Take the 2-minute tour ×

I just had an idea for a cool website, but it would require an application that is fairly similar to the Google Maps interactive map. I was wondering what it was made in?

Is it a Java applet or a Flash application? Or something else?

Thanks a lot

share|improve this question
The 'street view' is implemented in Flash (with a beta version in WebGL, where supported). –  Lars Blåsjö Feb 27 '12 at 1:13

3 Answers 3

up vote 1 down vote accepted

Javascript. Lots and lots of javascript, with JSON for loading new data without refreshing the entire page.

If you'd like to know more, there's quite a community revolving around Greasemonkey that specialize in extending/reverse engineering the google maps codebase.

share|improve this answer
Woah, that is impressive, and very much out of my scope! In addition my idea needs the users input to be saved to a server, which I believe JavaScript couldn't do? –  asdfman Feb 27 '12 at 1:01
I believe you could support an entire web application, front to back, using Javascript and [YOUR DATABASE HERE]. Granted, there are languages that can do more than javascript in some areas, but overall, it is a very well rounded language. –  Droogans Feb 27 '12 at 1:06
Interesting, thanks a lot for your help :) –  asdfman Feb 27 '12 at 1:09

Google API is Javascript. It is also available in Flash. Bing map is using the same sytem and it is available in javascript or silverlight. You may also be interested in openstreetmap (free alternative).

If you want to build a tile system from the ground, the easier is to use flash. You will avoid cross browser issues, and easely target large audiance. (I made one long time ago before gmap was out).

If your application require a map, you can use either Map API and build your application on top of it. Be aware that some kind of application and some uses require a licence fee and the entry ticket is quite high ($10k for gmap).

share|improve this answer

For the client side they are using the Google Closure Library, with a lot of extra javascript on top.

share|improve this answer

Your Answer


