Bing Maps

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Bing Maps (formerly known as Windows Live Maps , Windows Live Local and Live Search Maps ) is an online map service from Microsoft that allows you to view various spatial data and use spatial services. It is a further development of MSN Virtual Earth and is part of the Bing search engine .

The data and services are made available by the Bing Maps for Enterprise platform. The free Internet offering of maps includes satellite images and aerial images .

description

Maps, aerial photos and satellite images can be viewed free of charge in Bing Maps . A special feature compared to other Internet map services such as Yahoo Maps are oblique aerial images from a bird's eye view, which are mostly only available from urban areas. In addition, 3D models are available for various cities that can be viewed in 3D after installing a plug-in in the browser. In addition to the data provided, various services can be used, including for location searches and route planning.

Development and history

Since November 8, 2006 Microsoft has activated a 3D version. The buildings are textured for selected cities in the USA as well as for the competitor Google Earth .

High-resolution aerial photos from a bird's eye view of 58 German cities have been available since February 2007 ; these were taken in summer 2006 from small aircraft. The technology originally developed at TU Graz for this comes from the Vexcel Corporation , one of the Austrian Univ.-Prof. Franz Leberl , which specializes in aerial image processing and which Microsoft took over in May 2006. Image material has been available for Germany since May 25, 2007, the resolution of which allows objects around 1 m in size to be recognized.

In September 2007, the previously secret, low-noise propulsion system for the Ohio-class submarines of the US Navy was exposed using Virtual Earth . Microsoft had published a picture of a submarine that was in the dry dock without the drive being covered, thereby exposing the previously secret drive technology.

On June 1, 2009 Microsoft introduced the Internet service Bing and subsequently renamed the previous map service Live Search Maps to Bing Maps. The basis of the service is still the virtual earth engine.

Since the beginning of 2012, Bing has been gradually making the military areas and airports (Stuttgart) in the aerial photos unrecognizable by pixelating them.

Bing Streetside

Bing Streetside is a counterpart to Google Street View . It mainly contains recordings from the USA, Canada and a small selection of cities in France, England and Spain.

At Christmas time 2011 recordings of several German cities were published. For the fact that the images have not been available since the beginning of May 2012, Bing provides undefined data protection problems as a reason. Until May 2012 the cities were Munich , Augsburg , Ingolstadt , Nuremberg , Stuttgart , Karlsruhe , Pforzheim , Heidelberg , Mannheim , Darmstadt (recording period November / December 2011), Frankfurt am Main with Wiesbaden and Mainz , Düsseldorf , Duisburg and Essen as well as their immediate surroundings , Berlin only partially visible. The recordings for this began on May 23, 2011.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Chip Bing Maps 3D , - Download - CHIP Online, June 4, 2009.
  2. ^ Microsoft Acquires Vexcel Corp., a Worldwide Leader in Imagery and Remote Sensing Technology , Microsoft News Center , May 4, 2006
  3. ↑ Microsoft's virtual earth with real details , heise online, May 26, 2007.
  4. ↑ Virtual Earth shows a top secret submarine , WELT ONLINE, September 6, 2007.
  5. ↑ Microsoft's search engine Bing is online , heise online, June 1, 2009.
  6. ↑ Microsoft starts map service over Christmas , time online
  7. ↑ Street view Streetside is offline , Zeit online , May 23, 2012
  8. ↑ Bing Maps Streetside , Golem.de , (accessed on May 8, 2011)