Checking-In with Google Latitude

Google Latitude is a great location sharing application. It allows you to share your location with selected friends and to view your own location history.



Mark Laudon of Street View Funny has noticed a new feature in Latitude that I hadn't noticed before. If you select 'View and manage' from the 'History' tab you can now view an interactive graph of the distance that you travelled in any one day.



When you mouse-over the graph the map moves to your location at that time during the day and shows you the distance that you travelled. This is a pretty cool addition to the 'History' tab that lets you view your location history and provides some great statistics on how much time you spend at home, work and out & about.



The 'History' tab also keeps a record and displays a static map of all the countries that you have visited.



Google Latitude



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Google Latitude Does Coupons

If you check-in using Google Latitude you can now find great offers throughout the U.S..



If you use Google Latitude to check-in to venues you improve your 'status' at that location. If you improve your status at some venues you may find your loyalty is rewarded with check-in offers. From discounts to a free snack, check-in offers reward you for your custom.

Google Latitude has three status levels, Regular, VIP, and Guru. Venues however can also create their own status levels that they can reward visitors for achieving, with offers on Google Latitude.

Via: Google LatLong

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Latitude Gurus Battle Foursquare Mayors

Google Latitude

Google Latitude users can now earn offers when they use the service to check-in at different venues.

Google Latitude will reward users who regularly check-in to particular venues with 'Regular', 'VIP', or 'Guru' status. Your status at a particular venue could also earn you rewards in the form of offers that the venue has created for particular status levels.

For example, a cafe may give their Regulars a discount on a cup of coffee. You can find places where check-in offers are available in Google Maps for Android search results and Place pages. This means that you can check your Android phone for nearby offers before deciding which venues to visit.

Check-in offers are being launched in Austin this week but Google has plans to expand the service. You can learn more at google.com/mobile/checkin.

Via: Google LatLong

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Google Latitude Goes All Foursquare

Google Latitude has launched a number of new features that make it much easier for users to check-in at locations. When you open Latitude in your phone you can now view nearby venues and check-in.

To help you check-in at venues the updated Latitude includes:

• Notifications: Latitude will now notify you to check in at a nearby place once you arrive.
• Automatic check-ins: Add venues to your automatic check-ins and your phone will automatically check-in whenever you’re there. You don't have to lift a finger.
• Check out: Once you leave, Latitude knows to automatically check you out of places so friends aren’t left guessing if you’re still there.

Via: Google LatLong

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Google Latitude Just Got Interesting

Google Latitude

Google have revamped Google Latitude for the browser and added some very nice new features. Now you can view where your friends are and share your location from your desktop. You can also visualise your location history in some pretty cool ways.

Previously you have been able to use Google Latitude from your desktop via an iGoogle application but the new Google Latitude lets you view your friends current location on a large Google Map and also lets you view stats based on your location history.

The map shows your current location and the last check-ins of your Latitude friends. The history stats includes a breakdown of the number of hours you have spent at home, work and out and about. It shows you a map of all the countries you have visited and it lets you view an animation of your check-ins to Latitude for any defined time period.



The animation of your check-ins to Latitude on Google Maps (accessed by the 'view and manage' tab') is a very nice feature. It lets you replay your location for any day and shows the time and location for each time your location has been recorded by Latitude. You can also download the data in KML so there is great potential for Latitude users to create their own Google Map animations or heat maps of their recorded locations.

Google Latitude has definitely now become a lot more interesting.

Via: Google LatLong

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Using Google Latitude to Control Your House

Thermostat Control Based on Location and Weather

Hans Scharler has designed an automatic thermostat for his house that uses Google Latitude, WeatherBug, and ioBridge to control his heating based on his location and the weather.

Using Google Latitude on his Android phone Hans is able to control his thermostat automatically when he leaves his house or when he is coming home. Leaving home is relatively easy. Using Google Latitude his 'Location Aware Home Automation' system can turn off or enter power saving modes when it detects he is away from his house.

When he is returning home the system checks the weather using the Google Weather API and the WeatherBug API, and then checks his home temperature (via ioBridge) to see if the house needs to turn on the air conditioner, the heater, or neither.

If you want to try and replicate this Hans explained how he put this together on his I am Shadowlord blog.

Via: ReadWriteWeb

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Track Your Kids With Google Maps

ZenTracker

ZenTracker can track your child's location in real-time and send you messages if your child leaves a designated safe area. This child tracking application is built on top of the Google Maps and Google Latitude API's.

To keep track of your children your child's smartphone needs to be able to run Google Latitude. Google Latitude then keeps track of your child's location. ZenTracker regularly requests your child's geolocation from Google's servers. ZenTracker then checks the smartphone location against user-defined rules and sends you a notification if the location matches a specific rule, for example, your child has left a defined safe location.

Using ZenTracker users can define safe perimeters, such as the home or their school, so if a child leaves these areas a message will be sent to the parent.

Via: TechCrunch

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New Google Latitude API

Google Latitude API

Google have released an API for Google Latitude. Google Latitude is Google's location sharing service that let's you share your location and keep a location history. The new API lets you build applications using your location data and the location data of anyone who is willing to share that data with you.

Google have suggested a few ideas of the kind of applications you could build with the API:

• Thermostats that turn on and off automatically when you’re driving towards or away from home.
• Traffic that send alerts if there’s heavy traffic ahead of you or on a route you usually take based on your location history
• Your credit card accounts to alert you of potential fraud when a purchase is made far from where you actually are.
• Photo albums so your vacation photos appear on a map at all the places you visited based on your location history.

Via: Official Google Mobile Blog

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Google Latitude Now with History & Alerts

Google have added some new features to its location tracking service Google Latitude:

Google Location History

Using Latitude you can keep track of your location history. You can store your past locations and visualize them on Google Maps and Earth. Enabling location history means that anyone can produce their own road trip or travel map at the click of a button with Google Latitude.

Google Location Alerts
If you enable alerts in Latitude you can get notifications when your friends (who use Latitude) are nearby. Location History also allows alerts to only trigger when you are in an unusual place, filtering out routine alerts. Alerts can also notify friends where you usually are on that day and time to explain why your location is unusual and the alert was sent.

Via: Google LatLong

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Google Latitude on the iPhone

Google have today announced the release of Google Latitude for the iPhone and iPod touch, available in the Safari browser.

To add Google Latitude visit google.com/latitude from your iPhone's browser. You can add a bookmark by opening Latitude in Safari and tapping the + icon > Add to Home Screen > Add.

Using Latitude in your iPhone lets you see the location of your friends on a Google Map. If you don't want to give too much away you can modify your privacy settings and control how your location is shared and with whom.

When you run the application in the foreground of your phone your location is continuously updated.

Via: Official Google Blog: Google Latitude on your iPhone

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