Hello,

some of You are travelling with a notebook, laptop or a car-pc and, maybe, have the wish to use GoogleEarth offline. So, You must know, that GoogleEarth builds an internal cache on Your harddisk. This cache GoogleEarth requires for starting faster after a new start and it must not load all the date again. Try to start GoogleEarth without an internet-connection. Wait, that needs some time and when arrives this message (on Your computer in English)



You must press "No"

and than You can navigate in GoogleEarth offline. For example, You prepare a route or a track in KML or GPX, open it in GoogleEarth, zoom in and "travel" along the desired route. If this than is stored You can use it offline.

You also can rename the cache-files manually, but this is not very commod.

Hans-Josef M. from the Unimurr-forum has written a small program, which is dealing with the cache files much easier. After I have tested the programm, we contacted, phoned many times, made some changes, and this is now the result:

The GoogleEarth offline cache management

Your invited to download the program (see below), unzip and start it (the program requires no installation). Google Earth must be deactivated.



Actually, the program is self-explaining, I still write a little guide for it.

So virginal, the program looks like after the first start. As first save your current Google Earth cache, write in the map-field a meaningful name, if you want including a remark in the next field.

After pressing the button Save or Save current cache appears this notice:



That can now be up to 5 min + time, depending on the size of the cache file. The cache file may, after long use have 2 GB and are due to the peculiarities of this file saving stop lasts so long. Please wait so long to notice the window disappeared.

So you have your current cache, a small trick to the hereafter to be stored caches for their respective countries as small as possible to keep.

Go inn the File Manager of Windows to the following folders:

System C: -> Documents and Settings -> Ulrich (your area) -> Local Settings -> Application Data -> Google -> Google Earth

and delete the two visible in the image files.



Now quit the program and start Google Earth again, visite the country to get detailed data (Google Earth generates again the two cache files), quit Google Earth and start the GE-cache-program again.



Forgive a name and saves the active cache. Since this probably less than 2 GB will take this not too long. Repeatedly described the process of removing the two cache files and visited with Google Earth for the next country. Repeate so often until You have stored on the computer the desired countries.

That could now look like mine.

A rapid activation of the country is now nothing in the way. Select the desired country and press the switch Activating or Activate stored cache.



Wait until the program is finished and then the offline using Google Earth to begin.

The download of the program

Google_Offline_106.zip, 468 KB------------->

Thanks again to Hans-Josef M. for the excellent cooperation.

Regards

Ulrich

P.S.: Sorry for my English, hope You understand what I mean.

fantastic entry.. thanks for the tips and the program. will try at home tonight.

__________________
ozhan u.
website under construction

Hello,

I hope we have the final version now. Italian is also included and a progress bar.



Please use the upper download-link again.

Gruß

Ulrich

Hello,

Update.

Bugs removed.




Google_Offline_111.zip, 471 KB------------->

Please use only this download.

Regards Ulrich

PS.: Bertrand let me know if it works now.

Latest version works!
What a most excellent piece of software- Well done Ulrich and your friend


Life's a !!

In September we were trying to find a repair shop in Thessaloniki Greece. We had the address but our GPS did not include these streets, only Athens. We found the address in Google Earth and made screen shots of the area and saved them. We had no printer and used the computer and the screen shots as maps when we got into the city. This would have been so handy. Congratulations for all the work and thanks for the program

__________________

Our Favorite Roads, until the next trip!
Bob & Kathy
The adventures of Lemonade

Ulrich excelent software,

I have google earth 4.3 version and when i installed the new version 5 i beleive there were bugs that i could not view saved places from the cache, i not so good with this but the error that appear was regarding authentication and no earth appeared.

I might be doing something wrong .....maybe anyway i uninstalled it and went back to 4.3 and apparently it works fine.

Take a look if you have time

Thanx

Che

__________________
Happy Travels,
ww.thegippo.wordpress.com

My experience matched yours.The latest version of GE, 5.0 Beta, doesn't have a cache file although in the options menu there is a command for it. So the above program presently appears unuseable with the latest version of GE.

What is frustrating about this situation is the older version does not allow for real tiime tracking via GPS input although the new version appears to. So, if you want real time tracking of cached data while off-line, you are presently stuck between a rock and hard place unless you go further afield than GE.

While having a whine, it seems bloody senseless of Google to restrict the size of the cache. It's size should be left totally at the discretion of the user. Google must be hiring retrenched staff from Microsoft.

Hello Canis Lupus and Che,

I wonder about Your problems. I also have installed the latest version of GE: 5.0.11337.1968 (beta) and my small program still works as before updating GE. Also all my saved points, for example all campgrounds, ar visible and I got no mistakes. Maybe You are doing something wrong.

The cache for GE ist still on the same place as before.

Regards

Ulrich

Hi Ulrich, and thanks for the hello.

With the 5.0 beta version installed, the following path could not be found:

System C: -> Documents and Settings -> Ulrich (your area) -> Local Settings -> Application Data -> Google -> Google Earth

Nor could the fiile dbCache be found anywhere on the computer despite several comprehensive hard drive searches. When I uninstalled 5.0 and resinstalled 4.3, there dbcache was, at the same path as above, as it should be, quite easy to find.

The program is no doubt handy, although I don't see too many problems in doing the same thing manually.

Just as helpful at least is GE Voyager, which automatically scans areas to a depth you specify, and in doing so loads up the cache with the data, saving you the trouble of doing it manually. I'm still working out how to use that program properly.

Sorry, not to be more positive about everything. I would love to report nothing but good things.

Hi Ulrich,

Thanks, it works brilliantly (also in GE 5 beta) and so simple!

Caching maps of a whole country seems a labourious job though if you do it at a altitude usefull for navigation, like 1 km or so. What altitude do you "fly" to scan an area?

Would it be possible or an option to share cached countries between user?

Cheers and thanks again,

Noel
exploreafrica.web-log.nl

Ulrich,
you seem to be knowledgeable in this stuff. My GE won't work offline no matter what I do. Could it be because I have the paid GE plus version? I once paid for the plus version to be able to download my GPS data into GE. That was a stupid thing to do because I use Ozi Explorer to do that now, but still. I assume that's the cause of not being able to work offline...

Gert

I know my way around with the cache data so I don't really need the nifty little program you put up....

__________________
Gertmans
Looking for his buddies on the South American continent
KLR 650
www.gertmans.wordpress.com
www.picasaweb.com/gertmans

Came across this a few weeks ago:
Augmented Reality Software

Works like a charm.

Choose your area and zoom level; the program then downloads map tiles (road map, satellite, terrain, hybrid) and automatically stitches them together.

Been looking for something like this for a while now.

__________________
not all those who wander are lost | two earthlings ride around the world

Now at Google Map Buddy - Free software downloads and software reviews - CNET Download.com

Tim

__________________
"For sheer delight there is nothing like altitude; it gives one the thrill of adventure
and enlarges the world in which you live," Irving Mather (1892-1966)

Also downloadable on cnet is Google Earth Voyager 6 mentioned below by Lupus a year ago. Seems they too have got round the problem Map Buddy had with Google by not having a website.

Google Earth Voyager (GEV) is a program for automatically building a Google Earth cache file for a specified geographic area. GEV does this by controlling Google Earth, making it systematically scan over the area you want to cache. Google Earth caches what you see on the screen. ... This also means you can use Google Earth offline as long as the area you want to look at is available in the cache. .... Unfortunately this is not very practical when you want to scan larger areas with a detailed zoom-level.
This is where GEV comes in: it can tell Google Earth to move the screen viewpoint around in a systematic fashion.

Haven't tried it myself, but as far as I understand it, it looks like another useful option.

Chris S

__________________
Morocco Overland 4 pre-order for Xmas • Trans Morocco Trail