3D Campus Information System

[usfstpete]

*This discussion is intended to provide you with an overview of my
work on the University of South Florida St. Petersburg Campus Map and
to document the future plans I have to provide the development and
management of a better 3D Campus Information System.

When I started my term as an “Other Personnel Services” position with
the office of Facilities, Planning & Construction Services in the fall
2006 semester I updated the campus map to an interactive web-based
Google map. When I began choosing how I would organize the facilities
into a campus map, I looked at every option available and finally
chose Google’s system because of the way you can store information in
KMZ files. Many people today are unaware of the capabilities of
sharing information through these files. Using Google Earth you can
create a KMZ file that uses network links to add place marks, image
overlays and 3D model data uploaded on a web server without having to
store the files inside the KMZ file. The file then stays optimized for
web viewing because of the ability to stream files over the internet.
I edited and published one KMZ file for every version of the campus
map. When I needed to make a change I opened up Google Earth made the
changes and sent the single KMZ file to the campus webmaster to upload
the file to the server. The future of storing information in KMZ files
is that Google is working on 100% compatibility with all three of
their map products Google Earth, Google Maps & Google Maps for Mobile
devices. To be able to access the USF St. Petersburg campus map
anywhere using any device leads to more location awareness on campus
about each facility. You can go to maps.google.com and enter the URL
of the KMZ file in the search box and hit enter. You will then see
Google maps actually load the information from the KMZ file right
inside the map.

To see how this is done click the following link:
http://www.google.com/maps?q=http://www.graphicsphere.net/usf/stpete/maps/kmz/map.kmz

To view USF St. Petersburg's 3D Campus Information System go to:
***You must have Google Earth Version 4 or later installed.
http://www.graphicsphere.net/usf/stpete/maps/kmz/earth.kmz