Ummm - WOW...

Google does it again, and takes online mapping and driving directions to the next level. You have to try this - if nothing else it just looks cool. On top of that, it works very well. Animated maps and excellent, clean detail are real eye-openers. Google has a tour to get you acquainted here.

"Maps are great for getting around, but online maps could be a lot better. So Google decided to make dynamic, interactive maps that are draggable — no clicking and waiting for graphics to reload each time you want to view the adjacent parts of a map. Want to be able to type in the name of a region or neighborhood and see any part of it as easily as with a regular street map? Now you can with Google Maps."

Enter an address, hit enter, and voila:

Need directions to a location? Click the live links in the map, and enter a starting address:

Driving directions are fast and in my test (home to office), quite accurate:

Click on mapped items to automatically reorient the map image (animated) and zoom in on the mapped item:

The slider for zoom detail is very nice - much better than others out there - and there are no browser refreshes happening here. No time to look into exactly how this works right now, but it definitely does.

Check it out.