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Google Maps: The power of Fusion Tables with Dynamic Styling

The Fusion Tables Layer has been one of the most successful new features launched in the Maps API in the last year. We have seen a wealth of fascinating data visualizations that rely on Fusion Tables, such as the Bay Citizen Bike Accident Tracker and the WNYC Police Precinct map.

At Google I/O this week, Simon Rogers of the Guardian joined me and Kathryn Hurley of the Geo Developer Relations team to present some examples of how the Guardian uses Fusion Tables to visualise data for their readers, and introduce some great new features:

Fusion Tables allows you to share large tables of spatial data and render them on a map in a way that performs consistently well across all browsers, on desktop and mobile. The way in which the data is styled on the map, the markers used for points, the colours and stroke widths used for polylines and polygons, can be defined by the owner of the table in the Fusion Tables application, or using the new Fusion Tables Styling and InfoWindows API. However only the owner of the table can define the styling in this way, and styling for any single table is fixed.

At Google I/O we introduced Dynamic Styling of Fusion Tables layers. This allows the styling rules used for displaying a table in a Maps API application to be defined from JavaScript, and changed dynamically. For example you can use this to switch between rendering different data sets in the same table, or giving users control over which subset of the data is highlighted, as in the below example based on a public table of Chicago Homicides data:

In order to ensure the continued reliability of the Fusion Tables layer, we are also introducing some limits on the number of layers that can be used, and the complexity of styling. The Maps API now permits up to five Fusion Tables layers to be added to a map, one of which can be styled with up to five styling rules.

For information and code samples of how to apply dynamic styling to Fusion Tables, see our documentation, and for further assistance I recommend the Google Maps JavaScript API V3 forum. It’s great to see the creative ways in which Fusion Tables Layer is being used, and we hope this new flexibility will drive even more inspiring and informative Maps API applications.

Google Search: More powerful collaboration

Until now, CSE has had a simple collaboration feature that lets the owner of a custom search engine invite friends or colleagues to contribute sites, and assign labels to these sites. This was useful in expanding the scope of a search engine, but beyond expanding indexing, it limited what collaborators were able to do.

Starting today, we’re replacing the current collaboration options with more powerful shared administration features. Through Admin accounts, a new tab in your control panel, you can now invite collaborators to become shared administrators. Admin accounts have capabilities similar to those of the owner, but they cannot access the Make Money (advertising) tab or create additional admin accounts.

In line with these enhancements, we will be removing the Collaboration tab in a month. In the mean time, as an owner of a custom search engine, you can easily migrate existing sites from the Collaboration tab to your search engine definition and, if you like, upgrade existing collaborators to Admin accounts to give them shared administrator privileges. When we remove the Collaboration tab we will automatically migrate all sites but will not automatically upgrade all collaborators to admin accounts – so if you do want to keep existing collaborators on your site we recommend you migrate them today, or you can add them back manually later.

We hope you’ll find these shared admin capabilities more powerful. Let us know what you think in our discussion forum.

Google Places Verifying Business Listing Discrepancies with Owner

A number of users have sent me copies of a recent email communication that Google Places is sending to claimed business where there is possible problem with the listing. The emails detail potentially conflicting information with the listing when compared to information that Google has about the business in the “cluster”.

In one email example sent to the owner of a merged record, Google suggested a category that Google thought was more appropriate. The category was obviously for the other business in the merge and was inappropriate for this business. It was fascinating that Google was not accepting on face value the categories entered by the business owner.

In another example noted in the forums, Google couldn’t verify the street address that the business was using, perhaps because of the improper abbreviation of the word terrace. Google noted:

You provided: 20814 Houseman terr, Ashburn VA 20148, United States
Google was unable to identify the correct physical address for this business. This address is required for verification. Please edit your listing, and add the real, physical address. You can later choose to hide it from your Place Page, if your business doesn’t have a storefront or office.

Here is the copy of the email I received this evening for a listing that I manage:

Please review your listing

Hello from Google Places,

To help people searching for businesses like yours, Google is always working to improve the accuracy of local business listings. While reviewing your Places listing for Sundahl & Co Insurance, we found that this business may be permanently closed.

Is this place closed?

Sundahl & Co Insurance
58 Derrick Rd.
Bradford PA 16701
United States

Please log in to your Places account and let us know if this business is still open. If we don’t hear from you before January 31, 2011, we may remove this listing.

Thank you,

The Google Places Team

Email Preferences: You have received this mandatory email service announcement to update you about important changes to your Google Places product or account.

The email is a refreshing effort to verify discrepancies with the cluster BEFORE a drastic, business affecting change takes place. It is also an effort to align the content of the Places page with Google’s best known information about the Place.

In my case, there has been a persistent record popping up for the business at their old address which was marked as closed. It is possible that the information from the old address, although closed, merged into the cluster for the current listing. Google’s misunderstanding in the situation is understandable.

This new outreach allows Google to double check information in the cluster against the person or people best able to suggest its accuracy… the business owners. It is a welcome step and one that should minimize improper closings, mergings and other errors and use owner provided data at lest when Google trusts the owner’s input.

Props to Google Places!

Here are the screen shots from the process of providing Google from the owner’s point of view…

Appears at the top of the Places List view: