Geomap and its link with Google Maps
Some time ago I did a review of the Beta of Geomap, Which among its best attributes has the ability to synchronize data views not only with Google Maps, but also with Bing Maps, Yahoo Maps and Open Street Maps.
Unlike what other programs do, which only import a georeferenced capture, Geomap has support for loading tessellated maps, mosaics that in the form of bricks (tiles) have been standardized to certain approaches so that they can be cached. It is just what we see when we zoom in on Google Maps, it does not go to just any zoom but it approaches the one that adapts to that mosaic and that is why the display works in a fast, dynamic way that has already been adopted and that they do very sharp Open Source tools such as Open Layers and Tile Caché.
Just today they have announced a new extension called Geolocation Manager, with which data can be located on the map, which is displayed in the Google Maps viewer in a synchronized way. It is interesting that this works as it is done in Goolge Earth or Google Maps, that we write a term of a locality, and it returns points that have a match, as we see in the following example of
The island of El Hierro, on cartography of the Government of the Canary Islands.
I think that Geomap will have to be seen regularly, due to the innovation oriented to routines commonly used by users who work with programs such as AutoCAD, Microstation and ArcMap. Very good plugin, which joins initiatives that have caught my attention due to the integration with Google Earth, such as what it does PlexEarth with AutoCAD, Arc2Earth with ArcGIS, KloiGoogle with Microstation, ArcGIS, Mapinfo and Geomedia.
Little by little the interaction with online maps has been advancing on the part of the programs, both proprietary and free license. And although Google maintains some rudeness regarding WMS standards or lack of metadata for purposes that require precision, it will be necessary to respect its popularity and stick to what it offers.
