The Russian developer Alexey “Holyfoot” Botchkov improved MySQL’s built-in GIS functions in order to use precise operations instead of MBR-based operations. Binary packages of a MySQL release containing his work are available for public testing here (FTP).
According to the GIS Functions wiki entry following MySQL GIS functions have been added to the MySQL 5.1.23 beta GIS release:
- BUFFER
- DIFFERENCE
- DISTANCE
- INTERSECTION
- SYM_DIFFERENCE
- UNION
I haven’t had the chance to test it yet, but I remember being very excited when I first read about the MySQL spatial extension a couple of years ago, followed by disappointment because of the MBR limits. Finally I decided to go with PostgreSQL/PostGIS back then.
However, if this functions make it into the official release it would be a good tool for proper storage and inclusion of geospatial data in (lightweighted) mapping applications like map mashups, compared to file based XML (KML) storage for instance. MySQL is supported by every other shared hosting plan, so the install base would be quite considerable I guess. [via heise]
Google Analytics is free (well, there is a limit for free use but I think it’s about a 7 digit page view number) and is certainly one of the most comprehensive tools in terms of web site traffic analysis. It’s powerful and provides excellent reporting tools.
I have used Google Analytics and I’m still using it on some sites, however, after testing Clicky for the last couple of weeks I ordered a Premium account today. Clicky isn’t nearly as complete as Google Analytics, but it provides a very slick functional user interface, easy blog integration and an API. Perfect for tracking a low traffic blog.
I’m a curious person, I want to know who are my visitors, what are they doing here, where they came from and where they’ll go. Clicky gives me easy overviews and quick answers to all of those points.
Depending on what site you’re running and how much traffic is generated, Clicky currently doesn’t accept sites with more than 10.000 page views per day, but for low traffic blogs, the long tail of the blogosphere, I definitely can recommend Clicky.
Published on
July 18, 2007 in
Geomensch.
Tags: Analysis, Austria, Geomarketing, Hotmap, Mapping, Marketing, Microsoft, Research, Toursim, Virtual Earth.
Not only Vienna is heating up this week, we’re heading towards 35°C and more every day, no, even mapping sites are called hot today:
Microsoft released their research project Virtual Earth Hotmap.
Hotmap gives some insights about place popularity and shows where people have looked during the past 6 months in Virtual Earth.
It’s quite interesting that the map, the overall picture, is similar to other (spatial) analysis results we do in our day-to-day job: the map, literally based on hits and page impressions, shows an urban/rural divide and structures along major transport axis. Besides large urban areas, some tourism regions can be identified too – lake regions in Carinthia, skiing regions in Salzburg and Tyrol.
After a quick look at Virtual Earth Hotmap I’d say it provides some interesting data for regional marketing purposes and could be used additionally to other (tourism) website traffic analysis. E.g. if a tourism region doesn’t show up in Hotmap then probably not too many people are looking for information about or even searching directions to it (and going there?).