1. الخطوة الأولى هي أختيار تحميل الصور والبيانات من الأنترنت
   

1. الصندوق الحواري لأختيار مصادر البيانات من على الأنترنت
   

1. استعراض الصور الفضائية للقمر الصناعي "كويك بيرد"
   

Global Mapper, which I've raved about before, offers a nifty way to export any georeferenced raster image to a Google Maps tileset, it will even generate the html and javascript for you. Unfortunately, in the case of maps it's generally not a matter of pressing a button and it will magically work. There's a few things to keep in mind and those are the things I hope to add value to my customers with.

• Resolution
• Projection
• Design for screen, rather than print

Basically it boils down to making sure the image that is read by Global Mapper is as close to the correct projection and resolution as possible, to avoid resampling. I've put a few samples online on the Red Geographics website.  As always, feel free to contact me if there's questions.

In addition to the design, another important thing to keep in mind is the optimization of the images. I'm partnering with Derek Tonn of GraphicsOptimization for this. It's amazing how much smaller he can squeeze the images and still have them look the same (at least to the naked eye). A 20% reduction in the case of b/w aerial photography for example (not bad if you consider the 2 sets together weighed in at 120 Mb before optimization). This saves time, energy and ultimately, money.

For something that's supposed to be 'open', it sure is hard to get data out of it...

Then two things happened in a short amount of time:

• The OpenStreetmap website was changed so that exports to xml could now be made directly from the site. No need to install and run JOSM anymore.
• Global Mapper 9.03 came out, with native OpenStreetmap support.

Just tried that combination and it works like a charm. It loads all information from OSM, including more point features than the shapefiles provided. Exporting from Global Mapper to shapefiles is a breeze too, so this is a very big step in opening up OpenStreetmap.

A quick update, for those of you who are interested. I've been installing some Windows geo-applications on my new Macbook.

• FME - runs just fine.
• Global Mapper - runs fine too.
• VNS - took me some time to get some dll's installed in the right place and the install procedure was interrupted by Vista popping up some useless message, but after doing a clean install (read: copy-and-paste of the complete WCS directory from my Windows box) it's working okay.

None of this is to be taken as an official announcement that application x runs on this setup though. Always check with the vendors to make sure.

All of this is running on Windows Vista, 64-bit, through VMWare Fusion. I couldn't get Parallels to work and reports from other users indicate VMWare is by far the more stable solution.

Added option to World Wind export to allow generating the filenames required by the Java edition of World Wind.

There are lots of other improvements too, check out the Global Mapper Forum for more details, I'm still hoping they will add World Wind elevation export sometime, it is something many people would love.

So for anyone interested in getting custom terrain into World Wind check out http://wwterraintiling.spaces.live.com/ I am amazed at these guys patience and effort, great job Seer et al.

Dawn over Ephel Duath

The downside is it is pretty expensive software, and they ask for credit card details for the demo version, but here is the really great news, they will be releasing a free version of Global Mapper which will allow World Wind export with the limitation that every tile will have the word 'DEMO' written across the tile diagonally, an excellent way of testing the product out before parting with any hard earned cash.

Global Mapper version 8.02 with WW export should be released tomorrow, so give it a try.

EDIT : I was wrong Global Mapper do not ask for credit card details to get the demo version of Global Mapper.