Virtual Earth, An Evangelist's Blog

We are happy to announce the availability of version 3 of the Virtual Earth Map Control. This exciting new control comes with dozens of enhancements, including new features not available in any of the previous versions, simpler integration, better compatibility...

Today is a big day. BIG DAY. As you'll recall, several months ago we acquired Caligari because of their advanced 3D toolset - trueSpace (among other assets). I've always felt sketchy about other 3D freeware, so starting today trueSpace 7.6 is now available...

To provide a stable and predictable set of tools for our developers through the future, we are moving the all controls for Virtual Earth to a new location. The original control locations will be retired in the coming weeks to prepare for changes required...

Today we launched a new version of the Virtual Earth API . The release has a host of new features and takes advantage of some of the capabilities you've been envying on Live Search Maps. Below is a laundry list of new features in Virtual Earth 6.1 that...

Another huge addition to the digitization of our planet just hit the web last night – 21TB - all ortho imagery launched into Microsoft Virtual Earth, powering Live Search Maps (and other Live Search properties). Now, this one isn’t huge in terms of terabytes...

Welcome to MIX! Following suit with many Microsoft web technologies, here’s our product announcement…..It’s been a long time coming – a year, in fact, since I presented a sneak peak of the Microsoft Virtual Earth Silverlight (VESL) Map Control at MIX...

The engine has been churning for a few months and we’ve finally pumped out another imagery release – a massive 37TB of data 100TB worth of data (initial calculations have been corrected, but seriously who cares? The coverage is expansive, regardless)...

If you follow Microsoft Virtual Earth I'm sure you've picked up some blog posts that posted some of the features for this release, but those posts mysteriously disappeared. Information leaked out and you wondered, "Was that real?" Well, finally the definitive...

Another massive release of aerial photography for Virtual Earth – 41.07 TB worth.  Orthos Spain Barcelona Malaga Manresa Mijas Oviedo Sagunto Vigo Vilanova Vitoria Zaragoza Japan Sapporo Nagano Mt Fuji Nagoya Osaka-Kyoto Matsuyama Kobe Hiroshima...

The launch of Virtual Earth 3D makes the power of Microsoft’s new online mapping platform available to Web developers as well as Live Search customers. Virtual Earth 3D provides developers with an immersive 3D application environment to implement searching...

Zillow.com has been using Virtual Earth for some time now and, in fact, was one of our first customers to integrate and go live with the Virtual Earth platform on their site - just Bird's Eye, though. They were hosting their own repository of imagery...

A common question we get is, "What is the resolution or scale at a particular zoom level in Virtual Earth or Windows Live Local ?" Well, that is actually a little more complex of answer than you might expect. We use Mercator projection across the maps...

The following imagery was added to Virtual Earth (and Live Search Maps) today. Can you say 11.5 terabytes of new imagery data? Hi-res Orthos (using the UltraCam camera) Canadian Areas... • Toronto US areas... • Savannah, GA • SaintPaul, MN •...

It's official! We're releasing an update to the desktop products MapPoint 2009 (Desktop Business Intelligence Mapping and Analysis Tool) and Streets & Trips 2009 (Desktop Consumer Trip Planning). Contrary to the release of MapPoint 2006, there are...

Ask.com has migrated off of their mapping platform and onto Microsoft's Virtual Earth platform. If you navigate to maps.ask.com you will now see Virtual Earth (or MapPoint Web Service for those who don't have supported browsers or JavaScript is disabled...

The Virtual Earth version 6 API is now available. The launch included several new exciting features documented in the online SDK .Moving from Version 5 to Version 6 is easy! You simply need to change one character in your .ashx link - change http://dev...

Microsoft Virtual Earth now has a new name (and it’s not Kumo or Kiev). First, a little background to ensure we’re all on the same page. As of yesterday…. Live Search Maps was our consumer maps offering. This is the web site you go to for maps, aerial...

42.85 TB make up our March release of Virtual Earth data. Insane. Plus, we're hosting a whole new tile set that is out of this world! Orthos USA § Las Vegas, NV § Denver, CO § Phoenix DT, AZ § San Luis Obispo, CA Austria/Switzerland...

Are you kidding me? 69.2 Terabytes?? I was once asked at a show how Microsoft handles so much data when transferring it over the Internet to the data centers. New 3D models (Version 2 of the processing software). In addition to Dallas, Denver, Las...

More, more, more - 10TB more...... New / Updated cities in 3D Augusta, GA Denver, CO Avondale, AZ Gilbert, AZ Glendale, AZ Mesa, AZ Peoria, AZ Phoenix, AZ Tempe, AZ Tuscon, AZ Fort Worth (West), TX Chicago, IL Coral Springs, FL, Nashville Opry, TN...

14.3 TB of new imagery for Microsoft Virtual Earth. Save money on gas....use Live Search Maps powered by Virtual Earth . Ortho United States (UltraCam, Microsoft Proprietary) Elizabeth, NJ West Allis, WI    Paterson, NJ Pasadena, TX Austria...

Update 1: The Virtual Earth Standard Control SDK is avilable on MSDN: http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=4304174 The news is out: the MSN Virtual Earth site is now called Windows Live Local . Check it out: http://local.live.com The reviews so...

Better late than never, but I guy's gotta take vacation after the fiscal year! In case you haven't seen it elsewhere, here's the latest imagery updates pushed out to Live Search Maps / Virtual Earth (15.65 TB in all): New 3D Cities: a. Montreal...

Feel free to bypass my blog and download Photosynther now . Photosynther is the client software to create your own Photosynth's viewable in the browser. Some of this post may look familiar to you folks who leverage search engine cache, but I've added...

A nice improvement was just released for Virtual Earth’s Birds Eye navigation at http://local.live.com . The Birds Eye navigation thumbnail grid has been replaced with an inset map for easier usability (see screenshot below). Please note, this feature...