Most of us have used Google maps. But few are aware of the powerful information now available at the click of a button using the Google map technology. The geographical information can be used to orientate web users– like pinpointing services and places of interest to residents in a specific area.

Here is a internal proof of concept that one of the team at C5 is working on for Jersey.

We will put a live version online in a week or so.

A good example of how this may work is Charnwood Borough Council who offer their residents an easy way to find facilities including recycling points, health centres, schools and heritage sites amongst others:

http://www.charnwood.gov.uk/

So, for example, if you wanted to see what planning applications were in progress in your area…

1. Clink on the link above and use LE11 2TZ as your post code;

2. Select any address.

3. Click on the Planning tab. This will show you all the sites currently undergoing the planning application process in that area.

4. Try the heritage tab as well. This model shows how easy it is to provide a wide variety of different geographical information to locals as well as visitors.

We think it is an excellent way to provide public record information at the click of a button and are looking at ways to introduce the functionality to www.gov.je and others. All of this is done using Google maps and auto generated KML files. Here are a few more examples:

For recycling points in a certain area:

my.charnwood.gov.uk

For information on particular buildings like who they belong to or how much they were bought for:

resources.esri.com zoning information

And for those techies out there that would like to have a go and need further information on exporting My Map on KML, follow this link: http://sites.google.com/site/gmapstips/export-my-map-as-kml

It would be great to hear your thoughts on this powerful tool and how it could be integrated further into local sites.

Great end to a busy week at C5.  We had fantastic responses to our Guernsey and Jersey seminars, introducing  Sharepoint 2010 to both existing and new clients.  In Guernsey, 19 key business decision makers joined us at Christies for the breakfast briefing.  In Jersey, 28 existing and potential clients braved the early start to join us at the Royal Yacht.  At both events, we struggled to cover the wealth of changes and updates that are included in the new Sharepoint 2010 platform but it was a good start.  I’ve uploaded the presentation here (please keep in mind that all the screenshots are from a beta build).

Slides in PDF format

Slides in PPT format

I have removed some of C5 solution example screens, as I am not able to make them public, and I used the slide from the SharePoint Conference I went to in the US from Arpan’s presentations. You can access the original slides at Arpan blog.

Official launch of the new software is in May and I’m more than happy to go through the full system and/or updates with clients on a one on one basis.