Product Blog - Two New pre-Alpha APIs from CloudMade
Last week we took the covers off our new CloudMade website - if you haven’t had a look already, head over to CloudMade.com and see for yourself.
We also released two new APIs as pre-Alpha services: theWeb Maps API and the Mobile Maps API. Right now these services are targeted at developers who want to get their hands on the very latest things we have to offer. Both APIs are accessed by directly calling our tile server, though the observant amongst you will probably have noticed slippy maps present on lots of our pages. We’ll be releasing documentation for the slippy map API shortly, so watch this space.
We’re particularly excited about the Mobile Maps API, which gives developers access to a set of tiles which we’ve started to optimize for mobile use. By reducing the tile size to 64×64 pixels (rather than the usual 256×256) and simplifying the cartography we’re keeping tile sizes down to around 2-3kB. This is a first pass and we hope to get the sizes down even more to help mobile applications save on costly bandwidth and enhance user experience.
Because both these services are built on top of OpenStreetMap data you can use them in almost any way you like. Most other online map providers don’t let you use their maps in mobile devices or for real time routing or tracking or outside of their own APIs, for example. We want you to use CloudMade maps for the coolest things you can think of.
If you are itching to play with either the Web or Mobile Maps API, you can request an API key here - I can’t promise that you’ll get access straight away, but we will get back to you as soon as the API is ready. We’ve also got a developers mailing list which you can sign up to here.
Both images based on map data created by OpenStreetMap.org contributors and licensed CCBYSA.
June 4th, 2008 - Posted by Nick Black in api, cloudmade, geodata, news, products, tools | |
