Latest version of Virtual Earth is released! | The Coffeehouse

Mark Brown
Microsoft Web Platform

We have released the latest version of Virtual Earth 6.2 as well as version 1.0 of our new Virtual Earth Web Services. Let's dig in shall we? Smiley

Maps for Mobile Devices. Develop mobile applications with rich imagery optimized specifically for mobile devices, including the iPhone. The new mobile-optimized features are supported in the new Virtual Earth Web Services.
Geocoding and Reverse Geocoding. Get the most accurate locations around the world through integration of multiple geocoders and datasets with MapView, Reverse IP, and Culture to provide the most relevant and accurate results. And find the closest street address based only on latitude and longitude coordinates from a GPS or other geospatial device.
International Geocoding. Your customers can now find international addresses with reverse geocoding, available anywhere Virtual Earth has routing.
Localized Directions. Get localized driving or walking directions in 15 languages.
Localized Map Tiles. Create better connections with your global customers. Provide localized maps in U.S. English, German, French, Spanish, and Italian in Western Europe.
Extended International Parsing Capabilities. Users will experience better match rates for addresses in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and Puerto Rico.
Expanded Number of Rooftop Views. Provide more detailed maps to help users find locations with rooftop accuracy. Virtual Earth now offers 85 million unique addresses—more than 70 percent of all rooftops in the U.S.
Near-Matching Capabilities. using alternate and similar spellings, resulting in a more relevant search experience.
Imagery Metadata. Users can now find out the relative age of a given aerial image. This level of detail will help them assess if the imagery is relevant to their needs.
New Virtual Earth Web Services. Developers can now take advantage of the new Virtual Earth Web Services API, which offers static map images (.gif, .jpeg, and .png), direct map tile access, one-box search functionality, geocoding, reverse geocoding, and routing.
One-Click Directions. From your Virtual Earth Web application, allow your customers to get directions in one click, choosing from route options by shortest time, shortest distance, or traffic flow. With one-click directions, users instantly get directions without having to enter a starting address.
Pushpin Clustering. Provide customers the ability to zoom in on a map to better visualize a cluster of points. When many locations exist in a dense area, the pushpins can be clustered or hidden from view at smaller zoom levels.
Landmark-Based Routing. Provide customers in the U.S. and Canada with turn-by-turn maps that feature such familiar landmarks as gas stations and fast-food restaurants by name.
Multipoint Routing. Optimize travel schedules and improve driver efficiency by implementing the Virtual Earth trip planner and multipoint routing.
Weather Integration. With 3D view, get near real-time weather and cloud formation data.

Get more information:

We have two webcasts coming up next week for you to learn more and get started.

See Chris Pendleton’s Blog Post on his Launch Webcast on October 2nd at 9AM.
Mark Brown’s Blog Post for his Technical Webcast the next day on October 3rd at 10am.

Finally, if you haven’t already get out to http://dev.live.com/virtualearth (not updated yet at the time of this posting so do check back) and check out our updated Virtual Earth SDK and Virtual Earth Web Services SDK. Plus we’re also going to be publishing a bunch more content out on http://dev.live.com/virtualearth including a whole new round of white papers and other community created content. There’s tons of more options now for building your applications with Virtual Earth so this site should be your one-stop shop for everything Virtual Earth related.

Enjoy.
Mark

Dovella
Go Microsoft !!!!!!!

Thank's Mr Mark!
Congrat.

Mark Brown
Microsoft Web Platform

In reply to Dovella

#Sep 24th, 2008 @ 9:08 PM

Thanks Dovella. I highly recommend my webcast coming up on October 3rd for those interested in getting deep on implementing the new features in the VE Map Control 6.2 and our new VE Web Service. I have a link above but here's the details. I am also going to be cranking out a ton of new white papers including how to write a VE Silverlight application. Stay tuned to my blog above for details on that.

Virtual Earth 6.2 Technical Webcast

Event Date: Friday, October 3, 2008
Event Time: 10:00 AM PT
Duration: 90 minutes

Join Mark Brown, Senior Product Manager for Virtual Earth to get a deep dive review of the next version of Virtual Earth 6.2 with demos throughout to show you how to leverage these in your applications. In addition we are releasing Virtual Earth Web Services v1.0. This SOAP-based web service was designed for developers looking to build and deploy mapping applications in a server-side environment and provides support for building desktop and mobile applications. Mark will also go through a number of the features in this v1 release with some demos and sample code as well.

Test your System (do this today)

Join the Event (10/3/08, 10am Pacific)

Telephone Dial in (if you don’t have computer mic/speakers)

US/Canada: (877) 220-6697
International: (503) 295-8000
PIN: 8074

Hope to see you all there Smiley

-Mark

magicalclick

In reply to Mark Brown

#Sep 24th, 2008 @ 9:52 PM

Mark are you in the team? Super bad bug. Please put it on high priority.
When I use direction, the direction line is scaled down compare to the current level of map. Even when I zoom really close to street, the direction line still managed to move around like crazy. The direction line is screwed. But when I click print, the lines are ok.

I am using Vista Ultimate x64, 144DPI, IE8 Beta, Zoom 100%, Text = medium.
Zoom and Compatibility has no effect.

BTW, the add a stop sucks compare to Google interactive custom route. I know it is for different purpose, thus, we should add a stop and reorder it to achive the same custom route effect. But it is tidious and the refresh page is so weak compare to Google real time changes.

Sorry this is harsh, please fix the problem at least. For this MS fanboy trying to use Live Map instead of Google Map.

Mark Brown
Microsoft Web Platform

In reply to magicalclick

#Sep 24th, 2008 @ 10:16 PM

@magicalclick. Can you send me the two locations you are creating a route for? I want to repro what you are seeing.

Thanks.

EDIT: Just tested various driving directions and am not seeing the same behavior. My guess is that our base data may have incorrect coordinates for the route you are searching for. Send me the start and end locations so I can repro and I'll send along to the product team. --Thanks.

magicalclick

In reply to Mark Brown

#Sep 24th, 2008 @ 10:22 PM

Deleted
NVM this, I found the cause. MS sucks at DPI.

magicalclick

In reply to Mark Brown

#Sep 24th, 2008 @ 10:22 PM

Ok mark, I see the problem now. The same old same old MS sucks at DPI issue.
I turn back to 96DPI. Everything is fine now.

First IE8 HTML ignore DPI setting.
Second Live Messenger Online Status drop down list empty bug on DPI setting.
Now, Live Map can't work with high DPI setting. (Not sure it is the service or IE8)
MS sucks at DPI and yet all the childish talks about DPI.

Who would suffer? People like me don't want fussy low resolution and don't want buggy high DPI result.

Dovella
Go Microsoft !!!!!!!

Thank's

giovanni
...

In reply to magicalclick

#Sep 24th, 2008 @ 11:17 PM

Yes, I noticed that too. I have that problem on XP sp3, are you using Vista?

Ion Todirel
buuu

hey, regarding reverse geocoding can I convert say a list of bus stations ("hardcoded" in the map) to coordinates directly from the map? you can't do that with Google Maps...

giovanni
...

Finally International Geocoding!!! I have been waiting for this one for so long. I have been using Live Maps in the States for a while and I've been very happy with it. Now I can use it in Europe as well. Excellent job: so far I've been able to find all remoted and secluded locations I was looking for.

Mark Brown
Microsoft Web Platform

In reply to Ion Todirel

#Sep 25th, 2008 @ 1:33 AM

When you say "hard coded" what do you mean? If you have a lat/long and pass it into the FindLocations() function you can get its address.

For the source code for how to do this go to our Interactive SDK and click "Find Information (basic)" and then "Reverse Find".

Thanks,
mark

Mark Brown
Microsoft Web Platform

In reply to giovanni

#Sep 25th, 2008 @ 1:33 AM

@giovanni. Not only that but we also have base map tiles localized for Western Europe too so when you pull up a map in VE and pass in the mkt parameter like de-de you get the base map layer in German, etc. so that all the city names, rivers, geo political names are all in the local language now.

giovanni
...

In reply to Mark Brown

#Sep 25th, 2008 @ 6:35 AM

Excellent. Personally I do prefer the english version (for personal reasons). Now to make it perfect, I would like to see a scale in mi AND km and driving directions in both units, though this is a request for the Live Maps team and not the Virtual Earth one.

Edit: never mind you can set your unit under options. I never saw that one before.

wisemx
Live it

In reply to Mark Brown

#Sep 25th, 2008 @ 6:35 AM

Very cool Mark, keep it up.
(I blogged about the updates yesterday.)

Ion Todirel
buuu

In reply to Mark Brown

#Sep 25th, 2008 @ 6:33 AM

I mean for example on GMaps bus stations are already on the map, you can interact with them and get some info about that, but you cannot get their lat/long coordinates, can you do that in Live Maps?

Mark Brown
Microsoft Web Platform

In reply to Ion Todirel

#Sep 25th, 2008 @ 7:17 AM

@Ion Todirel, in Live Maps? No. That's our consumer maps offering and most consumers don't care about what the lat/long is for a particular Point of Interest. But you can do it in VE for essentially any data or point on a map. Basically build a search using the Find() function to return POI data like bus stations and then code up the Reverse Find to return the address to the user when they click on a push pin to a bus station. Trouble here could be that the Find() function returns more than just bus stations. Using our VE Web Service (VEWS) however you can build a more granular search and filter results to get what you want and then iterate through the search results and plot using a VE Map Control in JS.

Hope that helps.

-mark

Sven Groot
My name has 9 letters. Coincidence? I think not...

And it still doesn't understand Japanese addresses at all. Sad

Ion Todirel
buuu

In reply to Mark Brown

#Sep 25th, 2008 @ 7:27 AM

hmmm, that's sounds interesting, I'll take a look, if something watch out I'll come back with questions Smiley

magicalclick

In reply to Mark Brown

#Sep 24th, 2008 @ 10:22 PM

Hello Mark,
I checked it more. Google Map failed too. It should be my IE8 Beta on Vista Ultimate x64 I think. I am using 144DPI setting. I assume 120DPI would do the same.

Burn in High DPI Hell.

Mark Brown
Microsoft Web Platform

In reply to magicalclick

#Sep 25th, 2008 @ 9:18 AM

@magicalclick. Hey I don't think we "officially" support IE8 yet either so that's another thing to consider too.

Between that and High DPI you're living on the bleeding edge my friend Smiley

dentaku

Nice stuff.
Now if only there where high resolution images of Nova Scotia in other places than just Halifax. At the moment the Google maps have much more high res areas for this province.