Happy Birthday Google Maps API !!!

Mappybirthday

Today the Google Maps API celebrates its 5 year anniversary! Happy Birthday Google Maps API!!!

Five years ago the world was amazed when Paul Rademacher's released his Craigslist and Google Maps mashup. Google themselves were so impressed with Paul's hack that they decided to let everyone have a go at creating their own Google Maps mashup by releasing the Google Maps API.

It is a testament to the support that Google has provided to the API and to map developers over the years that Google Maps mashups still regularly become front page news. In the UK alone, and in just the last few days, Google Maps mashups have featured in national newspaper The Telegraph and London newspaper The Metro (Historypin and CASA's New Urban Landscapes respectively).

When Google asked me at the end of last week if I would help to produce a map of some of the Google Maps that have been created over the years with the Google Maps API I was delighted to say 'yes'! Mappybirthday.appspot is the result of my efforts (with quite a lot of help from Google).

The map shows the locations of over 300 Google Maps mashups. If I had another week available I would be able to add at least another 300 mashups to the map. I don't have another week so I apologise to all those wonderful maps that have been missed off.

But don't worry! You can add a map to mappybirthday.appspot yourself. Just click on the "Join in the celebration ... pin your mashup to the map!" link underneath the map and enter the details of your map.


When you have done that - take a deep breathe because the next five years starts today! Go check out the Google Maps API v3 (if you haven't done so already) ... start creating your next mashup ... and keep submitting your maps to Google Maps Mania.

Happy Birthday Google Maps API! Let's hope the next five years are just as exciting.

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Add a Contextual Menu to Your Google Map

ContextMenuControl Utility Library

Wolfgang Pichler has released a really cool open-sourced utility library to add a right-click contextual menu to a map developed with the Google Maps API.

The contextual menu includes options to get directions, zoom in or out, center the map and find out 'What's here?'. In fact it mirrors very closely what you get if you right click on a map at maps.google.com.

To add the control to your own maps all you need to do is include the script tag for the source code and add the control with:

  map.addControl(new ContextMenuControl());

For more information, read through the reference and developer's guide.


Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Plot Routes Around a Central Point

Some Experiments with Google Maps
This morning I've been revisiting the Google Maps experiments on maps.forum.nu. This site has some great examples of what can be achieved with the Google Maps API.

I particularly like these two Google Maps examples which could be very useful for anyone thinking of building a route planner with the Google Maps API.

POIs Along a Route

This route planning map can show you points of information along your route. So, for example, the map can show you all fast food outlets along your route. Alternatively you could build a map that showed all gas stations along a route.

Driving Radius Map

This is a cool experiment to show driving routes that lead to 30 miles around a given point. If you click on the map the map will load routes around that location that will take you 30 miles away.

I can see a few practical applications for this experiment. If you used it in conjunction with walking directions or biking directions you could load suggested routes around a point. You could allow the user to define the route distance so, for example, you could show the user a number of ten mile bike rides or hikes around any given point.

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Add Style to Your Google Maps

Styled Maps

The latest enhancement to the Google Maps API is Map Styling.

Map Styling allows developers to modify the look of the base map tiles, both in terms of what features are shown, and the colour scheme. This means that developers can change the look of their maps to suit the colour-schemes of their websites.

You can see some example styled maps on this demo page.

You can also use the Styled Map wizard to experiment with different styles, and generate the Styled Map definitions to use in your Maps API application.

The Mood of our Cities Now

NBC Local Media have used the new Styled Maps feature to show the most emotional stories of the day.

The map animates through news stories and displays the location of the story with the color correlating to how the majority of users felt about that story.

Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Place Pages on Google Maps

In what has been a busy day of announcements about new features for the Google Maps API we have two more:

• The Google Places Web Service
• Directions Web Service

The Google Places Web Service

The Places Web Service is a new web service Google will launch in July, 2010.

The Google Places Web Service is a service that returns information about a 'place' using an HTTP request.

The Nearby Places widget is a user interface element that will launch in the Google Maps API v3. It combines the W3C Geolocation API with location based Place search to present the user with a list of Places in their immediate vicinity. The user can select a Place which the Maps API application can use as a check-in, or to tag content supplied by the user about that place. The application can also obtain more detailed information about the Place, such as the address, telephone number, and Place Page URL.

Directions Web Service

The Directions Web Service is a companion to the existing Geocoding and Elevation Web Services, and allows applications to obtain Driving, Bicycling, and Walking directions through an XML/JSON REST interface.

All of the features of the Map API v3 Directions service are supported, including “avoid highways”, “avoid tolls”, and waypoint optimization (travelling salesman solver). For more information, check out the Directions Web Services documentation.

You don't need to use the Directions Web Service with Google Maps. In fact you don't even need a Google Maps API key to use the service.

Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Street View in Maps API v3

Street View Maps API v3 Demo

Street View has been added to the Google Maps API v3.

To add a Street View overlay to a API v3 map just add 'streetViewControl: true,' to your map code.

Street View in Maps API v3 uses HTML rather than Flash. The Street View layer in v3 also has the capability of showing your map markers directly in the Street View.

If you open up the demo that I've created and drop Pegman onto Westminster Bridge you can see how the map markers on the map can also be seen from within Street View.

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Google Maps API v3

The first maps related announcement from Google I/O is the graduation of the Google Maps API v3. Google say that the Maps API v3 is now the recommended version for all new Maps API application development.

As part of the Google Maps API v3 graduation to the principal maps API Street View has been added to the Maps API v3.

Street View in v3 is entirely implemented in HTML in order to accommodate all of the mobile devices on which v3 is supported. In v2 of the Google Maps API Street View relied on Flash.



Microformats.dk seems to be the first to produce a working demo of the new Street View feature in v3. Right click on the Street View in the demo - see no Flash!

The Maps API v2 will now be deprecated along with Mapplets (which is based on v2). This means that no further feature development is planned for these two APIs. However, Google will maintain and support applications using these APIs for at least three years consistent with the deprecation policy detailed in the Maps API Terms of Service.

Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Google's New Geocoding Web Service

Google Geocoding Web Service

Google have today announced a new Geocoding Web Service. Geocoding is the process of converting postal addresses into geographic coordinates (latitude and longitude), so that you can place markers on a Google Maps mashup.

The new geocoding service enables the precaching of geocoded results so that developers can cache the results on a server, and serve the locations to their Google Maps mashups. This ensures that the map does not need to geocode the address of a property every time it is viewed by a user.

Developers do not require a Maps API key to use the Geocoding Web Service. 2,500 requests may be sent to the Geocoding Web Service per day from a single IP address. The Geocoding Web Service can provide output in both XML and JSON.

Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Google Maps Altitude Meter & Auto Suggest

Mapperz this week has spotted a couple of very interesting experiments with the Google Maps API.

Terrain Tile Layer

Bill Chadwick has put together this demo of a Google Map that has an altitude indicator to show the altitude at any point on the map.

As you move you mouse cursor around on the map the altitude indicator updates to show the altitude at each location. The demo uses a terrain tile server hosted on Google App Engine to serve tiles of terrain data. There is very good correspondence with the Google Maps Terrain layer contours which are obtained from the same 3 arc second SRTM data.

Google Geocoder Suggests

Esa, a Google Maps API guru from Finland, has put together this Google Maps API demo of a search box with geocoding suggestions. As you type into the search box possible locations, based on what you type, are displayed.

In the example above you can see the suggestions that appear when you type 'Lo'. The suggestions update the more you type. If you add an 'n' to the 'Lo' the suggestions change to reflect the added letter.

When you click on one of the suggestions the accompanying Google Map centres on the chosen location.


Via: Mapperz

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A Year on Google Maps

2009 has been another busy year for the Google Maps team. The Google Maps API finally came out of 'beta', Street View imagery continued to be added to new countries around the world and new layers were added to Google Maps.

The biggest news of the year was probably the release of Google Maps Navigation (Beta) for Android 2.0 devices. Google Maps Navigation comes with everything you'd expect to find in a GPS navigation system, like 3D views, turn-by-turn voice guidance and automatic rerouting.

In December Google released 'Aerial View' in the Google Maps API. Aerial View is very similar to Bing Maps' Bird's Eye View. Whilst Aerial View is only available in the Google Maps API for now, I'm fairly sure it will graduate to the Google Maps site in 2010.


Here's 2009's Google Maps and Google Maps API releases in a little more detail:

January

In January Google added bathymetry imagery to Google Earth and Google Maps. Also in January Google added a new 'Transit' layer. The Transit Layer overlays public transit lines on Google Maps. Think of a virtual metro map on top of Google Maps.

The Google Maps API team released a Maps API library for Google Web Toolkit. The Maps API library for GWT provides Java classes which are designed to provide a familiar paradigm for Java users to access the Google Maps JavaScript API.

February


In February Google launched Google Latitude. Latitude is a mobile phone map tool that allows users to track friends and family in real-time.

In February Google also allowed Google Maps API users to start adding the new Google Maps UI controls. On the main Google Maps page Google started adding many more local searches. Until February Google Maps only plotted the first page of business results, now Google Maps plots hundreds more of local search results as small circles.

Google also launched My Tracks. My Tracks is an application for Android-powered phones that uses a phone's built-in GPS to record your trails. Using the application it is possible to visualise and share recorded trails on Google Maps.

March

In March Google released Street View imagery for the first time in the UK.

The Google Maps API team released a new GoogleBar control in the Maps API to allow users to search maps for local businesses, landmarks and points of interest. Map developers can use the map control to monetise their maps via advertising targeted to the user's searches in the results.

In March, a few years after its first release, the Google Maps API came out of 'beta'.

The main Google Maps site started adding Google My Maps and kml's to Google search results in Google Maps.

April

In April a new webcams layer was added to Google Maps.

Google added a couple of new options in driving directions on Google Maps. The first allows you to save your finished directions as a Google My Map. This makes it easy to share your driving directions with friends.

A new tool called 'Draw a line along roads' was also added. With this tool when you drag a line it should snap automatically to follow the line of the roads on the map.

Google also launched a Mapplets API Demo Gallery and a full-screen option for Google Maps Street View.

In March the Google Earth Browser plugin gained a number of new features. The new features mean it is now possible to explore the world's oceans underwater, record and play back narrated tours, view historical imagery, and explore Mars in 3D directly from the browser.

May

In May Google released Google Maps API v3. The main features of the new release are faster rendering of maps, better implementation of maps on mobile devices and better geo-coding.

In May Google also announced the release of the Maps Ad Unit. The Google Maps Ad Unit is a new way for Google Maps API developers to monetise their Google Maps mashups. The ad units update with geographically relevant ads as the user pans the map.

May also saw the introduction of the Google Maps Data API. The Google Maps Data API allows client applications to view, store and update map data in the form of Google Data API feeds using a data model of features (placemarks, lines and shapes) and maps (collections of features).

The Google Maps Data API also provides free hosting and bandwidth for your map data. The geodata is available across platforms; web, mobile phone, 3D applications, or even command lines. Geodata from the Google Maps Data API can be instantly indexed and made searchable in Google Maps.

June
Google added a new feature to the right-click menu on Google Maps. The new feature, 'What's here?', when clicked, gives you the most relevant results representing a location, whether it's a specific address, a natural entity, or a place name.

In June Google also launched Google City Tours. The application allows anyone to identify points of interest and plan multi-day trips in major cities. Users specify the location of their hotel and the length of their trip and City Tours maps out an itinerary.

Google also added voice search to Google Maps on Android phones.

In Street View Google added a layer to view user photographs and some new navigational tools. The navigational tools add rectangular overlays on top of Street View that when double clicked zoom you into the view. There are also round overlays that let you jump down a street and other rectangular overlays that let you jump down a street and pan to a particular view.

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A Year on Google Maps - Part Two

July
In July Google Maps gained a new button that, when clicked, centres the map on your approximate location.

Also in July the Google Maps for Flash API released 3D view. Street View added some cool navigation tools to use with user-contributed photographs (very similar to Microsoft's Photosynth).

Google Maps for Mobile 3.2 added a number of new layers, including traffic, local search results, Latitude friend locations and Wikipedia.

Google released a collection of favourite places around the world chosen by local celebrity experts. The Favorite Places site features a Google Map with locations chosen by each of the celebrities.

Real estate listings were added to Google Maps in Australia and New Zealand.

August

In August Google started adding interactive markers to businesses and points of interest in Street View.

The Google Maps team released v2 of the API for Google Static Maps. The release added a number of new features including polylines and polygons.

Google also added traffic conditions on arterial roads in selected cities on Google Maps.

In August Street View was launched in Switzerland and Portugal. Also Picassa photographs were added as a source for user-contributed photos in Street View.

September

Google added Polylines and Polygons to the Maps API v3.

In August Google also added Place Pages to Google Maps. To get to a Place Page you can click on the 'more info' link that appears when you carry out a search in Google Maps.

October

In October driving directions were added to the Google Maps API v3.

Google Maps also released a new base map dataset for the USA. Google ended its partnership with TeleAtlas for US map tiles. Which paved the way for Google to release Google Maps Navigation.

In October the biggest news was undoubtedly the release of Google Maps Navigation (Beta) for Android 2.0 devices.

Google Maps Navigation comes with everything you'd expect to find in a GPS navigation system, like 3D views, turn-by-turn voice guidance and automatic rerouting.

Google rolled out some design changes to the map and hybrid views in Google Maps. These included refinements to color, density, typography, and road styling.

In October Google also released Street View in Canada.

November

In November Google added some new features to its location tracking service Google Latitude. The main new feature was Google Location History, which allows you to store your past locations and visualize them on Google Maps and Earth.

Google released Street View in Mexico, Hawaii and expanded coverage in the Netherlands and Spain.

December

In December Google released Google Goggles. Google's new Android phone application, Google Goggles, allows mobile phones to carry out visual searches, using images rather than text. Users take a picture of something with their camera phone and Google will return results based purely on the photograph.

In December Google also released 'Aerial View' in the Google Maps API. 'Aerial View' provides oblique views on Google Maps. Aerial View imagery is limited to San Jose and San Diego for now but Google has plans to add new imagery over the coming months.

For now Aerial View is only available through the Google Maps API but in 2010 I'm pretty sure it will graduate to the main Google Maps site.

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Important Google Maps Developer News

Google have announced that in a few weeks time they will be adding new functionality to the Google Maps API v2 that allows Google to log the location and content of the markers and/or infowindows that are displayed in Google Maps mashups. Google then plans to use the gathered data created by Google Maps developers within the main Google Maps site as 'search results'.

This could obviously have huge benefits for map developers. Presumably Google will acknowledge or link to the creators of this third party content which, in theory, should drive traffic from the main Google Maps site to the sites that created the content.

However I'm sure that there are a number of developers and web sites that won't want Google to reuse their content in this way. Therefore Google are allowing sites to opt out of sharing their content. Here is what the Google Geo Developers Blog says,

To ensure that this new feature doesn't cause any issues, we have put a few controls in place:

1. We only index data from maps that have been viewed by many unique users. For example, maps only viewed by you and a few friends won't be indexed.
2. If your page is protected by robots.txt, we will not index your content.
3. You can opt-out of the logging by specifying "indexing=false" when loading the API.
4. If you are a Maps API Premier customer, we will not index data from your maps, unless you opt into indexing by passing in "indexing=true".

The impact of this move on users of the main Google Maps site should of course be hugely beneficial. Now, as well as seeing local user created content, from Google My Maps and Mapplets, users of Google Maps will potentially be able to view content from the thousands of Google Maps mashups created using the Google Maps API.

Programmable Web has recorded over 1,800 sites that use the Google Maps API. My guess is, however, that the number of websites using the Google Maps API runs into the tens of thousands. Therefore Google have a potentially enormous data set that they can leverage to enhance Google Maps as a product.


Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Directions in Maps API v3

Driving directions have been added to the Google Maps API v3. For version three of the API directions have been split into two, DirectionsService which passes directions queries and DirectionsRenderer which displays the results on the map.

Google have provided an explanation of the concepts involved, examples and a reference guide. Mapperz has also created a couple of examples; Directions and Directions with a Directions Panel.

Hat-tip: Mapperz
Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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Great New Polygons in the Maps API v3

Google have added Polylines and Polygons to Maps API v3 and made some great improvements to their use. Polylines and polygons allow you to draw lines or filled regions on a map, specify stroke and fill styles, and handle events.

Now you can create polygons with holes like in this Pentagon example.



You can also now create vertices with polygons as in this fractal snowflake poly example.



Via: Google Geo Developers Blog

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