Wednesday, March 10. 2010

Google Tidbits

Google has hinted about adding bike directions to Google Maps and now it's here. The beta app was announced at the National Bike Summit in Washington, D.C. Google sent a note to journalists about the desktop only, USA only tool. A mobile version is in the works.

In addition to providing thousands of miles of bike trails directly onto maps, this new feature includes step-by-step bicycling directions and a new "Bicycling" layer that indicates bike trails, bike lanes, and bike-friendly roads."
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The new bicycling layer for Google Maps, accessible via the “More…” drop down menu at the top of the map, will display an overlay of the various bike-friendly roads and trails around town. The layer is color-coded to show three different types of paths:
• Dark green indicates a trail;
• Light green indicates a dedicated bike lane along a road;
• Dotted green indicates roads without bike lanes but are more appropriate for biking, based on factors such as terrain, traffic, and intersections.

On Monday Google announced a new geocoding Web Service. It has all the goodies in the JavaScript API v3 for Google Maps. Oh, and you have to use it with Google Maps.

Note however that it is a requirement of the Maps API Terms of Service that you use the Geocoding Web Service in conjunction with a Google map. This means that when it comes time to use cached geocoder results in an application, the application must display the results or any data derived from them on a map generated using one of the Google Maps APIs or Google Earth API.

- Google Geodevelopers Blog

Also Monday, Google announced the ability to place edits to its data via StreetView. The idea is to note the location of entrance or facade of a business.

- Google Lat Lon Blog

Also on Monday, Google announced the Google Public Data Explorer, an experimental visualization tool in Google Labs. It seems more graphy than mappy on first look.

- Official Google Blog

A Google product manager told eWEEK the company will try different points of integration between Google Latitude and the new Google Buzz for mobile application.

- eWEEK