Template talk:Geolinks-US-cityscale

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Contents

[edit] Important

Before changing this template, be aware:

  1. Currently (July 2005) this template appears on almost every US city page.
  2. The original philosophy behind this template was to provide the MOST USEFUL resource for each type of information, not every resource available. Currently we can justify more than one of each type of resource because none is quite full featured, but in the future I hope we will be able to be able to eliminate items, not add more.
  3. If you add new resources to this template, they MUST BE AT THE PROPER MAGNIFICATION to be consistent with the other resources in the template.
  4. There are a set of other templates for other magnifications, and if you change this template it would be nice if you took the time to change the other templates for consistency. See below.
  5. There are also separate templates that can be plugged in modularly for other info such as weather maps. See below. If you have a new type of resource other than streetmaps, aerial/sat photos, or topomaps, consider creating a new modular template rather than changing the main template here.

Information on the whole template set: Template_talk:Geolinks-US-streetscale

[edit] Interwiki link to vi:

Please add an interwiki link to the Vietnamese version of this template:

[[vi:Tiêu bản:Geolinks-US-cityscale]]

Thanks.

– Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 05:34, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Breaks lists

When this template is used in an External links list, usually at the end of an article, if it is not the first entry in the list, it breaks the list with an extra blank line.

This can be fixed by hiding the previous newline with an html comment. An example follows:

*List item
*[http://www.ssdcougars.org/ Springfield Schools District website] <!-- Hide NL
-->{{Mapit-US-cityscale|39.926961|-75.335231}}
*List item
*[http://www.ssdcougars.org/ Springfield] <!-- Hide NL
-->{{Mapit-US-cityscale|39.926961|-75.335231}}
*List item

which produces:

I don't know how to hide a blank line after the template. -- SGBailey 23:28, 15 February 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Adding Template:Coor title d

See Template talk:Coor title dms#Ready for US cities?. -- User:Docu

[edit] ms virtual earth

Hi,

I can't seem to edit this one, os i'll post a message here. "Microsoft virtual earth" is now "windows live local"; it's url has been changed from virtual.msn.com to local.live.com... can someone fix it? atanamir 20:49, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Why is this page protected?

Why? --GeorgeMoney 21:24, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] absurd precision

Most of the articles that use this template seem to give coordinates to the nearest hundred-thousandth of a degree, something on the order of one meter. That's ludicrous; even if you want to put the crosshairs on city hall itself, a hundred meters should be fine. Could we publish a guideline somewhere that coordinates should be given only to the nearest thousandth of a degree? --Trovatore 19:14, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Yahoo! adds new features to mapping technology.

Yahoo! has added more features to their maps, such as traffic, sattelite, hybrid, flash/ajax, and other stuff. You guys should make it so people can access the new maps using this template!

[edit] What do you think about addind WikiMapia link to this template?

Thanks, Jack

[edit] Why is longitude displayed as negative?

Couldn't the template be changed so that the longitude displays as 75.3352° W (for example) rather than -75.3352° E ? --Mathew5000 07:22, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

The input is negative. I fixed it by removing "E" as per Template_talk:Geolinks-AUS-suburbscale. -- User:Docu


[edit] Wikimapia

It's full of "My house" links and jokes! Until they get a sensible Registration policy it's not going to improve either only get worse - Note the entry on Wikimapia says "Unlike some other wiki-systems, WikiMapia has no registered users and no administrative hierarchy. All users edit anonymously and there is currently no mechanism for monitoring or disciplining problematic users." Jaster 11:39, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I concur with Jaster entirely. Its entry for Area 51 (http://www.wikimapia.org/#y=37240203&x=-115818558&z=12&l=0&m=a) is full of useless junk and has nothing sourced or worthwhile. WP:EL says links should be "neutral and accurate material not already in the article", and that we should not link to "Any site that contains factually inaccurate material or unverified original research". By both of these criteria Wikimapia isn't an appropriate link. While I appreciate the effort and the undoubtedly clever implemention of Wikimapia, it's not Wikipedia's role to evangelise open source or open content projects. As it stands now, Wikimapia is unsuitable and should be removed - those individual articles whose editors have reviewed the specific Wikimapia area for that article may, if they wish, opt-in by adding an explicit link. Middenface 12:01, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Note also that its current, vastly undeserved, promenance comes from an edit by Nafos (talk • contribs) (most of whose grand total of 8 edits concern Wikimapia promotion in nav templates). And it was added to the template in the first place by Jacksav (talk • contribs), whose contributions to Wikipedia appear to revolve entirely around spamming Wikimapia onto many articles. Note also that the wikimapia domain [1] is owned by someone named Evgeniy Saveliev, likely Jacksav himself. This looks more and more like just plain spam. Middenface 12:11, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for your interest to our project. Your information about Wikimapia is not quite correct. You may find recent information about mutual integration of Wikipedia and Wikimapia on Mediawiki site: http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikimapia
But I will reply here to your worries:
1.Now we are finishing registration system
2.Wikimapia is a one of the top-popular Wiki project tied with maps.
For more information you may visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WikiMapia, feel free you express your thoughts there.
Alexandre Koriakine 4 October 2006

The information is correct until you get a registration system that restricts edits and allows edits to be reverted ... when your registration system is inplace I'll reconsider my views.

Note your knowledge of Wikipedia is seemingly limited since your link to the WikiMapia page is, a) an external link not an internal one, and b) is a totally inappropriate place to discuss WikiMapia (It's a encylopdia entry about WikiMapia and the Talk page is a discussion of the page not a discussion about the subject). Hopefully you understanding of the Wikipedia registration and editing/review system is not equally flawed or you user registration system may not work to clean up the rubbish on WikiMapia. As I said previously WikiMapia is a great idea that if implemented properly would be the Mapping equivilent of Wikipedia and a great complement to it, but the system of review is seriously flawed *at the moment* Jaster 09:07, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I understand your critics Jaster. I have made the same and a few other (Licence, Terms of services, etc.). That's why I proposed to discuss the possible connection between Wikipedia and Wikimapia in a more appropriate place : meta.wikimedia. Welcome, you would be very helpfull!--Olivier Auber 18:12, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal of Near Realtime Satellite Maps

NASA provides mid-resolution (250m/px) satellite photos on a daily base. Users will see hurricanes, weather conditions, wildfires and snow cover. Example: New York. Depending of timezone pictures are not older than 48h. Would you consider this as useful and add it to the template?--Noiv 12:08, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Does this Template unfairly favor the big 3 map sites?

I read above under "IMPORTANT" (quote:) The original philosophy behind this template was to provide the MOST USEFUL resource for each type of information, not every resource available. Currently we can justify more than one of each type of resource because none is quite full featured, but in the future I hope we will be able to be able to eliminate items, not add more. (end quote)

As a result, Google, Yahoo, and MSN maps (as well as TopoZone) are all guaranteed prominent access, whereas all other map providers must content themselves to a secondary link under the 'Maps and Aerial Photos' header. As a result, if provider X has the premier map for town Y, he/she is nevertheless relegated to secondary status.

Under the philosophy 'I hope we will be able to eliminate items, not add more' the logical result shall be that only googlemaps will in the end receive this preferred billing, and every other map provider shall be relegated to the second tier.

Also, because this Template is the home of the title 'Maps and Aerial Photos' a user wishing to provide a one-of-a-kind map of his/her favorite location(s) faces the challenge of trying to include the one-off map appropriately under the 'Maps and Aerial Photos' Template (which I don't think can be done for a one-off) or placing it generically under the 'External Links' header (which breaks the logical structure of having a separate heading for 'Maps and Aerial Photos.'

I would suggest for consideration that the 'Maps and Aerial Photos' heading be given superiority over the Geolinks-US-Cityscale Template so that the page for any given city could feature locally-produced maps before the universal map servers. For Topeka Kansas (for example) the resulting tree would look something like this:

 --Topeka, Kansas
 ---Maps and Aerial Photos
   ---- local maps
        ---- Joe's Topeka Map
        ---- Map of Topeka by Topeka Maps Inc.
        ---- My map of Topeka because I've lived here all my life and I know the city.
        ---- (this section is editable)
   ---- Automated mapping servers
        ---- Mapit-US-cityscale|36.781549|-119.792113
        ---- (editing of this template is locked)


Under this structure, a Wikipedia user could edit the Map section and his/her local map would achieve a billing above any of the big 3 map server sites.

Disclaimer: I am a new contributer and if there is a more appropriate venue for this discussion please inform me. -SJW2006nov05

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