Into Google Maps

Been a few days between posts. With the family away, you'd think I would have more time than ever for this. But no, I've been busy.

I got obsessed with a home-brew programming project. Felt good to spend all day Sunday getting into it. Starting it and (nearly) finishing it in a day. Of course, I've spent plenty of time since then refining it and starting another.

So what is it? A Google Maps hack: SFUSD School Info Google Map Hack I place a marker on the map of SF for every school. Click on the school and get some info. Nothing too breathtakingly useful—like some of the other map hacks I've seen on this blog, Google Maps Mania— but it was fun to do. I want to add some more bells and whistles to it, like displaying school stats on the map as circles centered on each school. It might be fun to look at school data like school population, student demographics, test scores, etc. on a map. The current map API is pretty lame in some key ways (unless I'm missing something) that its not possible to do polished, professional work. But, but, but,... what they have is so damned cool.

I've been obsessing on Google Earth too. Its just so fun to fly around the globe. Anywhere. My mind is blown.

After Google Maps and Google Earth, when I saw a note about Google Moon I immediately surfed my way there. And was totally unimpressed. Nice idea. But you Googleans have set the bar so high that, I'm sorry, you shouldn't put out anything so lame.

Tags: Google Maps, Map Hacks