I was looking at the number of Fon hotspots around the major cities on Fon’s Google Maps/Fon mashup and was interested in seeing the hotspots in Google Earth as well. Luckily Fon has .kml files available on their maps page for easy viewing. But when I tried opening the .kml in Earth I was told there were errors in the file. I’m not sure if it was because of version differences or some other factor, but the problem was that there were ampersands(&) in the Description tag of many locations. After removing them, I was able to view all the hotspots quite easily.
But then when I turned on the 3D buildings the hotspot graphics were obscured. 
It would be much more interesting to see the hotspots in 3D at each point. So I set out to make my own 3D hotspot model in Google Sketchup. It didn’t take long to create my own Sphere component. Placing the hotspot model into Sketchup is easy, just go to File > Import and place the model where ever you like. 
The next step is to get the model together with a .kml file to display all Fon hotspots in 3D.
You can use the Sphere component on your own. Just download it and use it in Sketchup the same as any other.
1 response so far ↓
1 Ogle Earth: A blog about virtual globes, with a special focus on Google Earth. // Mar 11, 2007 at 12:12 pm
client, especially if the client does not provide enhanced functionality. Much better is to free the data and place it inside the wider context of a global viewer like Google Earth or NASA World Wind. This is really worth a look: bdkowert.com builds a 3D icon for the KML files showing FON’s wifi hotspots (which you can download under the POIs tab). What I like about it is that the use of 3D is not a gimmick in this case, but adds information. Download it from Google Earth Warehouse and check it out for
2 bdkowert // Mar 13, 2007 at 10:54 am
Welcome Oglers! http://www.ogleearth.com/2007/03/links_sardegna3.html
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