OT (?): Bookmarking GPS coords

[Alex Tweedly]

Thanks - lots of useful info there.

The big issue in this approach is (as you say)
>   I would
> think it would be relatively simple to define a procedure (less simple
> to have the kids actually follow it) where the kids send you an email
In my case, I have a large number of addresses to define (say, 500) and 
a small number of volunteers (say 2 or 3) - so I'm not able to 
distribute the initial data gathering very well. The level of manual 
effort involved in copy/paste URL, type name, type address would be OK 
for each Scout doing one of them - but asking my volunteers to do a 
couple of hundred each is, um, challenging :-)

Also, I do have the addresses already collected - so I am hoping to 
import that into Google maps (or other mapping system)  ready for some 
human interaction to define where each on is - and ideally to then 
require only one click (or equivalent) to capture enough info for me to 
process it.

A kmz file might be usable - but I'd need to generate it on the fly, 
because I want to only show one (or at most a handful) of addresses - 
there's already a lot of local concern about putting anything like this 
on the internet.

Currently I have system (LC + revBrowser) working to define locations, 
though I'd like to make it a bit smarter.
And a (very) initial display system - see 
https://www.kilmelford.com/igniter.lc/basic/findaddress
    (good examples to try for the search string are "glen", or "cuil" or 
"cuil cottage" or ....

This might work for me because one of my volunteers has access to a 
high-definition map of part of the area, with house names already 
shown;  but for the other part I will probably need to do the GPS app 
for phone/tablet and have them walk/cycle around.

So - off to experiment with kmz files ... thanks !!
-- Alex.


On 11/04/2017 00:12, Kay C Lan via use-livecode wrote:
> On Sun, Apr 9, 2017 at 10:58 AM, Alex Tweedly via use-livecode
> <use-livecode at lists.runrev.com> wrote:
>> I'm looking for any help or suggestions for existing apps that can do
>> (something like) what I want to do - could even be a clever way to use a
>> feature I've not found in Google maps, or pple maps, or ...
>>
> Hi Alex, I'm not exactly sure what you are trying to achieve but here
> is a scenario that might address some of your needs:
>
> You have a local Scout group and you want all the children in the
> group to know where all the other kids and group leaders live so you
> want to produce a map with place markers that can be easily shared.
>
> So I'd get all the kids to go home, get onto Google Maps and find
> their own home using Street View. Once they've found their home, they
> take a copy of the URL and have them email it to you. The entire URL
> will look like this:
>
> https://www.google.com.au/maps/@52.7810059,-1.7254772,3a,75y,38.54h,87.5t,358.22r/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sNB14D3D9SvOQvL8Efe9h8w!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1
>
> The format is pretty straight forward to decipher, the two numbers
> directly after the @ is the latitude and longitude. It would be easy
> to write an LC utility to strip the address to just the Lat and Long.
>
> Take this Lat and Long and paste it into Google Earth. Note I started
> out in "Maps" because of Street View - it is much easier to find your
> own home in Maps vs Earth. Obviously pasting the Lat Long into Earth
> will take you to exactly the same spot. In Earth you can then place
> multiple 'Placemarkers' and give them appropriate names and
> descriptions - that are like pop up tooltips. I'd name the
> Placemarkers after the kid's name, and for the description enter their
> proper address.
>
> Once you've entered all the Placemarker details, you can scale your
> view to cover just the area that includes all your Placemarkers. You
> can then save this as a .kmz file and send it out to everyone. When
> anyone opens the file they'll see exactly what you saw when you saved
> it; but it doesn't preclude them from zooming in and out or panning
> around.
>
> Google Earth is available on all the popular desktop and mobile OSes
> and is free.
>
> Lastly, .kmz files are basically an xml file as defined by Google.
> Again the format is pretty simple to decipher - or you could look it
> up on the internet and have it precisely described to you. I would
> think it would be relatively simple to define a procedure (less simple
> to have the kids actually follow it) where the kids send you an email
> with the body is in a format like:
>
> URL: qerpoqueoruqweouqeoruqoru
> Your fullname: oiu lh mnbmb
> Your Full address: 765 hohjjkl jhgjgh ouyiuy UYT 432 FHG
>
> and then have LC read the email, extract the relevant data and then
> automatically add the Placemarker data into the .kmz file. One problem
> I see is that someone might join who lives outside the original zoomed
> level of your custom kmz map so with each update to the kmz file you
> would have to actually open it and look at it in Google Earth and
> determine that the zoom level is correct to ensure that everyone is
> still within the bounds of display; before saving the file and sending
> it out as an update to everyone.
>
> Also, Google Earth allows you to create your own 'Tracks' that can be
> saved and shared. So for instance, you could save a Scout hiking trip
> and share it and so parents would know where to drop kids off and pick
> them up, and theoretically the kids can't get too lost on the route in
> between;-)
>
> HTH
>
> _______________________________________________
> use-livecode mailing list
> use-livecode at lists.runrev.com
> Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences:
> http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-livecode