Google Earth

[+gingerbreadmen]

I've run Google Earth with no problems for some time on my desktop 'puter. I recently treated myself to a new laptop running Vista. I downloaded Google Earth and find the screen is slightly different to the version I already had - no problems there. However, I now have yellow push pin icons which when I hover the cursor over them show the name of the cache. Alternatively I get the geo icons (which I am used to) but they show the name of the cache all the time which makes the screen look very crowded. (I don't know why or how I change between the two screen settings, it just seems to happen!). When I hover the cusor over the cache icon the writing increases in size.

What I want to do is get back to having my old geo icons with the cache name only appearing when the cursor is over the icon. How do I do that?

I can't check any settings on the laptop Google Earth as it's poorly and gone to the 'puter doctors to make it all better again.

[+ryme-intrinseca]

This answer will be no help whatsoever , but I just wanted to let you know you are not alone - I sometimes randomly get yellow pins instead of icons. It only happens when I specifically need it to show the proper icons, I think there is a setting within Windows which detects when I'm particularly stressed and deliberately makes it worse.

 

PS. Erm - I find your tag line a bit worrying gingerbreadmen - dare I ask you to explain?

Edited April 17, 2007 by ryme-intrinseca

[+gingerbreadmen]

PS. Erm - I find your tag line a bit worrying gingerbreadmen - dare I ask you to explain?

 

err, in a word...NO! (Some things are best left unsaid )

[+ryme-intrinseca]

 

[Edgemaster]

Could it be that Groundspeak haven't tweaked their file to work properly with Google Earth 4? It may work as it used to in 3, but 3 is rather old now, and you can't download it.

[+molfrew-mosstoad]

This wont help but I have Google Earth 4 running on W2K & WinXP and on both machines I get the "Usual geo icons" for a short while then they turn to the yellow pins... Think its a G/E thing

 

To be honest I prefer it, seems less cluttered, but I know what you mean about the names you have to hover over them for them to display.

[Edgemaster]

The Google Earth network link provided by geocaching.com is less accurate, too, a Google Earth export from GSAK is nicer, unlimited, customisable.

There's also the option to import a GPX straight away - but the icons may be defaulted.

Edited April 17, 2007 by Edgemaster

[+Birders]

Believe this has been mentioned elsewhere... banyone know why the pins/icons keep changing position? We recently had a couple of days in LA and the only map available to us for geocaching was Google Earth. We nearly went bananas trying to work out where caches were because the pins/icons kept jumping around..

[Nediam]

Believe this has been mentioned elsewhere... banyone know why the pins/icons keep changing position? We recently had a couple of days in LA and the only map available to us for geocaching was Google Earth. We nearly went bananas trying to work out where caches were because the pins/icons kept jumping around..

I think it's to prevent people being able to find the caches by using Google Earth alone. With the "movement" of the pins, you need the actual co-ords from Geocaching.com to be able to locate the cache.

[barryhunter]

It's a deliberate tactic to not 'ruin' the game by giving away the exact location (huh???), or more likely to limit the attractiveness of the Google Earth feed for people trying to harvest coordinates and <real cynic mode>even to make it less attractive to people to use thereby saving on server capacity</end cynic>

 

You are better off just downloading a GPX file (ie Pocket Query) and dropping that into Google Earth - there are programs available to set approriate icons on the file - or you can export from GSAK which has custom exports etc.

[+FollowMeChaps]

How dooes one use GSAK to export to Google Earth - or do we need GSAK 7?

[+scanker]

How dooes one use GSAK to export to Google Earth - or do we need GSAK 7?

 

I just cracked this last night, so should be able to help.

 

I export from GSAK as a gpx file and open this from Google Earth. I have GSAK7, but presume gpx export was present in earlier versions.

 

The bit that I stumbled on was that I had to upgrade my version of Google Earth from an earlier beta version. The import didn't work with my beta version.

 

HTH.

[Edgemaster]

How dooes one use GSAK to export to Google Earth - or do we need GSAK 7?

Or, with icons, choose one of the Earth macros from here: http://gsak.net/board/index.php?showforum=28

[+greengenes]

Any body ever have this message pop up when you activate the GeoCaching KML plug-in in Google Earth:

 

You have exceeded the allowed views for the day. Please try again tomorrow.

 

Even though this was the first time I've used it today and the area I am trying to view only contains about 15 caches?

 

This has been happening ever since I got a new computer. I have yet to be able to use the GC KML

[Edgemaster]

Any body ever have this message pop up when you activate the GeoCaching KML plug-in in Google Earth:

 

You have exceeded the allowed views for the day. Please try again tomorrow.

 

Even though this was the first time I've used it today and the area I am trying to view only contains about 15 caches?

 

This has been happening ever since I got a new computer. I have yet to be able to use the GC KML

This is a weird problem, others have had it too. Which company provides your internet connection?

[+greengenes]

Any body ever have this message pop up when you activate the GeoCaching KML plug-in in Google Earth:

 

You have exceeded the allowed views for the day. Please try again tomorrow.

 

Even though this was the first time I've used it today and the area I am trying to view only contains about 15 caches?

 

This has been happening ever since I got a new computer. I have yet to be able to use the GC KML

This is a weird problem, others have had it too. Which company provides your internet connection?

 

Insight Communications in Louisville, KY

[Edgemaster]

Right, never heard of them. But, I was going to suggest that possibly due to one IP being used my multiple customers, but since it occured with a new PC, I don't really know.

[+scotte]

It's a deliberate tactic to not 'ruin' the game by giving away the exact location (huh???), or more likely to limit the attractiveness of the Google Earth feed for people trying to harvest coordinates and <real cynic mode>even to make it less attractive to people to use thereby saving on server capacity</end cynic>

 

Even more than that, if the feed gave out the real coordinates, you wouldn't need a premium membership to get them (it would be trivial to write a harvesting script to do so with the feed), so it's in Groundspeak's financial interest to do so.

Edited April 23, 2007 by scotte