And more problems with the Google Maps Interface

One of the things that I felt would be an integral part to my Social Locater project idea was local bus routes (especially those that I used most often). I obtained an ESRI shapefile of Asheville transit information and did a quick conversion to KML. The problem that I quickly discovered is that Google APIs have difficulty in understanding lines which overlap themselves.

After research on the issue I found that the KML work around for this problem is to was to create a series line segments for each route to prevent a single line from overlapping itself. This created another problem when attempting to upload the KML file into Google Maps in that the segments created a situation that was somewhat computationally intense and caused the interface to lock up on occasion. Additionally each segment of a line was considered a separate entity within the map and created a situation where the entire route may not be visible on the map.

The workaround for this issue was to manually edit the KML file and use the tag to make the numerous line segments appear as a single route. This worked extremely well in Google Earth, but the problem continued in Google Maps. I learned from the Google Maps API that the XML/KML parser that drives Google Maps does not understand the tag. If using the Google Maps engine with another parser this problem could be potentially avoided.

The screenshots below capture the problem. Look at the table of contents in the left of each application to see the division of routes.

Mapfacture

One of the problems that seems to be recurrent with the Google Maps application is an inability to handle XML type feeds right out of the box. While the KML editing and sharing tools are remarkable and seem to be improving constantly, I haven't been able to integrate data with Google in a manner that wasn't extremely painful.

Mapfacture is yet another application based on the Google Maps API. Mapfacture is a quasi-social site that allows users to create and share more dynamic map information than Google want's to handle. Additionally Mapfacture will convert a dynamic XML feed (geoRSS and other formats are also supported) into a KML file that can be incorporated into your Google My Maps. Mapfacture can be used as a completely independent mapping interface in and of itself, but needs more work in my opinion. When attempting to use a KML file that originated as an ESRI shapefile as a sort of base for my Mapfacture map I was surprised to find my polygons converted to polylines. My formatting information had also mysteriously disappeared.


My goal as I progress through this project will be to utilize Mapfacture to create KMLs from any XML data that I wish to incorporate into the My Maps interface.

jEdit KML Validation

Google Maps now allows you to directly import existing KML files into the My Maps interface. This is extremely useful when attempting to put together maps that requires heavier editing than the standard My Maps tools allow. Pete Kennedy pointed me to jEdit which can validate KML files that you are attempting to manually edit. Check out Google's video below.