Using Network Links as a wrapper

Network Links can be used in many ways, delivery of dynamic data for example, but the most basic is in the form of a wrapper so that you can change your main data file(s) while not requiring your subscribers to do anything except refresh the link thay have saved.

The Formula One collection works in this way and the reason is simple. As the season progressed Google updated the base imagery from time to time and this meant I had to adjust the collection to reflect this. I could have updated my main KMZ and re-posted but this would have meant that anyone who had an earlier version would be out of date.

Knowing that this situation would arise instead of posting the main KML to the Google Earth Community I posted a Network Link instead. This file pointed to my main file, which I could amend, but didn’t itself change.

Here’s what the Network Link file looks like.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<kml xmlns="http://earth.google.com/kml/2.2">
    <NetworkLink>
      <name>Formula 1 - 2008 Season</name>
      <Snippet>(right-click and Refresh for latest version)</Snippet>
      <visibility>0</visibility>
      <open>1</open>
      <description></description>
      <refreshVisibility>0</refreshVisibility>
      <flyToView>0</flyToView>
      <Link>
        <href>http://www.thekmz.co.uk/ge/kmlfiles/f1_2008/F1_2008.kmz</href>
      </Link>
    </NetworkLink>
</kml>

The F1_2008_NetworkLink.kml, above, is the KML I posted - but the F1_2008.kmz is the file I update.

Using Network Links in this way gives you a great deal of flexibility.