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I took my dogs on a 2 mile roundtrip walk today, to and back
from a
park. The walk to the park was almost completely downhill, yet
the
lack of any shade along the way turned the cloudless, sunny sky
into a miserable heat lamp, and my black-furred puppy, Boba,
had
a terrible time of it,
constantly
stopping in every small spot of
shade
we passed and begging to be carried. After about 3/4 of the walk,
I
softened and acquiesced to his request and carried him a short
way
until we reached a shady length of road.
On the return trip, which was almost all UPHILL, I decided to take
a
longer, more winding path to keep us going along shaded
backstreets instead of the unshaded direct route. Boba made this
longer, UPHILL walk in the shade (after being tired from the walk
to and playing at the park, no less) with no difficulty. It was also
easier on me. This got me thinking.
The version of Google Earth released for Android 3.0+ devices
features a 3D UI, meaning it clearly knows the heights of all the
buildings on the map or it wouldn't be able to accurately
represent
them on a 3D map. If it knows the height and geographical
coordinates of all given buildings in an area, and with the
appropriate layers selected can even show trees... and if you
search
for walking or biking directions in Google Maps it can give pretty
good time estimates on how fast you're likely to be moving, and
knows the position of the sun at any given time...
Then it should be easy to add an option to create a route based
on
availability of shade along said route. This would benefit
pedestrians
greatly when traversing unfamiliar territory by foot.
The best part is, it shouldn't actually require a device to be
compatible with the 3D map view to use this feature. It doesn't
have to DISPLAY the height of the buildings and/or trees. All it
has to do is access that information from Google's database to
incorporate the data into its route calculation. This should make it
compatible with ANY smartphone/tablet with ANY version of
Google
Maps or Google Earth.
Google streetlights
http://googlemapsma...oogle-maps.html?m=1
[21 Quest, Jul 03 2011]
UK's FixMyStreet.com
http://www.fixmystreet.com/reports
(Not Google - includes broken lampposts, and traffic cones on post boxes ...). Damn Barnet looks like either a duff place to live or has many web-savvy eagle-eyed busy-bodies [Dub, Jul 04 2011]
An old problem affecting more than one species.
http://www.google.c...ved=1t:429,r:8,s:23
[mouseposture, Jul 05 2011]
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Wouldn't it be simpler to bleach Boba? |
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[+] This should end up in a Stephen King novel at some point. |
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Conversely, I suppose it could be used for safety when walking
at night to maximize moonlight and streetlight exposure. |
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max:I think the problem with heat might have been
the hot pavement burning the pads of his feet? |
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Bob, that thought had occurred to me as well. |
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Maybe those mad dogs in the noonday sun are mad because their feet hurt. The englishmen I understand: the rickets have made them desperate for vitamin d. |
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Good for fat people, too.
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How would google know where the fat people are when you want to go out? |
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My old sheltie has been known to flop down on his side during walks on hot days and just lie there content to die. |
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// where the fat people are //
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Google knows where the doughnut shops are. They won't be far away. |
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Yup. "Only in America ... |
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Long and winding, somewhat shady shaggy-dog story of an idea. [Bun!]
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Ought to be quite straightforward to extact the OpenGl Z info |
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//the problem with heat might have been the hot
pavement// in which case, the blackness of the dog
was a red herring. |
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Not exactly, Max. There are multiple factors in play, all of them
valid. The sunlight causes the dog's whole body to overheat
because it is absorbed by the black coat. In addition, it burns
the pads of the paws by heating the pavement. Shade keeps
the sunlight off the dog's coat and the pavement, killing two
cats with one oven, so to speak. |
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// killing two cats with one oven //
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Take that idea, [21Q], and run with it ...
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"If you build it, they will come ..."
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Or rather, if you build it, we will bring them. In dozens. In a sack. |
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Getting streetlight information into Google may be a
tad difficult, however neccessary. + Could some sort
of object recognition algorithm detect a streetlamp
from satellite view? |
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Cheaper to employ lots of badly-paid poor people (tautology) in a Third World country to look at satellite images and pick out the streetlamps. |
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Go for a walk in the early morning or late afternoon,
when it's cooler? That's what most people do, to
avoid the heat of the middle hours of the day. |
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well yeah, except that I work from 1:30 PM to 10:00 PM, and
when I get home I sleep. I walk my dogs twice daily, once in the
morning, once before work. |
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[21] - do you seriously work 20.5 hour days? |
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Whoopsie! I'm correcting it now... |
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With a bit of training, a large animal like a horse could shelter a something like a great dane as it walked along, under which would scamper a small dog, who's underbelly space would facilitate an even smaller dog, etc etc, the whole arrangement progressing down to a shrew, and terminating with an ant.
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Obviously this would be difficult to manage and achieve, (especially training the ant) but I see it as the perfect solution to shadow management for walking animals in sunny places. Horses spent all their time outside, so I presume the sun doesn't bother them as much.
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[+] for your idea [21] and for allowing me to tag mine unto the end. |
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Actually it can bother them... I saw several specially made horse
blankets designed to keep them cool. But what it means is,
you'd only need the *one* blanket. Neat concept, Xen. |
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...almost TOO sensible! [+] |
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//Horses spent all their time outside, so I presume
the sun doesn't bother them as much.// You never
saw this before? <link> |
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I'm currently in correspondence with somebody on Christmas Island. I'm playing at trying to find her house without her telling me exactly where she lives using Google Earth (No, I'm not stalking her, she says I pass the perv test).
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But there's so many clouds in the image - Google Shade Walk would go crazy.
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Most domestic horses can take or leave shade, but my mustang would ALWAYS use every scrap when he was not going someplace. |
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(I deleted the now-pointless comments regarding the third link
being defective, now that it's been fixed) |
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Bun, but only for the this application's contrasting
use, ie Google Sun View.
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I like to have a beer during my lunch break,
particularly when it's sunny. However, working in
the West End, there's a lot of tall buildings that
block the sun. It's only through experience of the
area that I now know which pubs bask in sunshine
at which hour. Therefor, my first pint will be
stood outside the Duke of Argyll from 1pm, swiftly
moving round the corner to the White Horse
(affectionately dubbed the Zebra) when the sun
moves round at 1.30pm.
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In an area I was unfamiliar with, Google Sun View
would be perfect for strategising lunchtime
sunshine pint imbibing. [+] |
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I think the problem would be explaining Google Earth to the horse, and there not being a lot of GPS systems with buttons suitable for hooves. |
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Seems like the definition of ease would be programming a
voice command system with Equinese in the list of supported
languages... |
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+ For the shadow people and those who love dark
areas everywhere. |
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I like very much xenzags pyramidal arrangement. Could the horse fit under a giraffe? One could tether a blimp to the largest animal to provide extra shade. It would be a solemn, slow (accomodating the poor ant) and shady processesion. The blimp could have solar panels providing the power to play a New Orleans style dirge. yes, yes. |
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//One could tether a blimp// sp. "roc". |
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useful for vampires, too. Could be updated to show garlic growing areas and silversmith as well (or was that werewolves?) |
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Silversmiths are pretty much worthless for a vamp infestation,
but you might find a nearby fletcher or priest. |
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