Playing with Google Maps

Can’t sleep.

So I thought I’d go back to some of the Google Maps API stuff I last played with about a month ago.

The Google Maps code I wrote before would show my last stored location.

I thought it’d be more interesting to see a number of updates over a period of time – so went back to the code and tweaked it to show updates from the last day, week or month.

Code is a bit messy, but in my defense it is past midnight 🙂

I wanted to use the Google routing algorithm used to show directions – to link together the points that I have been to over time. Assuming that I will probably have taken the most direct route between points, then you would end up with something approximating my travelling over time.

Unfortunately, Google don’t expose their routing stuff in the API. Shame.

And on a related note, apparently if I’d used the Yahoo Maps API to do all of this, I’d be breaching their terms of service.

A friend sent me this:

You may use location data derived from GPS or other location sensing devices in connection with the Yahoo! Maps APIs, provided that such location data is not based on real-time (i.e., less than 6 hours) GPS or any other real-time location sensing device, the GPS or location sensing device that derives the location data cannot automatically (i.e. without human intervention) provide the end user’s location, and any such location data must be uploaded by an end-user (and not you) to the Yahoo! Maps APIs.

Spoilsports! (Well, I guess it’s more to do with the demands of who provides their mapping data, but pah – yay for Google)

Note: This post is a bit thin on content – sorry about that. But Twitter is down, so had to say this somewhere! 😉

4 Responses to “Playing with Google Maps”

  1. […] mentioned before that I wrote some simple code to access the GPS device in my phone and upload the coordinates to a Google Maps […]

  2. […] GPS code, although interesting to develop, hasn’t really had much to do other than track me around […]

  3. ram says:

    hey dale i also want those api’s to find locations. if u dont mine please forward me code or api

  4. dale says:

    ram – Sorry, I’m not clear what code you are after. What are you trying to do?