LiveSide - News blog : Traffic

Live Maps Directions with Traffic re-routing

Kip Kniskern — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 02:16:00 GMT

One of the newly improved features of Live Maps is the traffic re-routing feature, called Clearflow, which can re-route Live Maps directions based on traffic information. The new system, updated initially for 72 US cities, takes into account not only major traffic routes but adjacent city streets as well. I tried out the directions, with Traffic switched on:

Hmmm green lights all the way on this route, smooth sailing. Anyway, if you run into traffic, you just click on "choose route based on traffic"

Actually I've tried the traffic routing in other locations, it's pretty cool. Of course if you're a Seattle to Redmond Microsoft commuter, there are only 2 bridges across the lake, doesn't take advanced algorithms to figure out which one is best :).

If you're looking for the easiest way to get from say Mountain View to Sunnyvale, give Live Maps a try!

Live Search Maps adds traffic for 3 Canadian cities

Kip Kniskern — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 12:09:40 GMT

Just in from our friends at Windows Live Chronicles, traffic info has been added for 3 Canadian cities: Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal - so now Phunky can detour around that black line near downtown.

Yes, the Live Search and Live Search Traffic gadgets are gone: security concerns cited

Kip Kniskern — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 11:35:00 GMT

We've received some tips and comments about the Live Search Traffic gadget for Vista being removed from Windows Live Gallery when it updated last week, and indeed it is gone, along with the Live Search gadget. In an email to Donavon West, who wrote both gadgets and also posts here on LiveSide, I asked about the missing gadgets. He replied, in part:

The traffic gadget AND the Live Search gadget were both pulled because of possible security concerns. I'm working on an article that will talk about these concerns.

Specifically if the case of the traffic gadget, it loads a script file from the Internet (the Virtual Earth API script). Doing so is now decreed my Microsoft as a no-no.

in loading scripts off of the Internet (as a sidebar gadget), a ner-do-well can interject malicious code via a MitM attack (man-in-the-middle). While this can be done on any plain ole webpage, doing so in the Sidebar can be exceptionally malicious as the code runs in the context of the logged in user and can do all sorts of evil things like delete files.

Microsoft has not contacted me about re-writing the gadget to alleviate this problem. Frankly, I'm not sure anything can be done about it (at least easily).

Donavon goes on to cite an MSDN article titled "Inspect Your Gadget" that offers guidelines on writing secure gadgets. Donavon has promised to update us when his article is published, in a week or two. But for now, the gadgets are gone from Gallery, and using the traffic gadget opens up at least the possibility of cross-site scripting attacks.

Hopefully these popular gadgets will return in a more secure form soon.

Version 2 of the Mobile Search application released

Chris — Fri, 13 Jul 2007 05:49:00 GMT

A new version of the Mobile Search application for Windows Mobile, Java-enabled phones and Blackberry's is now available. New features in the client application (http://wls.live.com) include:

Movie times
Traffic directions and GPS integration
Cache option to save map imagery to a storage card
Local Search now features user reviews

The browser search available at http://m.live.com has also been updated. Check it out if you can't install the Mobile Search application as both of these are extremely useful products. Currently the applications are limited to the US and UK, with certain features such as traffic still US only.

Read more on the VirtualEarth team blog.

Instant Answers adds maps and traffic info

Kip Kniskern — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 09:47:00 GMT

Do a search in Live.com or MSN.com, and as of today, if you type in an address you should get an inline interactive map as the first answer, according to the Virtual Earth / Live Maps blog.

(click to enlarge)

The new Instant Answers feature extends to traffic information as well, for cities that feature it. Typing "traffic Seattle", or "commute Chicago" will provide instant traffic information, although the info will be a snapshot and will not update in real time on the search page (although it will in a sidebar gadget, of course). The maps are fully interactive however, and pan, zoom, and even aerial imagery are supported.

Metro area traffic currently supported include Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, New York, Oklahoma City, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Portland, Providence, Sacramento, Salt Lake City, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, St Louis, Tampa, and Washington DC.