Google Gas
Oh the wonders of Google Maps. For those who are unaware, the design of Google Maps makes it somewhat easy for independent developers to leverage their mapping tool for other purposes and applications. In the age of rising gas prices, this site uses Google Maps and gasbuddy.com to map out the cheapest gas prices in your area. There are a lot of these types of applications popping up and really the possibilities are endless.
For example, I’m looking around to find some additional memory for my desktop pc. What’s the standard thing to do when you want to buy electronic items like that? or any item for that matter? For me anyways I peruse the online databases of relevant store websites like BestBuy, Circuit City, etcetera, etcetera. This is kind of annoying though. You have to search each store’s website individually, which takes time by itself. What’s more, all of them have slightly different structures, navigation schemes and basic user interface designs. Now what would be really cool? How about a tool that integrates the store databases of all relevant stores along with their physical locations, individual inventories, and prices. Integrate Google Maps and now I can search for the exact type of memory that I’m looking for and the results page compiles pricing and inventory information for all matches from all relevant stores in my geographical area.
Anyways, it’s just a thought and one of the many applicable applications of Google Maps. Who knows, maybe somebody’s done it already.
August 17th, 2005 at 2:52 pm
[...] I know this is about the third post I’ve made on Google Maps in the last few weeks but including this one on cheap gas locations and this one on hybrid maps. In any case I thought this article from lifehack.org was worth mentioning. It lists several other applications that are similar to (and also including) the cheap gas locator mentioned previously. [...]