Esri Texas Wildfire Social Media Map

is online.

Groupon Buys Pelago, developer of Whrrl, for its team; Whrrl to Shutdown at End of April

"Groupon Acquires Pelago; Shuts down Whrrl" is the clear headline from GPS Biz News. Whrrl didn't seem to be going anywhere as "just another" share your location offering. But it's a feather in Groupon's cap that the target of so many acquisitions stepped up to add to its developer portfolio, probably for little cash. Whrrl will shut down April 30.

- GPS Biz News

Google Map Maker Now Available for U.S.

The editing tool, until now only available in countries where Google was actively looking for crowdsourced data (that is, less mapped ones) is now available for editing Google's own U.S. dataset. It's only available in the browser for now, but it's likely a mobile implementation will appear. The tool includes access to StreetView data (to check your edits I guess) and a granular search engine. Edits are reviewed by a Google team and can go live quickly (we'll see how quickly); your history as an editor has an impact on that speed. As TechCrunch notes, far more people read about the availability of Map Maker in the U.S. than will actually use it.

The video is basically an ad.

- Lat Long Blog

- TechCrunch

International GIS Tidbits - 4/19/11

Malaysia

Malaysia has adopted a new GIS crime mapping system called “Safe City Monitoring System” as part of the country’s on-going efforts to ensure that crime prevention initiatives under the Government Transformation Program’s National Key Results Area are on track and sustainable.

- Future Gov

China

Government official in Chongqing, a large city in China is required to carry a cell phone 24/7. And, each one is contacted twice a month and asked where they are. If the response does not match the GPS reading, they are disciplined and may be fired. A local phone company provides the phones for free and as you might expect, workers do now and again use the battery dead or phone was dropped in water excuse for non-compliance.

- NDTV

Pakistan

UNESCO has developed a “National Database for Pakistan’s Cultural Assets” to safe guard, conserve and preserve the cultural and natural heritage of NWFP.The database is a Geographical Information System (GIS) compatible database in which contribution was made possible due to the cooperation from the Ministry of Culture and its attached bodies: National Institute of Folk Heritage (Lok Virsa), Pakistan National Council of the Arts (PNCA) and the Department of Archaeology and Museums (DOAM); each institution offering unconditional support to house the National Database...

- AP of Pakistan

GIS Developer/API Tidbits - 4/19/11

Nanaimo, BC is holding a hackathon for developers to work with the city's and province's data April 30, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Registration is capped at 40 (20 seats are filled) and closes Apri 21.

Examples of some of the data from the city  and 

Examples of data from the province

- BC Local News via @manomarks

In a product announcement bid aimed at improving Oracle Database developer productivity, the company has this week announced the availability of Oracle SQL Developer 3.0. This graphical tool for database development has been augmented with new migration functionalities designed to appeal to development and database administrator (DBA) tasks. It also introduces support for Oracle Data Mining and Oracle Spatial -- a tool to manage all geospatial data including vector and raster data, topology, and network models.

- Dr. Dobbs

Data Science Toolkit .35 released

- @RWWgeo