So as not to break applications expecting Sector postcodes in the API, there is a new API endpoint:

http://api1.nearby.org.uk/api/convert.php

API requests against this domain will give the position of the full postcode, and also reverse geocode (return you the nearest) full postcode!

- The Original URL for the API is still available – and will continue to be. I’ve also taken the opportunity to add a version number to the URL. It’s been 4 years since I created this API, and learnt lots in that time, so should be able to create a better version 2 When introduce that don’t want to break compatibility.

Of course the ‘Coordinate Convertor‘ is now using CodePoint Open too – the end of having to pay a commercial provider!

(sorry this has taken so long, OS Opendata was introduced at the beginning of the month!, its been a busy month)

Will take the opportunity to duplicate the copyright message:

Contains Royal Mail data © Royal mail copyright and database right 2010.

As it serves as a useful thank you, for making this data available.

See the original post for more details of the event

So an extra month to work on entries. Also gives me a bit more time to come up with an even better website for the competition!

P.S. The Geograph API has recently been extended to have a JSON API, meaning can be used directly in a Javascript based mashup

Sometime recently* Google has added ‘geo-filtering’ and attribute filtering to the Google Maps Data API, I haven’t seen any announcement of this or other mention (if it was, it was below my radar), other than a tiny footnote in an Article about doing geo-queries on AppEngine.

Anyway for people not aware of the Google Maps Data API, its basically a programmatic access method to the ‘My Maps’ feature of Google Maps. So with the API you can use Google Maps as your Geo-Database. (Subject I believe to a limit of 10,000 features per ‘Map’, but can have many maps)

However it wasn’t all that useful, as all you could do was inject your data, or read it all back. But now that searching and filtering is possible, it makes the API a viable method store your data for a Google Maps API or similar mashup. As soon as you get beyond a trival number of markers, you need to store your data in a database, and being able to only fetch the features in the current viewport is a good way of only working with a small subset at once.

Curouslly, there doesn’t seem to be a ‘limit’; so a big bounding box, could potentially still access many features. But hopefully that will be rectified soon.
Update2: Seems there is a max-results : handy!

Google now (officially) offers to install Google Earth without the dreaded GoogleUpdate!

It’s only offered when clicking the small ‘advanced setup‘ link on the main Download Earth page. But I think that is ok, using the updater is probably a sensible default, most people will get along just fine with auto-updating. What I have long bemoaned is there was no official way to opt out for people needing or wishing to.

Here’s that link again just in case:

Advanced Google Setup

Thank You Google!

UPDATE: JULY 2010, petition: Google Earth should make the sea floor rendering optional

Frank, just alerted me to the new rendering Google have released for Google Earth of the Ocean Floor. Strangely I keep wanting to shout FAIL! Sure at the broadest sense – viewing the globe as a whole it looks quite nice, if a little fuzzy, but once start zooming into coastline, the matching is just a mess. The new lighter blue just sort of fades out the old darker blue. Have to say even Frank doesn’t seem convinced…

Admittedly I not really into ocean travel so the probably higher resolution doesn’t really interest me, so that puts it at a disadvantage from my point of view. Hopefully they can vastly improve the edge matching, aka the coastline, then I wont mind.

Ok so it wasn’t perfect before, having a greenish area – but it just looks like algae. But the new doesn’t look natural somehow.

Another issue (oh dear), is the new lighter blue around the UK, is a closer to shade of land. And in the overview map – example below, I can’t even see Wales, and most of England and France etc is pretty indistinct – making the overview map fairly worthless. (disclaimer: I am red/green colour blind)

Overall: E- (sorry)

Not that long ago Google updated the Terms of Service on Google Maps API – I guess mainly in responce to issues brought up on the Mail group, and elsewhere. As a result of that edit there where many concerns raised (and more)- and a further edit was made. (note, only linked to some of the blogs etc – follow links to read more) This was over a week ago, but due to non online commitments haven’t really had a time to follow this up. You can read my early reaction here, which has been edited in to Mikes post.

11. Licenses from You to Google.

11.1 Content License. Google claims no ownership over Your Content, and You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Your Content. By submitting, posting or displaying Your Content in the Service, you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute Your Content through the Service and as search results through Google Services. This license is solely for the purpose of enabling Google to operate the Service, to promote the Service (including through public presentations), and to index and serve such content as search results through Google Services. If you are unable or unwilling to provide such a license to Your Content, please see the FAQ for information on configuring your Maps API Implementation to opt out.

11.2 Brand Features License. You grant to Google a nontransferable, nonexclusive license during the Term to use Your Brand Features to advertise that you are using the Service.

11.3 Authority to Grant Licenses. You confirm and warrant to Google that you have all the rights, power and authority necessary to grant the above licenses.

To be honest still unsure how I feel about this section, and finding it very hard to vocalise (well to put to pixels) the concerns. I certain its not compatible with a number of situations where the Maps would otherwise be ideal, but that I guess is real life – just need to move on an find something that is more suitable. But its still gauling to have invested so much in Google Maps API to have it all disappear in puff of legal smoke, I guess its now going to be“Once Burnt, Twice Shy” as they say.

How can I opt out of including my content in Google search results?
To remove your page or site from search results, follow the instructions provided in our webmaster help center. If we enable indexing of any content that is a part of your Maps API implementation, we will provide updated instructions to opt out of including that content in search results.

This seems to equate ‘indexing’ with ‘licence’.

Now I kinda understand why Google are doing this, they want to legalise the crawling they are doing – so they have a get out that the data has been licensed to them specifically.

So does that mean if we don’t agree to the licence – the data wont be crawled and indexed? But we do want content to be indexed – previously we’ve never agreed by allowing content to be crawled we giving a licence to that data.

… so with Geograph at least – I cant grant the licence – but I cant use the elusive ‘opt out’ (boils down to robots.txt I guess), as I do want the content to be indexed. So can Geograph use the Google Maps API or not? I still can’t see how it can – if it did it would be contravening the TOS of the API (cant confirm as per 11.3), and/or violating the Creative Commons licence (see section 4.a. of the legal code, “You may not sublicense the Work.” which is the most succinct expression of the issue).

Another silly issue in all of this, users displaying Geograph content on Google Maps website itself (eg via KML files) are basically agreeing to the same terms (by way of here and here [see section 11]). So the same issue displaying such content is not actually abiding by the terms and licence. And by providing links to Google Maps we inciting users to do this :p – but that is a step away from doing it wholesale on the website itself?

* sorry this has taken so long, truly sorry for the inconvenience. In retrospect maybe was a bit hasty – but couldnt allow the licence to data been entrusted with the be undermined.

 © Copyright Dr Richard Murray and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

Update, In the Press: Offical (login required) (RSS), Paul’s Blog, Boing Boing, Reddit, and Digg. 

This is post is made with rather less zeal than perhaps it even deserves, but it is 1.44 in the morning here, the tipping point rather caught me unawares so wasn’t prepared! We’ll have something more offical out soon…

There are a number of interesting artefacts in this, if you are quick you can follow people as the hike long distance paths, but you can also see the people making concerted efforts to knock of hectads.

Of course the raw frames are available under Creative Commons, and a bonus prize to who can make an good mashup of these. The animations include both weekly frames, and monthly versions (labelled quick)

(the fire reference)

People viewing your file in Google Maps will see the update soon, Google Maps caches it for a while.

People viewing in Google Earth however will not, as they downloaded a static file, which brings onto another point, if want them to auto update as well, could create a network link to your Container, using the standard GoKML form, (enter the url your container and choose appriate refresh period).

No idea why, but the simple

svn sw http://svn.automattic.com/wordpress/tags/2.5/

Just didnt cut it,

PHP Fatal error: Cannot redeclare get_tag_feed_link() (previously declared in wp-includes/link-template.php:384) in wp-includes/feed.php on line 211
PHP Fatal error: Call to undefined function absint() in wp-includes/query.php on line 1346

etc. It seems it simply didn’t update all the files?

So back to basics, and doing a fresh install of 2.5 and installing my stuff into it (just like the first time setting up SVN) – now the working copy switches to 2.5.1 without issue!

Anyway, now have 2.5 running – quite like it, the admin is certainly more responsive, not sure of new features yet, dont tend to push WP that much.

Oh and then upgrading plugins, somewhere along the line Akismet got conflicted? Zapping it and checking it out again fixed that. Then Geopress, thought it would make sence to switch to using SVN for that, and found the/a repositoity, but that only gives me 2.4.1, whereas this suggests 2.4.3?? I guess that repro is either outdated or abandoned? Also this page is borked.

[Update: just noticed the KML output from GeoPress doesn't work - installed 2.4.3 in the end too, but seeing as I wrote the KML code, I guess its my responsibilty to fix - will work on that!]

[Update2: The correct geopress repro location is here - thanks to Andrew in comments!]

Anyway at least it now done (for now)