Slapped in the face by the 90′s

Recently I listened to something I haven’t heard in quite a few years, namely the album “Whiskey”, by Swedish crooner Jay-Jay Johanson. I remember I listened to it all the time when it was released some time in the mid 90′s. It was then described as a trip-hop Scott Walker. I was surprised I still enjoyed the music as much. Have I changed that little?

So tell the girls that I am back in town – Jay-Jay Johanson

Over – Alpha

Over – Portishead

Static maps with Google Maps

Google has just released an API to include static maps on a website. No need for JavaScript or server-side programming, using it merely means including on a page a simple img tag, with the source set to a specific URL, depending on what you want to display. For example, for my place near Parc Montsouris, in Paris, with a red G icon (“redg” in the string below) on it, the src string would be :

http://maps.google.com/staticmap?center=48.823825,2.341465& markers=48.823825,2.341465,redg&zoom=15&size=500×300

(I have excluded the key parameter for conciseness)

And here is the resulting image :

It is limited currently to 1000 requests per day and per user (that would refer to a reader of the page I think). A special version of maps, specifically for mobile users can be obtained as well. It seems to have more contrast, especially on toponyms :

It does not do much then but it is still nice. I really think they should add some simple form of thematic mapping to it (chloropleth, proportional icons…), which would nicely complement their Chart API released a few months ago, for all-around simple data visualization needs.

Vinicius de Moraes

A few songs by Vinicius :

Chorando pra Pixinguinha

Berimbau

Generative music

Reactable

This is so cool it made my head explode :

The Reactable was made by Spanish researchers and is currently used by Björk in her live performances.

Data Management in the Worldwide Sensor Web

Sensor web enablement is one of the hottest areas these days in geospatial tech. See the numerous OGC standards for interoperability in the field. This article, about the challenges of managing the vast quantity of sensor data, is also interesting.