Tadi iseng-iseng googling “kombor”. Eh, nemu peta rumahnya kombor di wikimapia.

Hehehe… itu bukan rumah Kombor yang punya blog ini. Kalau yang gubuk itu, … itu baru betul walaupun itu gubuk di Sleman sana. Untuk yang sekarang ditempati entah mengapa kok di Google Earth lokasi rumah Kang Kombor tertutup awan alias tidak kelihatan.

ISRO , Indian space & research organization has launched Bhuvan, a satellite mapping tool similar to Google Earth and Wikimapia on 12th August 2009. Bhuvan gives you an easy way to experience, explore and visualize IRS images over Indian region.

Bhuvan is a geoportal that provides medium to high resolution satellite imagery of  virtually the entire India over the internet. You can “fly” around using mouse and keyboard on a simple desktop computer with virtual globe in front draped with IRS images over Indian region. Many other features are built in, including 3D terrain and information on many thematic data.

Bhuvan is a free web based image portal. Most Image visualization programs are very expensive and complex. Bhuvan provides a fast and friendly way to look at IRS satellite data and thematic information in geographic context, which is invaluable for management, planning and visualization.

“With Bhuvan we will be able to produce very local information which will be specific to only to our own country. This information available from this mapping system will be useful in addressing very local problems like floods, famines, infrastructure development, education and much more,” said ISRO chairman Dr G Madhavan Nair.

Multi-resolution images from multi-sensor IRS satellites of India is seamlessly depicted through the Bhuvan web portal by enabling a common man to zoom into specific area of interest at high resolution. Bhuvan brings a whole lot  of uniqueness in understanding our own natural resources whilst presenting beautiful images and thematic vectors generated from varieties of geospatial information. Bhuvan will also attempt to bring out the importance of multi-temporal data and to highlight the changes taking place to our natural resources, which will serve as a general awareness on our changing planet.  There are lot more special value added services which will be enabled onto the web portal in due course of time and each one of those services are going to be unique to preserving and conserving our precious natural resources through public participation.  We are sure the common man will get rich benefits from these Indian geospatial data services in days to come.

Bhuvan can take closer pictures of the Indian Subcontinent as compared to the Google Earth. Bhuvan is capable of taking a zoom level of up to 10 meters, while Google Earth features a zoom level of up to 200 meters.

Unlike Google Earth, however the Bhuvan application will not be downloadable and will not allow users to host content in the near future. It is not yet ready for Mac OS and Linux. But, at the moment Bhuvan can run only on windows system and is optimised for IE 6. or higher with 1280×1024 resolution.

One will be able to see the following data using Bhuvan:

• Satellite imagery (LISS III , LISS IV along with metadata and  Multi- temporal Data from OCM & AWiFS)
• Value added information (NADAMS – National Agricultural Drought Monitoring System), Output of flood studies for certain areas
• Thematic information  (Wastelands, Soils, watershed,water resources related maps)
• Base layers ( administrative boundaries, transport layers, water bodies, etc)
• Census information
• Metadata

Advanced functionalities to be provided in future versions

• Urban Design Tools (to build roads, junctions and traffic lights in an urban setting)
• Contour map ( Displays a colorized terrain map and contour lines)
• Terrain profile ( Displays the terrain elevation profile along a path)
• Draw tools (Creates simples markers, free hand lines, urban designs)
• Navigation map (to jump to and view locations in the 3D India)

It is mandatory to register to use Bhuvan. The basic version of Bhuvan is free. Once you register and you login, you will be asked to download the Bhuvan plug-in. Accept the installation of the plug-in and you are ready to use the full features of Bhuvan.

Mi piace molto usare Wikipedia. In particolare spesso mi ritrovo a cercare un argomento di cui sono curioso, leggere la pagina corrispondente e da lì seguire i vari link verso le altre pagine, e informarmi su cose di cui non sapevo neanche l’esistenza. E’ un tipo di esplorazione casuale, che porta alla scoperta di qualcosa di inaspettato, di non previsto, qualcosa che si può riassumere col termine serendipity.

Ma in realtà è possibile essere molto più metodici nell’utilizzo dell’enciclopedia online, utilizzando criteri ben precisi nella fruizione delle voci. Due giovani russi, Alexandre Koriakine e Evgeniy Saveliev, hanno avuto un’idea. Quella di georeferenziare i lemmi di Wikipedia (almeno, quelli legati a precisi luoghi geografici). Nel 2006 mettono online la loro applicazione, Wikimapia, il cui obiettivo è quello di “descrivere l’intero mondo“. Wikimapia si basa sulla mappa ibrida di Google Maps. Gli utenti del sito possono aggiungere delle note in qualsiasi parte di questa. Cliccando su uno dei tanti rettangolini più o meno grandi che appaiono sulla mappa si apre una finestra di popup all’interno dell’applicazione, contenente alcuni brevi cenni sulla località cliccata (una regione, una città, ma anche un lago o un singolo edificio), nonché un link alla corrispettiva voce su Wikipedia.

Wikimapia (che non è in alcun modo legata alla Wikimedia Foundation) è ancora in fase di beta, sono presenti ancora molte lacune e la redazione di molte note è di livello sicuramente inferiore rispetto a quello cui sono abituati gli utenti di Wikipedia. Inoltre l’enciclopedia di Jimmy Wales ha un suo modo di georeferenziare le proprie voci geografiche: è possibile cliccare sulle coordinate geografiche di un lemma (ad esempio la città di Roma), e, tramite il servizio GeoHack, visualizzare l’area corrispondente su molte applicazioni di mappe online. Tuttavia questo procedimento non permette la ricerca inversa, quella a partire dalla mappa verso le definizioni. Sarebbe pertanto molto interessante un’eventuale integrazione tra Wikipedia e Wikimapia. Se anche non si verificasse mai tale collaborazione si potrà comunque utilizzare un servizio molto interessante, in via di perfezionamento.

Imej satelit Bandar Pasir Puteh

Bandar Pasir Puteh kini boleh di lihat melalui imej satelit dari Google Earth. Walaupun hanya sebahagian dari kawasan pusat bandar yang dipaparkan dengan jelas namun ianya lebih baik dari sebelum ini yang tidak nampak langsung.

Bagi mereka yang ingin melihat imej satelit ini, sila muat turun aplikasi Google Earth yang disediakan secara percuma di sini http://earth.google.com/ dan “install” ke komputer terlebih dahulu. Dengan kemudahan internet dan dengan menggunakan aplikasi ini, kita boleh menerokai mana-mana tempat di seluruh pelusuk dunia.

Sekiranya anda ingin melihat imej satelit bersama dengan peta sahaja, layari sahaja Google Map http://maps.google.com/ dan jika anda ingin menanda/melabel lokasi tertentu pada imej satelit atau peta sila ke pautan Wikimapia http://wikimapia.org/

This method is intended for:

a.  people who have access to shapefile data and wish to easily view their shapefiles, together with polygons created in WikiMapia.

b.  people who have kml or kmz files they wish to view as a map overlay on their website.

Framework

The framework for this project is a web page that serves Google Earth imagery using the Google Earth plug-in.

Benefits for WikiMapia Tag Creators

1. You can see every created and non-deleted tag in WikiMapia. This means you can use the WM Beta Satellite view without ‘+ old places’ and still be sure of seeing all tags.

2. You can clearly see where your newly made tags match the outline of the shapefile data.

Background and Overview

What is kml or kmz?

Kml (keyhole markup language) is an xml file type developed by Google to contain data for display in Google Earth. There are many references for this file type, so I’ll stop at this.

KMZ versus KML

KMZ is simply a zipped version of a kml. Any standard zip program can do it – just zip the file and rename the extension to .kmz. This method is useful if your data is large enough to benefit from compression.

Prerequisites for the Method

There are a few things you need, in the following order. Here is the list:

1. Google Earth plug-in: if you don’t have the Google Earth plug-in, you must download and install it. It is available here:

http://dl.google.com/earth/plugin/GoogleEarthPluginSetup.exe

This is an installer program, which after downloading and running will connect to Google for the complete plug-in download. The file size of the latest installer is about 540K, the plug-in file (geplugin.exe) is about 17MB and the total downloaded and installed package is about 31MB. After you run it, the plug-in is installed to your internet browser (Firefox, Chrome, or IE for Windows – Safari or Flock for Mac), and at the same time it installs the Google Update Service, a system level updater of Google products.

Support for GE plug-in

This link is to a Google group forum that I find useful:

http://groups.google.com/group/google-earth-browser-plugin/topics

2. A website: you must have a website, but it can be one obtained through a free web host. 

3. A Google Earth API key: this is free, and it is assigned to the website you will use for this project. More details about how to obtain and use this key are given below. The key is obtained here: http://code.google.com/apis/earth/

Note: when applying for the key you should use the second-level domain name:

mywebsite.com or http://mywebsite.com for example, not www.mywebsite.com or http://www.mywebsite.com.

This will let allow the API key to be used anywhere on your site.

4. A package of files to upload to your website: I will provide those using the following email link.

mrb@inetvision.info

I will accept requests by email until June 16, 2009.

The package contains the following:

a. A web page (_wikimapia_kml.html) that will use the plug-in to show GE imagery and the WikiMapia network link file to show WM polygons. This page must be slightly modified by you, replacing my API key with yours. Near the top of the page, this is indicated by ‘// replace my API key with your own:’.

There is an optional modification – if you wish to automatically load your kml files when the page is loaded. This is indicated by ‘// insert your kml file names here:’.

If you don’t want to do this, there is also a way to do so after the page loads, using the ‘Kml Documents’ tab on the sliding control panel.

b. Two javascript files and two css stylesheets. One of them, ‘Ext.ux.GEarthPanel-1.1.1.js’ must be modified to replace my web site root address with your own.

The text you need to change is indicated by ‘// insert your website root address here:’. 

c. ‘WikiMapia.kml’, a network link to Wikimapia.org, which will update and show the WikiMapia tags in near real time. This file is set to update the display 1 second after you stop moving on the map.

d. Six PNG images, in a directory called ‘images’, which are used for the sliding control panel on the main page.

e. Your own shapefiles (converted to kml) or your own kml files.

After you have all these files, upload them to your website. They all go in the main directory (for free websites it is usually ‘public_html’) except the image files, which need to be a directory called ‘images’.

The Method: converting shapefiles to kml

First, you need to convert your shapefiles to kml or kmz. There are several tools available for doing that, but I will ignore the high-cost commercial solutions (ArcGIS extensions etc) and focus on free or inexpensive software.

First choice: I highly recommend ‘shp2kml Converter.exe’, by Reimers.dk, which is available here: http://www.reimers.dk/files/folders/google_maps/entry328.aspx

Using this software I have converted fairly large shapefiles (50MB) with no problems.

Second choice is ‘shape2earth’ and is now version 1.4.6. It is available at: http://shape2earth.com/default.aspx

This is a shareware plug-in to MapWindow GIS and there is a short evaluation period, which also has limited functionality (number of points allowed is 500). If you have a lot of data and will need this tool in future then the cost of USD 29.95 is not very much. It does work well and has many options.

In order to use shape2earth you must also download MapWindow GIS, an excellent, free GIS. It is available here: http://www.mapwindow.org/download.php?show_details=1

Third choice is free, called ‘shp2kml’, now in version 2 and available at: http://www.zonums.com/shp2kml.html

I have had mixed results with this software. My first attempts to convert some shapefiles worked perfectly, so I was encouraged to continue – but subsequent trials were less successful, and it all had to do with the limitations of shp2kml in dealing with large indices and attribute (field) names over 100 characters in length. I also had problems when trying to change their default choices for placemark icons (I didn’t want any).

Having said that, I was able to successfully convert 6 large shapefiles to kml.

An Additional and Recommended Step to Tweak the kml

If you load your converted shapefiles (as kml/kmz) in Google Earth you can change the name of the file, the default style colors and/or icons. If you select the folder containing the data and then right-click (CMD-click for Mac?) you can choose the Properties menu and change things. You can also use the Google Earth Properties menu. This is highly recommended.

I suggest to not display any icons and to display only the outlines of your polygons – they will then be easy to compare with the imagery and with Wikimapia polygons.

Then select Save As… to save the file to your hard disk and then upload the changed file to your website.

Demo Site

I have created a demonstration of the method here: http://norlectech.net/_Wikimapia_kml.html

I have set this up to demonstrate the method and will keep it running for a month or so. You won’t be able to view this site without having the Google Earth plug-in installed to your browser.

After the web page loads, click on ‘Find a Location:’ and enter ‘lizard island’ in the text box. Feel free to look around!

Web Page Interface:

The entire web page is used for the Google Earth imagery map, and there is a sliding control panel on the left side of the page.

There are four tabs on the panel:

‘KML Documents’, which lets you load kml/kmz files.

‘Find a location:’, to search and fly to a location.

‘GE Map Layers’, to set GE map layers.

‘GE Options’, to set Google Earth options.

You can reduce the panel to the far left side of the web page.

That’s basically it. Enjoy!

Unfortunately, I cannot use the WikiMapia mapplet to access their content, so this is just an ordinary Google map.

View Larger Map

To be continued…

Technorati Tags: Google Map,Wikimapia

I suggest that WikiMapia use graphic symbols for many of the features on the map.

What are the advantages of using Symbols?

Essentially:

If well designed it will help reduce eye-clutter,

it may help focus the viewer on where to obtain specific types of locations or services,

and it may provide a friendly, familiar user experience.

More about Eye-Clutter:

With certain types of features on the map, an immediately apparent problem is what to do about office buildings, shopping malls, tourist destinations and any other feature that can has multiple uses or multiple tenants.

It is inconceivable that we will make tags with the names of all the tenants, or all the goods and services available in one of those places – at least not directly on the limited area of the map. Symbols, and in some cases, even logos, can be a reliable guide for viewers of the contents of such a place – helping them decide whether to pursue looking further at that location.

More Advantages for using Symbols:

There are at least two major uses for symbols in WikiMapia.

One is for symbols shown directly on the map, as examples, the symbols for an ATM, a hospital, a shopping center, an office building and a marina.

The other is to use symbols as a kind of visual directory – shown to the viewer only after clicking on a location to get further information. For example, a shopping center, an office building, a marina or the club house at a golf course. This use requires specially created dialogs or windows, offering more types of information, having a scrollable area, and so on.

What symbols, for what kind of Features?

Locations having Multiple-Uses, Tenants, Goods or Services: Office buildings, shopping centers, marinas, club houses, etc.

Goods or Services / Public: Police, fire, hospitals, hospitals, medical or dental clinics, emergency medical services, drug stores and other public services that are considered essential.

Goods or Services / Private: any retail or wholesale shop, grocery stores or hypermarkets, hair salons, clothing stores, and so on, although we should select just a superset of all these.

Landforms: Peninsula, cape, point, isthmus, tombolo, etc.

Water-based Features: ocean or sea, lake or pond, island, (reef, sandbar, rock or shoals), marine hazard, (strait or channel or passage), (bay or cove), lagoon, (seaport or harbor), (jetty, dock, pier or landing), etc

Travel and Tourism: Land, Water or Air Accommodation and Transportation:

Airports, subways, monorails, train and railway stations, ferries, car rentals, accommodations of any type, tour and travel agents etc.

Leisure Activities: any, on land, water or in the air.

Dining and Drink:

Historic Site/Landmark/Point of Interest: (commonly acknowledged)

Government or Administrative: capitals, either regional or national and border stations/customs houses, port authorities or any other government office or facility.

This is not an exhaustive list, just a start. But, it should be reducible to not more than about 40-50 commonly known symbols, because the balance of the information available can be obtained by clicking on the tag.

What is the source for the Symbols?

There are many sources. Unless the WikiMapia developers wish to commission a designer to create them, or if they can be obtained for a reasonable fee, I suggest we use those which are available under the Common Creative Media license – acknowledgement will be given to their creator and content providers get what is needed to make more effective maps.

What about Polygons and other Shapes?

Not a problem. Polygons are very useful and they can still serve to indicate anything that has a visible area. They can also be linked to the symbols, so by rolling the mouse over the symbol of a restaurant for example, some basic information is displayed and the polygon covering the restaurant is highlighted. The rollover/mouse-over technique will work for polygons too, and will display basic information, clicking th polygon will open the full display of available information.

Clicking on the symbol would also open a full display of everything known about that location.

This topic is related to the discussion of Categories and will be continued…

There is a mapplet that allows you to view WikiMapia data in Google Maps. The frequency of update is not known – but unfortunately, most of the data presented by a search for ‘WikiMapia’ was from already deleted tags. The WikiMapia search bar is also available.

If you do a search for ‘WikiMapia’ in the main Google Maps search bar at the world zoom level, it shows a total of 141,166,217 results –wow! I don’t know if that is accurate, I don’t really have time to check them all out. I did see that much of what is presented for the search results are ‘junk’ tags – and that doesn’t do WikiMapia much good.

It is interesting that the WikiMapia layer is initially displayed somewhat like in Google Earth – which is a pretty boring rectangle and an icon to click, no polygons. After that, if you click the icon, a WikiMapia page appears, embedded in Google Maps, and that shows all the polygons and click-able region/tags. Clicking a tag shows the WM info window – this entire experience is just like going to the WikiMapia.org website – except you never leave Google Maps.

I will continue this post after spending more time with the Google Maps and the WikiMapia layer.

Diane, pointed me in the direction of  wikimapia and I have added a couple of items,  so that people know the Alex triangle.  I will be one of a few places this next quarter:

> SERF:  Center of Astrophysics  and Space Sciences (CASS) dept on campus.  Find me here doing research or more probably teaching some students about the universe.

> Mayer Hall Addition:  While Mayer hall is nearly done,  physics has not moved in yet, so that the main grad student classroom will be somewhere here in the addition.  Find me learning here.

> Miramar Apts: This is the eastern edge of my living radius.  Find me here sleeping, and possibly running in circles.

> BioMedical Library:  I study here,  It is nice except when finals roll around, with all of those “smelly” undergrads, who take up all the seats and are loud.

I might actually have to leave the triangle on a daily basis, they have moved some of the classrooms around, so that either for the class that I am teaching / the for my classes, I might be moving around.  but who knows…

I still want to get a gps locator data logger, so that I can trace my location over time for a couple of years.

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

السلام عليكم و رحمة الله و بركاتة ,,,

حيا الله الجميع

wikimapia موقع يماثل قوقل إيرث لكن يتميز بحرية الكتابة !!!

موقعنا اليوم يختص بالبحث عن المواقع  ( المكانية ) مثل قوقل ايرث ,,

و برنامج ناسا ورلد ويند ,,لكن يتميز بسهولته عن غيره ,,,

و هذا هو الموقع :-

http://www.wikimapia.org/

تستطيع أن تحدد موقعك وتكتب عليه ماتشاء من أسم المنزل او (مكان كشتتكم )

طريقة الكتابة عليه, تذهب لكلمة WikiMapia ,,

موجودة فوق يمين باللون الأحمر

ثم تختار >> Add New Place << ,, يخرج لك مربع تحديد

تحدد المكان بالضبط ثم تكتب أسمه الذي تريد

ثم تضغط على كلمة >> save << ,

———–
من الخيار WikiMapia نقدر نبحث عن اي موقع نبيه ,,

وفيه مواقع كثيرررره بالعربي وبغيره ,,,
———-

اذا نبي نبحث عن موقع معين نختار الامر Search Places ,,

وبالمربع اللي يطلع لنا نكتب اللي نبيه ,,,
———-

و اما اذا نبي ندور على مدينه معينه نختار الامر Search City ,,

ونكمل علي الوضع هذا ,,,
بسيط بس قوي جداً ,, و الحلو الي فيه إنك تقدر تكتب على أي مكان

تبيه ,,,

..

بأختصار موقع بطل وتنبسط وانت تشوف بيتكم وخصوصا اذا كان مساحته كبيرة يصير أوضح من المساحة الصغيرة

ويدعم اللغة العربية

..

لكن مما يسوئه أستخدام الناس له أستخدام سلبي كالتشهير والسب والشتائم

..

تصفح ممتع أتمناه لكم

*منقول مع الأضافة

This article is somewhat technical in nature. I will try to keep it brief and readable.

WikiMapia exports all it’s content to Google Earth, in the form of a live ‘NetworkLink’, in a file called ‘ge.kml’. The content are updated in near-real time, every time the globe is moved, and within 2 seconds after the movement stops.

It is the display of WikiMapia content in Google Earth that I wish to discuss here.

I consider that the NetworkLink method is working well, but the display is not optimal. Google Earth already suffers from the perennial web-mapping problem of eye-clutter. Unless you turn off most of the available layers of data it is difficult to clearly see locations on the globe.

Suggestions:

1. Choose unobtrusive colors and greater transparency for the polygons. Note: they are not actually polygons in the GE kml sense – the method used is called ‘PolyString/LinearRing. This might need to be changed for some purposes.

2. Allow a mouse-over on any part of the polygon to show the objects region, not just the icon or the borders. This may be fined tuned based on the relative scale of the object, so large overlapping objects won’t interfere with the viewers ability to navigate on the GE globe.

3. Choose a smaller icon, preferably with a WikiMapia logo.

4. Show the Title for all objects.

5. Show the Description after a click.

If a viewer chooses to go to the WikiMapia website it will be because they have a genuine interest, not just because they can’t see enough basic information in the object display on Google Earth.

The subject of WikiMapia and Google Earth is worthy of more discussion…

To be continued…

Context

We are adding data to a map, and to a set of servers storing that data and serving it up again through a map display – and eventually offering a robust facility for users to query the data. The data we add is automatically geo-coded, so at least the country of location is automatically known. When Wikimapia has the lower level administrative boundaries for all countries, when the content-providers have added the points of interest, the neighborhoods, commercial estates, offices, central business districts etc, then even the ‘local’ locations will be good. 

A location would appear as a linked list, for example:

(Indonesia, DKI, Fatmawati Barat, RT/RW 004/007)

This provides ‘local’ information, but it might also be linked to ‘friendlier’ terms, e.g.

(Indonesia, DKI, Fatmawati Barat, RT/RW 004/007: close to Citos)

Category Trees are essential to encoding meaningful information about a place: whichever category is selected will appear and be recorded in the servers. If you leave it at the top level then that’s what will appear, otherwise you can select a finer (lower level) designation.

Here’s an example:

1. Present a list of Top level categories:

Food: select this and a list of sub-categories will appear, what Type of food place is this?

Restaurant: select this and a list of it’s sub-categories appear, what Type of food is served?

Mexican:

The final category selected and appearing on the tag is:

Mexican Restaurant.

This type of tag will enable a fine grained search for all restaurants serving the food of a certain type or country.

When a more robust search feature is eventually implemented for Wikimapia, we should also be able to limit our search geographically, again using an associated tree list. It should accept binary terms and have an advanced search feature.

This is why categories are vital – because all of this is really just a way to mine the data, to query the servers. Categories make things easier. Coupled with high quality geo-coded data, it could make Wikimapia a winner.

The problem is that we are not using a linked category system – and no related choices are presented after choosing a top level category. We need this type of category system.

To be continued…

Anyone creating new tags or using the polygon tool will likely encounter the following error messages or conditions:

1. ‘Polygon too big’

2. ‘Building’ is often checked as default

3. ‘Polygon too long’

4. ‘Too many actions’

5. ‘email links disallowed’ – or something similar to this

The last three are presumably designed to foil vandals or spammers – but they don’t and won’t work!

Let’s look at each of them in turn:

1. ‘Polygon too big’ :

There is a real need for big polygons. Regional boundaries, large natural features immediately come to mind. This should be fixed.

2. ‘Building’ checked by default:

There is no need for this. It simply interrupts the rhythm of creating a new tag, assuming you are not tagging a building. I also assume we could substitute ‘man-made structure’ for ‘building’.  This should be fixed.

3. ‘Polygon too thin’:

Thin, long polygons are also very much needed. Pipelines, long or thin jetties, long or thin bridges, long walls and many other physical features require a long, thin polygon. This should also be fixed.

4. ‘Too many actions’:

This one is insidious. If someone is prepared and capable of creating many tags in a short time, why should they be punished form it? If your time is valuable to you, and if you are held back by his message, it is very possible that a valuable contributor will eventually tire of this message and simply stop creating new tags. If this is intended to stop vandals or spammers it will also not work! This should definitely be fixed.

5. ‘email links disallowed’:

This was surely intended to prevent spammers from repeating the same Title over and over. On then other hand, a legitimate tag creator may be naming generic features, such as Lake, Pond, Island etc, often with the intention to either return to the tag later and give it a local name, or to simply leave it like it is – since not every physical feature has a name. I suggest that a list of safe, generic terms be allowed as Titles, without generating that message. I don’t believe this is difficult to implement. This should be fixed.

There are more such issues, I will address them in later posts.

I am proposing a model for WikiMapia content providers (registered users) and other suggested improvements.

This is targeted at issues arising from one-time or sporadic users, vandals, spammers and others who contribute mainly ‘junk’ or ‘offensive’ content to WikiMapia.

It is also intended to provide a stable, transparent framework, and a better user experience, for all who are involved with WikiMapia.

Glossary of Terms:

User: anyone viewing the WikiMapia website.

Registered User: somene who has registered to contribute to the WikiMapia project. Details of the registration process are described below.

Level 1: a registered user who has a limited account. Details below.

Level 2: a registered user who has an expanded account. Details below.

Level 3: a registered user who has an enhanced account. Details below.

Administrator: a person appointed by the WikiMapia project developers or owners to be responsible for the administration of WikiMapia. These appointments will be announced in the WikiMapia Forum.

Moderator: a person appointed by the WikiMapia Administrators to moderate the WikiMapia Forums. These appointments will be announced in the Forum.

Content Provider: any registered user of WikiMapia, or any person or entity authorized by an Administrator or by the developers or owners to edit or create content for WikiMapia.

Content: the product created by any Content Provider for use in WikiMapia.

Banning: the process of closing the account of a Level 1 or Level 2 user. Level 2 or Level 3 users may vote to ban a user through the WikiMapia Forum. A minimum of at 7 votes more than those voting not to ban are required.

Personal Places: these are private residences, which may be allowed – but they will be automatically categorized as ‘houses’ or ‘personal’.

WikiMapia Terms of Use for Content Providers:

Only Registered Users may edit or add to the map.

Registration requires a valid email and a confirmation. Periodic re-confirmation may be required by the Administrators.

Newly registered users have the Level 1 designation.

Level 1 users are limited in their actions:

They may create a maximum of 3 ‘personal’ places, subject to review and approval by Level 2 or higher users.

They may edit the Title, Description, Rectangle or Polygon of an existing, non-protected place.

They may delete the tags or photographs of places created by other Level 1 users.

They may send and receive Private Messages (PM) through the WikiMapia Forum. They may use the Search facility in the WM Forum.

They will be directed to read the WM User Guide and other pertinent documentation.

Level 2 users are proposed for selection by Level 2, Level 3 or Administrators in an open Forum process, and they have expanded rights:

They may delete or edit the work of any Level 1 user.

The may edit the work of any Level 2 user.

They may delete the work of any Level 2 user, providing that notification is given to the user concerned, and that assent is also given by at least one other Level 2 user through the WikiMapia Forum.

They may vote to ban any Level 1 or Level 2 user.

They may use the designated Level 2 Forum section.

They may propose or suggest improvements, report bugs or anomalies concerning WikiMapia through designated topics in the WikiMapia Forum.

Level 3 users are appointed by the Administrators and have enhanced rights.

They may be allowed to upload many tags at once, using approved batch processes.

They may be given access to special tools for mass deletion of ‘junk’ tags.

They may have access to other tools at the discretion of the Administrators.

They may be appointed as Forum Moderators by the Administrators.

Administrators represent the project owners or developers:

They may ban any user without notice or recourse.

They may moderate any WikiMapia Forum.

They may appoint Level 3 users.

Unless otherwise indicated, a higher level user will inherit all of the privileges of lower levels.

The next part of this series will go into more specifics.

This is far from a perfect, or even good list. It is not even a good start, because there is no discernible system or structure. It is incomplete and incorrect.

The Tourism category is spotty at best, and given the sparseness of the sub-categories it is clearly not been thought through.

Popular might be a search term representing an aggregate of categories, but it is not a good category term on it’s own.

Overall, Wikimapia’s category system is a hodgepodge of top-ranked (by usage) user choices, which does not reflect well on the developers, since they should be responsible for providing the framework.

‘Interesting place’ is not an objective description of a location, only a subjective impression. People looking for tourist attractions, bridges or islands don’t want to look at all the ‘interesting places’ first.

A good first test is to view the category as a search term – can it be used to approach or pinpoint a search? is it too broad? is it too specific?

This is part 1 of a continuing series. More to come.

We need better tools, with more features and better behavior.

Many WM users have made good suggestions in the Forum.

We need better categories (tags), rationally structured and easily accessible.

I have suggested that 3-5 of the most recently used categories be shown at the top of the list.

We need a development framework and a roadmap that can be relied on.

This must come from the Developers, and it should come soon.

Some specific issues:

1. The interface is stiff, messages presented are poorly written and can be confusing, especially for a novice.

There are enough people who understand interface design. Hire some.

2. The performance of the interface is not robust and often unresponsive. The editing tools feel ‘clunky’, and the visual environment is less than satisfactory.

There are many talented programmers around – what’s holding this up?

3. Dialog boxes are fixed in size and screen location. The text caret is not ‘focused’ where you might expect, and the polygon tool is rudimentary. There are no other graphic primitives (circle, eclipse or other basic shapes).

This is an extension of the interface and user experience points above – there is no lack of users, but there seems to be little understanding of the need for user and usability testing. In the end, a successful interface will support a successful product. The interface alone will not make WM a success for the developers, but it might at least create a satisfactory experience for the users.

4. Selection of categories (more properly the tags that classify the new content) is from a list of most used terms, and many of those terms are not what you might expect.

There is a lot of discussion about this in the WM Forum, but it tends to get sidetracked, as often occurs in a public forum. There are no ‘group of experts’ tasked to solve this problem, and very little input from the WM developers. Until this is satisfactorily resolved it will remain a serious barrier to progress in getting good, useful content from the WM editors/users.

There are a number of good classification systems – pick one or build on one, then settle on a stable, robust framework.

There is no published roadmap for development.

This is another critical area that needs attention. Right now Wikimapia is a ‘sandbox’ for new users, a burden for the people serious about keeping poor content off the map, and a trial for those trying to easily add new content with proper categories.

Wikimapia is a project with great potential. The developers should publish their vision, make better tools and create some momentum for their project.

The kml files generated from the Wikimapia tags, using ge.kml to load them into Google Earth – do not contain polygons. They use the MultiGeometry/LineString method instead, so if we want to export the kml file and retain the polygon shape created in Wikimapia we need to parse the kml file and insert the Polygon/LinearRing tags (see the GE kml help at http://code.google.com/apis/kml/documentation/kmlreference.html#polygon).

Whenever a Wikimapia user creates a new tag (a location on the map) he can choose to make a polygon or a plain rectangle. A title is mandatory, a description is optional and so are the selection of appropriate categories. I find the lack of at least one category truly amazing – but I’ll save that for another post.

After saving the new tag, that information is stored on the Wikimapia servers, and it is also transferred very quickly to Google Earth. If we download and insert the ge.kml file from Wikimapia we will we able to see all the WM tags in Google Earth.

We can individually select and copy the tags, which will be in the form of individual kml files, saving them to our computer if we like. As far as I am aware, there is no way to download all of the WM tags in a single operation, so it would be a very time-consuming task to save all the tags.

Who is the owner of the tags that users make?

Wikimapia has the right to display or destroy them, as does Google Earth. Do the creators of those tags have any rights to them? Assuming that the tags created by others are not fair game, can we at least have the right to our own tags. I suspect the answer is both yes and no. Both Wikimapia and Google are expecting to make money from the maps and the user-generated content. But, non-commercial use of an individual’s tags ought to be a reasonable premise. Even commercial use, providing that the earth imagery or other base maps are legally obtained and licensed. The latter is not a very viable option for an individual, even a lowly billionaire might be hard pressed to keep them up-to-date.