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Public area => The Pub => Features => Topic started by: Arantor on October 27th, 2011, 03:15 PM

Title: Google Maps feature in profile
Post by: Arantor on October 27th, 2011, 03:15 PM

Noisen and here have the facility to add the Google Maps feature into your profile so you can indicate where you live (if you so choose), and there's a mod or two on sm.org for it.

We talked about it being core, but whether it is or whether it is a plugin in the end is up for debate but that's not what's prompted me to post.

I discovered this: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/10/27/google_maps_api_no_longer_free/

I'm not sure whether we're using the API or not, though I suspect we are - which means the game has changed slightly, and not for the better. 25k calls a day may sound like a lot but on a popular site, I can envisage plenty more.

Title: Re: Google Maps feature in profile
Post by: Nao on October 27th, 2011, 03:37 PM

Interesting... And a bit sad.

Well, 25k/day is still okay for most, but it's complicated.
They still allow embedding though -- meaning that users can still post map URLs and Aeva Media will happily embed them into your posts. We could simply have a custom field in profile areas, telling users to post a GMap URL to their location if they want... Obviously, though, this makes it impossible to gather everyone into a single map, or things like that... But quite honestly, I think that after the novelty effect, maps aren't that exciting at all.

Or we could also simply change to a competitor...

Title: Re: Google Maps feature in profile
Post by: Arantor on October 27th, 2011, 03:41 PM

Quote

But quite honestly, I think that after the novelty effect, maps aren't that exciting at all.

Would you say, then, that it's probably worth making it a plugin and (as a consequence) letting users deal with it themselves? I get the feeling that simple embedding isn't as awesome as a member map but it does make me think twice about it being close to a core feature.

As for competitors... there are competitors?

Title: Re: Google Maps feature in profile
Post by: Nao on October 27th, 2011, 04:13 PM

Well, last time I checked, Bing Maps was pretty okay...
There's nothing that matches Google's speed and feature set, but there are okay alternatives.

Yeah I'd say it'd be best as a plugin by now... Too bad, though. But we could still record coordinates through GMap, because I doubt even a 'big' site would have 25k+ users actually update their map position on a daily basis...

Title: Re: Google Maps feature in profile
Post by: Arantor on October 27th, 2011, 04:17 PM

Updating I can understand would be through the API, but do lookups as they are in Noisen call the API too?

(For big member maps, I can imagine they would, but for individual maps?)

Title: Re: Google Maps feature in profile
Post by: Nao on October 27th, 2011, 06:07 PM

They require an API key for every single (sub)domain you use the script in.

Title: Re: Google Maps feature in profile
Post by: Arantor on October 27th, 2011, 06:08 PM

Hmm. But yeah, it's definitely looking like plugin material. That's not a bad thing, because it'll make sure the profile area is suitably hook-enhanced.