Maps have become a very popular application on mobile devices. And with more powerful mobile devices with sleeker form factors and crispier displays coming to markets, there are newer applications of Maps.

SEO By the Sea has an article on a new patent application by Google for metrics on map that change according to the users location. The technology would make it possible to know the exact distance or several other dynamic factors about the locations that users are tracking relative to their locations.

It would also be possible to apply several templates to the new maps.

An excerpt from SEO By the Sea

For a task like house hunting, the patent filing gives us the following example of some of the metrics that might be shown on the map, or next to the map:

1. Demographic, psychographic, and/or other statistical data describing a population of a region,
2. Boundary data describing governmental and quasi-governmental boundaries,
3. Cost information describing costs of living,
4. Real estate values,
5. Fuel costs,
6. Traffic and weather data describing traffic congestion, average temperatures, and air quality,
7. Location data describing locations of entities such as offices, commercial centers, schools, religious facilities,
hospitals and public transportation,
8. Average noise,
9. Locations of registered sexual offenders,
10. Whether ocean views are available from a location etc.,
11. Others.