How to add Image using CDATA tag in KML / XML?

Question

I'm creating an android application where I need to create KML file which have Location title , location description & Image of location . As of now I have managed to add Title & description to Kml file & it is working perfectly fine but I'm not able to find any solution where I can add Image into KML file using JAVA .

Here is code of creating KML file :

public void generateKMLFile()
{
    try {
    DocumentBuilderFactory factory = DocumentBuilderFactory.newInstance();
    DocumentBuilder builder = factory.newDocumentBuilder();
    TransformerFactory tranFactory = TransformerFactory.newInstance();
    Transformer aTransformer = tranFactory.newTransformer();
    Document doc = builder.newDocument();
    Element root = doc.createElement("kml");
    root.setAttribute("xmlns", "http://earth.google.com/kml/2.1");
    doc.appendChild(root);
    Element dnode = doc.createElement("Document");
    root.appendChild(dnode);
    Element rstyle = doc.createElement("Style");
    rstyle.setAttribute("id", "restaurantStyle");
    Element ristyle = doc.createElement("IconStyle");
    ristyle.setAttribute("id", "restaurantIcon");
    Element ricon = doc.createElement("Icon");
    Element riconhref = doc.createElement("href");
    riconhref.appendChild(doc.createTextNode("http://maps.google.com/mapfiles/kml/pal2/icon63.png"));
    rstyle.appendChild(ristyle);
    ricon.appendChild(riconhref);
    ristyle.appendChild(ricon);
    dnode.appendChild(rstyle);
    Element bstyle = doc.createElement("Style");
    bstyle.setAttribute("id", "barStyle");
    Element bistyle = doc.createElement("IconStyle");
    bistyle.setAttribute("id", "barIcon");
    Element bicon = doc.createElement("Icon");
    Element biconhref = doc.createElement("href");
    biconhref.appendChild(doc.createTextNode("http://maps.google.com/mapfiles/kml/pal2/icon27.png"));
    bstyle.appendChild(bistyle);
    bicon.appendChild(biconhref);
    bistyle.appendChild(bicon);
    dnode.appendChild(bstyle);

    Cursor c = mDatabaseManager.getAllLocations();
    while (c.moveToNext())
    {
        LocationBean lb = new LocationBean();
        lb.locationTitle = c.getString(c.getColumnIndex(DatabaseManager.LOCATION_TITLE));
        lb.lat = c.getDouble(c.getColumnIndex(DatabaseManager.LOCATION_LATITUDE));
        lb.log = c.getDouble(c.getColumnIndex(DatabaseManager.LOCATION_LONGITUDE));
        lb.remark = c.getString(c.getColumnIndex(DatabaseManager.LOCATION_REMARK));


        Element placemark = doc.createElement("Placemark");
        dnode.appendChild(placemark);
        Element name = doc.createElement("name");
        name.appendChild(doc.createTextNode(lb.locationTitle));
        placemark.appendChild(name);
        Element descrip = doc.createElement("description");
        descrip.appendChild(doc.createTextNode(lb.remark));
        placemark.appendChild(descrip);
        Element styleUrl = doc.createElement("styleUrl");
        styleUrl.appendChild(doc.createTextNode( "#" +lb.locationTitle+ "Style"));
        placemark.appendChild(styleUrl);
        Element point = doc.createElement("Point");
        Element coordinates = doc.createElement("coordinates");
        coordinates.appendChild(doc.createTextNode(lb.log+ "," + lb.lat));
        point.appendChild(coordinates);
        placemark.appendChild(point);

    }

    Source src = new DOMSource(doc);
    Result dest = new StreamResult(new File("/sdcard/PlaceMarkers.kml")); // temporarily directly saved to sdcard
    aTransformer.transform(src, dest);
    System.out.println("Completed.....");


}
catch (ParserConfigurationException e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
} catch (TransformerConfigurationException e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
} catch (TransformerException e) {
    e.printStackTrace();
}


}

And here is snippet of reference KML file which have image data (hosted on google cloud) within CDATA tag so , I thought we can add something like image data within CDATA tag from JAVA APIs:

<Placemark>
    <name>Home</name>
    <description><![CDATA[<img src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/6-eAD3dYM1l4nBR5lQOZ3XLWmPuZ0juf4kgPqQykrJw0rTIo17TZQIc_1G1Jg4AuAV2M5xB4HBHB6x4WaHG4H4zQXCqeKonhmHm05AqLZsbhlIAmQyzFfzfpTaDmoVzoLQ" height="200" width="auto" /><br><br>My HOme]]></description>
    <styleUrl>#icon-1899-0288D1</styleUrl>
    <ExtendedData>
      <Data name="gx_media_links">
        <value>https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/6-eAD3dYM1l4nBR5lQOZ3XLWmPuZ0juf4kgPqQykrJw0rTIo17TZQIc_1G1Jg4AuAV2M5xB4HBHB6x4WaHG4H4zQXCqeKonhmHm05AqLZsbhlIAmQyzFfzfpTaDmoVzoLQ</value>
      </Data>
    </ExtendedData>
    <Point>
      <coordinates>
        73.1988519,22.2953976,0
      </coordinates>
    </Point>
  </Placemark>

All data i.e location name , location description , latitude , longitude & images are stored in SQLite db & creating KML file from these data.

I have asked question as KML / XML it is because if we can create in XML then it is possible for the KML so , any suggestions on this ?

Answer 1

If your question is "how to embed an image into kml"? I donot think that this is specified in google-s kml standard.

I have only seen kml-s that contain a link relative to the kml-file and kmz-file which is a zip file containing kml with relative links plus images-files.

Here is the spec how to create kmz files with relative links plus images-files

Maybe also interesting for you:

The open source android app FancyPlaces want to use zipped gpx files