GOOGLE CODE , TIPS TRICKS and Hacks

Save The Date: Wedding Digital Technology

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Tue, 05 Sep 2017 09:08:00 +0000

Found something cool and decided to blog on it. So this is how the future looks , tech enabled wedding.

Just forget about the thousand queries you need to answer to all your friends and relatives on the wedding, the bot will do all this for you. Right from reminding the date to travel planing to collecting all your candid marriage pics, this is the one stop destination for your wedding planning.

You not only save time but also delight your friends with your tech savviness. A small draft I received from the Save The Date team on what all features it has

“Wedding” a most important, precious moment in our lives? So why not wedding invitation reflect the same.

The coolest wedding invitation is hear!

Save your Precious Time and Money with this coolest form of wedding invitation.

Let your wedding invitation, creat a lifelong memory! Get your chat based wedding invitation now!

From the design of our wedding invites, to its printing, to not missing out on any name that we want to be a part of our special moment, travelling and visiting their places, we got lot on our plates. Finding time and peace of mind to do all this, is more like finding needle in haystack. The trouble of multitasking and managing everything is unimaginable.

The saviour in the midst of all this hassle, became “Save The Date ChatBot”

“Save The Date ChatBot” is hasslefree, imaginative, inventive yet eco-friendly invention which helps to spare opportunity and cash, in this bustling calendar of ours! It does all the hard work for us, smartly with the help of messenger and sends invites on our behalf, to each and every guest of ours. Also, benefits in numerous ways by saving our time, printing and traveling cost and also it is eco-friendly, which serves the social and environmental cause of helping the society.

“Save the date chatbot” has been so beneficial, it helped me invite friends from different time zones. Its user friendliness helped guests locate address, by sharing exact location and address, avoiding any reasons of confusion. Personalized and custom made feature enables to share the magical tale of our story to the friends long lost in time. Artificial Intelligence powered program helped to tell them the story of how I found my soul-mate, exactly the way I wanted to, over the Facebook messenger.

“Save the date ChatBot” works in a very simple way. It shares the information with guests in an interactive and personalized way, about all the details of our special day like 'Wedding Date and Time', 'Wedding Venue' and our Picture and Video gallery. In the end, it takes a confirmation of their presence and we get the rundown of all the confirmed attendees over email.

Utilizing, “Save the date ChatBot” one will likewise, be perceived as a cutting edge man,who is a part of advanced technology in India. Also one will be supporting and contributing, to the possibility of new innovative business in the development of specialized India.

To see, how this truly works go check their website: www.savethedatechatbot.com

And ,dont forget to check demo: http://m.me/savethedatechatbot

And also find what's the latest happening from their other social media handles as“savethedatechatbot”

So next time to plan something big for you wedding Remember to SaveTheDate

Understanding Android Layout : Linear Layout

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Mon, 05 May 2014 19:15:00 +0000

In the last tutorial we have seen the life-cycle of the Android Application . Every Android Activity
will have a set of life cycle methods that will be called based on the state of the Application .
The onCreate(Bundle) is where you will initialize your activity , this is where you will be setting
the content of the Activity using the setContentView(Layout Resource) method.

So we will be covering different type of Layouts in this set of tutorial . Lets start with the most
easy and commonly used layout LinearLayout .

Linear Layout

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="vertical" >

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn1"
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button1" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn2"
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button2" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn3"
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button3" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn4"
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button4" />

</LinearLayout>

This will give you a layout as shown below.

LinearLayoutVertical

Now lets add margin between two the buttons , this can be done using the layout_margintop,
layout_marginbottom attributes. The layout file and the corresponding change is given below.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="vertical" >
    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn1"
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_marginTop="30dp"
        android:text="Button1" />
    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn2"
        android:layout_width="fill_parent"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_marginTop="30dp"
        android:text="Button2" />
</LinearLayout>

2. Horizontal Linear Layout

We will learn through examples , which is much easier and fast to understand .

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="horizontal" >

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn1"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button1" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn2"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button2" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn3"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button3" />

</LinearLayout>

Simple Horizontal Linear Layout

Suppose we are setting the layout like given below where we will be explicitly setting the
width instead of using wrap_content or fill_parent .

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="horizontal" >

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn1"
        android:layout_width="150dp"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button1" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn2"
        android:layout_width="100dp"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button2" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn3"
        android:layout_width="100dp"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Button3" />

</LinearLayout>

Horizontal Linear

3. Horizontal Linear Layout : Layout_Weight example

As we can see the third button is out of the screen bounds . A more flexible way of setting

the width in the horizontal linear layout would be to use the layout_weight . The most important
thing to notice while playing around with layout_weight is that to set the (layout_width or
layout_height) to be set to 0dp depending on whether you are going to divide the space
horizontally or vertically . In our case we will be setting the layout_width = 0 since we
are dividing the horizontal space .

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="horizontal" >

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn1"
        android:layout_width="0dp"
        android:layout_weight="1"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Btn1" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn2"
        android:layout_width="0dp"
        android:layout_weight="2"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Btn2" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn3"
        android:layout_width="0dp"
        android:layout_weight="1"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Btn3" />

</LinearLayout>

layout_weight example

The logic of layout_weight is quite straightforward . The percentage of space taken by a
child element (eg. Btn1 in our case) is equal to

child element layout_weight / Sum of total layout_weight of all siblings .

In our case Btn2 would be taking 50% and remaining buttons would be taking 25%.

Layout_weight Scenario 2

Suppose we are using a scenario in which one of the elements are not using layout_weight.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:layout_width="match_parent"
    android:layout_height="match_parent"
    android:orientation="horizontal" >

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn1"
        android:layout_width="0dp"
        android:layout_weight="1"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Btn1" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn2"
        android:layout_width="0dp"
        android:layout_weight="1"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Btn2" />

    <Button
        android:id="@+id/btn3"
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:text="Btn3" />

</LinearLayout>

In this scenario the button3 would be taking minimum space required and the remaining space
would be divided equally between the two buttons since the layout_weight percentage is 50%.

Layout Weight Example

Understanding Android Project Structure

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Mon, 05 May 2014 16:03:00 +0000

Its very important to understand the structure of the Android Project before you start developing
your applications . So in a very short tutorial we are going to understand the structure of Android
project .

1. src - This folder will contain all your java source files .
2. gen - Generated java library , no tampering with this folder . It is used for Android internal
purpose only.
3. libs - This will contain all the external libraries that required for the project .
4. res - (Resources directory) As the name suggests , the resources you need for your
project needs to be placed here. The res will contain sub folders to segregate the
resources . Some of the important sub-folders are .
a) drawable - It will contain all the images and logos that are required in your android
application . In your project you will find 4 different types of drawable resources
folder , this is to support different type of screen densities . There is a good description
on Android Developer Docs on Screen Densities .
b) values - It will contain a strings.xml , styles.xml and dimens.xml in which you will be
storing values that you are going to mostly reuse in your application . Its a good practice
to store the string values in string resource file and access it using the identifier in your code.
c) layout - It will contain all the layout resource files the Android Application Activities will
be using in your application .

5. Android Manifest File

It presents important information about your app to the Android system . Its the
information the Android system must have before it runs any of your App's code .
All the the activities, services, broadcast receivers, and content providers that your
application is using must be declared inside the Android Manifest file . Apart from
that the manifest file will contain the list of permissions the application will be needing
to run on your phone . It also declares permissions other apps will require to interact with
your app .

Sample Android Manifest file from one of my apps .

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    package="com.taxidriverapp"
    android:versionCode="1"
    android:versionName="1.0" >

    <uses-sdk
        android:minSdkVersion="11"
        android:targetSdkVersion="18" />
    <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.CAMERA" />

    <uses-feature android:name="android.hardware.camera" />
    <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE"/>
    
    <application
        android:allowBackup="true"
        android:icon="@drawable/ic_launcher"
        android:label="@string/app_name"
        android:theme="@style/AppTheme" >
        <activity
            android:name="com.taxidriverapp.TaxiActivity"
            android:label="@string/app_name" >
            <intent-filter>
                <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
                <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
            </intent-filter>
        </activity>
    </application>

</manifest>

An activity having the android.intent.action.MAIN and android.intent.category.LAUNCHER settings in the intent-filter indicates that it will be the launcher Activity for the Application. We will also
be specifying the icon , label and default theme of the app inside the Application tag .

The target sdk and the minimum sdk required for the App is also displayed in the Android
manifest file . As you can see the permissions required for the App to run on the Android
system is also displayed on the Manifest file . This means we will be requiring internet access
and camera hadrware access for the Application .

 <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE"/> 
 <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.CAMERA" />

Creating an Android Project

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Tue, 29 Apr 2014 03:45:00 +0000

The first step in creating an Android project is getting the right set of tools for development.
Google has introduced the new ADT Bundle , which has the Android SDK Components and

a version of Eclipse IDE with built-in ADT (Android Developer Tools). With this single you
have all the essential components to kick start your Android Development.

Download link - ADT Bundle Download

Create a Project using Eclipse

1. File - > New or Right Click on the Project Explorer Pane and Select New .
Select Android Application Project.

2. You will get a window as shown below.

3. Fill the details

a) Application Name : This will be the name that appears to the user.

b) Project Name : This is the name of the project directory which will be visible in
eclipse .

c) Package Name : This is the package namespace of your app. Make sure you
use a proper package name . Your package name must be unique across all
packages installed on the Android system .

d) Minimum Required SDK - It is the lowest of version of Android that your app
supports.

e) Target SDK - It indicates the highest version of Android your app has been tested
on. Please select the latest version supported to take the maximum advantage .
f) Compile with - indicates the highest version of Android against which you are going
to compile your app. Set it to the latest versions to take maximum advantage of the
sdk .

Add Local Language Support to Google Maps

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 17:13:00 +0000

Google Maps Tutorials (v3): Basic Concepts

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Checkout this cool game
Newton Ball in Playstore

In this tutorial we will teach you how to how to add local language
support to Google Maps .By Local language support what we mean
is you can actually display your Google Maps in Local Language like
Arabic,Urdu,Japanese,Hindi and all the languages that are supported
by Google .

How to do ?

To change the Google Maps basic language you have to just change
one parameter language which is by default set to en(english).

<script src="http://maps.google.com/maps/api/js?sensor=false&amp;language=ja" type="text/javascript">
</script>

The languages supported by Google Maps

Language Code :

ar	ARABIC
eu	BASQUE
bg	BULGARIAN
bn	BENGALI
ca	CATALAN
cs	CZECH
da	DANISH
de	GERMAN
el	GREEK
en	ENGLISH
en-AU	ENGLISH (AUSTRALIAN)
en-GB	ENGLISH (GREAT BRITAIN)
es	SPANISH
eu	BASQUE
fa	FARSI
fi	FINNISH
fil	FILIPINO
fr	FRENCH
gl	GALICIAN
gu	GUJARATI
hi	HINDI
hr	CROATIAN
hu	HUNGARIAN
id	INDONESIAN
it	ITALIAN
iw	HEBREW
ja	JAPANESE
kn	KANNADA
ko	KOREAN
lt	LITHUANIAN
lv	LATVIAN
ml	MALAYALAM
mr	MARATHI
nl	DUTCH
nn	NORWEGIAN NYNORSK
no	NORWEGIAN
or	ORIYA
pl	POLISH
pt	PORTUGUESE
pt-BR	PORTUGUESE (BRAZIL)
pt-PT	PORTUGUESE (PORTUGAL)
rm	ROMANSCH
ro	ROMANIAN
ru	RUSSIAN
sk	SLOVAK
sl	SLOVENIAN
sr	SERBIAN
sv	SWEDISH
tl	TAGALOG
ta	TAMIL
te	TELUGU
th	THAI
tr	TURKISH
uk	UKRAINIAN
vi	VIETNAMESE
zh-CN	CHINESE (SIMPLIFIED)
zh-TW	CHINESE (TRADITIONAL)

Screenshots:

What Next??

Checkout all the cool stuff under Google Maps category and
don't forget to share and bookmark this article for further
reference .

Changing Default Google Map Marker

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 17:12:00 +0000

Google Map v3 Tutorial : Basic Concepts

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Checkout this cool game
Newton Ball in Playstore

There are two ways by which you can change the default Google
Map Marker . In place of the default pushpin icon you can replace
it with the icon of your own . Google Maps documentation says
the icons can be of two types .

1) Simple Icons

This can be done by specifying the markers icon property
The icon property is set this way .

icon : 'somemarker.png'

For transparency ,icon should be an 24-bit png image .

function initialize() {

    // Setting the Options for the Maps 
    var myOptions = {
      zoom: 4,
      center: new google.maps.LatLng(-33, 151),
      mapTypeId: google.maps.MapTypeId.ROADMAP
    }

    //Creating the Map Object 

    var map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map_canvas"),
                                  myOptions);
     

    var image = 'somemarker.png';
    // Image for the Icon  
    var myLatLng = new google.maps.LatLng(-33.890542, 151.274856);

    var someMarker = new google.maps.Marker({
        position: myLatLng,
        map: map,
        icon: image
    });
  
}
//End the Initialize function

I assume you know how to call the initialize function .You can
get the basic format of the code here .

2) Complex Icons

This is the second set of markers , but unlike simple icons
here you can specify the exact clickcable region , the shadow
image , the order in which they should be displayed with
respective to other overlays . Here you have to specify the
size of the icon ,anchor of the icon .Its more customizable
and you can customize it according to your needs .

So along with the icon property you will have to specify three
more properties .
a) shadow
b) shape
c) zIndex

Shadow and Icon in case of Complex Icons must be objects of
MarkerImage.

MarkerImage takes in four parameters
a) Image Source
b) Size of the Marker
c) Origin of Marker
d) Destination of Marker

Example of MarkerImage:

var image = new google.maps.MarkerImage('beachflag.png',
      // This marker is 30 pixels wide by 32 pixels tall.
      new google.maps.Size(30, 32),
      // The origin for this image is 0,0.
      new google.maps.Point(0,0),
      // The anchor for this image is the base of the flagpole at 0,32.
      new google.maps.Point(0, 32));

In the Similar Manner you can create the shadow MarkerImage .
Things you must note while choosing the shadow image is :

a) The shadow must spread out horizontally in 45 degree to the
icon image . Both Shadow and the Icon images should be transparent
i.e must be of the extension (.png) .

The third property Shape of the Marker takes in two parameters
a) type : HTML <area> elements examples (poly,rect,circle).
b) coord : X,Y coordinates of the polygon selected .
The shape is used to define the clickable area of the marker .

Code for Complex Icons

function initialize() {

    // Setting the Options for the Maps 
    var myOptions = {
      zoom: 4,
      center: new google.maps.LatLng(-33, 151),
      mapTypeId: google.maps.MapTypeId.ROADMAP
    }

    //Creating the Map Object 

    var map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map_canvas"),
                                  myOptions);
     
      var image = new google.maps.MarkerImage('beachflag.png',
      // This marker is 20 pixels wide by 32 pixels tall.
      new google.maps.Size(20, 32),
      // The origin for this image is 0,0.
      new google.maps.Point(0,0),
      // The anchor for this image is the base of the flagpole at 0,32.
      new google.maps.Point(0, 32));

      var shadow = new google.maps.MarkerImage('beachflag_shadow.png',
      // The shadow image is larger in the horizontal dimension
      // while the position and offset are the same as for the main image.
      new google.maps.Size(37, 32),
      new google.maps.Point(0,0),
      new google.maps.Point(0, 32));
      // Shapes define the clickable region of the icon.
      // The type defines an HTML  element 'poly' which
      // traces out a polygon as a series of X,Y points. The final
      // coordinate closes the poly by connecting to the first
      // coordinate.
   
      var shape = {

           coord: [1, 1, 1, 20, 18, 20, 18 , 1],
           type: 'poly'

      };

     var someMarker = new google.maps.Marker({
        position: myLatLng,
        map    : map,
        shadow : shadow,
        icon   : image,
        shape  : shape,
        zIndex : 2   

    });
  
}
//End the Initialize function

Screenshot

beachflag_shadow.png (Shadow)

beachflag.png (Icon Image)

Top 3 Latitude Apps for Android

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 14:16:00 +0000

Google Latitude came up with their location-detection utility in 2010 . Since
then it has been one of the most searched terms on the internet. A number of
Google Latitude Apps have sprung up in the Android Market and we are here
reviewing the top 3 Latitude Apps in the Android market.

One thing that distinguishes Google Latitude Apps from other Location detection GPS based apps is accuracy and the use of Wi-fi , Cell tower detetction and A-Gps(Smartphones inbuilt gps also called Assisted Gps.) simultaneously giving an accuracy of around 50-100 metres .

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Checkout this cool game
Newton Ball in Playstore

1.Latify

Latify is the best Google Latitude App seen so far , it has a variety of
features which makes it stand out from the crowd . This app allows you to
share your location with your friends through Twiiter ,Facebook, Buzz, Email.
It also supports offline sync, background gps updates .

Another useful feature is that it allows you to update the Location at an user
defined interval when you are stationary and this saves the battery .

History Visualization :

Best feature in this app is the history visualization,cool display of your
history on Google Maps integrated with playback and progress bar of
your history and giving you the feel you are watching an movie .

Export your history in KML format which you can easily display on Google
Maps . We had written a post showing you How to Integrate KML files with
Google Maps? . Another feature is integration with Google Fusion Tables and
also with a click you can share this KML files with your friends through Email,
Dropbox, Twitter and thats really cool and really worthy of buying .

Latify Features Video : Download

2.Latitude Update

One of the first Latitude Apps to hit the Android market . This Latitude App allows you to choose the frequency at which the Google Latitude updates your current location . So even if you haven't used Google Maps for a long time , the location that is displayed is updated in background . You can also retrieve your location history , for more details you can visit the site . Screenshot Download

3.Succotash-Location Prediction

This a cool fun app based on Google Latitude which actually predicts your future location based on your history of stored latitude location . Prediction is good enough especially if you have been using Google Latitude for pretty long. Display and user interface is also good and is really fun to use . Screenshot Download

What next??

If you liked this article then you can show your appreciation by sharing this articles . Also don't forget to check out all the cool Latitude Articles on this site through which you can get new ideas .

Free Geocode Address Database

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Tue, 24 May 2011 18:37:00 +0000

I spend a few days searching on the web to get a good geocode database
and all my efforts proved to be in vain because there were a number of sites
that was providing me with a geocoding address database at an expensive cost
of $30-$100 . The cost was huge for me as this was only a supplement to my
full project . Luckily for me and for you while researching on this topics I came
across a number of viable options that could fit my need with a little bit of hack.
This were the three mapping giants Google Maps , Yahoo Maps & Bing Maps,
each of had their geocoding services that could be accessed via an API and this
exactly fitted my needs since I could store this data onto my database although
it is again the policies , you can still use it without a problem for small and big
projects within each of the MAP API's query limit .

Research on the Google,Yahoo and Bing Maps

So I started my testing the various Geocoding values returned by the various
API. I started out with Google Maps . Well the results of geocoding of the Google
Maps was highly accurate both for locations in and outside the US. The
Google Maps scaled well in terms of both accuracy as well as granularity of
results, in short it was giving out accurate geocoding results for even small towns .
The next test was on Bing Maps but sorry to say Bing Maps accuracy was best
till the city level , most of the Geocoding Address results was restricted to
only City Level results .The next and final research was done on Yahoo Maps
and happy to say Yahoo Maps Address Geocoding results was too accurate and
results between Yahoo and Google Maps could actually be mapped with each
other .

Difference between Google Maps and Yahoo Maps ?

Each one has its own pros and cons and telling which ome is better is tough job .
However the key differences I have found out while comparing the two API's

Graphically Google Maps has superior looks and gives a good
experience to the end user than the Yahoo Maps .
Loading time of Yahoo Maps is less than that of Google Maps.
Geocoding Rate of Google Maps is about 2000 queries a day/server .
Geocoding Rate of Yahoo Maps is around 50,000 queries a day .
In Google Maps you can take the benefits of the Google Driving Directions
API but Yahoo doesn't provide such a facility to use its Driving Directions
in an API even though it does have one integrated in its Yahoo Maps website.

Creating the Geocode Address Database

With Yahoo providing me an Geocoding Address limit of 50,000 queries and its
Geocoding addressing being accurate enough , I decided to use the Yahoo Maps API.
So lets start the coding part .The code for Yahoo Geocoding is as follows

Geocode.php

<?php

// Json encode the data

function json_code ($json) 
{ 
$json = substr($json, strpos($json,'{')+1, strlen($json));
$json = substr($json, 0, strrpos($json,'}'));
$json=preg_replace('/(^|,)([\\s\\t]*)([^:]*) (([\\s\\t]*)):(([\\s\\t]*))/s','$1"$3"$4:',trim($json));
return json_decode('{'.$json.'}', true);
} 
 
// function to get the geocode of the address

function geoCodeYp($point)
{
// Replace your Yahoo AppID here 
$yahoo_appid = 'Your yahoo app id';            

//URLEncode for eg convert space to %20 .
$pointenc = urlencode($point);

// URL Formation that will fetch you the results on query
$url="http://where.yahooapis.com/geocode?location=".$pointenc."&gflags=R&appid=".$yahoo_appid."&flags=J";

// get the contents of the URL formed
$jsondata = file_get_contents($url);

$json_data= '{
  a: 1,
  b: 245,
  c with whitespaces: "test me",
  d: "function () { echo \"test\" }",
  e: 5.66
  }';  
 

 $coord=explode(" ",$point);
 
        // this will json encode the data .
  $convertedtoarray=$this--->json_code($jsondata);
  
  // line1 of addrress comprising of house,street no etc
        // line 2 of address comprising of city state country  
  $line1 =$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['line1'] ;
        $line2 =$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['line1'] ;
 
        $county =$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['county'] ;
        $street =$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['street'] ;
  
  
if(($line1=="")||($line2=="")||($county=="")||($street==""))
{
   $yahooresults['status']="noresult";
}

else
{
      $countrycode=$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['countrycode'] ;
      $statecode=$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['statecode']   ;
      $city=$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['city'] ; 
      $house=$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['house'] ;
      $latitude=$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['latitude'] ;
      $longitude=$convertedtoarray['ResultSet']['Results']['0']['longitude'] ;     
 
$yahooresults = array('countrycode'=>$countrycode,'statecode'=>$statecode,'county'=>$county,'city'=>$city,'street'=>$street,'house'=>$house,'latitude'=>$latitude,'longitude'=>$longitude);    
}
  
 return $yahooresults ;
}

?>

To increase modularity & code reusability I would advice you to keep this page
separate . So How do I use this php code?

Create another php page in which you will be using this geocoding functions
using the php include page command .

1)Suppose you want to get the geocode address of a place say "CHICAGO" .
You can simply call the function as follows

geoCodeYp("CHICAGO") ;

Now for storing this result into the database you will have to capture the
result like this

$result=geoCodeYp("Chicago") ;
// get each of the values as
$latitude=$result['latitude'];
// Get the Latitude
$longitude=$result['longitude']; 
// Get the Longitude

.............Remaining Variables..................
You can store each of the results in database by retrieving
the remaining values as $result['valuename']; . The valuenames
are city,countrycode,state,street,house etc.

2) To geocode address of a point(latitude&longitude)
//Example Point with latitude 72.5632 & longitude 19.756

$latitude="72.5632"; 
$longitude="19.756";
// You have to include space between the latitude & longitude
$point=$latitude." ".$longitude ;
//call the geocode function
geocode($point);

Time Required to setup Geocode Address Database

Suppose you have to want to geocode the address of around 5,00,000 address

1 yahoo appid -> 10 days 
2 yahoo appid -> 5 days
10 yahoo appid -> 1 day

And best thing is that you can do this from a single server or from your pc
with php installed .Tell me if you have problems implementing it . I haven't
included the steps to insert the values into database & retrieve from it ,
well that is what Google is for!!!

Do Check out all the Google Maps category on this website!!

Style Google Maps : Make ur Map Look Cool

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Mon, 09 May 2011 17:11:00 +0000

Tweet #newtonball with a screenshot of the level to win a suprize gift.
Checkout this cool game
Newton Ball in Playstore

In this tutorials on Google Maps we will show to you how
you can Cutomize the Google Maps to make it blend with
your websites templates . So for this the three things we
are going to deal with is

a) mapTypeIds
This is used to specify the differenet map Types we
want in our map .If we donot set this explicitly it will
render all three type(RoadMap ,Satellite ,Hybrid)
by default. In this tutorial we will be creating and
using our Customized Map named "RailwayIndia".

b)MapTypeStyle
This will be used to define where and how we will
be applying our styles on Google Maps . It has 3
attributes
1) featureType : It defines on which map element
we will be applying your styles .It was a number
of values which we will learn shortly like transit,
administrative etc .Here's the full list

`administrative`	Apply the rule to administrative areas.
`administrative.country`	Apply the rule to countries.
`administrative.land_parcel`	Apply the rule to land parcels.
`administrative.locality`	Apply the rule to localities.
`administrative.neighborhood`	Apply the rule to neighborhoods.
`administrative.province`	Apply the rule to provinces.
`all`	Apply the rule to all selector types.
`landscape`	Apply the rule to landscapes.
`landscape.man_made`	Apply the rule to man made structures.
`landscape.natural`	Apply the rule to natural features.
`poi`	Apply the rule to points of interest.
`poi.attraction`	Apply the rule to attractions for tourists.
`poi.business`	Apply the rule to businesses.
`poi.government`	Apply the rule to government buildings.
`poi.medical`	Apply the rule to emergency services (hospitals, pharmacies, police, doctors, etc).
`poi.park`	Apply the rule to parks.
`poi.place_of_worship`	Apply the rule to places of worship, such as church, temple, or mosque.
`poi.school`	Apply the rule to schools.
`poi.sports_complex`	Apply the rule to sports complexes.
`road`	Apply the rule to all roads.
`road.arterial`	Apply the rule to arterial roads.
`road.highway`	Apply the rule to highways.
`road.local`	Apply the rule to local roads.
`transit`	Apply the rule to all transit stations and lines.
`transit.line`	Apply the rule to transit lines.
`transit.station`	Apply the rule to all transit stations.
`transit.station.airport`	Apply the rule to airports.
`transit.station.bus`	Apply the rule to bus stops.
`transit.station.rail`	Apply the rule to rail stations.
`water`	Apply the rule to bodies of water.

2)ElementType : It basically takes two values
a)geometry :- whether you want to apply the
style to the geometry of the map element .
For eg if you have selected road as a feature
type you can apply specific styles and colors
to the road shapes .
b) label :- Applying style to the labels .With
reference to the above example , customizing the
style of Road Names .
c) all : style will be applied to both

3) stylers :
This will define the style of the featureType
you have selected . Below I have listed the

`gamma`	`number`	Gamma. Modifies the gamma by raising the lightness to the given power. Valid values: Floating point numbers, [0.01, 10], with 1.0 representing no change.
`hue`	`string`	Sets the hue of the feature to match the hue of the color supplied . Note that the saturation and lightness of the feature is conserved, which means that the feature will not match the color supplied exactly. Valid values: An RGB hex string, i.e. `'#ff0000'`.
`invert_lightness`	`boolean`	Inverts lightness. A value of true will invert the lightness of the feature while preserving the hue and saturation.
`lightness`	`number`	Lightness. Shifts lightness of colors by a percentage of the original value if decreasing and a percentage of the remaining value if increasing. Valid values: [-100, 100].
`saturation`	`number`	Saturation. Shifts the saturation of colors by a percentage of the original value if decreasing and a percentage of the remaining value if increasing. Valid values: [-100, 100].
`visibility`	`string`	Visibility: Valid values: 'on', 'off' or 'simplifed'.

So lets start with the coding :

First of all we will decide what we want to customize and how ?
In this tutorial we will be creating a customized Indian Railways
Maps . So we have selected featureType as transit.railway for
this and we have decided to use invert_lightness feature for
landscape so that it gives better view of the Railways .

var stylez = [
    {
      featureType: "transit.station.rail",
      elementType: "geometry",
      stylers: [
        { hue: "#00ff00" },
        { saturation:100 }
      ]
    },
    {
      featureType: "transit.station.rail",
      elementType: "labels",
      stylers: [
        { hue: "#ffff00" },
        { saturation:50 }
      ]
    },
    {
      featureType: "landscape",
      elementType: "geometry",
      stylers: [
        { invert_lightness:true}
      ]
    }
  ];

The next step is to create a mapType "RailwayIndia" which
is the name for our customized Google Map .

var styledMapOptions = {
      name: "RailwayIndia"
  }

  var jayzMapType = new google.maps.StyledMapType(
      stylez, styledMapOptions);

  map.mapTypes.set('bestfromgoogle', jayzMapType);
  map.setMapTypeId('bestfromgoogle');

So this will give the map a name "RailwayIndia" which will
come in the top of the Google Maps . The complete code is
as follows :

<html>
<head>
<title>Google Maps JavaScript API v3 Example: Styled MapTypes</title>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://maps.google.com/maps/api/js?sensor=false"></script>
<script>
var map;
var brooklyn = new google.maps.LatLng( 19.9455,72.8933);

function initialize() {

  var stylez = [
    {
      featureType: "transit.station.rail",
      elementType: "geometry",
      stylers: [
        { hue: "#00ff00" },
        { saturation:100 }
      ]
    },
    {
      featureType: "transit.station.rail",
      elementType: "labels",
      stylers: [
        { hue: "#ffff00" },
        { saturation:50 }
      ]
    },
    {
      featureType: "landscape",
      elementType: "geometry",
      stylers: [
        { invert_lightness:true}
      ]
    }
  ];

  var mapOptions = {
    zoom:8,
    center: brooklyn,
    mapTypeControlOptions: {
       mapTypeIds: [google.maps.MapTypeId.ROADMAP, 'bestfromgoogle']
    }
  };
  map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map_canvas"),
      mapOptions);

  var styledMapOptions = {
      name: "RailwayIndia"
  }

  var jayzMapType = new google.maps.StyledMapType(
      stylez, styledMapOptions);

  map.mapTypes.set('bestfromgoogle', jayzMapType);
  map.setMapTypeId('bestfromgoogle');
}
</script>
</head>
<body onload="initialize()">
 <div id="map_canvas" style="width: 400px; height: 400px;">map div</div>
</body>
</html>

The customized Google Map should look like this now .
If you have found this article helpful or have any queries
you can do so by leaving a comment on this article .
Happy Coding!!!!

Add Local Search to Google Maps

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Mon, 09 May 2011 09:54:00 +0000

Customize your Google Maps to add Pizza , Parks , Places of interest,
Hotels and all what you think is important from your websites commercial
point of view . In this thread we are going to show you how you can
add customized Local Search to your website .

Requirements For Google Maps Local Search

Even though Google Maps V3 API doesn't require a Google
Map Api Key , but to use Google Local Search you need to
get a API Key .

Integrate Google Local Search to Google Maps

1) Initialize the local searcher and set the Call back
function when the search is completed .

 
 gLocalSearch = new GlocalSearch();
 gLocalSearch.setSearchCompleteCallback(null, OnLocalSearch);

2)Define the input parameters from where you will take the
search parameters . Once we have the search parameters we
define the Search Center Point and execute the search.

    function doSearch() {
      var query = document.getElementById("queryInput").value;
      gLocalSearch.setCenterPoint(gMap.getCenter());
      gLocalSearch.execute(query);
    }

3) After the Local Search function returns a result we have
to display markers representing the search results . The
markers will have a infowindow displaying the address and
other contact details of the place .

The full code of the Google Maps Local Search goes as follows

<html> 
  <head> 
    <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"/> 
    <title>Google AJAX Local Search API + Maps API v3 demo</title> 
    <link href="http://www.google.com/uds/css/gsearch.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"/> 
    <link href="./places.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"/> 
 
    <script src="http://maps.google.com/maps/api/js?sensor=false"></script> 
    <script src="http://www.google.com/uds/api?file=uds.js&v=1.0&key=ABQIAAAAprwmHxNNm8OiTZgaNvJYGBT2yXp_ZAY8_ufC3CFXhHIE1NvwkxSLkUgytlZc-bH0DrooX8yigzsWVQ" type="text/javascript"></script> 
    <script type="text/javascript"> 
    
 
    // Our global state
    var gLocalSearch;
    var gMap;
    var gInfoWindow;
    var gSelectedResults = [];
    var gCurrentResults = [];
    var gSearchForm;
 
    // Create our "tiny" marker icon
    var gYellowIcon = new google.maps.MarkerImage(
      "http://labs.google.com/ridefinder/images/mm_20_yellow.png",
      new google.maps.Size(12, 20),
      new google.maps.Point(0, 0),
      new google.maps.Point(6, 20));
    var gRedIcon = new google.maps.MarkerImage(
      "http://labs.google.com/ridefinder/images/mm_20_red.png",
      new google.maps.Size(12, 20),
      new google.maps.Point(0, 0),
      new google.maps.Point(6, 20));
    var gSmallShadow = new google.maps.MarkerImage(
      "http://labs.google.com/ridefinder/images/mm_20_shadow.png",
      new google.maps.Size(22, 20),
      new google.maps.Point(0, 0),
      new google.maps.Point(6, 20));
 
     // Set up the map and the local searcher.
    function OnLoad() {
 
      // Initialize the map with default UI.
      gMap = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map"), {
        center: new google.maps.LatLng(37.4419, -122.1419),
        zoom: 13,
        mapTypeId: 'roadmap'
      });
      // Create one InfoWindow to open when a marker is clicked.
      gInfoWindow = new google.maps.InfoWindow;
      google.maps.event.addListener(gInfoWindow, 'closeclick', function() {
        unselectMarkers();
      });
 
      // Initialize the local searcher
      gLocalSearch = new GlocalSearch();
      gLocalSearch.setSearchCompleteCallback(null, OnLocalSearch);
    }
 
    function unselectMarkers() {
      for (var i = 0; i < gCurrentResults.length; i++) {
        gCurrentResults[i].unselect();
      }
    }
 
    function doSearch() {
      var query = document.getElementById("queryInput").value;
      gLocalSearch.setCenterPoint(gMap.getCenter());
      gLocalSearch.execute(query);
    }
 
    // Called when Local Search results are returned, we clear the old
    // results and load the new ones.
    function OnLocalSearch() {
      if (!gLocalSearch.results) return;
      var searchWell = document.getElementById("searchwell");
 
      // Clear the map and the old search well
      searchWell.innerHTML = "";
      for (var i = 0; i < gCurrentResults.length; i++) {
        gCurrentResults[i].marker().setMap(null);
      }
      // Close the infowindow
      gInfoWindow.close();
 
      gCurrentResults = [];
      for (var i = 0; i < gLocalSearch.results.length; i++) {
        gCurrentResults.push(new LocalResult(gLocalSearch.results[i]));
      }
 
      var attribution = gLocalSearch.getAttribution();
      if (attribution) {
        document.getElementById("searchwell").appendChild(attribution);
      }
 
      // Move the map to the first result
      var first = gLocalSearch.results[0];
      gMap.setCenter(new google.maps.LatLng(parseFloat(first.lat),
                                            parseFloat(first.lng)));
 
    }
 
    // Cancel the form submission, executing an AJAX Search API search.
    function CaptureForm(searchForm) {
      gLocalSearch.execute(searchForm.input.value);
      return false;
    }
 
 
 
    // A class representing a single Local Search result returned by the
    // Google AJAX Search API.
    function LocalResult(result) {
      var me = this;
      me.result_ = result;
      me.resultNode_ = me.node();
      me.marker_ = me.marker();
      google.maps.event.addDomListener(me.resultNode_, 'mouseover', function() {
        // Highlight the marker and result icon when the result is
        // mouseovered.  Do not remove any other highlighting at this time.
        me.highlight(true);
      });
      google.maps.event.addDomListener(me.resultNode_, 'mouseout', function() {
        // Remove highlighting unless this marker is selected (the info
        // window is open).
        if (!me.selected_) me.highlight(false);
      });
      google.maps.event.addDomListener(me.resultNode_, 'click', function() {
        me.select();
      });
      document.getElementById("searchwell").appendChild(me.resultNode_);
    }
 
    LocalResult.prototype.node = function() {
      if (this.resultNode_) return this.resultNode_;
      return this.html();
    };
 
    // Returns the GMap marker for this result, creating it with the given
    // icon if it has not already been created.
    LocalResult.prototype.marker = function() {
      var me = this;
      if (me.marker_) return me.marker_;
      var marker = me.marker_ = new google.maps.Marker({
        position: new google.maps.LatLng(parseFloat(me.result_.lat),
                                         parseFloat(me.result_.lng)),
        icon: gYellowIcon, shadow: gSmallShadow, map: gMap});
      google.maps.event.addListener(marker, "click", function() {
        me.select();
      });
      return marker;
    };
 
    // Unselect any selected markers and then highlight this result and
    // display the info window on it.
    LocalResult.prototype.select = function() {
      unselectMarkers();
      this.selected_ = true;
      this.highlight(true);
      gInfoWindow.setContent(this.html(true));
      gInfoWindow.open(gMap, this.marker());
    };
 
    LocalResult.prototype.isSelected = function() {
      return this.selected_;
    };
 
    // Remove any highlighting on this result.
    LocalResult.prototype.unselect = function() {
      this.selected_ = false;
      this.highlight(false);
    };
 
    // Returns the HTML we display for a result before it has been "saved"
    LocalResult.prototype.html = function() {
      var me = this;
      var container = document.createElement("div");
      container.className = "unselected";
      container.appendChild(me.result_.html.cloneNode(true));
      return container;
    }
 
    LocalResult.prototype.highlight = function(highlight) {
      this.marker().setOptions({icon: highlight ? gRedIcon : gYellowIcon});
      this.node().className = "unselected" + (highlight ? " red" : "");
    }
 
    GSearch.setOnLoadCallback(OnLoad);
   
    </script> 
  </head> 
  <body style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: small;"> 
    <p>Perform a local search on the map below:</p> 
    <div style="width: 500px;"> 
      <div style="margin-bottom: 5px;"> 
        <div> 
          <input type="text" id="queryInput" value="pizza" style="width: 250px;"/> 
          <input type="button" value="Find" onclick="doSearch()"/> 
        </div> 
      </div> 
      <div style="position: absolute; left: 540px;"> 
        <div id="searchwell"></div> 
      </div> 
      <div id="map" style="height: 350px; border: 1px solid #979797;"></div> 
    </div> 
 
  </body> 
</html>

Your Google Map should look like this now !!

You can also mashup the Local Search with your Websites Google Maps theme
like store locator ,taxi services and could be of a great use in tourist website where
you can give your customized views and ratings on Google Local Search Results.

Google My Maps KML integration for your Website/Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Fri, 06 May 2011 15:09:00 +0000

This is a continuation of
Export My Maps Into KML File
in which we had learned how to export
Google My Maps into KML file .

To integrate KML layer into our website we will be using
Google Maps javascript v3 API's google.maps.KmlLayer()
function . We pass the URL of the KML file as the parameter
to this function .

// The Kml Overlay should be used as
var georssLayer=new google.maps.KmlLayer(url);
// Since KML is an overlay you should
// use the Google Map setmap property
georssLayer.setMap(map);
// map is the Google Map Object

The complete code for Google Map KML Layer is as follows .

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"/>
<title>Google Maps JavaScript API v3 Example: KmlLayer GeoRSS</title>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://maps.google.com/maps/api/js?sensor=false">>/script>
<script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.5.1/jquery.min.js">>/script>
<script type="text/javascript">
$(document).ready(function() {
initialize() ;
});

function initialize() {
  var myLatlng = new google.maps.LatLng(49.496675,-102.65625);
  var myOptions = {
    zoom: 4,
    center: myLatlng,
    mapTypeId: google.maps.MapTypeId.ROADMAP
  }

  var map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map_canvas"), myOptions);

  var georssLayer = new google.maps.KmlLayer('http://www.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=202891427095450912947.0004a29997cffdd0f176d&ll=19.156195,73.061829&spn=0.326906,0.672226&z=11&iwloc=0004a299a67007d319eb4&output=kml');
  georssLayer.setMap(map);
}
</script>

<body>
  <div id="map_canvas" style="width:500px;height:550px"></div>
</body>
</html>

Your Google Map Integrated into your Website should look like this .

Gmail says :UR sending mail to the wrong guy!!

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Fri, 06 May 2011 12:48:00 +0000

Starting today you would never miss out someone special when you

send mails . Gmail adds two new features into Gmail "Don't Forget Bob"

and "Got the Wrong Bob" ,don't go by the names this are the two super

cool features integrated into gmail .

"Don't Forget Bob "

Many times while sending group email invitations we miss out important

persons unknowingly and have faced embrassing situations due to this .

For instance my friend Prashant forgot to include his dear friend Satish

in his email birthday invitation .To avoid such situations gmail introduced

this feature which prompts you to include "Satish" in your mailing list .

Gmail provides this suggestions based on past mailing habits .

"Got the wrong Bob"

This prevents you from sending mail to the wrong person .Suppose you are

sending mail to a group of friends regarding the weekend trip you are going

to make . By mistake you include Bob(your boss) instead of Bobby(your friend)

Gmail provides you suggestions Did you mean Bobby ? which helps you

rectify it and prevent you from the dilemma .

Export My Maps into KML file

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Fri, 06 May 2011 12:36:00 +0000

I have been searching for a while on how to use My Maps
Options on a Google Maps Application . Finally after hours
of trying out all the different things on the net I have come up
with a simple and easy solution to this .

In My Maps section create your personal Google Map . For
demo purposes I have created a Google Map which shows
two shapes 1)Triangle 2) Squares in My Maps and have
given each of them a title . Once you have created your
My Map save it and give it a name .

My Map

The next step is to Export the My Map you have created into a
KML format .For that Click on the Link Option on Google Maps.
Now you will be shown two options
a)Paste link in email or IM

b)Paste HTML to embed in website

Choose the first option and copy the url into a text file .
Embed output=kml at the end of the url .Your KML
URL should like this

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=202891427095450912947.0004a29997cffdd0f176d&ll=19.191866,73.031616&spn=0.354719,0.672226&z=11&output=kml

If you want to download the KML file to be saved on your webserver
for other purposes , all you have to do is copy & paste this url into your
web browser(Mozilla or Chrome recommended) and the kml file will
get automatically downloaded to your personal computer .

Periodic Table of Google API's

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Fri, 06 May 2011 04:32:00 +0000

Did you know ? Google has its own periodic table just as periodic table
of chemical elements . So spend more time developing , rather than
spending time searching for which API will suit your developing needs .
Well I myself found it to be a gift & I bet it will be same for you .

Google Periodic Table also lists the different categories of API's

like Search ,Books API,Gadgets,Chrome,Location based API's .

So next time an API gets added all you have to do is view the

periodic table & you know whats new in Google Products??

Google Chrome Speech Recognition mashup with Google Maps

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Thu, 05 May 2011 19:57:00 +0000

Google see its browser as the central part of its future computing devices .

With Chrome OS to be released in US,UK ,India and other countries in

around June 2011 , Google Chrome will be used for everthing from listening

to music to creating office documents .

The latest version of Google Chrome enables support for Speech Recognition,

based on HTML5 standards . You can now specify speech as one of your

inputs in your HTML5 form , record what the user speaks and interpret it .

Speech Recognition is one of the widely unexplored fields and with Google

entering this field ,we will surely find many speech based API's in near future.

How to use Google Speech Recognition in Google Maps Application ??

Create an input tag with text as type like this <input type="text" id="address" x-webkit-speech />
Create an div in which your Google Map will be displayed .
Create function to geocode your address .
Create an marker to display the location on the map .

The complete working code is as follows .

<html> 
<head> 
<title>Google Speech Recognition Mashup Google Maps</title> 


<script type="text/javascript" src="http://maps.google.com/maps/api/js?sensor=false"></script> 
<script type="text/javascript"> 

 function initialize() {
   geocoder = new google.maps.Geocoder();
    var latlng = new google.maps.LatLng(-34.397, 150.644);
    var myOptions = {
      zoom: 8,
      center: latlng,
      mapTypeId: google.maps.MapTypeId.ROADMAP
    }
    map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map_canvas"), myOptions);
  }

 function codeAddress() {
    var address = document.getElementById("address").value;
    geocoder.geocode( { 'address': address}, function(results, status) {
      if (status == google.maps.GeocoderStatus.OK) {
        map.setCenter(results[0].geometry.location);
        var marker = new google.maps.Marker({
            map: map, 
            position: results[0].geometry.location
        });
      } else {
        alert("Geocode was not successful for the following reason: " + status);
      }
    });
  }
</script> 
</head> 
<body onload="initialize()"> 
  

<input type="text" id="address" x-webkit-speech />
<input type="button" value="Show Location on Map" onclick="codeAddress();" />
</body> 
</html>

See the Live Demo

This feature can be integrated with number of websites that have
a field for address in their form .Google Speech Recognition
works particularly well with recognizing addresses , however when
it comes to recognizing names Google still has a lot to improve .

One improvement Google could certainly make is embed extra attributes
in input tag that will help it narrow down the search results . For eg
in this example it would have been great if it had given an attrbute
like place,email address or phone numbers , which would make the
speech to text conversion more specific .

Geocode Zip Code on Google Maps

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Thu, 05 May 2011 19:35:00 +0000

We have created a simple Google Map application that
uses the speech recognition in Google Chrome 11 or any
of the smartphones to point out the address on Google
Maps that you pointed out .

If you are using Google Chrome 11 or any of the smartphones,
you can Speak out the Address to be geocode on the map OR
Just Enter the address in the input box and press Geocode
to have the location pointed out on Google Maps . You can also
enter or speak the US Postal zip code to have the address pointed
in Google Maps .

Man Behind Google Map Marker .. the PIN you see on Maps ??

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Thu, 05 May 2011 18:58:00 +0000

Google Map Marker or the small PIN we see on Google Maps when
we search for a place . The small tiny red colored oval marker that fits
so well in the Google Maps .

Tweet #newtonball with a screenshot of the level to win a suprize gift.
Checkout this cool game
Newton Ball in Playstore

Who Invented Google Map Marker or Google Map Pin??

Ji Lee the ex Creative Head Of Google was the man behind this creative
oval shaped Google Marker . Google initially came up with many
different pointers like circles, squares small sphere , but all of these
overlays didn't create the charm that the pin shaped 45 degree pointer
created .

Who is Ji Lee ?

Born in Seoul, Korea, and raised in São Paulo, Brazil, Ji Lee studied
design at Parsons School of Design . Ji Lee is currently working as the
Creative Director For Facebook after his exit from Google . Ji LEE is
also the man behind the famous Google Bubble Project which spreaded
like a virus in the New York City .

Google Latitude Mashup With Google maps

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Thu, 05 May 2011 18:21:00 +0000

This thread is a continuation of my post on Google
Latitude Badge API , so to have a better understanding
of this topic you are requested to have a look at the post
before .In this post I will be showing you how to display
the users Google Latitude location dynamically on Google
maps .

For that we will be using a jquery plugin called JQUERY:GMAP3

Step1

Create a php file that will return the latitude & longitude

Step2

Make an ajax call to the php file

Step3

Display the google latitude result on google maps

Step1
The file that will return the latitude & longitude .
We are naming this php file as
getposition.php


<?php
//Replace the YOURUSERID in the url below with your Badge userid . 
$url="http://www.google.com/latitude/apps/badge/api?user=YOURUSERID&type=json" ;
// We get the content
$content = file_get_contents( $url );
print($content); //This will return the data in json format
?>

Step 2 & Step3
For the ajax calls we will be using jquery
functionalities directly ,a call will be
made to the php page, which will return me
data in json format which we will parse
using jquery parseJSON() function .After
this using the jquery GMAP3 library
(http://plugins.jquery.com/project/gmap3)
we will be displaying the marker on google map .


<html>    
  <head> 
    <script type="text/javascript" src="jquery-1.4.4.min.js"> </script>        
    <script src="http://maps.google.com/maps/api/js?sensor=false" type="text/javascript"></script>
    <script type="text/javascript" src="gmap3.js"> </script> 

    
    <script type="text/javascript">   

      $(function(){
 // ajax call to the php page   
  $.ajax({
   type: "POST",
   url: "getposition.php",
   success: function(msg){
       
     var obj=$.parseJSON(msg); 
     // Parse data recived .For more details check  //http://api.jquery.com/jQuery.parseJSON/
     var latitude=obj.features[0].geometry.coordinates[1];
     var longitude=obj.features[0].geometry.coordinates[0];
     var coord=new google.maps.LatLng(latitude,longitude); 
             
     $('#test1').gmap3(
      { action: ':addMarker',
      latLng: coord,
      map:{
       center: true,
       zoom: 14,
       mapTypeId: google.maps.MapTypeId.ROAD
      }
      }
      );    
   }
  });
  
      });
    </script>  
  </head>
  <body>
      </body>
</html>

This was just a basic mashup of google latitude & google maps .
If you want to use all the functionalities of google maps you can
refer the site http://night-coder.com/jquery-plugin-gmap3.html
which has clear explanation of using google maps jquery plugin.

If you have still queries about this thread , please do comment .

Thanks !!

Create your first Android App , You donot need to be a programmer for that !!!!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Thu, 05 May 2011 17:39:00 +0000

Google Labs comes up with another invention & this one
I bet you is gonna be a super hit !!!
Google App Inventor (Beta) is an Android app maker which
lets you create your own Android apps & that too on a browser ,
and best thing about it is that you donot need to be
a programmer for that !!!!!

So lets get started

Computer Requirements

1 . You need to have java 6 installed on your computer .

You can download the latest jdk from www.java.com .

2.Install the App Inventor Setup

a) For Windows users you can download it from AppInventor.

b) After the installation of app inventor it may ask for the location

of the software , if it does so then specify it as

C:\Program Files\Appinventor\commands-for-Appinventor

because this is where the adb.exe file is located .

c) Once you are done with this please login using your

google account to appinventor.googlelabs.com.

Click on My Projects and now you are ready to create

your first app .

3) Building my first App

Click on New , Give a name to your project . Oki Lets

name it MyHome .

MyHome:- Its a simple app in which you have pics of

your family member ,when you click on the pic a call is

established to the family member .

Step1:

So first you decide what your screen should look like .

For that we will be using Labels & Buttons .

On the left hand side of your browser you have Basic List

From that select the Components Button and drag & drop it

on to the screen .Next add a Label to the screen .

Step2:

In my MyHome App I have included four buttons for 4 family

members & a label for each of them .

Step3 :

Set the Label text properties to the text of

of your choice .

Label1: Mother

Label2: Father

Label3: Brother

Label4: Sister

Step 4:

Your screen should look like this now .

Once done with this,the next step is to set the

properties of the Button .Clear the text properties

of the button .To set the Image Properties : Click

on Image on the Properties box and upload the

image of your choice .Your screen should look

like this now .

Step 5 :

You need to establish a call when you click on the pic for that

you need to add the phone component .The Phone component

is available in the Social Tab of the Pallete .Choose the Phone

Call Component and drop down it to the Screen .

We have four members & so we will be using four phone call

components .

Step6 :

Set the Phone Call Properties .

Enter the phone nos in each of the phone call component with the

nos of the corresponding members .

So this ends up the Design of your App .

Now the next step is to build the Application Logic .

On your browser click on the Open Block Editor Button .

A file will be downloaded(AppInventorForAndroidCodeblocks.jnlp)

Double Click on the file and wait till the Block Editor opens , it may

take sometime though around 30-50 secs .

Once the block editor is open the next step is to connect it with

a device .If you are using a emulator click on New Emulator&
select a emulator .Now click on Connect to the Device button &
wait till the device is connected .

Step 7 .

Select Button1 on My Blocks Editor .

From the list of options select the Onclick block .

Step 8

Select Phone Call on My Blocks Editor

Form the list of options select the MakePhoneCall Block

Repeat this step for each of the buttons .

So finally you are done with the application logic & you can

download it to your Android Phone or computer to use .

If you want to emulate it in an emulator then you will have

to install it on your computer .

Download the app you have created :- For that next to the

Open Block Editor Button you have one more button that

gives to the option of downloading it to the computer .

For trying your app on a emulator :

1. Download the app and place the app in the folder

C:\Program Files\Appinventor\commands-for-Appinventor

2. Open the cmd prompt on your computer .

Make the root directory of cmd prompt as

cd C:\Program Files\Appinventor\commands-for-Appinventor

3. Install the apk file my running the command

adb install MyHome.apk

So you have finally installed the apk file & now you can

view your working MyHome app on your emulator !!!!!!

If you still have any problems creating your first app , please do

write.

Google Latitude : Ruby on Rails Example using Oauth

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Thu, 05 May 2011 16:53:00 +0000

A good Example of Google Latitude on Ruby on Rails that was
what I was searching for the past few days .I thought it
would be good to include this one in my blog as it already
contained a lot of stuff on Google Latitude .

This are the simple steps you need to follow to
have your Google Latitude Oauth on Ruby on Rails
running .

Register Domain with Google

a)Go to: https://www.google.com/accounts/ManageDomains
Add a domain name & register it .

After registering your domain , the next step is to create
an pair of RSA keys , this one is needed for encryption
of the data to be send during the OAuth Handshake .

In linux and OS X you can use openssl
openssl req -x509 -nodes -days 365 -newkey rsa:1024
-sha1 -subj ‘/C=US/ST=CA/L=San
Francisco/CN=example.com’ -keyout rsakey.pem -out
rsacert.pem

Upload the rsacert.pem, and keep the rsakey.pem in a
safe place. For the Target URL path prefix, Just add
the domain name.

Get the Oauth Consumer Key and Secret .

2) OAuth GEM

Include in your environment.rb
config.gem "oauth"
You need to install it to use in your system .
Recommended version 0.4.1 .

3) Generate OAuth Access Token Model

$ ruby script/generate model OAuthAccessToken
Note: I've done this because I don't want to store
my access token directly in my User model. This
gives me the option of having tokens for multiple
scopes for a user through a polymorphic association.

Migration:

create_table :oauth_access_tokens do |t|
t.string :oauth_token, :oauth_secret, :scope
t.string :subject_type, :limit > 30 #for polymorphic association
t.integer :subject_id
t.timestampsend

4)User Model

has_one :latitude_access_token,
:model_name => 'OAuthAccessToken',
:as => :subject, :conditions => ['scope = ?','latitude']

5)Setup OAUTH Consumer for Latitude

Create class lib/o_auth_consumers.rb

class OAuthConsumers  
  Latitude = OAuth::Consumer.new( CONSUMER_KEY, 
      CONSUMER_SECRET, {
      :site => "https://www.google.com",
      :request_token_path => "/accounts/OAuthGetRequestToken",
      :access_token_path => "/accounts/OAuthGetAccessToken",
      :authorize_path=> "/latitude/apps/OAuthAuthorizeToken",
      :signature_method => "RSA-SHA1",
      :private_key_file => "#{RAILS_ROOT}/config/rsakey.pem" 
       #path to my rsakey that I saved earlier
  }) 

end

Remember to change the CONSUMER_KEY and
CONSUMER_SECRET which you got from step1.

6)Generate Controller for APP

ruby script/generate controller latitude

require 'oauth'
require 'oauth/signature/rsa/sha1'
class LatitudeController < ApplicationController

def index
    #check the user has a latitude oauth access token
    if current_user.latitude_access_token
      token = 
     OAuth::Token.new(current_user.latitude_access_token.oauth_token,     current_user.latitude_access_token.oauth_secret)
      @request = JSON.parse(OAuthConsumers::Google.request('get', "https://www.googleapis.com/latitude/v1/currentLocation", token).body)
      @lat = @request['data']['latitude']
      @lng = @request['data']['longitude']
      @time = Time.at((@request['data']['timestampMs'].to_i)
       /1000).strftime('%b %d, %Y - %T')
    else
      redirect_to :action => 'authorise'
    end
    
  end

 def authorise
 if !params[:oauth_token]

request_token = OAuthConsumers::Latitude.get_request_token(
{ :oauth_callback => "http://localhost:3000/latitude/authorise" },
{ :scope => "https://www.googleapis.com/auth/latitude" }
                        )

session[:oauth_secret] = request_token.secret
      redirect_to request_token.authorize_url + 
      "&domain=example.com&granularity=best&location=all"
      else
      request_token = OAuth::RequestToken.new(
                         OAuthConsumers::Latitude,
                         params[:oauth_token],
                         session[:oauth_secret]
                       )
 begin
        access_token = 
        request_token.get_access_token(
         :oauth_verifier => params[:oauth_verifier] )
        rescue
        redirect_to :action => 'index'
      end

if access_token
        #now save the access token for this user 
        OauthAccessToken.create :subject => current_user,
                                :scope => 'latitude',
                                :oauth_token => access_token.token,
                                :oauth_secret => access_token.secret
      end

   redirect_to latitude_path
    end
  end
  
end

7) Get the Latitude To Work

That's pretty much it. Go to http://localhost:3000/latitude,
you will be directed to Google to authorise your account,
then once that all goes through, you will be sent back to
your app, an Access Token will be created which will be
stored for your user. I'm not exactly sure how long this
lasts at the moment, but I'm testing that right now and
will update if I find anything important. Sorry guys just
can't show you a live demo right now . But if anyone of
you make one please do leave a comment over here ,so that
I can tell my readers "Hey checkout this live Demo".

Thanks to Ben Petro for creating the code on Ruby On Rails
platform .

Easier way to use Google Latitude API : Google Badge API

noreply@blogger.com (Vaishakh Thayyil) — Thu, 05 May 2011 15:34:00 +0000

Tweet #newtonball with a screenshot of the level to win a suprize gift.
Checkout this cool game
Newton Ball in Playstore

There are two ways in which you can use the Google Latitude API

a) Use the long way in which you will need the user to authenticate
your Google Latitude App each time you want to get his location
details, but this rather a long method to get the user's location.
Its a more generalized & accepted method of using the Google
Latitude API. The disadvantages of this method is that you can
create a vehicle tracking system or human tracking system using
this methodology since you need to follow the steps in the
OAUTH playground to authenticate your application to access the
location details .

b) Google Latitude Hack :
We hereby comeup with a simpler and a much easier method to use
Google Latitude API and we are calling it as Google Latitude
HACK since it simplifies the location tracking process & its
hardly few lines of code .

Steps for using Google Latitude Badge API .

We will call this technique as Google Latitude Badge API ,why?
Because it uses the Google Latitude + Google Badge for location
tracking purposes .

a) Log into your Google Account in which you have Google
Latitude enabled .( Enabling Google Latitude is simple
you just have to log into your Google Latitude using
any of your Google Accounts and you will automatically
enable it ).

b) Goto https://www.google.com/latitude/b/0/apps .This is
nothing but your Google Latitude Apps settings section.

c) The next step is to enable your public location badge .
In Google Public Location Badge choose the best
location badge radio button .

d) If you are following this steps using a A-GPS enabled
mobile phone , your location will displayed on the map
as shown below .

e) If you following this
steps using a pc you may
set a static location of your
choice on Google Latitude.
For that Enable the Set My
Location Manually option
under Privacy Section in
Friends Tab .

f) So once you have followed this basic steps you are
ready to implement the location tracking system using
Google Latitude Badge API .

Code :

<?php
//Replace the YOURUSERID in the url below with your Badge userid . 
$url="http://www.google.com/latitude/apps/badge/api?user=YOURUSERID&type=json" ;
// We get the content

$content = file_get_contents( $url );

// We convert the JSON to an object
$json = json_decode( $content );
$coord = $json->features[0]->geometry->coordinates;
// this will give you the coordinates of the user
echo $coord ;

$timeStamp = $json->features[0]->properties->timeStamp;
// timestamp of the last update

echo $timestamp ;
// If you want to retrieve the longitude & latitude separately 

$latitude=$coord[0];

$longitude=$coord[1];

echo "Your current coordinates  Latitude :".$latitude."  Longitude".$longitude ;

?>

g) How do I get the userID?

Under the Google Latitude Badge a small code similar to as
shown below is seen .

<iframe frameborder="0" height="300" src="http://www.google.co.in/latitude/apps/badge/api?user=XXXXXXXXXXXX&amp;type=iframe&amp;maptype=roadmap&amp;hl=en-GB" width="180">
</iframe>

So the XXXXXXXX is your userID replace that in your code and
you can have your code running .