terraserver coordinates

[Guest puma]

I have been looking into the www.terraserver.microsoft.com site for coordinates and have found the coordinates to average 1 to 2 miles off, anyone else notice this, or am I off.

[Guest jeremy]

I'm sending WGS84 coordinates to Terraserver, and they apparently use NAD27 instead. It's a known bug. I'm planning to convert the coordinates so the map works, but I fear if I do so people may use the converted coordinates in their receivers if they take them from the terraserver site.

 

Jeremy

[Guest mouse]

You could post a little note next to the link warning them of the difference. I always take my coordinates off the Cache's page.

[Guest Chad of PDX, OR]

jeremy,

 

While you're tinkering with the link to terraserver.microsoft.com, may I suggest that you use "t=1" in the link? That will tell terraserver to show the satellite image map, instead of the weak topo map it shows me by default. The topozone.com topos and the mapblast streets are far superior than terraserver's topo and streets, but it's the satellite photos (t=1) that make the terraserver worth the click. (Detail enough to see individual cars!)

 

Maybe experiment with the zoom, too. "S=10" is the close-in zoom. But I'm not sure if that works with all locations. Sometimes appending "S=10" to the link has no affect on the image.

 

Too bad terraserver switches to it's own non-lat./long. coordinate system after you zoom/move. But notice below the words "Image courtesy of the US Geological Survey." they've hidden the lat./long. in WHITE text. Hrrmm.

 

One other tidbit that I find useful there is the "Image Info" link in the upper left corner. (It uses "/imageinfo.asp...") Viola! it brings back the lat.long. in helpful slices (but it looses the pan/zoom buttons.)

 

With such good maps, sometimes I think I'm cheating by using them! :-)

 

-chad