Visible Past Gwiki

Imagine an online historical atlas where each historical event would be mapped and annotated with text, diagrams, pictures, videoclips, and audiofiles. http://www.visiblepast.net

Imagine... a site where people interested in the same historical events, places, monuments or periods can network.

Imagine... a site that can automatically index information and create clusters of events, places or historical personalities based on the users common interests in them.

Imagine... a site that can recommend the best books or articles available for a specific historical topic.

Imagine... a service that would deliver to your cell phone information about any spot on the planet you might find yourself at.

Imagine... a room with life-size screens on which virtual models of the ancient Roman Forum, of the Omaha Beach Battle or of the Forbidden City would be projected and interacted with in 3d.

Now imagine... there was a way to make available for reading or editing the information stored by the atlas to the person using the cell phone in Rome, at the ruins of the Roman Forum. Imagine that the person in the 3D virtual reality room could visualize all the data contributed by the visitors of the online atlas.

Finally, imagine the people using cell phones, desktop computers or full immersion 3d virtual reality models talking to each other through a communication system that allows them to share impressions, passions and ideas.

These ideas do not belong to the realm of science fiction. They are the product of the Visible Past project, initiated by a group of faculty at Purdue University. Visible Past is a seamless network of information that turns the idea of information searching and retrieval on its head. Spatially locating and disseminating information, Visible Past takes the pain out of searching for information because through it information searches for you.

Send a geoGreeting!

Send a unique message to your friends with the geoGreeting website. Your text will be spelled out with aerial views of buildings and other things from an interactive Google map. For example, a circular stadium would be used to represent the letter “O”. Give it a try!

Silicon Valley JavaScript Meetup - January 21, 2009

Silicon Valley JavaScript Meetup session from January 21, 2009, hosted at the Googleplex in Mountain View, CA.

Nicholas Zakas talks about the performance differences between local and global variables (cross variables.)

Davey Waterson talks about ActiveRecord.js, an open source JavaScript library that implements the ActiveRecord data persistence and querying pattern popularized by (though not invented by) the Ruby on Rails community.

Tom Robinson talks about server-side JavaScript using Jack and Roundabout.

More infromation:
http://javascript.meetup.com/9/calendar/9319458/

Local Business Center for Google Maps

Go to Local Business Center: http://maps.google.com/localbusinesscenter
Use Local Business Center to enhance your business information on Google Maps and google.com.

iGoogle Love Stories

What do you love about your iGoogle homepage? Share your story with us. www.google.com/sharethelove09

A Tour of Glacier Data Sets via Google Earth and GeoServer

Two widely used glacier data sets are the World Glacier Inventory (WGI) and the Glacier Photograph Collection (GPC). Both data sets are available from the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The WGI encompasses over 100,000 records of glacier data and the GPC houses approximately 10,000 digitized photographs. The online GPC has doubled in size this year due to significant updates from the USGS Ice and Climate Project collection and also many contributions by Austin Post.
These updates bring photographs from the past to the forefront by enabling users to view Alaskan glaciers from the 1960s through the
1990s. The GPC KML files are updated intermittently. Because the WGI contains over 100,000 data records, a PostgreSQL database with a PostGIS extension was selected to store the data. GeoServer, an open source server, supports PostGIS and produces KML output automatically. By facilitating access to the KML files, data users can locate their region of interest and search for glacier data in a spatial context. The KML files are presented in Google Earth.

Presenter: Lisa Ballagh

National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES), University of Colorado at Boulder.

Using Google SketchUp with Earth for Scientific Applications

Numerous scientists and engineers have discovered the value of the Google Earth application and Keyhole Markup Language as a medium for research and teaching in earth science, life science, and environmental science. Google SketchUp, on the other hand, has been used mainly for designing buildings and for recreational 3D modeling.This talk demonstrates the use of Google SketchUp to create Collada models that have Earth and Planetary Science applications on the virtual globe. Sample applications include plate tectonics, geophysics, atmospheric science, and the generation of paleoDEMs that represent the earth's landscape during previous geological periods.

Presenter: Declan De Paor

Director of the Pretlow Planetarium and Research Professor of Geophysics at Old Dominion University, Norfolk VA.

Declan obtained a PhD from the National University of Ireland in 1981. He came to the U.S. in 1983 as a Senior Fulbright Scholar and has since worked at Johns Hopkins University, Boston College, Harvard University, Boston University, and Old dominion University. His main research interests are strain and kinematic analysis of deformed rocks and digital mapping of geologic structures.

Google Latitude privacy tips

Learn about Google Latitude privacy options

www.google.com/latitude

Google Earth 5.0 - Launch Event

Google Earth 5.0 Launch Event at California Academy of Sciences, 2/2/09. Speakers include: Greg Farrington, Dr. Eric Schmidt, John Hanke, Vice President Al Gore, Dr. Sylvia Earle, Terry Garcia, Marissa Mayer, Jimmy Buffett

Google Latitude

Google Latitude lets you see your friends on a map on Google Maps for mobile and iGoogle. Use Latitude to plan an impromptu meetup, see that a loved one got home safely, or just stay in touch with friends. www.google.com/latitude

See where your friends are on a map with Google Latitude. Latitude is a new feature for Google Maps for mobile and an iGoogle gadget.

What's New in Google Earth 5.0

With Google Earth 5.0, you can now travel back in time to see historical imagery, dive below the surface of the ocean and record a tour of your journeys. Download at http://earth.google.com