Author Topic: Google Maps (Read 10556 times)

saturnine · « **on:** February 13, 2005, 07:53:20 PM »

It would be fantabulous if we could also choose a street map tileset, such as Google Maps. Don't know anything about the terms of use, though.

See Mapping Google

Krein · « **Reply #1 on:** February 13, 2005, 09:38:29 PM »

Yeah, I saw that & would love to have that info in TF. I can take a look at it.

Maarten · « **Reply #2 on:** March 11, 2005, 01:24:22 PM »

Is the TopoFusion source set up to easily hook up to new data sources? Integration with Google Maps would be great. I've long thought about a few other sources:

1. the on-disk topo maps that come with National Geographic Topo! (which would require figuring out the file format) These are newer and nicer than the sets that TerraServer has.

2. my local county's GIS system, which has multiple sets of beautiful aerial photo coverages for the county. Could connect to it online/live. Alternately, could write separate code to download relevant tiles, retile them, and save to a cache format that TopoFusion understands.

I'd be curious to hear commens about the feasibility of any of those projects. I'm potentially available to help with coding.

KanyonKris · « **Reply #3 on:** March 16, 2005, 10:25:00 AM »

I would also love to be able to import my topo map data from National Geographic TOPO! since the detail and resolution on those maps is very good.

Topofusion is stronger in most features than TOPO! now. The main thing I still go back to TOPO! for is printing maps. I know the devs are aware of this - hope to get good map printing in Topofusion soon. It would also be nice if you could add notes in TF. This is very handy in TOPO! for annotating maps (i.e. turn here, good place to camp, etc.).

Krein · « **Reply #4 on:** March 17, 2005, 09:12:32 AM »

Although TF is set up fairly well for new sources there are always new quirks and extensions/fixes that need to be made. I can certainly think about some other data sources.

I don't know the format of the maps in Topo! and am not sure it would be legal to access their maps.

Yep, export and print of big maps -- it's next up.

jmstacey · « **Reply #5 on:** March 19, 2005, 01:48:38 PM »

I would think it would be alright. Aren't they basically just higher quality scans of the same topo maps available and touched up with some 3d shading and included DEM files to top it off? At least, that's the way it appears on my v2.5 cd's, not sure about the newer ones.
For personal use, I don't see why it wouldn't be legal to use the maps in any program you want.

If you really wanted to get savvy, how about making this part of TopoFusion plugin friendly allowing installation of only mapsets/sources wanted as well as opening up the possibility of 3rd party programmers releasing custom plugins to get map data from other sources out there such as topozone.com
In other words, move the routines of retrieving the maps to the plugin, which then passes the retrieved maps to TopoFusion which stores them.

Personally, it appears as if terraserver uses slightly more compressed, lower quality jpeg's than other sources

Maarten · « **Reply #6 on:** March 22, 2005, 10:16:35 AM »

Yes, a plugin architecture for new map sources would be great, that's the direction I was thinking of as well. With proper design, data could be either local on disk, or fetched asynchronously over the net from another source. And it would save you (Krein) from having to write code for each data source.

The big catch might be in reconciling datums. Ideally (in the long run), TF would offer the plugins services to convert coordinates between UTM, state plane, etc. to easily match the data source's layout, and map rectification to warp the image to the right projection. In the short term, the plugins would have to do that themselves. Probably not trivial; haven't coded any of it.

hogg · « **Reply #7 on:** April 01, 2005, 08:01:26 PM »

I'm north of the border and therefore don't see any maps in TopoFusion, just LandSat photos. In the absence of TopoFusion support for a Canadian map source, I'd like to integrate my own maps. A possible workflow is:
   * Photograph map and download to computer
   * Manually enter first-approximation location of map
   * Drag known waypoints to their locations on map
   * Click the magic button to rotate map, set precise location and resize or store scale with map
   * Write out calibrated map
   * Make map available from map source dropdown box
After this setup process, TopoFusion would handle local files like any other source.

As an interim or minimal solution, positioning, rotation and scaling could be done outside of TopoFusion. The key capability is being able to specify a local map source with location info.

Cheers -- John

Krein · « **Reply #8 on:** April 03, 2005, 08:22:47 AM »

Yep, we still want to add this capability to TopoFusion. But it may be a while yet before we get to it.

Thanks for the request & info.

saturnine · « **Reply #9 on:** April 05, 2005, 08:30:06 AM »

Google added hi-res color satellite imagery to the service! There is a faint Google watermark but otherwise the quality and coverage are great.

I'm itching to have TF use this service ...

Krein · « **Reply #10 on:** April 05, 2005, 08:41:38 AM »

Awesome, thanks for the pointer.

I see that the coverage is varied. For urban areas they've got some nice stuff, but in mountainous regions the images look roughly like 16m resolution at best.

However, this is very cool. Since google is a company, rather than involved with a gov't agency, we will not add any support for their maps without contacting them. If anyone has a connection there, do share...

Maarten · « **Reply #11 on:** April 05, 2005, 10:49:58 AM »

Yeah, since TopoFusion can be seen as competition for Google's Keyhole, I wonder how they'll respond. Will be interesting.

sanewcomb · « **Reply #12 on:** April 06, 2005, 01:56:07 PM »

There are hi res color images of many outdoor, mountain regions as well. The Grand Canyon, Lake Powell and Paria are well covered, and I've never seen these areas in color before at high res. The service is definitely beta, and I often get time outs.

Interestingly enough, they are not available (yet) on Keyhole, their paid service. Kind of makes me wonder what direction they are headed.

Regardless, you should inquire about access to their map data. At the very least, they will see what you're up to and you might even get a job offer with a cool company.

Steve