Sorry for being slow - love the polygons, but how do you turn them off again? Is there an easy way to toggle them on and off?

Thanks

Just uncheck the "placemark" (in Temporary Places or in My Places if you already placed it here ).

It is the same for all placemarks/overlays/polygons

Nice job, though my graphics engine (on mother board) just shows the polygons as white borders; i.e., unfilled.
May be a similar problem that displays all overlays over a certain size as a white square.
Guess I need a better graphics card! :-(

It's possible that your integrated gfx card isn't really all that 3D capable.
Try switching from OpenGL to DirectX. Make sure you have the latest gfx card drivers installed. Perhaps that will help.

Nice work on creating the polygons mcshea98!
I just wish the contry borders in GE would be more accurate.

Greetings mcshea98.

This is by far one of the best overlay image maps created for the Google earth app that I have come across. I have not seen any postings from you since 8.03.05
and I am wondering are you working on any updates to this wonderful *.kmz you have designed and fixed any of the known bugs?

I am really surprised you off-centered some of the ballons for nations (how did the US location end up in France? But I took it as a humorous joke unlike how some others may take it.

So I was also wondering why you could not use the CIA factbook flag images instead of imageshack for most of the nations as a majority of the flags would not display when the ballon hovered over a country I clicked on. Was this because of a legal/permission issue? If so, I wonder what the CIA would say about linking the flag images from their site with your *kmz file.

Could we possibly just request their permission to use their image links? I am sure they would wind up using your *.kmz in the future instead of re-inventing the wheel and developing something similar in-house all over again if they have not already done so or have something similar.

I have already begun reverse engineering your code to update some of the flags for nations I have viewed that did not work with the CIA factbook website. I could offer to send it to you so you could post if their would not be any legality issue with using their images, otherwise I would just keep it for my own use. Also I am looking into correcting some of those other known bugs and I will get back to you on that as soon as I can figure out reversing the rest of your code. I did take a look at the *.kml example you posted on another thread so that helps out alot.

Apologize about the long message, I will be brief next time. Take care, and by the way, I live in VA also.

Respectfully,
Kdrobins

Kdrobins,

Thanks for the compliments. I just started my new job last month and I have been extremely busy with that. Hopefully things will slow down in about a month.

The off-centered polygons for some nations is a bug, not a feature. There is a placemark at the end of everything that lists out known bugs; however, I don't think that I added the reason why they were bugs. Most of these off-centered balloons are a result of a country covering an odd shaped geometry (islands are the big culprit). The way GE works for balloons is that it takes the extremes of eastings and northings and creates a point in the center. The basic example is Vietnam. Because of its cresent shape, the balloon is just west of Vietnam. For the US, some of the Aleutian Islands are actually in the eastern hemisphere; therefore, the average of its farthest east and farthest west grid is about 0 (-180 and +180). The solution is to place a <LookAt> field for each country that is incorrect. I just haven't had the time to do it.

The only reason that I used ImageShack instead of the flags from the CIA World Factbook was because I wanted to try using image hosting source. In the past I have had files end up invalid because the website I was referencing changed the name of their graphic. Then I had to go back and fix it. I just didn't want to have to deal with that. The CIA Factbook is probably the exception, because they are pretty strict in their naming conventions. (ie predictable). As far as I know, I don't think there is a problem with using their flags.

I usually try and put comments in my KML file in order to help other users figure out how it was done. I didn't with this one, but you can look at some of my earlier posts in the KML discussions forum. I am not territorial with my KMLs. I put them out there to help generate ideas. In fact most of my posts are just a compilation of several other people's ideas. So, feel free to modify and post as your own. Just reference people like James_Mcgill, Ink Polaroid and GlobalTrotter2 (the people who came up with the ideas).

Again, thanks for the compliments. Welcome to the BBS, and I look forward to some of the things you will produce.

p.s. I am adding my updated file. It is a work in progress, but I don't know when I will get to work on it. This includes Ink_Polaroid's CIA World Factbook KML. Also, it has been restructured into folders, to help with organization of other KMLs.

Hey there mcshea.

Thank you for the excellent and prompt response. I have uncovered mostly what you mentioned on your last post when I looked at reassembling the kml 2.0 code. There was no tag in the code for the placemarkers with the original kmz file you uploaded so for most of the countries I had to resort to redrawing the polygon borders manually which was a laborous task. And for a few countries I did redraw the lines for, ie Sweden, and Spain, the placemarker ballons ended up in the same location your original file had them.

So I realized it was a bug with Google's program. Oh well. So I did look into the posibility of using the flags from the CIA website and what you mentioned about link paths always changing makes perfect sense and I understand your reason for using imageshack now.

The CIA website states the following from their FAQ link:

"Can I use some or all of The World Factbook for my Web site (book, research project, homework, etc.)?

The World Factbook is in the public domain and may be used freely by anyone at anytime without seeking permission. However, US Code prohibits use of the CIA seal in a manner which implies that the CIA approved, endorsed, or authorized such use. If you have any questions about your intended use, you should consult with legal counsel. Further information on The World Factbook's use is described on the Contributors and Copyright Information page. As a courtesy, please cite The World Factbook when used."

Anyhow I want to forward to you the few changes I was able to make to your original kmz file. I have not had the time to entirely look at the new one you posted although I see how you planted a more defined placemark for each nation now which may help in nailing down the ballons to the center of the right country.

I understand about starting your new job and being extremely busy. Congratulations and I wish you much success on your future endeavors. Thanks for welcoming me to the G.E. BBS. You will definitely see alot of contributions from me in the future.

Respectfully,
Kdrobins

Hello,

This is abslutely great, nice one! Just one thing I noticed though, you seem to have missed Northern Ireland as part of the UK and have the whole island as the Republic.

Cheers,

Simon.

This is a great file and should be used by students everywhere.

One hint that I haven't seen mentioned on this thread that many people don't know. With filled polygons, you can hold down the control key and left click on them, and the description balloon will pop up.

Brilliant little tip - and exactly the sort that educators are looking for. Thank you.