New Google Maps domains in 29 African Countries

New Google Maps domains in 29 African Countries
Example Ghana Google Maps - http://maps.google.com.gh/ in Beta

Google Maps users can now find local businesses, towns, highways, or roads. This could be a burger place in Lagos, a garage in Kampala, a hairdresser in Accra or an airport shuttle in Dakar. Any business anywhere can add their own business listing for free via the Google Maps Local Business Centre.

South Africa gets its own mobile site - http://www.google.com/intl/en_za/mobile/

The active list so far: 18 of 29...

http://maps.google.co.ke/ Kenya
http://maps.google.com.na/ Nambia
http://maps.google.com.ng/ Nigeria
http://maps.google.com.et/ Ethiopia
http://maps.google.com.sl/ Sierra Leone
http://maps.google.cg/ Congo, Republic of,
http://maps.google.ci/Côte d'Ivoire
http://maps.google.dj/ Djibouti
http://maps.google.ga/ Gabon
http://maps.google.gm/ The Gambia
http://maps.google.com.gh/ Ghana
http://maps.google.mw/ Malawi
http://maps.google.sn/ Senegal
http://maps.google.co.mz/ Mozambique
http://maps.google.co.bw/ Botswana
http://maps.google.co.tz/ Tanzania
http://maps.google.co.zm/ Zambia
http://maps.google.co.zw/ Zimbabwe

Source:
http://google-africa.blogspot.com/2010/02/new-maps-domains-in-29-african.html

Google Maps API Geocoder now uses the Localised versions
Example Ghana (Major Roads, MapMaker Additions)
Please use the Google Spreadsheet for more countries covered.
http://gmaps-samples.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/mapcoverage_filtered.html

@Mapperz

New Yell Maps Beta 2010 Online

New Yell Maps Beta 2010 Online

New cleaner, faster yell maps, helps users locate local directory listings faster. optional is to display Points of Interest (POI) surrounding the local area.

Yell, the search directory business, is introducing a 'bespoke local business' mapping solution on its Yell.com service.

Yell.com Maps has been developed in partnership with Paris-based specialist provider Tridoo (http://www.onyourmap.fr/), which already provides mapping for Yell’s mobile phone services.

“It needs to be as natural for people to find a local business through Yell Maps as it is with the Yellow Pages directory.” Matthew Bottomley, Director of New Media Product Marketing

Yell.com Maps, which is in beta, is part of Yell’s ongoing development of new technologies to ensure it is the best provider of quality business leads for local businesses. Key features and benefits over the previous mapping service include:

• Ability to search within the map for local businesses and services
• Faster response and better geo-coding for increased accuracy
• Consistent experience across web and mobile
• Quarterly updates to keep information as accurate as possible
• Brand new design with bespoke colour-scheme and bigger, clearer maps

Djamila Fernana-Ritchie leads Yell’s mapping team. She said: “This is the first of a number of planned releases designed to make Yell Maps the premier mapping solution for local business search in the UK. "

see the youtube video
http://www.youtube.com/user/yell


The partnership with Paris-based Tridoo has been a cultural and technical shift for Yell. Djamila said:
“It is a relatively small specialist company which has spent the last 10 years at the forefront of mapping and geo-spatial development.

Goal:
“Yell.com Maps is the culmination of all that knowledge, in one platform.”

Yell maps beta is also available via mobile device.

More & Source:
http://www.yellgroup.com/english/media-pressreleases-2009-yellcommakesitsownlocalbusinessmappingservice

Cartifact Maps (Beta)

Cartifact Maps (Beta)

Cartographic Maps made available with Cartfact Labs and Google Maps API.


Take Google Maps and add your own custom tiles, integrate local search, historic maps (1880, 1928 & 1981) and you get a nice cartographic mashup.

"Our goal to create a visually enhanced environment for custom cartography focuses on Los Angeles for this beta release."
Bruce Daniel
Director, Cartifact Labs


Lens Zoom - can display historic, Google maps/aerial of Cartifact's own custom tiles.

Additional Features:
Lens control (see image above) - no need to zoom in - the lens does the work
Local searches on Hotels, Residential Properties and Commercial Spaces.
Drag zoom.

Try the Cartographic Mashup - http://maps.cartifact.com/

Mission
Cartifact Labs’ mission is to identify, explore and provide expertise in emerging technologies related to the creation and use of maps.

Live Maps Netherlands

Live Maps Netherlands

Live Maps partners with De Telefoongids to localize the Netherlands for improved searches.

Straat (Steet Map)
The Netherlands is excellent in Virtual Earth (better than Google) more named roads throughout the country.

Lucht (Aerial)

Tulip fields in 'Holland'

There is low resolution satellite imagery and high resolution aerial photography in the towns and cities.

Vogelvlucht-weergave (Bird’s Eye View) – 43 Dutch cities in Bird’s Eye.

3D (but is very flat!)
Live Maps Netherlands now has the 3D view activated. This allows viewing the world in all dimensions, near-real-time weather and a growing number of 3D cities. Bird’s Eye overlay allows overlying the 3D view real bird’s eye photography.

Bedrijven (Yellow Pages)
Put in the Wat (what) and put in the Warr (where) and start local searching provided by De Telefoongids.

Verzamelingen (Explore Collections)
It is now possible to explore collections on Live Maps Netherlands. Collections are user generated content that is collected from all over the web.

Delen (Share)
Users can now not only share map links in mail but also publish to blogs or websites with a click.

Route-advies (Directions)
The routing engine now allows the creation directions using Snelst (quickest route), kortst(shortest route) or lopen (walking) algorithms. Walking directions is available in the Virtual Earth giving users the quickest way suitable for pedestrians.

See Live Maps Netherlands:

http://maps.live.nl/

Source:

http://blogs.msdn.com/virtualearth/archive/2009/01/15/live-search-maps-netherlands-geboren.aspx

Egypt Yellow Pages Gets Google Maps and Mobile Mapping

Egypt Yellow Pages Gets Google Maps and Mobile Mapping


Yellow Pages now use their own data with Google base maps for users to locate businesses in the local area.

"In the online and mobile world, mapping services from Microsoft and Google have in fact trained Yellow Pages users and advertisers on how to immediately benefit from mapping services on websites and mobile portals"

The local search company announced today it has added location based mapping to both its YellowPages.com.eg and Mobile Yellow Pages websites.

http://www.yellowpages.com.eg/

YellowPages.com.eg is also available on your mobile device yellowpages.com.eg website is accessible by any mobile device in Egypt and around the world. To view the Yellow Pages Mobile portal, simply enter the YellowPages.com.eg in the address line of your mobile browser and launch it.

'It is no easy process to geo-code a Yellow Pages database for an entire country,' commented Mohamed Salah, Egypt Yellow Pages Data Architect and leader of the geo-coding program. 'In our business, businesses never cease opening, closing and relocating; we now have a dedicated team working full time on this project. It is a never ending process'

Source:
http://www.ameinfo.com/179448.html

192.com Boosts Spatial Local Searches

192.com Boosts Spatial Local Searches

The Search company that is investing in the power of Geographical Searching has now updated and integrated in to map based searching.

"192.com’s Local Search Solution merges its business records within mapping technology to bring local search to life. Businesses can now fully integrate 192.com’s mapping technology on to their sites by geo-coding their own data giving consumers an overall better user experience"

"...which has the ability to merge maps with over 4.5million business records and make this available to third parties"


Searching on the map quickly pulls local information to the user. Multiple search terms can be applied.

'192.com’s Local Search Solutions' default local services are:

• Car parks
• Banks
• Hotels
• Restaurants
• Petrol Stations

This is along the lines of Yahoo new local search (see previous post)
This is the future of 'local' searching, very powerful and very fast.
(192.com contains over 630 million records)

Try it yourself
http://www.192.com/maps/
zoom in and enter a search term.

"192.com is the de facto standard search engine for finding people, business and places across the UK."

Mapperz

Local Search for the United Kingdom Launched

Local Search for the United Kingdom Launched

"For users already using the AJAX Search API for local search you should now be able to search for businesses in the United Kingdom without having to make any changes to your code. Go ahead and now try "Starbucks near London" in your App that uses the Google AJAX Search API. You should get something like the following:"

Mapperz Map now can return UK Businesses from the Search ( found right hand column of this blog)

Google Maps API and AJAX LocalSearch Control

Google Map API and AJAX Search API get closer ...

the one liner that makes it happen
map.addControl(new google.maps.LocalSearch());

Update Please Note: Adsense is not Enabled yet but in the pipeline.

Note: Google will serve advertisements if you use this Local Search Control.

In addition to providing useful search results to users of your Google Maps API powered site, the Local Search Control for Google Maps is designed to help you make more money from your maps mashup. Search is a great opportunity to target relevant AdSense ads to users of your site. If you pass your AdSense ID into the constructor of your Local Search Control, then you will share in the revenue from clicks on the AdSense ad(s) generated by the Search Control. If you do not provide your AdSense ID, then ad(s) will still be served, but you will not receive revenue from those advertisements.

http://mapperz.googlepages.com/new_local_search_ajax_apiv3.html
(corrected url for the css)

Official Post
http://www.google.com/uds/solutions/localsearch/compact.html

Google Map API response
http://googlemapsapi.blogspot.com/2007/06/localsearch-control-letting-users.html

more info and stay tuned on Adsense in Google Maps!:
http://www.google.com/uds/solutions/localsearch/index.html
http://www.google.com/uds/solutions/localsearch/adsense_gmlocalsearch.html

Yahoo! Go Local 2.0 Gamma

Yahoo! Go Local has a new update from Yahoo Mobile



"Yahoo Go! is the first application optimized for the “small screen” of a mobile phone that truly makes it easy and fun to access the Internet. Everything about the Yahoo! Go interface is designed to be both visually stunning and give you what you want with the fewest clicks possible."

• Find anything around you, instantly

  Find local businesses, hear what other people have to say about them and even call with just one click.

• Your guide to what’s going on

  Yahoo! Go gives you the scoop on what’s happening in your town—or any place you want to visit.

• Get where you’re going more easily

  Interactive maps, turn-by-turn driving directions and real-time traffic reports help you get there fast.

Like a car navigation system, Yahoo! Go knows where you are and can help you easily locate what you’re looking for in your area. It gives you instant access to the best local index and detailed listing information available.




UK users of this service will be pleased to know that it will work in the United Kingdom.

Combined with the Integrated GPS (the Nokia N95 has this built in) you will not be so lost. If you are lost you can use it will tell you are location and get your from your 'lost' location to a desired location (like home).

Installing options

1. Check your phone is compatible (lots are NOT supported yet)
   
2. Either enter your phone number and receive a text to link to the download
3. Or go directly to http://get.go.yahoo.com on your phone.

Help Guide

Demo Tour

Download in 5 Easy Steps

Source: Yahoo! (UK)


Mapperz

BlockHunter - For Homeowners and Buyers

This site helps homeowners and potential buyers locate property for exchange.



However there is major difference on this site

There are no properties for sale on this site.

Normally, you use an estate agent to advertise your house for sale

You hope someone sees your advert and buys your house

Blockhunter works the other way around

Buyers use this site to register their searches on a map

Sellers can then register their house to see if buyers are interested

Registered sellers are NOT advertising their property

Your property details remain private. It's up to you if you contact a buyer

The Mapping used the Google Maps API but there some nice functionality on the mapping side .
The Create Block refers to a rectangle that can be resized to become the search area.
This is a good way to empower the user and making the the search more interactive.

One Suggestion is to have a Circle Search and/or a multi-edged polygon.
Multi-edge Polygon Example
Circle Method

Has very good potential though. Mapperz

UK Geocoder Goes into Beta

Been tinkering with this on and off with a good programmer, but made the geocoder more efficient and have checked data is not using and copyrighted data sources.

Uses the Geocoder Map
http://gmaps-samples.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/geocoder/singlegeocode.html

worked from the UK example given
http://geo.localsearchmaps.com/?street=48+Leicester+Square&city=London &country=UK
and using that output
map.centerAndZoom(new GPoint(-0.130427, 51.510036), 4);
to centre on a google map.

try it soon.

pending features - icon displaying in the middle with info window display the input address.
get better results up to 95/96% match or nearest point to input address.

quadruple check data source is not crown copyright (have cross-referenced results with address point and they do NOT match).