Heptazane's Stump

I was just informed that my comrade-in-arms in the evil empire: Kristoffer has a blog on doing cool things with VE3D.  Check it out at http://blogs.msdn.com/kristoffer/default.aspx or we'll send the Borg Cube to land on your house. 

Seriously though, I've had people pull up to me while I was walking down the road and ask me where "the Microsoft building" is.  Well, we have tools for letting you view buildings, and in this view, pretty much every building comprises main and west campus.  That doesn't include the countless other campuses both in the area and world wide.  While I think it would be sweet to just have a giant Borg Cube from which we all operate off of the hive mind, reality, as usual, takes its own path.

1. Start Visual Studio.
2. Create a new WinForms app.
3. Go to Tools->Choose Toolbox Items... 
4. Select Browse, then find Microsoft.MapPoint.Rendering3D.dll (probably in C:\Program Files\Virtual Earth 3D), then OK all the way out.
5. Select Globe Control from your toolbox and drop it onto your form.  You'll get an exception here, and you can just immediately delete the control that was dropped on, but now you have all of the references.
6. Right click on References in your solution, and select Add Reference...
7. Select the Browse tab and browse to your VE3D install directory (probably C:\Program Files\Virtual Earth 3D).
8. Select Microsoft.MapPoint.*.dll and select OK.
9. Now add some code like this to your form's constructor (after InitializeComponent):

this.globeControl = new GlobeControl();

this.SuspendLayout();

this.globeControl.Location = new System.Drawing.Point(0, 0);

this.globeControl.Name = "globeControl";

this.globeControl.Size = this.ClientSize;

this.globeControl.Anchor = AnchorStyles.Left | AnchorStyles.Right | AnchorStyles.Top | AnchorStyles.Bottom;

this.globeControl.TabIndex = 0;                       

this.globeControl.Host.DataSources.Add(new DataSourceLayerData("Elevation", "Elevation", @"http://sc1.maps.live.com//Manifests/HD.xml", DataSourceUsage.ElevationMap));

this.globeControl.Host.DataSources.Add(new DataSourceLayerData("Texture", "Texture", @"http://sc1.maps.live.com//Manifests/HT.xml", DataSourceUsage.TextureMap));

this.globeControl.Host.DataSources.Add(new DataSourceLayerData("Models", "Models", @"http://sc1.maps.live.com//Manifests/MO.xml", DataSourceUsage.Model));

this.globeControl.Host.WorldEngine.ShowBuildingTextures = true;

this.globeControl.Host.CameraControllers.Camera.Viewpoint.Position.Location = new LatLonAlt(0.830766834501557, -2.13516921856724, 299.907466547564);

this.globeControl.Host.CameraControllers.Camera.Viewpoint.LocalOrientation.RollPitchYaw = new RollPitchYaw(0, -0.391886060767613, 0);

this.Controls.Add(this.globeControl);

this.ResumeLayout(false);

You'll have to add a "GlobeControl globeControl;" local variable and resolve any missing using clauses (just right click on the unknown type and select Resolve->using Xyz), but that should drop you in downtown Seattle.

1. Make sure you have the Virtual Earth 3D control installed by going to http://maps.live.com and selecting the 3D button.
2. Grab the executable sample here (and the source from here if you want to dig into it later).
3. Unzip the sample to your local drive.
4. Move the BindingsSpaceNavigator.xml file to your Settings and Cache directory which is:
      "C:\Documents and Settings\{User Alias}\Application Data\Microsoft\Virtual Earth 3D" on XP
      "C:\User\{User Alias}\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Virtual Earth 3D" on Vista
   See "Settings" article above for more info on the location.
5. Run SpaceNavigator.exe and patiently wait until you see buildings.  You should be able to move around with your device.

I included the source code for how to accomplish this which illustrates the creation of an EventSource.  The SpaceNavigator provides simply an XYZ movement delta and a rotational XYZ delta, so the BindingsSpaceNavigator.xml file defines how these axis map to actions.  Since we have no Roll action, one of the rotation axis is unused.

1. Make sure you have the Virtual Earth 3D control installed by going to http://maps.live.com and selecting the 3D button.
2. Grab the executable sample here (and the source from here if you want to dig into it later).
3. Unzip the sample to your local drive.
4. Move the BindingsTopDown.xml file to your Settings and Cache directory which is:
      "C:\Documents and Settings\{User Alias}\Application Data\Microsoft\Virtual Earth 3D" on XP
      "C:\User\{User Alias}\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Virtual Earth 3D" on Vista
   See "Settings" article above for more info on the location.
5. Run TopDown.exe and patiently wait until you see buildings.