Hi,

My colleagues and I are using CE to monitor tree-based landscape restoration progress around the world. Some of the countries where we work have very limited internet connectivity. Is there an offline version of CE on which we could upload high-resolution images we have access to but cannot share?

Thanks!

Florence

asked 10 Nov '16, 18:08

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flandsberg
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Dear Florence,

So I don't understand, you have imagery that you want to use in GOogle Earth but you cannot share. You mean you cannot share it even with the people that you are working with??

I am guessing that you can actually share it with those people. Then you have two options:

  • Set up a WMS server (that could be in one of the laptops that you use) and have the operators doing the assessment connect to it (See here how to use WMS in Google Earth )
  • Store all of your imagery into a hard-drive and distribute it to the operators! If you have your GeoTIFFs then you can build KML files with the image overlays to show in Google Earth using something like GDAL (see this).

In any case, a good Internet is very important to do a good Collect Earth assessment as the connection to Google Earth Engine is very important for the change analysis...

Let me know if you get a better solution...

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answered 11 Nov '16, 00:23

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collectearth ♦
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Dear Florence,

A quick alternative to build KML and display your imagery is using QGIS (www.qgis.org), with the GearthView plugin (http://plugins.qgis.org/plugins/gearthview/).

You load your VHR imagery in qgis and you use the plugin to make it appear in GE.

However, I don't know how CollectEarth would interact with those temporary layers.

Rémi

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answered 11 Nov '16, 12:03

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lecrabe ♦
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Hi "collectearth"! Thanks for your suggestions. I am a complete newbie to CE (and GE, believe it or not!) so I have to find my footing in all of this. I will certainly let the forum know if I settle for one option rather than another. I and my colleagues would have access to some very high resolution data for visual interpretation but we wouldn't be able to download them. I am not looking at past images, I need to access offline the most recent data from GE for my areas (200,000 ha and 90,000 ha) and access the CE tools offline. I hope that I make sense despite my deep ignorance.Best,Florence

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answered 11 Nov '16, 16:49

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flandsberg
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Dear Florence,

An important note is the if you use Google Earth Pro ( which has been free for the last year, licence GEPFREE ) you can load many kinds of files that usually cannot be open in the "normal" Google Earth, like shapefiles, many types of raster files and other common GIS files.

If you want to use the Google Earth imagery offline then a very good option is to use the Google Earth cache (up to 2GB of data) in order to pre-load the imagery when you have internet connection (in the office let's say) anmd then be able to visaluize it when you are in the field. Please see this previous support issue on caching!

Let us know what was the final reulst of your investigation!

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answered 11 Nov '16, 17:48

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collectearth ♦
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Hi!

Thanks for your suggestion. I am wondering if 2GB would be enough as we have 6,900 sample plots of 0.49 ha each (and I would think we would want to have a bit of their surrounding too). If not, how could we get a special permission to cache more?

Cheers,

Florence

(17 Nov '16, 20:15) flandsberg flandsberg's gravatar image

Hej Florence,

we improved the answer about caching data, see the improved and easier method!

Still, you are right, I don't think you will be able to cache more than 1000 plots at once....there is a trick to use multiple folders of Google Earth cache and then merging them. Basically you would run the tour for smaller CSV plot files containing around 1000 plots and use a new cache folder each time, renaming the folder where Google Earth keep these files each time you run the tour. Usually the folder is

C:\Users\YOUR_USERNAME\AppData\LocalLow\Google\GoogleEarth\unified_cache_leveldb_leveldb2

At the end you put all of the files inside this folders into the last created single folder, and voila, you now have N x 2 GB of data instead. It is a laborious work but it might work...

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answered 20 Nov '16, 23:27

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collectearth ♦
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question asked: 10 Nov '16, 18:08

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last updated: 20 Nov '16, 23:27