the timboucher experience

Just discovered this delightful trick for harvesting maps.google.com thusly:

1. I open Google Maps to the vicinity of where I would like coordinates.
2. I use my right click mouse button and select “center map here” from the drop down button.
3. I past this javascript code that I keep saved somewhere convenient on my computer into my browser’s URL address window.
Here’s the code:

javascript:void(prompt('',gApplication.getMap().getCenter()));

4. I click the “go to the address in the location bar” button usually to the right of the address.
5. A popup appears showing the coordinates of the center of the map like this: (43.60336, -110.7362)
6. I right click on the coordinates the copy and click either “OK” or “Cancel”
7. I then paste the coordinates into google’s “search maps” text box, remove the parenthesis and click “Search Maps”
8. A popup appears with a marker for the centered spot. The popup has the coordinates in both Decimal Degrees and Degrees, Minutes, Seconds.

Quoted from a forum post by David B. Robert founder of ProximityCast.com, which seems to be a site for deriving related business information according to a specified location. Would be nice to get historic landmark information added into sites like his, such as is documented by our fledgling Monument City project.

I’m not sure I entirely understand why Google’s map application doesn’t simply offer you that option, without having to go through a back door script. Thanks to David though, as this will no doubt come in very handy with my own upcoming geospatial keyword explorations!

PS. If you read through following comments on that forum, Google Maps does have some add-ons which you can implement into your customized Google Maps interface. The thing is though, you have to sign in and create a user account. I’m not sure exactly which online Google-based information “identity” I would want to associate this information with, my relatively private personal info-persona, or my more public one? Saving and compiling geographic information about a particular user reveals quite a lot of valuable information…

• Exploring rich human-created GPS site-specific information
• UFO Maps
• Street Art Maps
• Six and a half days…
• Notes on Wormhole Linking Project