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Mapping Hacks: Tips & Tools for Electronic Cartography Review by Conrad Shultz
Interesting read, but obsolete at time of publication
I should begin by noting that while I am a competent programmer and geocacher, prior to reading this book I knew only as much about mapping and cartography as I could glean from episodes of NOVA and my childhood orienteering training. It is my suspicion that those more familiar with mapping technologies could make better use of some of the hacks in this book, so my review will be necessarily incomplete as I am not in a position to evaluate or even comprehend the more sophisticated hacks.
Perhaps the greatest virtue of this book is the introductory material toward the beginning that discusses some of the theory of mapping, geocoding, and computer navigation. Arguably I learned more from this material than from any of the more specific technical hacks.
For a great many of the hacks, however, the book is a victim of bad timing. While today (and even at time of publication) the Google Maps API is the de facto standard mapping system on the web, and Google Earth is certainly the best designed and most thorough free end-user GIS program, O'Reilly's Mapping Hacks makes no mention of either. This was a supreme disappointment for me and, I would think, anyone who was hoping this book could provide guidance for developing the latest and greatest Google Maps-enabled web application. If O'Reilly follows this with a new edition (which I very much hope they do) this major deficiency will obviously be rectified.
Some of the neatest hacks, however, are ideas that many of us have thought about in the backs of our minds but have never seriously tried to implement. These generally also do not depend on any particular mapping API, mitigating the foregoing concerns. I am particularly fond of Hack 16, which supplies the reader with information on a variety of useful geopolitical statistics websites, and Hack 62, which introduces Perl functionality I didn't even know existed and is instructive on mapping GSM cell sites. (After all, everyone has wanted a nice map of cell coverage just like in the TV series "24," right?)
Overall, I would recommend this book to those interested in learning what is possible to do with computer mapping, but who are also willing to go research more modern innovations to supplement the book's material. For those seeking more shake-and-bake recipes (as are frequently found in the excellent "Hacks" series), lobby O'Reilly for a new edition!