Google Mapplets - Preview

Google are rolling out Google Maps API Mapplets


Google Mapplets are mini-applications that you can embed within the Google Maps site


Here is a first example of a Mapplet in action. Notice the new tab next to 'My Maps'

link
http://maps.google.com/maps/mm?
mapprev=1&ie=UTF8&om=1&z=4

"Mapplets are mini-webpages that are served inside an IFrame within the Google Maps site. You can put anything inside this mini-webpage that you can put into a normal webpage, including HTML, Javascript, and Flash. Google provides a Javascript API that gives the Mapplet access to services such as manipulating the map, fetching remote content, and storing user preferences.

When a Mapplet is enabled by the user, Google's servers will fetch the Mapplet source code from your web server, and then serve it to the user from gmodules.com. To reduce the load on your server, gmodules.com will cache your source code for several hours."

Full Documentation on this is available here:
http://www.google.com/apis/maps/documentation
/mapplets/index.html

See some Mapplet Gadgets

This looks very promising in delivering your on live content on a google based map.
With the addition of buffering and geographical analysis of multiple types of data this becomes more of a geographical information system than a plain old map.

Describing content in visual form empowers people to understand their surroundings.

Mapperz