Google Maps have some tourist quality satellite imagery

[void]

The imagery is not military calibre, but its still pretty darned interesting.

For a sample view of Buckingham Palace:
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?ll=51....7918&t=k&hl=en

Slashdot.org noted "Google has hugely expanded the areas of the world that it covers with satellite imagery. Egypt, Iraq, mainland Europe and the UK have all now got satellite coverage to a lesser or greater degree. "

Most the magery is a year or more old.

Here is a link to an image of Phuket Thailand [edit I added this later after I figured out how to copy the link]
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Phuk...2598&t=k&hl=en

I found an image of the pier in Chalong Bay in Phuket Island, a classic view of one of the more subdued areas of Phuket (the image will be posted assuming I can master the "attach files" / "manage attachments" function). I had to reduce the image quality a lot, to fit inside the 100KByte image file size limit.

[Thai Kwan Do]

i hope they finish patong soon

[steve w]

thats bloody good, i catch fishing boat off there every year

[wavecrusader]

It would be fantastic if they were to offer pictures from satelite of patong at night. Pattaya would probably be even better. So many lights, so many ladies. I can almost hear them now--"Hello, hansum man. Whea you fruhm?" God, I miss the LOS. Can't wait to return.

[sting]

Hello
NASAs interaktive atlas «World Wind» is a grate program it is BIG DOWNLOADE
(180 MB) Search for phuket end you get some grate sat pics
http://worldwind.arc.nasa.gov/

[Tarzan]

Originally Posted by sting

Hello
NASAs interaktive atlas «World Wind» is a grate program it is BIG DOWNLOADE
(180 MB) Search for phuket end you get some grate sat pics
http://worldwind.arc.nasa.gov/

Thanks Sting.
A realy fun program. Have been sitting with it for 3 hours now....

[louiswhitehouse]

same here thanks sting i been all over the world in the last hour, good fun

[void]

Originally Posted by sting

Hello
NASAs interaktive atlas «World Wind» is a grate program it is BIG DOWNLOADE
(180 MB) Search for phuket end you get some grate sat pics
http://worldwind.arc.nasa.gov/

I downloaded the NASA Interactive Atlas program and played with it. I find it most educational and entertaining, the way in which the globe of the world spins, and then the image zooms into the selected location. I also like the way in which the Lat and Long can be displayed.

I was a little disappointed with the resolution of the NASA interactive atlas, although maybe that was my setting? I found the resolution of the Google Map/Satellite imagery much better. Am I doing something wrong with the NASA interactive, or is that (compared to Google) a disadvantage?

Below are a couple more images from Google, this time of the Boat Lagoon in Phuket (again, I had to reduce image quality to stay under 100Kbyte file size limit). Its unfortunate the really high resolution Google views of Phuket are only of the Eastern side of the Island.

[LivinLOS]

The google thing is great but just stops short of Patong.. Can see one of my mates swimming pools in the high res bits and would love to see if my place is visible but less detail over me..

Will wait for this eve to do the nasa download

[Nicke]

Great maps, would love to have a complete photo of Phuket island in that detail. Last time i checked Google Maps they only had US, so it is great they are expanding.

[Nicke]

World Wind was great, worked fine here except my computer got over heated after 10 minutes of looking around. But I have that problem with games too. The graphics card get very hot when I use graphic intensive programs. (Look like 30 degrees room temperatur is too hot for modern computers)

Dizbusta, I dont know what caused your problem but it may be your graphics card and/or drivers.

[sting]

[quote=dizbusta]Unfortunately, it wouldn't work on my machine, it caused some big problems and I had to spend an hour fixing them.

I think others should be wary, some seem to have downloaded it OK, it could just be the settings on my PC, but it could also be because it is a little old.

Hello dizbusta
sorry if it caused you problems but i dont think it is the program. i have downloaded it to lots of pc at home and work and never i hade any problems.

System Requirements for World Wind

Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000, or XP
Intel Pentium 3, 1 GHz, or AMD Athlon or higher
256 MB of RAM
3D Graphics Card
nVidia GeForce 2 Ultra
ATI Radeon 7500
Intel Extreme Graphics 2
DSL / Cable connection or faster
2 GB of disk space

[magnusvv]

Originally Posted by Nicke

World Wind was great, worked fine here except my computer got over heated after 10 minutes of looking around. But I have that problem with games too. The graphics card get very hot when I use graphic intensive programs. (Look like 30 degrees room temperatur is too hot for modern computers)

Dizbusta, I dont know what caused your problem but it may be your graphics card and/or drivers.

What graphics card are you using that is overheating on you? Yeah 30C is not a healthy temp for PCs. I know that there are a bunch of ATI Radeon cards that are sold w/o cooling fans, just heatsinks. I doubt those would survive in hotter temps. I've seen many of the computers in LOS come with a ton of cooling equipment built in, so much so that they really make a racket when you power them up.

I will have to try that program out later when I get home, I was having fun here at work with the google maps.

[Nicke]

I have ATI Radeon 6800 XT, and 30 degrees room temperature is too hot. The graphics card do have a fan and heat sink but it doesnt help much.

Originally Posted by magnusvv

What graphics card are you using that is overheating on you? Yeah 30C is not a healthy temp for PCs. I know that there are a bunch of ATI Radeon cards that are sold w/o cooling fans, just heatsinks. I doubt those would survive in hotter temps. I've seen many of the computers in LOS come with a ton of cooling equipment built in, so much so that they really make a racket when you power them up.

I will have to try that program out later when I get home, I was having fun here at work with the google maps.

[void]

Originally Posted by dizbusta

I have XP running on a Pentium 3 chip using a 550Mhz motherboard, does everyove else have newer faster machines ??

I'm running an Athlon-2800+, with 1GByte of RAM, and only 8GByte free on the hard drive (too many pix taking up space). I installed World Wind from my PC's WinXP partition, and the installation program installed a couple of microsoft packages, and had me restart the installation, before it installed itself. .... All a big mystery to me, as I confess I don't know much about WinXP, with my being mainly a Linux user.

I consider myself lucky the Wind World worked on my WinXP partition.

[LivinLOS]

I assume it just needed DirectX9c

[void]

Originally Posted by Nicke

Great maps, would love to have a complete photo of Phuket island in that detail. Last time i checked Google Maps they only had US, so it is great they are expanding.

Google just announced a further upgrade to their global maps. Much like the NASA World Wind software (argueably better), they have a globe that rotates, and one can zoom in. Part of the service is free, part is commerical. I played with the free service for an hour, and it is pretty good. Their resolution offered is better than NASA World Wind, and they also offer non-standard views of the landscape, if so desired.

Please check out the free download on:
http://earth.google.com/

I highly recommend the free version that you can download free.
http://desktop.google.com/download/earth/index.html
Please look at the PC requirements before you download.

They still don't have a really hi-res view of western Phuket Island (yet).

From http://slashdot.org/articles/05/06/2...tid=95&tid=159

Originally Posted by slashdot.org

Google launches Keyhole 3 today, rebranded Google Earth, and are dumping the subscription rate (except for a $20/year "plus" versions with prettier pictures) available soon at earth.google.com. The program lets you fly around a 3D globe, with overhead satellite photos, tilted 45-degree photos, 3D rendered buildings, and overlays that display everything from roads to hotels to bike routes. I have a lot of info and screenshots at Inside Google, and Search Engine Watch has a big writeup. With Yesterday's Google Video release, this is shaping up to be a major week for the search giant.