I'm brand new to web technologies, and in researching a web app that I want to create I got a little bogged down. I want to be able to use a Google Map on my site, including the functionality that allows you to use layers and draw shapes and lines on top of it, but I'm confused at the difference between the Google Maps API and Google Maps Engine and which one would best suit me.
Is one of those a better option for me? There seems to be a lot of red tape on getting Maps Engine for a site, but I'm unclear on if Maps API has all the functionality I'd want.
Sorry for the beginner question, but I haven't found any sort of FAQ that's addressed this. I'd really appreciate any insight. Thanks!
So Google actually offers three different products.
Google Maps JavaScript API is intended for developers, and it lets you take Google's base maps and draw on them programmatically by writing your own JavaScript that calls the API.
Google Maps Engine is for creating your own base maps. You could use it to render shapes and lines on top of a map, but if that's all you want to do, it's probably overkill (and it's not free).
Google Maps Engine Lite is the new boy in town, and it's still beta as I type this, but it might fit your use case the best: you can draw by hand on top of Google's standard maps, import a variety of formats with geo data, and then share your results or embed them on your website, all without having to write a lick of JavaScript.
It all depends on how comfortable you are with coding. Google Maps API requires the application to be built in JavaScript.
As Google Maps Engine has now been shelved by Google I would suggest taking a look at MangoMap. It allows maps to be built using only an interface, you can built really powerful web ma applications without writing a single line of code.
Disclaimer: I'm the CEO of MangoMap ;-)
With Google Maps API, Google supplies a blank map and you add points, line, polygons, etc. to the map via JavaScript. This is great until you start having to add thousands of map objects.
With Google Maps Engine, (now deprecated), you upload, store, and process the geometry data on Google's servers for optimal rendering. You can turn a large group of points and lines into image files with transparent backgrounds which can display quickly on a map.
Related
I am writing web application based on ArcGIS API for javascript. So far I managed to create empty map using this tutorial and write some code which visualizes some data.
The basemaps which ArcGIS offer are quite nice and I would like to use them, but they represent whole world and what I need is basemap of just a single country. What's the best/easiest way to do it? I tried using ArcGIS Online to edit basemap but the don't offer good options for cutting single country.
I found some links out there but they aren't solving my problem (or my knowledge is to small to understand them), for example https://developers.arcgis.com/javascript/latest/sample-code/basemap-custom/index.html
If you like the look and feel of the Esri basemaps, you don't want to make your own. That's certainly technically possible, but requires a greater command of ArcMap and publishing services -- and isn't what you're really looking for. And basemap tiles shouldn't be edited, even ones you publish yourself, since the difficulty of doing that well is just not worth the effort.
Instead, you can restrict the JavaScript map to prevent panning outside your area of interest. Whenever the user moves to an extent that exceeds allowed values, the code automatically resets the extent to the allowed limit, and they can't move outside it. (You can similarly restrict zoom levels so they won't even be able to zoom out further than the view of your area of interest.)
For code details, see existing answers on Restricting base map on specific extent in ArcGIS API for JavaScript 3? (GIS.StackExchange)
I have a UIMapView in my iPhone-app.
First I want to show streetnames on it.
Second I want to give the user the chance to look for places with an UISearchViewController.
Are there any tutorials for these 2 points and which service do you think is the best for finding places?
You need to explore and understand Apple's MapKit Framework (https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/MapKit/Reference/MapKit_Framework_Reference/_index.html). To show stuff on the Map you can use MKAnnotations and MKLocalSearch to get points of interest around the user's location. The Documentation is super clear and has examples on how to get latitude/longitude, drop pins, pin-point user's location, add balloons with info (MKAnnotations), etc. Also, take a look at UISearchViewController documentation to see if it is the best for your use case.
Then, I would suggest you to take a look at Google Places Search API (https://developers.google.com/places/documentation/search) or Foursquare's API (https://developer.foursquare.com/docs/). At the end everything is about showing the info coming on a JSON response from one of the APIs on a List or on the Map with balloons.
If your data source ends up being Google Places... I would suggest you to use Google Maps for iOS instead of the native MapKit.
As for tutorials, there are probably 100s of them in the Interwebz... but I suggest you to start with Apple Documentation on MapKit understand that first and then try to mix it with other data sources.
Good luck and happy holidays!
I was working on a mapping solution for WP7 and so wanted to use Bing maps as part of the solution. I learnt that Bing maps doesn't quite get the locations "right", where Google maps seems more accurate.
Are there some properties I can set on my calls to the API to change the results, or should I just switch?
no you cant get them to match. Bing maps are modelled by NAVTECH, google maps by TomTom (Teleatlas). Complex road crossings can be modelled in various ways.
I'd like to add a map of countries to my website where the user can choose a specific country by clicking on it. http://code.google.com/apis/chart/docs/gallery/map_charts.html has the looks i want, but it's not possible to underlay the countries with links, afaik(Besides lacking pan/zoom, nice to have). The interactive map(Geo Map) allows more options but it's based on flash which i'd like to avoid(Not sure if links would be possible anyway).
I've played with shapefiles/polylines and google-maps but thats too complex(Lots of data for the polylines, far too much for the simple functionality i need).
Do you know of alternatives which are similarly easy to implement as the google-api-options?
Thx
Christian
I would, if I may, suggest to check out Highmaps, from the people behind Highcharts (myself included). It's 100% Javascript based, and designed to get you up and going with very little effort. You can easily implement your own click-based events.
Highmaps is free for non-commercial use, works great with mobile browsers (full touch support) and old IE down to IE6. It also has support for advanced dynamic features like drilldown and rich tooltips, and is very customizable.
We supply a map collection with over 350 maps, to get you started quickly. The maps are optimized for size to keep things lightweight.
So I've been looking into the different mapping API's out there, and I've narrowed it down to Google Maps API and MapQuest's API. I'm leaning towards the MapQuest API for:
Unlimited queries
Support for draggable routes. Google's API allows multiple way points, which is not the same thing.
The draggable routes is a pretty important feature for what I'm working on, but am I missing any big reasons to avoid MapQuest's API? Some caveat in the EULA perhaps? The draggable route support sucks in practice?
It's kind of a late answer, but I ended up using the Mapquest API because they work better as small maps, and don't look quite as cluttered, especially after I extracted the zoom control from the map and implemented it via jQuery UI Slider.
I thought it was rather intuitive and easy to use. If I'm just looking up directions somewhere, I still always opt for Google Maps. If I need to build an API map, especially to fit smaller dimensions, MapQuest seems to do the trick.
If you need to actually PAY for their HTTPS services (e.g. you need to use their maps BEHIND a password protected site), it costs less with Mapquest
Are you sure Google Maps doesn't support draggable routes? There are plenty of times I've accidentally dragged a planned route when using the website, throwing everything off. Not sure about the API though.
As accuracy goes I've noticed that for directions here in North Carolina, MapQuest is slightly more accurate. Google doesn't always map addresses to the right position. MapQuest and Google use different data providers in some places. Google uses a variety of data, and in some places the providers will be the same (NAVTEQ and Tele Atlas).
Otherwise it is largely user preference: I rarely do see sites though that don't use Google Maps. Microsoft seems to force their projects to use Bing for some reason ;)