11 new 3D cities from around the globe are now available on experiences powered by Microsoft Maps. For example, check out the beach in Calais, Portugal.
Read More

Bing Maps is the most widely used map control inside of Windows Store apps. Many simple apps consist of a single page user experience while many other consist of multiple pages. Many developers like to use Bing Maps throughout their application, but have found that this results in the map control constantly being loaded/disposed as the user navigates between pages. This doesn’t make for the best user experience, as there is a slight delay due to...
Read More

Bing Maps is a very powerful mapping platform that is often used for creating engaging user experiences. The fluid interactive maps make for a great canvas when visualizing location based data. In this blog post we are going to take a look at how to make the user experience a little more engaging by adding custom animations that can be used in both web and Windows Store apps. Full source code for this blog post can be found in the MSDN Code...
Read More

When nsquared, a software development company based in Sydney, Australia, wanted to enable multi-user mapping scenarios for large, interactive touch devices, it turned to Bing Maps, Windows 8, and Perceptive Pixel by Microsoft to create nsquared maps…READ MORE
Read More

Not long after the Bing Maps Windows Store apps SDK was first released we published a blog post on how to calculate and display routes. We created a simple input form to allow the user to enter a start and end location and then displayed the route instructions using a ListBox. This works fine, however the directions in the Maps app in Windows 8 have a lot more options in the input form, and the route instructions have nice turn-by-turn icons...
Read More

A while ago I wrote a blog post on How to Share Maps Using the Search Charm in Windows Store Apps. In that blog post we made use of the Bing Maps REST Imagery service to generate a static image of the map that we could share in an email.  But what if you want a true screenshot of the map? In this blog post we are going to take a look at how to take a screenshot of the map which we can then either share via the Share charm or save as a...
Read More

Tile Layers are a creative way to visualize large complex data. By visualizing data as an image the map control only needs to reposition a set of images rather than every single data point of the data. This greatly improves performance and often reduces the amount of data the user will have to download. Tile layers generally consist of a large number of images that have a specific naming convention and are hosted online. Every once and a while I...
Read More

A while back I wrote a blog posts called Image Overlays with Bing Maps (JavaScript). In this blog post we saw a couple of different ways to overlay an image on the map and bind it to a bounding box such that it stays correctly positioned when panned and scales as you zoom the map. In this blog post we are going to look at two different methods for doing this in the Native Bing Maps SDK for Window Store Apps. The first method will consist of...
Read More

In the Bing Maps SDK for Windows Store Apps there are five main types of data that you can add to the map: Pushpin, MapPolyline, MapPolygon, MapTileLayer, and UIElements. UIElements can be added to the map just like pushpins and are a great way to create custom shapes to the map.  In this blog post we will see how we can make use of the ability to add a UIElement to the map to create custom shapes that have a lot more customization options...
Read More

Are you developing a location-based Windows Store app using web or managed programming languages? Do you need help with how to get started? A new eBook entitled, Location Intelligence for Windows Store Apps, is now available for free download. Written by Ricky Brundritt (EMEA Bing Maps TSP at Microsoft), the eBook delves into location intelligence and the different options for creating location-aware apps in Windows 8.1. The first half of the...
Read More