Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Telling Google WHERE you are in the world

Step 1. Go to http://maps.google.com
Step 2. Go to 'mymaps' tab and create a map, with a pushpin marking your location
Step 3. Hit the 'View in Google Earth' button and save the .kml file
Step 4. Load the .kml file into Google Earth
Step 5. Save the new .kml file from Google Earth (this one is cleaner)

(an alternative to the above 5 steps would be to use http://www.addressfix.com/ (I've just discovered that useful tool!)

Step 6. Edit the kml file in your favourite text editor making good use of the tags and links you can put in there.

Here is a nice example of a .kml file which indicates the kinds of things you can do with the <description> tag:
http://www.seo-expert-services.co.uk/seo-expert-services-london.kml
and in use here.

Step 7. Put a link to the kml file in the sitemap.xml file, like this...
<url>

<loc>http://www.userexperiencedesign.co.uk/userexperiencedesigncambridge.kml</loc>

<priority>0.5</priority>

<changefreq>daily</changefreq>

</url>


Refs:
http://weblog.millionpieces.nl/2007/4/how-to-get-your-information-into-google-maps


Some more advanced KML examples.

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