Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

In+ersec+ion for Spatial People

Major Virtual Earth Release: KML Support, 3D Birds Eye and Much More

posted by lxnyce on Tuesday October 16, @02:15PM   Printer-friendly   Email story  Permalink  Trackback URI  Slashdotthis  Diggthis  Del.icio.us
from the It's-about-time dept.
Microsoft Virtual Globe Web Mapping Open Geospatial Consortium
Correction : The Google Earth Blog actually reported this story yesterday. My apologies to the blog's author.

Ogle Earth reports first about this major VE update. Head on over there for more details, but the new features are :
  • Importing of GeoRSS and GPX and.... KML!
  • Bird's eye view in 3D
  • 3D modelling
  • Better search
A longer more detailed list can be found here in the Virtual Earth Developer Forum. Be sure to check out the Sketchup Killer app they bundled with the update. Right click on the 3D globe, and select "Add 3D model". It will install the modelling app at this point. Update: 10/17 13:39 GMT by S : I added a few related stories below. This is really a major improvement of Microsoft's Virtual Earth. Here's another GEB entry on the new KML support in VE. SharpGIS offers a few interesting screenshots. And be sure to read the official Virtual Earth blog entry. Oh, and Microsoft have rejoined the Open Geospatial Consortium, this is great news!

Related Stories

Microsoft’s Photosynth Technology Preview Now Available [+]
Microsoft's Photosynth, previously on Slashgeo, is now available as a technology preview. From Very Spatial: "The Photosynth demos show you the point cloud that was generated for each photo collection, and then you can navigate around and see each photo in its referenced location and look at the 3D rendering of the photos. Even though it’s not even a beta yet, I just think it’s cool. Many, many possibilities come to mind again, of course, by linking Photosynth to a virtual globe, such as, let’s say, Virtual Earth 3D…" Spatially Adjusted offers screenshots.
OGC Moves KML Closer to a Standard [+]
Green Palolo writes "http://www.gcn.com/online/vol1_no1/44454-1.html The Open Geospatial Consortium has dubbed Google’s Keyhole Markup Language – the language used for developing Google Earth – a best practice and is working with Google and other OGC members including ESRI and Autodesk to make sure KML integrates well with such other standards as the Geographic Markup Language. Microsoft — which is continuing development of its Web-based mapping product, Microsoft Virtual Earth — is not currently an OGC member, though it is expected to join soon. Google offered KML 2.1 to the consortium last April and is working closely with OGC in further development of the language. An OGC official said the main advantages of making KML a standard are that it speeds development of Web-based mapping applications, encourages greater interoperability of products and ensures easier movement of data between applications. OGC expects KML 3.0 to be released as a standard early next year." See the several related stories below, this has been covered previously.
Microsoft Virtual Earth to Support Google's KML Format [+]
The Geothough blog informs us Microsoft has plan to support Google's kml format in Virtual Earth. From the blog: "[...] in the Microsoft "vendor spotlight" presentation which just finished, the speaker said that Virtual Earth will support the ability to display KML in a September / October release this year. [...] so I think this is a very welcome announcement (assuming it's correct), which can only cement KML's position as a de facto standard (I don't think Microsoft could have stopped KML's momentum, but if they had released a competing format it would have been an unfortunate distraction)." Don't forget Google's KML is slowly becoming an OGC standard.
10 New Live Search Maps Features, Virtual Earth in ArcGIS and Microsoft Back with the OGC 1 comment [+]
A few Microsoft-related stories. Let's start with 10 reasons why to love the new Microsoft Live Search Maps. There's an entry on Virtual Earth embedded in ArcGIS using Arc2Earth (with screenshot). And finally, even if we told you, the official bits about Microsoft rejoining the Open Geospatial Consortium as a Principal Member. From the 10 reasons introduction: "Now I present to you my list of the top 10 improvements aimed at delighting you; features that quietly improve your daily experience and at the same time make the more talked about features really shine. To go with another sports analogy, I present to you the starting offensive line of Live Search Maps :-)" See also related stories below.
Massive 33.7TB of New Imagery in Virtual Earth [+]
Microsoft announced a massive November worldwide imagery update, 33.7TB in so many different places you'll have to follow the link to learn more. As much as important, last month's update brought many new features. This week, new features were also added to the VE API: "It is now possible to import 3D collections into VEDataType.VECollection. It is now possible to import KML and GPX data into VEDataType.ImportXML. [...] Localized driving directions can now be accessed through the API. [...] SSL support has been added for the Virtual Earth map control [...]"
Impressive Upgrade to Virtual Earth 3D 1 comment [+]
The Google Earth Blog brings us news of this pretty impressive Virtual Earth 3D update. The screenshots alone should tell the story, so please head on over there for more information. As if the pics on the Google Earth Blog weren't amazing enough, they also let us know about this blog which also sports pretty amazing pics showing before and after. Update: 04/11 15:11 GMT by S : This is indeed a major update, here's the list of new items from the GEB: Improved 3D buildings, Export to KML, 3D Modeling Improved Also, Bird's Eye Enhanced, MapCruncher integration (see also SA on MapCruncher), Explore Collections, Movie Capture, Real-time Traffic, Improved KML Support. Additionally, Mapperz offers a list of improvements for the new Virtual Earth API version 6.1. For VE enthusiasts, a Slashgeo reader named Eric submitted the MapForums VE blogs monitor page.
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Major Virtual Earth Release: KML Support, 3D Birds Eye and Much More | Log In/Create an Account | Top | 3 comments | Search Discussion
Display Options Threshold:
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.