google earth help

[djwini]

i just downloaded the new google earth and the geocaching kml file. has anyone delved into it yet that can give an overview of what it can do and how to use it?

[Cheesehead Dave]

Have you read this page yet?

[abcdmCachers]

djwini, did you get it working yet? If not, here’s some extra info for you or anyone else who may want instructions. When you download the kml file, if you choose the option to save it to your disk, you will then need to do a file/open in Google Earth and select the kml file from the folder that you saved it in. When you exit Google Earth, it will ask if you want to save the Geocaching Info in “MyPlaces”. Select yes so that next time it will be loaded automatically. You can also choose to open the file instead of saving it when you download. In this case it starts Google Earth automatically, with the cache info already loaded. Not sure about this, but I’d be a little leary of doing it this way since I’m guessing the kml file will live in the temporary internet files folder and may eventually go away, but maybe Google Earth is smart enough to copy it. Also note that you need to zoom in a ways before any geocaches show up.

If people haven’t tried this yet, I’d recommend it. When I read the description on geocaching.com, it sounded like since “the link has been set up to work just for you”, that I’d only see caches in my area. But you actually get the caches for wherever you zoom to. I was looking at geocaches in New Orleans and surprised to see quite a few that have been found since Katrina went through.

[djwini]

i got it to work, but don’t see the value in it. it shows the caches when i zoom in, but the streets are very blurry. i thought you were supposed to be able to see cars and houses and streets. to me it is just another fun toy, but not something i am going to use.

[abcdmCachers]

Yeah, some of the maps are very low resolution (unusable), some are crystal clear – depends on where you are looking. Note that you can turn on the map overlay, so that it shows road names as well as the satellite picture.

[hogrod]

i would agree, the maps suck, unless you are in a area with an overlay. the site google earth hacks has more map overlays and POI files. the only overlay that i found for Download in wisconsin was for a boyscout camp, it showed all the trails, ect. was pretty nice….. would be really cool to see more of these, maybe even for state parks.
also you can get a file to show WIFI hotspots, so you can find not only caches, but other things that maybe useful too. check out the site below and look around. youll find some cool stuff. http://www.googleearthhacks.com/

here is an example of an area before and after i downloaded a map overlay.
without overlay http://img433.imageshack.us/my.php?image=withoutoverlay8ah.jpg
with downloaded overlay http://img433.imageshack.us/my.php?image=withoverlaymap7tk.jpg

[This message has been edited by hogrod (edited 11-04-2005).]

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