Posted 10/23/09 at 09:02:59 PM by Ryan Whitwam

Google announced today that they were making the first major changes to their maps interface since the initial launch. The changes are mostly based around making it easier to pick out details at all zoom levels. The changes affect the regular ‘maps’ view, as well as ‘hybrid’ view.

Many of the changes are subtle at first glance. For instance, in the maps view, the width of roads has been reduced allowing for better legibility. Arterial roads have, in the past, looked inflated to the point that they covered map details. The crisper lines are certainly a welcome change. The color scheme has also been toned down a bit.

In hybrid mode, the roads have a new outline to make them easier to follow against the background. These changes have allowed more information to be displayed at various zoom levels. While zooming from a national view, to a local one, you’ll see smaller roads become visible sooner. Fonts have also been changed to increase contrast. Hit the read link to see all the samples. How do you like the changes? Do you think you would have noticed?

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Posted 03/24/09 at 09:38:26 PM by Mark Edward Soper

Another reason why Google has left its competitors way, way behind in the search engine race: Friday, a post on the (unofficial) Google Operating System blog noted that you can now restrict Google image searches by specifying one of twelve different colors:

red, blue, green, teal, purple, yellow, orange, pink, white, gray, black, brown

Only images that contain the specified color will be listed in the search results. Officially, you must use a command-line search in your browser's address bar to use this new feature, using the following syntax:

http://images.google.com/images?q=SEARCHTARGET&imgcolor=COLOR

[Replace SEARCHTARGET with what you're searching for and COLOR with the color you want to see in the images]

Here's an example that displays train photos containing the color yellow:

http://images.google.com/images?q=train&imgcolor=yellow 

To learn how to search for images by phrase and color, and for an easier way to use this new image search method, join us after the jump.

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