Google Maps, User Training?
By klard | August 20, 2006
I have to admit I am frustrated with the Google map usage. I was planning on converting most of the real estate information I download from MLS like vacant land and commercial listings into a Google map search because to me…it makes sense to search for real estate that way. However after reviewing the logs for the rental properties I am finding that there is apparently a lack of understanding on how to get the map to work. 50% of the visitors to the site cannot for the life of them seem to get the map to work…..from viewing the logs these people spend 5 minutes moving the map all over the place then give up and leave. I added the overlay described in the last post that clearly says that in order for the points to appear there have to be less than 100 points and then I tell them where is says how many points are in the view/zoom level they are in. I also created a demo with screen shots to try and help that way…..many people have viewed the demo and that seems to help some.
The problem I am having is that we don’t get any revenue from rentals so if I am losing 50% of my visitors, so what. I cannot though in good consceince convert any traffic that may actually generate revenue knowing that half of them will not get it. If anyone has any ideas on how to help people understand map search…I am all ears.
Topics: Google Maps Mashup, Web Design | No Comments »
Inserting an Overlay on a Google Map
By klard | August 8, 2006
I am not going to try and take credit for code snippits I didn’t write from scratch….therefore I got this code from the google maps group and it was posted by evilc here.
Pretty much all I did was modify it to fit my needs as with most everything I tend to do. Anyway the code is:
//this code is inserted right after declaring the map using something like
//"map = new GMap(document.getElementById("div_map"));"
var tip = document.createElement("div");
tip.setAttribute("id","div_loading");
document.getElementById("div_map").appendChild(tip);
var pos = new GControlPosition(G_ANCHOR_BOTTOM_LEFT, new GSize((map.getSize().width/3.5),map.getSize().height/12)); //I need to look at this further..it anchors the overlay at the bootom left and then moves it to bottom center
pos.apply(document.getElementById("div_loading"));
tip.style.visibility="hidden";
messages = new Array();
Ok, so we have initialized our new div…..now we need to add some code for the messages. I struggled a little to figure out where to place the next block simply because the functon has to be included in the function that draws the markers on the map. I am no java programmer so I bet you could include it globally but this seems to work.
// Once again...I added this function inside the function that adds the markers to the map
function loadingPane(channel,message){
messages[channel]=message;
if (!messages['init']){
messages['init']='';
}
var tmpstr = '';
if (message['init'] !=''){
tmpstr += messages['init'];
}
document.getElementById("div_loading").innerHTML = ''+tmpstr+'';
if (messages['init'] !=''){
document.getElementById("div_loading").style.visibility="visible";
} else {
document.getElementById("div_loading").style.visibility="hidden"; }
}
Now it is pretty much just an exercise in calling the function loadingPane whenever we want the overlay to appear and clearing it when we want it to go away. Because of my design I want the loadingPane to show up when there are more than 100 markers and for it to go away and have the markers appear when there are fewer than 100 markers. Here is how I did that.
loadingPane('init',''); //clears the pane
} else {
loadingPane('init','Please Zoom In To View Properties
Use either the zoom +/- buttons at top left
Or double left click the area you want to zoom on.'); //adds it when I want to see it
}
If you want to see exactly how this is laid out you can view the source here Florida Rental Properties
Topics: Google Maps Mashup, Web Design | No Comments »
Google Maps
By klard | August 3, 2006
I have created a google map application incorporating the rental properties that I get from the Mid Florida Regional MLS at the Lakeland Rental Properties site and I am very excited about how it is turning out. The impetus behind the previous post about Postgres was related to this effort, however I have reverted back to Mysql as I determined that the Postgis stuff was too much for what I was doing. Anyway, just an overview about what I am doing on this new map and maybe I will get into specifics later. I am using a combination of perl and php to accomplish this. I am using a perl script to pull data out of the database and a combination of Google geocode and Yahoo geocode to get the latitude and longitude of each address. Then I am putting the results into a seperate table. The map is running against a php script and using a couple of new features in Gmap 2 including moveend, getLatLng and getBounds. The big changes I have made is that I am not plotting points or generating the XML file unless there are fewer than 50 points in the bounds of the current map. This change finally makes the maps fast enough to use.
Topics: Google Maps Mashup, PHP, Web Design | No Comments »
Webmin 1.290 and Postgres 8.1
By klard | July 23, 2006
As usual any time I try and get something to work I have to figure out a way around some roadblock. At least if I log it here then I can refer back to it when I hit the same stump again. Anyway I was trying to get the full table list from Postgres 8.1 using Webmin 1.290 and I kept getting an error stating ” ERROR: column “oid” does not exist”. So as I am want to do I started searching around on Google with very little luck, finally I decided to delve into the code and figure out the problem. Turns out it is a super simple fix.
Change line 197 of (at least in my case) /usr/local/lib/webmin/postgresql/view_table.cgi from
“select oid,* from $qt $search limit”.
to
“select * from $qt $search limit”.
Simple as that.
Now comes the fun part………..getting all the rest of the functions working without oid….whoop, more on that later.
Actually this doesn’t really work as planned. If you do this, it hides the first column which in my case is the key column. I am working on a better workaround using essentually this function, but, in liu of removing oid changing it to the key value extracted from the schema. The only real problem I can see with this is that your primary key would have to be your first column in all cases. It does however seem to fix the problems with editing and deleting rows individually. I will post the solution once it is complete.
Topics: Postgres, Webmin | No Comments »
Cisco and Syslogd
By klard | July 17, 2006
Just a quick note in regard to logging from a Cisco PIX to Redhat and OpenBSD.
To get syslog in Redhat to accept external logging events you have to run syslogd -r
To get syslog in OpenBSD to accept external logging events you have to run syslogd -u
Seems kind of odd at first considering if you start syslog without these options and run netstat, it shows the port is open but according to the man page (specifically in OpenBSD) syslogd does not accept external logs unless you run it with the -u switch. Without doing any reasearch I am going to assume it is a security feature. Take that for what it is worth.
Topics: Cisco, Security | No Comments »