and now we have Google-Earth
Posted: Mon Jul 04, 2005 10:19 pm
http://earth.google.com/
before this it was a private beta, but now (1-2 days ago) it's finally been released to the public.
it's a 10meg program. it's very much like Nasa-WorldWind or the old Keyhole programs. google actually bought out keyhole, and you can tell because google-earth is almost identical. but it's FREE.
so so this is google-earth: you have a globe of the earth, you can rotate it around and zoom in, it's all 3D. as you get closer it automatically downloads higher and higher resoution data from googlemaps and integrates it into your view, so as you get closer and closer the view gets clearer and clearer. it also has terrain elevation data so you can tilt eh camera and rotate around to see how the land raises etc.
now... Nasa Worldwind does this as well, so what's the big deal?
well googlemaps and therefore googleearth too has a higher resolution than Nasa-WorldWind does.
also googlearth has a HEAP of more layers. it can layer over your view things like roads, places of interest, 3D buildings, population data. it also has a complex MARKER system that allows you to put neat little markers whereever you want (of course teh first thing i did was mark my house
) and also share them with the greater community.
seriously guys, this program is like googlemaps on steroids, in 3D. it's FANTASTIC. everyone should have this program.
before this it was a private beta, but now (1-2 days ago) it's finally been released to the public.
it's a 10meg program. it's very much like Nasa-WorldWind or the old Keyhole programs. google actually bought out keyhole, and you can tell because google-earth is almost identical. but it's FREE.
so so this is google-earth: you have a globe of the earth, you can rotate it around and zoom in, it's all 3D. as you get closer it automatically downloads higher and higher resoution data from googlemaps and integrates it into your view, so as you get closer and closer the view gets clearer and clearer. it also has terrain elevation data so you can tilt eh camera and rotate around to see how the land raises etc.
now... Nasa Worldwind does this as well, so what's the big deal?
well googlemaps and therefore googleearth too has a higher resolution than Nasa-WorldWind does.
also googlearth has a HEAP of more layers. it can layer over your view things like roads, places of interest, 3D buildings, population data. it also has a complex MARKER system that allows you to put neat little markers whereever you want (of course teh first thing i did was mark my house
) and also share them with the greater community.seriously guys, this program is like googlemaps on steroids, in 3D. it's FANTASTIC. everyone should have this program.
I typed in my address, and from a global zoom it took me... two doors down. 
Close enough!