I wasn't available to share the recent geonews in batch mode last Friday, so there you go!

On the Google front:

• Google Places is now more widely available in Asia
• New in Google Maps for Android: Latitude real-time updating and more
• Via APB, there's a 'big buttons' version of the Google Maps UI that is being tested

On the Microsoft front:

• Bing Maps' latest map app is OnTerra’s “RouteSavvy” Route Optimizer, allowing you to find the best route for multiple destinations (think solving the travelling salesman problem)
• IDV's Visual Fusion 5.0 has been released, it integrates with Microsoft tools such as Bing Maps and Sharepoint

On the open source / data front:

• Here's an important entry if you use ExtJS or GeoExt, it's about the licensing limitations of GeoExt depending on your use case
• Here's a blog entry on how do OpenStreetMap and open government geodata fit together
• There's WMS cascading in the latest GeoServer
• Here's an interesting entry named Latest on JPEG2000 Improved Support for the Java world

On the ESRI front:

• An entry named Esri Forestry Group Aims to Create Open Templates and Tools
• Here's two entries from V1 on ESRI's Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) conference, one named “All Roads Lead to Rome” and a second one named Thought – Is ESRI Building a Search Engine?

In the miscellaneous category:

• Here's an entry on a disagreement of the value of REST for geodata processing and the OGC
• We mentioned China's MapWorld recently, here's more info and a note that it uses DigitalGlobe imagery
• Here's a free set of online calculators for geographic coordinates and distances
• It seems that Vans can Drive Themselves Across the World and another geo-related discussion over Slashdot: Forming New Mobile Networks With People-Borne Sensors
• Here's news from LizardTech: Next Generation MrSID Technology Offers Enhanced Compression Technology for Hyperspectral Data
• I liked this short tidbit letting us know that a "trial in New South Wales revealed that a GPS device that beeped when drivers were over the local speed limit (access from a database, not input by drivers as other devices require) caused 89% of drivers to slow down."
• Also from APB: MapQuest Visits Down 22% over Last Year
• And if you like editwars, "Neogeography" has been deleted from Wikipedia
• And ending up the serie from APB, updating a NAVTEQ in-dash GPS can cost you more than the value of a new handheld GPS device
• Why not, Australian Researchers Design Software to Help Robots Read Maps

In the maps category:

• The Wikileaks Iraq War Logs Mapped
• Here's an interesting entry named The Surprising Geography of International Tourism
• Here's a review of the new National Geographic Atlas
• Here's about the Berlin Solar Atlas project
• The One Europe One Geology book is now online

Here's the Friday geonews in batch mode, or more precisely, the geonews that were not already shared earlier this week.

On the ESRI front:

• After ArcGIS API for iOS, it's not surprising to learn about ArcGIS For Android And ArcGIS API For Android Coming Soon
• V1 reviews Michael Zeiler's new book named "Modeling Our World: The ESRI Guide to Geodatabase Concepts"

In the miscellaneous category:

• Bing Maps is now a component of UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency
• V1 sums up various news regarding Bentley (think Microstation) products
• Here's a Safe Software User Meeting Recap
• In the U.S., there's a new National TOD (Transit-Oriented Development) Database
• APB has an entry on Garmin's attempt to monetize geocaching

In the map category:

• Here's a map of U.S. foreign military bases
• TMR has an entry on the true size of Africa, since most of us are often mislead by the Mercator projection
• Here's an entry on ProtectedPlanet, mapping 150,000 of the world's protected areas
• Like in some other countries, you will need to register to do mapping activities in Pakistan

A busy week for these geonews in batch mode.

On the Google front:

• Google Latitude is now available for our desktop computers, a reminder; Latitude is Google's tool to share your location with friends and see where there are in real-time on map. And yes, you can get alerts when friends are neaby.
• If you use Google's Panoramio, integrated into Google Maps and Earth, you now have access to new sets of statistics for your photos.
• The GEB answers the question How often does Google update the imagery in Google Earth? And of course, there was another imagery update this week.
• The GEB offers an entry named 8 things to do with Historical Imagery in Google Earth

On the FOSS4G / opendata front:

• Here's an entry on running PostGIS in parallel threads
• Here's a link on a "GDAL Web driver", GDAL filesystem implemented on HTTP
• OpenStreetMap's founder Steve Coast left CloudMade
• SpotMaps images are now available in OpenStreetMap [French link]

On the Microsoft front:

• Here's an entry about new options regarding Enabling the New Style in the Bing Maps AJAX Control.
• Here's an entry on Bing Maps and the use of U.S. 311 issues, specifically for Miami and San Francisco.

On the ESRI front:

• James Fee informs us Esri Added Parcels to Their World Streets Map Service.
• There's a new software called GeoCat Bridge for ArcGIS, to publish using OGC services data from ArcGIS Desktop to the open source GeoServer and GeoNetwork.
• Here's an entry about Trimble Support For ArcGIS 10 And ArcPad 10 Now Available.

In the miscellaneous category:

• The European GNSS (GPS) system GALILEO needs more funding and more time, completion date is now projected to be.
• TMR links to Gizmodo's best navigation apps for iOS and Android.
• IBM launched CityOne, their SimCity-like game to build smarter cities.
• Spatial Sustain discusses a review of online mapping tools usability and accuracy, specifically Google Maps, Bing Maps and MapQuest.
• Regarding augmented reality, APB mentions an app with which you point an airplane with your iPhone and you get info about it (flight number, destination, height and speed).

In the maps category:

• Here's an entry on The Census of Marine Life in Google Earth, "the major international oceanographic research project involving researchers in over 80 countries, who tagged more than 120,000 types of species & millions of organisms over the past decade".
• Here's a Map of all the munitions dumped in Europe after WWI and WWII.
• The Australian Atlas of Mineral Resources has been updated

Here's a few recent Microsoft-related geonews:

• Bing Maps gets transit directions: "In this initial release (i.e. more to come) of Bing Maps transit directions, Bing Maps will cover 11 cities: Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New Jersey, New York City, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle, Washington DC, and Vancouver"
• Here's another entry on Bing Maps plugin for WordPress
• There's an entry on Bing Maps going Mobile
• and another one on Improving the Map App Developer Experience
• MSN also launched an interactive guide to the Battle of Britain
• Here's an entry on an Hurricane Tracker for Bing Maps

Here's the recent Microsoft-related geonews.

• Bing Maps and Hotmail come together: "When you select “Maps and Places” [in an Hotmail message] a task pane opens that allows you to add new locations or interact with a set of previously defined locations."
• Part of the Bing Spatial Data API, Microsoft introduced batch geocoding and batch reverse-geocoding with Bing Maps.
• In addition to the Windows Phone, the Blackberry and iPhone, now there's Bing Maps on your Verizon Android device.
• For the developers amongst us, MS introduced PHP and VB .NET SDKs for Bing Maps Platform. There's also an entry on Bing Maps and MS Visual Studio LightSwitch.
• The official blog also mentioned Geo Fact Finder, "the application includes over fifteen distinct data themes that includes several dozen specific variables" for the U.S.

[this is old news from July and sharing it with our users to make sure they're aware of it] Spatially Adjusted linked in July to a BostonGIS article named "Cross Compare SQL Server Spatial, PostgreSQL/PostGIS 1.3-1.4, MySQL 5-6". Previous such comparison is over 1.5 years old, see also related stories below. From the associated blog entry: "A few people have been asking us what are the pros and cons of using SQL Server Spatial and PostGIS and as a Windows user, why would you still consider using PostGIS. Rather than simply providing some hand-waving saying "well if you just care about displaying data, then use whatever you feel comfortable with, but if you want to do real intensive sophisticated spatial analysis and geometric processing without having to purchase a bunch of expensive software, then PostGIS is probably better for you. Hell why must you think in either or propositions - just use both using the strengths of each.", we have tried really hard to quantify the similarities and differences between the 2 and to boot - we have also added in MySQL."Story imported from the previous Slashgeo Slashcode site, user comments have not been migrated. For more information, please read Welcome to the new Slashgeo!. Thank you for your understanding. [this is old news from July and sharing it with our users to make sure they're aware of it] Spatially Adjusted linked in July to a BostonGIS article named "Cross Compare SQL Server Spatial, PostgreSQL/PostGIS 1.3-1.4, MySQL 5-6". Previous such comparison is over 1.5 years old, see also related stories below. From the associated blog entry: "A few people have been asking us what are the pros and cons of using SQL Server Spatial and PostGIS and as a Windows user, why would you still consider using PostGIS. Rather than simply providing some hand-waving saying "well if you just care about displaying data, then use whatever you feel comfortable with, but if you want to do real intensive sophisticated spatial analysis and geometric processing without having to purchase a bunch of expensive software, then PostGIS is probably better for you. Hell why must you think in either or propositions - just use both using the strengths of each.", we have tried really hard to quantify the similarities and differences between the 2 and to boot - we have also added in MySQL."