I am building a new web site in asp.net, and im newbie with using maps.
For my web site i will need the following functionality:
display a map of specific location.
display route map between two or more location
calculate distance between 2 locations.
I found most of the functionality at the Bing Maps interactive SDK site:
and it works fine.
My questions are:
does it cost money to use this SDK ?
for the third task, i understand that i will have to use MapPoint Services.
(is there another way??) does it code money to use it?
I will really appreciate it if you dont send me links, cause my english is not the best one...
thanks a lot
It sounds like you're at the decision making stage of your project and weighing up the pros and cons of various frameworks. Due the nature of developing commercial applications using maps (supplied by Google, Bing, Yahoo, or any other map provider), it might be an idea to code against a library called MapStraction.
It allows you to easily swap and change map providers depending on commercial and/or customer requirements. It also provides a consistent interface so changing your map provider half way through the project isn't a big deal.
Have a look at using OpenStreeMaps. It's completely free, and so far I have been very impressed with it. In my area, it's more accurate and detailed than Google maps.
In the UK OS maps are also free.
Bing Maps is a good option. If your website is public and the map is publically available, then you can make use Bing Maps for free if you have less than 125,000 page views (similar to a session) of your map page in a year as noted here: http://www.microsoft.com/maps/product/licensing.aspx
If you expect a higher volume of usage then you would need a license. Note that Bing Maps licenses tend to be cheaper the Google licenses. This is pretty neat as Bing Maps has much more data than Google.
Also, MapPoint Web Services are not need, nor do they exist anymore.
Read the licenses carefully, both Bing and Google Maps cost money, if you use it for commercial purpose.
E.g. read this blog post:
http://www.47hats.com/2009/07/google-maps-the-10k-gotcha/
However, if you using it for your non-commercial app, it is free.
Another option to consider for those looking at this thread is Azure Maps, Microsoft's newer enterprise mapping platform. It usually costs less than Bing Maps and provides more features and services. It is also a part of Azure which make things a lot easier if you are already developing in Azure. Find more information at https://azure.com/maps
You can do all of that using just Bing Maps. The Bing Maps routing service can b sued to calculate the driving distance between two locations. If you want the straight line (as the crow flies) distance then it's just a simply calculation.
For Bing Maps you will always need a license, however there are free licenses. If you qualify for free usage depends on your use case. There's a good tool available for figuring out if you need an Enterprise license or if you qualify for free usage here: http://www.microsoft.com/maps/Licensing/licensing.aspx
Related
We have raster data that we want to process using earth engine and then use that data in another cloud environment. All this should happen programmatically. So manual tools like the asset manager are out. I could not find an API to expose its functionality.
Is there an earth engine API we could use to import and export raster data?
If I understand correctly your question, you want to use google earth as a map/tile provider. Long long time ago in a galaxy far away, there used to be some years ago this crazy Russian hacker (in the good sense) that had created code to get tiles, however this was not exactly legal, and i am not sure if it is maintained.
If you want to use Google, you should have to go through their APIs (unless there is a solution involving caching in a limited space, e.g. like this?) and should use some google API earth-engine, maps, ...? (I am a bit rusty on the current satus)
Be also aware that what they provide changes over time and is not / will not be always free.
For alternatives, which are free and open, this might be helpful for maps (also google open street maps).
All of Earth Engine is API driven, however some portions of the API are easier to access than others.
For automated imports, you can try using the earthengine command line tool, which formats the API calls for you: https://developers.google.com/earth-engine/command_line
For exports, the easiest path is using the Python client library and the ee.batch.Export calls.
We are planning to develop a new application that should offer:
Android-capable
Turn by turn with voice navigation
Offline maps (and perhaps routing?)
Satellite maps
Truck issues
As fas as I can see, all of the requirements (but the offline routing) is included in different Here Maps developer plans. Nevertheless, I still have some questions:
On their web (https://developer.here.com/plans/api/consumer-mapping), there are two main divisions (API plan and Mobile SDS plans). Which one is better for me and what is the difference?. I mean, it seems clear that I should go for the mobile plans, but not sure if this will be limiting my development in the future.
There appear no pricing options for the Mobile SDKs. We are planning to make the app available to our customers on a free basis and they will be charged for enhanced services. But seeing that API plans are based on a volume basis... how does the mobile plans work? (does it have any cost depending on the number of transactions too?).
Finally, customized POI are the main advantage of our app and is closed to other users (will no be made publicly available). Does the Here api include the option to add our POIs coming from another (ous) database on the fly?.
Thanks in advance,
Jose.
Turn by turn guidance will be only available via the (Premium) MobileSDK. Via REST APIs you can get routing, but not TbT voice guidance. Also Offline is only avaiulable via the Premium MobileSDK. Beside this, the native MobileSDK offers native vectorbased map rendering, when you use the REST APIs you would need to use the raster tiles. So in a nutshell: if you target Mobiles, you should definitely go with the MobileSDK. If you need any feature that's only available via web APIs (platform extensions, isoline routing, and some more), you can still combine these web APIs with the MobileSDK.
Pricing depends on your usecases, so you should discuss your usecase with HERe Sales: https://developer.here.com/contact-us?interest=mobile-sdk#contact-sales
Customized POIs is quite general, but of course you can load datasets from your servers and show them as POIs on the map, but you could also use the Platform Extension CLE, that also allows you to search within your dataset and is seamless integrated in the MobileSDK already.
Short Version (tl;dr):
Is there an open source or commercial engine that provides embeddable collaboration and microblogging functionality?
Long Version:
I am creating a niche application that has need of this functionality and do not want to reinvent the wheel. The following are must have requirements:
Data API only. My application is SaaS, and I want to build the functionality around the data. This eliminates most of the offerings out there (facebook, salesforce chatter, yammer, present.ly, teambox)
Does not require use of a built-in front end. I really just want an engine that will take care of the storage and events, and gives me a means of querying. Requiring the use of a specific front end renders it useless for embedding into my app. This eliminates everything else I have found (status.net, Yonkly, Jaiku)
Beyond standard updates and replies, can handle custom events. For example, if I were embedding this into an logistics application, I could have the engine handle events like "shipped", "received", and "cancelled".
Beyond this, there are several nice to have features that a framework would have:
Should not require a specific platform or server technology to run (i.e. something like a RESTful API would be nice)
Should be message based so that commands that affect its state can come from any source
Should encapsulate its own storage so that external resources are not necessary (i.e. no database needed)
Should have pluggable extendable UI components/widgets for web, mobile, and desktop clients
Should have search and retrieval APIs available for many languages/platforms
It seems that someone out there should have this already, or at least be in progress with it. Please point me in the right direction.
Since nobody had any answers and continued research did not find anything, I created a solution on my own called Collabinate. Updates can be found on Twitter, and the project itself is hosted on GitHub.
I'm currently developing an application for the emergency services (target market is NY) A crucial part of the application is the mapping feature. I'm currently using Google maps API and Bing, as a proof of concept, and it's working great. I like google a lot better as it seems to have more features and looks better. I've been finding that sometimes google is inaccurate about 10-20% of the time (Bing is also inaccurate, but not as much). It's working for a proof of concept, but as this is for emergency services, I need the maps to be as accurate as possible. I wouldn't have a problem using one API to geocode, and then use google to display. Does anyone know a good geocoding service out there that could live up to these standards? (Free would be best, but I'd take fee based services suggestions too)
Thanks!
For something like this you really want to pay someone and get support, corrections, fixes etc on demand. Mapquest might have an offering that suits you (and their geocoding is generally very good).
I need to create an ASP.NET site which can display graphs, charts, statistics for a dashboard type application pulling data from a backend data source.
I am trying to locate either:
(a) open-source modules that I can use / build up on
(b) tutorials which teach the above
(c) existing modules (preferably low-cost) that work well.
I did the basic googling, but found only VERY expensive paid solutions (eg: http://www.dundas.com/ $700+, http://www.devexpress.com/ $300 * n).
For simple visualizations, you should take a look at the EXTJS library. It's a free javascript framework.
http://www.sencha.com/products/js/
There are several good examples of dynamic charts there and I've found the API is pretty easy to use.
A non-free library that you can always go to is Adobe's Flex platform. That will give you more of a sexy front end. A basic license for Flash Builder (which comes with the Flex library) is only $249, so that may be within your budget.
If you can publish your data as JSON objects and have the results displayed in a browser, Protovis is a free JS library that's pretty nice to work with:
http://vis.stanford.edu/protovis/
ASP.NET is shipped with everything you need to build the application without having to purchase additional components.
(a) there are plenty of open source projects around charting. http://www.codeproject.com/KB/graphics/zedgraph.aspx
(b) there are plenty ASP.NET tutorials on the next including ones related to charting. Google is your friend here!
(c) see point a (if I understand well what you are asking for.
And the last but not least, don't hesitate to ask your questions on stackoverflow.com !