I started working on a Point Of Interest (POI/P.O.I.) mapping project.

A few months ago I bought a Garmin C550 GPS unit and absolutely LOVE it! I immediately learned how to add custom POI files and soon had a rather big collection of POI files I gathered from different sources on the Internet and made myself.

I could not find a FREE/easy way to view all my POI files. So I started work on a solution.

My POI Plotter uses the Virtual Earth API (v5 as of this writing but I will upgrade to the current version, v6, soon).

The POI Plotter allows you to upload your POI file and plot it on a map to see where your POIs are.

It is in its infancy so expect many features to be added in the near future.

POI Plotter

So, as seen in the previous blog post, my employer sent me 2 new 19" Dell monitors. I was very upset to see that my all time favorite screen saver did not support dual monitors.

I have been using This Virtual Earth Screen Saver. It's a screen saver using Virtual Earth APIs which reads RSS feeds to show interesting Virtual Earth birdseye and satellite images from users with information about those images.

The good news is that the Virtual Earth Screen Saver is hosted on CodePlex and the source code is available. I went and checked it out. The code is written in C# and I'm a VB.NET developer but I can usually find my way around C# just fine. I downloaded the code, figured out how to add dual monitor support and BAM! My favorite screen saver now uses both of my beautiful new monitors. Love it. I'll try and contact the Virtual Earth Screen Saver developer team to see of they want my changes.

I don't blog much but today is a good day! The FAA just sent me 2 new 19" Dell monitors. I love this set up. Watch my productivity go through the roof! It hard to tell from the photos but these things are HUGE. They take up most of my desk. Love 'em though.

www.flickr.com dugrhill's Doug's Home office photoset