With a wide range of online mapping toolkits and services, it is usually relatively easy to produce a web map that displays data from a desktop system. For example, data points can be plotted as pushpins or placemarkers; and annotation can be imported using a file format such as KML or ESRI Shapefiles.

Some desktop mapping application such as Microsoft's MapPoint can draw shaded area (choropleth) maps. Data is specified by label (eg. zipcode, or county name), rather than with explicit shape definitions. This is useful for an end user who can quickly create such maps without the shape definitions. However, it makes it difficult to copy this data to an online mapping application which rarely (if ever) supports shaded areas by name.

Bjorn Sandvik's ThematicMapping.org offers a partial solution. ThematicMapping.org offers global coverage and visually impressive maps, but lacks the level of shape detail that a desktop product such as MapPoint can offer. MapPoint may only cover North America or Europe, but it can plot data at the state, county, zipcode/postcode, and census tract levels.

This article shows you how to plot any MapPoint map, including shaded area maps, in a Bing Maps application.

This article was previously published on GeoChalkboard, and has been reproduced here with permission. It was originally published as two separate articles which have been combined here to emphasize their relevance to the geospatial web. GeoChalkboard is published by Geospatial Training Services who provide a range of geospatial web courses.

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