Canada

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BPeWJTuD7G8]

Canadians are getting a little bit of love today from Google as Google Map Maker for Canada officially goes live. The project has been available in the U.S. since earlier this year and elsewhere since 2008, but now Canadians too can add local geographic data to Google Maps.

By heading over to www.google.ca/mapmaker, you can now start adding points of interest (adding/naming buildings, restaurants, schools, etc.), rivers, trails and roads, or update existing landmarks to make them more accurate. Of course all of your edits will first have to be approved for accuracy by Google engineers before being displayed on Google Maps.

The tool isn’t too difficult to use. You can easily select a route for a bike path or newly constructed road, drop a familiar red pin to add a point of interest, or draw a shape to add a building or landmark. You’ll already notice a lot of edits and additions to the Canada map, as Canadian Google employees have been testing out the tool in preparation of today’s launch.

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Undergraduate students from universities across the U.S. and Canada spent a week at Android Camp, Google’s “Android Development 101” course. The program was somewhat like an internship. Students, most of which who are in school for computer science, spent the week at Google’s Mountain View campus and got hands-on help from engineers. Students were assigned teams and began to hammer away at creating an Android app. Google notes a few of the applications developed:

At the end of the week, each group presented its application to other Android campers and Google engineers. Applications spanned a variety of categories: recipeBEAR provides people with a list of meal recipes based on ingredients they have on hand; Blazin’ Contacts uses QR codes to automatically collect contact information from a large group of people and input it into your mobile device; OnTime combines Google Maps with the device’s alarm to help people gauge how much time they’ll need to arrive somewhere; The Shake Race, as you may imagine, was the most entertaining of the bunch—group members demonstrated the game by shaking their Xoom Tablets furiously to race their characters across the screen.

This new program is going to be annual for college freshman and sophomores. Sign-ups for next year’s camp will go up in November.
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Whip out your syrup and bacon, because Engadget is reporting that the Samsung Galaxy S II is coming to Canada on three carriers. This device is on its way to Bell, Virgin Mobile, and SaskTell. Bell and VirginMobile have yet to release any pricing. SaskTell will be carrying the phone for $79.99 on a 3 year contract, which seems like a reasonable price but absurd commitment. SaskTell and Virgin Mobile are saying the device is on its way in the coming weeks, where Virgin Mobile is holding a contest to win the phone that ends July 19th. Expect to see this phone soon.