geoLibro.org

Near the end of July Bull’s rambles mentioned a WorldWind spin-off called Dapple. I didn’t have a way to test it out (I was Mac-only, driving across the country), but James Fee posted a quick review of it. I got a little snide about some user interface stuff (the more Windows I use, the more I become an Apple fanboy), but today let me say that Dapple has some good things going. I recommend everybody try out its WMS implementation at least, and be sure to try out the keyword search function in the table of contents. Ideally, this "lookup" function would be tied to a more standardized, taxonomized vocabulary or catalog (something an enterprising GIS Librarian might want to look into), but it’s still about the only attempt I’ve seen at being able to search for data layers from within the display app (yes, yes, the Mapdex toolbar could be considered). I’d be happy to be corrected on that, by the way.

atals(t) points to a great map of Oakland at theOrganicCity.com that dots the city with a special kind of attribute: text, audio, and video submitted by lovers (or, potentially I suppose, haters) of Oakland’s neighborhoods, landmarks, scenes, and cultures. I love this kind of melding of (fine: mash-up of) humanities, activism (potentially), and maps. Just as I was leaving Texas A&M International University (I can say “was” because yesterday was my last day) I almost had an opportunity to work on something like this. Old narrated video tapes about the city of Laredo were donated to the library and one of the ways we intended to release this content was via a map interface. I was really looking forward to it, but I confess I am more excited still to be heading off to Purdue in August.

At any rate, enjoy Oakland.