age of imagery or the fact that Google buys a lot of its images from other agencies who may be doing the censorship themselves. See this post for details.

7. You can use Google Earth offline. Google Earth stores the satellite images of areas you visit on your hard drive in a special folder called a cache. If you've visited London in Google Earth you can then disconnect from the web and use Google Earth to look at London some more. Google Earth will do this by loading the images back in from the cache. If you then fly to Paris and zoom in Google Earth will just show you a fuzzy mess because it can't download the new imagery to produce Paris on screen until you connect up to the web again. This is very useful for presentations using Google Earth at conferences where you can't rely on wifi.

8. You can tilt the view to see mountains in 3D. A couple of years ago it was a common misconception that Google Earth was just 2D, many users didn't know you couldn't tilt the camera view and see the landscape in 3D. I'm not sure its such a common misunderstanding any more.

How To: tick the terrain layer in the layers column if you can see one, if you can't, don't worry. Hold the shift key down and use the up and down arrows on your keyboard to tilt .

9. Google Earth is not a security threat. Lots of scare stories have gone around about terrorists using Google Earth to plan attacks or thieves using it to set up robberies and that Google Earth should therefore be turned off or censored (see 6 above). It may be true that Google Earth is a tool for enemies of society but there are two main arguments against censoring Google Earth; firstly, satellite imagery has been available for sale to all comers for years before the appearance of Google Earth - if your security system relies on people not being able to see dated satellite imagery of your house, military instillation or city then it's never been very good security. Secondly, cars, mobile phones and pens are all used by terrorists and thieves, are we going to ban them too?

10. You can use Google Earth to explore other Planets, the Sky and History.Google Earth has lots of other features people users are usually unaware of, for example, you can use it to explore the surface of Mars, the Moon and the night sky. It also can be used to show historic imagery.

Do you have any comments or violent reactions? Feel free to give us your insights so we can add them to the list above.