I actually implemented Tiling at Trailworks.com back in 1998 for a prototype that worked almost exactly like Google Maps, complete with drag-to-scroll and even drag-to-throw (but pre-dating mousewheels, therefore no mousewheel-zoom). In IE4/NN4, no less.
The problem back then was storage. Even for the US-only trail maps we were doing, there was no way we were going to store all those tiles at the $$$/GB that hard-drive space went for at the time. The plan was to cache only the most popular areas, and rebuild outlying tiles as necessary.
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I actually implemented Tiling at Trailworks.com back in 1998 for a prototype that worked almost exactly like Google Maps, complete with drag-to-scroll and even drag-to-throw (but pre-dating mousewheels, therefore no mousewheel-zoom). In IE4/NN4, no less.
The problem back then was storage. Even for the US-only trail maps we were doing, there was no way we were going to store all those tiles at the $$$/GB that hard-drive space went for at the time. The plan was to cache only the most popular areas, and rebuild outlying tiles as necessary.