Google Maps

Google has begun its yearly unveiling of April Fool’s Day jokes with some clever new ideas that probably come up in strategy meetings throughout the year.

Google Nose. Searching a query on Google and clicking the ‘Nose Beta’ button can only find this ‘service’. The service isn’t real of course, but you can read about its features on Nose’s homepage. Funniest bit?

Don’t ask, don’t smell: For when you’re wary of your query – SafeSearch included.

More Google jokes are on the way…
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The two most popular non-game apps downloaded from Apple’s iOS App Store so far this year were both Google ones: YouTube and Google Maps, according to data from App Annie (via The Next Web).

Google Maps was originally installed as standard on iPhones and iPads until Apple struck out on its own with the rather ill-fated Apple Maps. Though Apple has since fixed many of the embarrassing errors in the launch version, demand for Google’s version has seemingly increased rather than decreased.

In an ironic turnabout, Google lost the top slot on its own Google Play store to Facebook.

Google announced today on its Official Blog some that it began rolling out some new enhancements for Google Maps with the addition of famous mountains such Kilimanjaro in Africa and the Everest Base Camp in Asia. Imagery for other mountain peaks is included in today’s update, including: the tallest mountain in Europe; Mount Elbrus located in Russia; as well as the highest in the Western and Southern Hemispheres, Argentina’s Aconcagua.

These mountains belong to the group of peaks known as the Seven Summits—the highest mountain on each of the seven continents. While there’s nothing quite like standing on the mountain, with Google Maps you can instantly transport yourself to the top of these peaks and enjoy the sights without all of the avalanches, rock slides, crevasses, and dangers from altitude and weather that mountaineers face. This imagery was collected with a simple lightweight tripod and digital camera with a fisheye lens—equipment typically used for our Business Photos program.

Google also shared a detailed post on its Lat Long blog that details the process of collecting imagery for today’s update.

FastCompany today posted an in-depth look at the differences between Apple’s MapKit and Google’s recently launched Google Maps for iOS SDK from the perspective of developers. The lengthy piece gets insight from several iOS app developers with apps that rely on the SDKs and sheds some light on a few things that Apple is doing much better than Google despite a perception from users that Google Maps are superior:

“Google doesn’t currently charge for the Places API, but they do require a valid credit card for access–which gives you a quota of 100,000 daily requests. So you have to wonder if they plan to start charging sooner or later,” McKinlay explains. “That 100,000 limit perhaps sounds reasonable, but each user session can generate many requests–particularly when using the ‘autocomplete’ feature of Tube Tamer–and some types of requests count for 10 times the quota each, so it can get used up pretty quickly.”

While noting that Google wins out with location lookup services, 3D buildings, directions, geocoding, and better hybrid satellite imagery, the developers were also quick to point out downsides of the Google Maps SDK such as quotas for the Places API, an increased app size, and limitations with markers, gradient polylines, and overlays.

Developer of transportation app Tube Tamer, Bryce McKinlay, discussed some of the benefits of using Apple’s MapKit:
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Google rolled out the official YouTube app for Wii U in November, allowing users to browse channels and categories from the GamePad and view the video in 1080p on their TVs. Today, as previously announced, Google is rolling out its new Google Maps and Street View solution for Wii U owners with the Wii Street U app available now on the Wii U eShop. The app allows users to view street view and 360 degree content and easily navigate Google Maps using the Wii U GamePad:

With Wii Street Utm powered by Google, you can step into Google Street View with an immersive experience that will make you feel like you’re actually there! View a 360 degree Google Maps Street View of locations all over the world using the Wii Utm GamePad controller’s motion controls. Jumping to a location is easy—just use the GamePad touch screen to type in an address or location and start exploring, or instantly travel to over 70 fascinating, hand-picked locations around the globe.

A video of the app in action is below:
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Kia Motors is working with Google to bring Google Maps and Google Places integration to new vehicles via an updated version of its UVO eServices telematics system. Kia said in a press release today that it would work with Google to integrate Maps and Services for “driving directions and locate Points of Interest (POIs) in a seamless and organic manner.” The new integration will land in the 2014 Sorento CUV and go on sale in the first half of this year, but it will presumably hit all-new vehicles that utilize Kia’s built-in UVO eServices. Kia will also provide Maps and Places features from its UVO smartphone app:

Available with the 2014 Sorento CUV, the new Google-powered UVO system will serve Kia owners whether they are in their cars or away from them. Enabled by the Send2Car feature, Kia owners can send a POI or destination to their car directly from the Google Maps via their SmartphoneUVO app. From within the car, Kia owners will benefit from Google Places, which will provide POI and destination resources such as a dealership location, and Google Maps, which will provide directions to virtually anywhere and everywhere a car can travel.
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[tweet https://twitter.com/googlemaps/status/269499168354091008]

As noted on the Google Maps blog, Google continues to update maps with new aerial, satellite, and 45-degree imagery for many cities in the U.S. and abroad. Google’s most recent addition to maps is a new collection of 45-degree imagery for 60 new cities—40 in the U.S. and 20 internationally— in places like Switzerland and Luxembourg. That brings the total number of cities with updated aerial and satellite imagery in Maps and Google Earth up to 164 cities in 108 countries. Google walked through a few of the recent updates, such as the Space Needle in Seattle and Bridges in the Sky art installation in Austria, but also provided a full list of cities with new high resolution imagery (below):
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Google announced today on the Official Google Blog that it will now include public AMBER Alerts through Google Search results and Maps in coordination with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and the Google Public Alerts platform:

If you’re using Google Search or Maps on desktop and mobile you’ll see an AMBER Alert if you search for related information in a particular location where a child has recently been abducted and an alert was issued. You’ll also see an alert if you conduct a targeted search for the situation. By increasing the availability of these alerts through our services, we hope that more people will assist in the search for children featured in AMBER Alerts and that the rates of safe recovery will rise.

Google explained the alert could include information about an abducted child or additional details including “make and model of the vehicle he/she was abducted in or information about the alleged abductor.” It also said it is working with other organizations, such as Missing Children Europe and the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, to roll out alerts to other countries as well. Google has partnered with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in order to display the AMBER alert data:
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Google is sponsoring an upcoming hackathon by Hattery Labs that is awarding two grand prizes to innovators using Google Maps API.

The “Reroute/sf” hackathon runs from Oct. 19 to Oct. 21 at The Hattery, according to its Facebook page, and it aims to “improve transportation in San Francisco with technological innovation, and work with the City to make it real.” The three-day event essentially invites engineers, designers, and entrepreneurs to “make San Francisco a better place.”

The hackathon will host three challenges, i.e., “Collect the right data,” “Plan a trip anywhere – on-time,” “See what’s broken and watch it get fixed,” while senior representatives from the City of San Francisco and the technology community will determine who wins the following four prizes:

• Best Innovation using Google Maps API | $7,500 Grant
• Runner-up Innovation using Google Maps API | $2,500 Grant
• Best Public Transit Innovation | $500 Clipper Card credit
• Best Collaboration | 3 free General Assembly classes per team member

Aside from Google, the Hattery, the San Francisco Mayor’s Office, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, Waze, Google Maps, and the General Assembly sponsor the hackathon. The Hattery is a collection of experts ranging from designers and engineers to investors and brand marketers, and some of their most notable collaborative work under Hattery Labs includes giving people clean water and helping Haitians rebuild schools through WellDone and Haiti School Project, respectively.

Registration details below.

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While still taking its sweet time building a Maps app for iOS, Google is making sure to take care of its own business today by launching the biggest update ever for Street View.

Street View is a five-year-old feature in Google Maps and Google Earth that provides panoramic views of many streets in the world, and its latest update adds over 250,000 miles of roads from around the globe. Google’s Street View team elaborated on the service’s expansion in a post on the official Lat Long blog:

We’re increasing Street View coverage in Macau, Singapore, Sweden, the U.S., Thailand, Taiwan, Italy, Great Britain, Denmark, Norway and Canada. And we’re launching special collections in South Africa, Japan, Spain, France, Brazil and Mexico, among others.

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Google’s map offerings build in the human intelligence on the front end, and that’s what allows its computers to tell you the best route from San Francisco to Boston.

In an exclusive story by the Senior Editor at The Atlantic, Alexis C. Madrigal, Google for the first time gives us a look at “Ground Truth”. It is a project described by Madrigal as a secretive, complex internal map that contains data, such as “no-left-turns and freeway on-ramps, speed limits and traffic conditions,” necessary to help users navigate through Google Maps:

I was slated to meet with Gupta and the engineering ringleader on his team, former NASA engineer Michael Weiss-Malik, who’d spent his 20 percent time working on Google Mars, and Nick Volmar, an “operator” who actually massages map data. 

“So you want to make a map,” Weiss-Malik tells me as we sit down in front of a massive monitor. “There are a couple of steps. You acquire data through partners. You do a bunch of engineering on that data to get it into the right format and conflate it with other sources of data, and then you do a bunch of operations, which is what this tool is about, to hand massage the data. And out the other end pops something that is higher quality than the sum of its parts.”

Describing Ground Truth to be an elaborate internal Map Maker of sorts, perhaps the most interesting aspect of the story is just how much human input goes into making the Google Maps experience accurate. In the story, Madrigal noted the Ground Truth Geo team aims to address most of the fixable problems reported by users (thousands daily) within minutes:
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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrS9AVPUMFQ&feature=youtu.be]

Today on the Official Google Blog, VP of Google Maps and Earth Brian McClendon announced Google is expanding Google Maps to new locations across the globe with the addition of new turn-by-turn navigation with traffic condition data, biking directions, as well as StreetView and Map Maker imagery. The first big addition goes to a number of towns across indian cities such as Bangalore and Delhi:

First, we’re expanding Google Maps Navigation (Beta) with voice guided, turn-by-turn directions in thousands of towns across India. Navigation is one of the most frequently requested features in this region and can be especially helpful when driving in densely populated cities like Delhi or Bangalore. We’re also adding live traffic conditions for major roads with estimated travel times to help you save time and to reduce stress on the road.

New Zealanders are also getting new access within Google Maps with the roll out of both Map Maker and Biking directions in the region. However, perhaps the biggest update today comes with new Street View imagery being released this afternoon for over 150 new university campuses around the world. Google noted a few of the more recognizable additions including UCLA and Royce Hall at the University of California in the U.S, Sophia University in Japan, Pembroke College in the U.K, and McGill University in Quebec.

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Google announced today on the Lat Long Blog that it added even more Street View imagery to Google Maps; this time for Brazil and pre-hispanic Mexican cities. While there was already Street View imagery available for the locations, the latest additions include panoramic imagery for 70+ cities throughout Brazil including “colonial cities like Fortaleza, architecturally compelling cities like Brasilia and coastal landmarks like Recife, Natal and Salvador.”

You can even virtually travel to the west side of Brazil and visit Foz de Iguaçu, or if you’re planning an upcoming trip, preview the the area around your hotel as well as nearby shopping malls, historic monuments, restaurants and more. With so many upcoming events, like the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympics, we’re excited to share the riches of Brazil’s cities not only with tourists from around the world, but also with locals who might want to visit a city, neighborhood or landmark they’ve not yet experienced.

Also included in today’s update is 30 Mesoamerican archaeological areas in Mexico, including the 1,100-year-old Kukulkan’s Temple pyramid, and other sites such as Teotihuacan, Chichen Itza, and Tulum.

Google — Left: Mobile map with all modes of public transit shown; Right: Transit Lines layer in Subway mode

Google Maps now offers schedules for over 1 million public transportation stops in nearly 500 cities worldwide, while its Android counterpart updated today to make the abundance of new transit data more convenient.

Christopher Van Der Westhuizen, a Google Maps software engineer, announced version 6.10 of the Google Maps for Android app on the Official Google Blog:

We’ve made some changes to the Transit Lines layer, so that you can select a specific mode of public transportation (train, bus, tram or subway) to display on the mobile map, hiding the other modes. This is helpful in areas where there is a tight concentration of several types of public transit.

Google offers a list of supported cities at its Transit page.

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