Beginning Google Maps Applications with PHP and Ajax: From Novice to Professional

383 Pages·2006·1.9 MB·English

by  Jeffrey Sambells

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Beginning Google Maps Applications with PHP and Ajax: CCoovveerrss
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From Novice to Professional
Beginning GGooooggllee’’ss ggeeooccooddeerr!!
Beginning
Dear Reader,
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Until recently, building interactive web-based mapping applications has been a o
cumbersome affair. That changed when Google released its powerful Maps API. o
Michael Purvis We’ve written this book to help you take advantage of this technology in your g Google Maps
own endeavors—whether you’re an enthusiast playing for fun or a professional l
e
building for profit.

We get rolling with examples that require hardly any code at all, but you’ll M
quickly become acquainted with many facets of the Maps API. We demonstrate
a
powerful methods for simultaneously plotting large data sets, creating your
p
own map overlays, and harvesting and geocoding sets of addresses. You’ll see
s Applications
how to set up alternative tile sets and where to access imagery to use for them.

We even show you how to build your own geocoder from scratch, for those A
high-volume batch jobs. p
Jeffrey Sambells,ZCE We’ve had a blast researching and writing this book, and we really think it p
has turned into a great, comprehensive resource. As well as providing hands-on
l
examples of real mapping projects, this book supplies a complete reference for ic
the API, along with the relevant aspects of JavaScript, CSS, PHP, and SQL. a PHP Ajax
If you enjoy this book or you’ve built something cool related to Google t
Maps, we encourage you to drop by http://googlemapsbook.com and let us io with and
know. We’re keeping a blog there that’s an ongoing stream of new pointers,
n
ideas, and resources to help out fellow mappers.
s
Now, go forth and map the world!
w
Cameron Turner Mike Purvis, Jeffrey Sambells, and Cameron Turner it
h
Join online discussions: P
From Novice to Professional
forums.apress.com H
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Beginning Google Maps Application j
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Web Development
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S
Michael Purvis, Jeffrey Sambells,
ISBN 1-59059-707-9 a
SOURCECODEONLINE 53499 TumP
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elli
US $34.99 rs,s,
Foreword by Mike Pegg,
Shelve in
Founder of the Google Maps Mania Blog
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User level:
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7079ch00FM.qxd 7/27/06 3:18 PM Page i
Beginning Google Maps
Applications with
PHP and Ajax
From Novice to Professional
Michael Purvis
Jeffrey Sambells
and Cameron Turner
7079ch00FM.qxd 7/27/06 3:18 PM Page ii
Beginning Google Maps Applications with PHP and Ajax: From Novice to Professional
Copyright © 2006 by Michael Purvis,Jeffrey Sambells,and Cameron Turner
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval
system, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner and the publisher.
ISBN-13 (pbk): 978-1-59059-707-1
ISBN-10 (pbk): 1-59059-707-9
Printed and bound in the United States of America 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Trademarked names may appear in this book. Rather than use atrademark symbol with every occurrence
of atrademarked name, we use the names only in an editorial fashion and to the benefit of the trademark
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Lead Editor: Jason Gilmore
Technical Reviewer: Terrill Dent
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To Anne and Jim,that with God’s grace,
Imight one day be so loving aparent.
—Michael Purvis
Dedicated to my loving wife,Stephanie,always by my side as my navigator in life.
May we never lose our way in this crazy world.
And also to my parents,Frank and Linda,
who taught me to always look beyond the horizon.
—Jeffrey Sambells
I dedicate this book to my amazing wife,Tanya,and our son,Owen.
Tanya is the ultimate teammate and life partner—
always willing to dive into an adventure or opportunity regardless of the size.
I’d also like to thank my parents,Barry and Lorna,for supporting me
in all my ambitions and encouraging me to take risks and pursue dreams.
Without all of you,Iwould never have agreed to write my first book
about amoving-target topic such as Google Maps,
on acompressed timeline,with anewborn baby!
To everyone else who helped out in the last few months,thank you.
We couldn’t have completed this book without your help and patience.
—Cameron Turner
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Contents at a Glance
Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
About the Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xix
About the Technical Reviewer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxi
Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxiii
PART 1 ■ ■ ■ Your First Google Maps
■ CHAPTER 1 Introducing Google Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
■ CHAPTER 2 Getting Started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
■ CHAPTER 3 Interacting with the User and the Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
■ CHAPTER 4 Geocoding Addresses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
PART 2 ■ ■ ■ Beyond the Basics
■ CHAPTER 5 Manipulating Third-Party Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
■ CHAPTER 6 Improving the User Interface. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
■ CHAPTER 7 Optimizing and Scaling for Large Data Sets. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
■ CHAPTER 8 What’s Next for the Google Maps API?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
PART 3 ■ ■ ■ Advanced Map Features
and Methods
■ CHAPTER 9 Advanced Tips and Tricks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209
■ CHAPTER 10 Lines,Lengths,and Areas. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
■ CHAPTER 11 Advanced Geocoding Topics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
PART 4 ■ ■ ■ Appendixes
■ APPENDIX A Finding the Data You Want . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315
■ APPENDIX B Google Maps API. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323
■ INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 351
v
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Contents
Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
About the Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xix
About the Technical Reviewer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxi
Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xxiii
PART 1 ■ ■ ■ Your First Google Maps
■ CHAPTER 1 Introducing Google Maps. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
KML:Your First Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Wayfaring:Your Second Map. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Adding the First Point . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Adding the Flight Route . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Adding the Destination Point. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Adding a Driving Route. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
What’s Next? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
■ CHAPTER 2 Getting Started. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
The First Map. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Keying Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Examining the Sample Map. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Specifying a New Location. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Separating Code from Content . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Cleaning Up. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Basic Interaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Using Map Control Widgets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Creating Markers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Opening Info Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
A List of Points. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Using Arrays and Objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Iterating. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
vii
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viii ■ CONTENTS
■ CHAPTER 3 Interacting with the User and the Server. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Going on a Treasure Hunt. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Creating the Map and Marking Points. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Starting the Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Listening to User Events. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Asking for More Information with an Info Window. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Creating an Info Window on the Map. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Embedding a Form into the Info Window. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Avoiding an Ambiguous State . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Controlling the Info Window Size. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Using Google’s Ajax Object. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Saving Data with GXmlHttp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Parsing the XML Document Using DOM Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Retrieving Markers from the Server. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Adding Some Flair. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
■ CHAPTER 4 Geocoding Addresses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Creating an XML File with the Address Data. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Using Geocoding Web Services. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Requirements for Consuming Geocoding Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
The Google Maps API Geocoder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
The Yahoo Geocoding API. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Geocoder.us . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Geocoder.ca . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Services for Geocoding Addresses Outside Google’s Coverage. . . . 85
Caching Lookups. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Building a Store Location Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
PART 2 ■ ■ ■ Beyond the Basics
■ CHAPTER 5 Manipulating Third-Party Data. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Using Downloadable Text Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Downloading the Database . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Parsing CSV Data. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Optimizing the Import. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
Using Your New Database Schema. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
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■ CONTENTS ix
Screen Scraping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
A Scraping Example . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
Screen Scraping Considerations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
■ CHAPTER 6 Improving the User Interface. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
CSS:A Touch of Style . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Maximizing Your Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
Adding Hovering Toolbars. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Creating Collapsible Side Panels. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Scripted Style. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Switching Up the Body Classes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Resizing with the Power of JavaScript. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Populating the Side Panel. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Getting Side Panel Feedback. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
Warning,Now Loading. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Data Point Filtering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Showing and Hiding Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Discovering Groupings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
Creating Filter Buttons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
■ CHAPTER 7 Optimizing and Scaling for Large Data Sets . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Understanding the Limitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Streamlining Server-Client Communications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
Optimizing Server-Side Processing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Server-Side Boundary Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Server-Side Common Point Method. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Server-Side Clustering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Custom Detail Overlay Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
Custom Tile Method. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
Optimizing the Client-Side User Experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186
Client-Side Boundary Method. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Client-Side Closest to a Common Point Method. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
Client-Side Clustering. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
Further Optimizations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198