Google Earth Outreach
Another Google technology effort captured public attention
in 2005: the Google Earth service allows users to call up on their computer
screens detailed satellite images of most locations on Earth. Furthermore,
these maps can be used to create combinations (known as “mashups”)
with various overlays, incorporating details such as street names, weather
patterns, crime statistics, coffee shop locations, real estate prices,
population densities, and so forth. While many of these mashups were created
for convenience or simple novelty, others became critical lifesaving tools. In
the wake of Hurricane
Katrina, Google Earth provided interactive
satellite overlays of the affected region, enabling rescuers to better
understand the extent of the damage. Subsequently Google Earth became a vital
tool in post-disaster recovery efforts.
Google's commitment to privacy was questioned, however,
after it introduced a related mapping service, called Street View, that showed street-level photographs from around the
United States that were searchable by street address. Some photographs provided
a view through house windows or showed persons sunbathing. Google defended the
service by saying that the images showed only what a person could see if
walking down the street.
In October 2008 Google Earth for the iPhone and the iPod
Touch was released as a downloadable application from Apple
Inc.'s Internet iTunes Store. With
support for the accelerometer (motion detector) in Apple's portable devices,
this version of Google Earth adjusts the way that the three-dimensional maps
are displayed as the devices are tilted.
In February 2009 Google Earth began adding marine data where
information was available. In addition, the mapping service began offering a
feature called Historical Imagery that allowed users to view a sequence of
regional satellite images to see environmental changes, such as those caused by
erosion or human agency.
In 2006, in what many in the industry considered the opening
salvo in a war with Microsoft, Google introduced Google Apps—software hosted by
Google that runs through users' Web browsers. The first free programs included
Google Calendar (a scheduling program), Google Talk (an instant messaging
program), and Google Page Creator (a Web page creation program); in order to
use these free programs, users had to put up with ads and be reconciled to
having their data stored on Google's equipment. This type of deployment, in
which both the data and the programs are located somewhere “out there” on the
Internet, is often called “cloud
computing.”
Between 2006 and 2007 Google bought or developed various
traditional business programs (word
processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software) that were eventually
collectively named Google Docs. Like Google Apps,
Google Docs is used through a browser that connects to the data on Google's
machines. In 2007 Google introduced a Premier Edition of its Google Apps that
included 25 gigabytes of e-mail storage, security functions from the recently
acquired Postini software, and no ads; as the components of Google Docs became
available, they were added to both the free ad-supported Google Apps and the
Premier Edition. In particular, Google Docs was marketed as a direct competitor
to Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint).
With the release in 2008 of Google Chrome,
a Web browser with a superior JavaScript engine better suited for running
programs within the browser, Google continued to advance its ability to serve
customers over the Internet.
No comments:
Post a Comment