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Mapping 3 days in Berlin

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Berlin walkingGoogle Maps has made it really easy to draw lines on its interface, that’s good to keep a small walking-log of last few days in Berlin.
The city is gigantic, it’s a tiring experience urban-hiking all day long (make me remember Paris before I got my skating shoes) and I’ll switch to bike in next days (or next summer) to discover the city further.

Mixing Google Maps KML output and Google Earth, you can obtain the superposition showed on the picture. Today, it takes a bit of time to point all the way on the map, it sure could be helped by some GPS tech, and some GeoRSS from Flickr, or PicasaWeb, would help a lot to show the photos taken during the trip.
GPS + Camera hacks already exists today, and I hope it would become mainstream in near future (less than 2 years).

Some links:

RSS extension: GeoRSS

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Reading about Google Maps API today, I discovered GeoRSS features:

Some simple xml elements to add in item elements:

<georss:point>43.127697 -77.573776</georss:point>
<geo:Point>
<geo:lat>43.127697</geo:lat>
<geo:long>-77.573776</geo:long>
</geo:Point>

Add it to Flickr feeds with a simple attribute (georss=1): http://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/[…]&format=rss_200&georss=1

WordPress extented by GeoRSS plugin can be ready in 5 minutes and do miracles.

From weblog to geolog: virtual wall maps

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How to get a virtual world wall map similar to those you can find in most of students flat? with small pins on it to celebrate reminders of excellent moments abroad?

Using google map, it’s possible to add this pins (markers) on the map, and it’s possible to add lines between these markers, so everything is there to implement basic functionnalities.

Once the basics are done, the next steps could be more interesting: how wirtual maps can extend the experience?

  • Add a slider to navigate thought time, David‘s idea with his students about extending google maps with history layers (see google market sliders);
  • Have the possibility to add future markers, so your friends – or other people – can see your plans for coming weeks. Serious privacy issues, but all the tracklog concept lay on these issues;
  • Creating a multi-layer map with friends or other people on it, there we are really near a Global Surveillance concept;
  • Color change on path, depending on the transport – plane, foot, bicycle, … – or relate to the time slider with a nice gradient.

Interesting links around the same idea: