Forum: General Topics
Forums / General Topics / Creating a Route
| Subject: | Creating a Route | |
ChrisM 11:32 Location: Phone Model: | Hi Stephen, Wow, your 'to-do' list must be getting huge!! :-) Just a thought... How difficult would it be to have the facility on the website to create a Route? I was thinking of a screen similar to the Track viewer map, but where you could use the mouse to create points/lines that could then be saved as a Route, uploaded into the phone and followed in the usual way... It would be a really neat feature (IMO) for creating routes for walks/rides/drives etc. Not quite as good as turn-by-turn directions, but the next best thing... What would be even better, if you could somehow use it in conjunction with GoogleMap's route planner, so that you could convert Google's projected route into a TMJ route (even if it was just by manually 'tracing' the blue line Google overlays onto the map)!! I think that would be a very worthy addition to TMJ's (already bursting!) functionality, what do you think?? Chris. | |
ChrisM 11:50 Location: Phone Model: | Thinking about it, you've got some of the functionality there already, with the Geofence page...! | |
Stephen 13:13 Location: Phone Model: | Hi Chris, " Wow, your 'to-do' list must be getting huge!! " Yeah, tell me about it!! Just wish I didn't have to do the day job to pay the mortgage - it getting to the point where I could easily work on TMJ full time! The routing idea is actually one I've had on the back-burner for quite a while now - its definitely something that I'm planning to do, just got to find the time to do it. I'm afraid the Google Maps routing link-up boils down to the licensing issues again, I've already got this kind of working in testing, but I don't think I'll be able to release it unfortunately! :-( Eventually I'm hoping to revamp the mapping on the website (possibly via a Java applet - Javascript is sooo fiddly), which should make it easier to examine tracks/edit routes/create new ones, etc. Just need a spare month or two! Cheers, Stephen | |
ChrisM 14:39 Location: Phone Model: | Been thinking since my last post... You are surely very nearly there already (I think). You already have a webpage that'll let me create a waypoint by clicking on the map. Would it be much more difficult is it to allow me to create a series of points with multiple clicks, join them together with a line and save the result as a track/route rather than a single waypoint?? I'd just like the ability to create a route via the website. The routing thing was just a future development that'd be really cool!! Chris. PS. You never know, maybe one day TMJ will be paying your mortgage...! | |
Stephen 20:49 Location: Phone Model: | Yes, I guess the groundwork is partly done, the problem I anticipate though is that all the extra 'helpful' functions that would be needed would get quite fiddly (eg: editing an existing track, deleting/moving existing points, etc). I'd rather not spend too much time implementing this in Javascript, only to have to redo it properly in Java at a later date. But I must admit you have got me thinking... A *REALLY* simple page (have I highlighted that word enough!!?) - where each click of the map adds a new point, plus a save button, which converts all the points into a track/route (and thats all it will do!) - might be fairly straightforward. But please don't expect it to then allow full track editing, etc!! I'll see what I can do... " PS. You never know, maybe one day TMJ will be paying your mortgage...! " Here's to hoping! | |
ChrisM 8:36 Location: Phone Model: | " A *REALLY* simple page where each click of the map adds a new point, plus a save button, which converts all the points into a track/route (and thats all it will do!) - might be fairly straightforward. But please don't expect it to then allow full track editing, etc!! " That's all I need. Though the 'Full Fat' version would be really cool, the simple version would certainly do the job... The one 'editing' feature that'd be useful in the basic version would be an 'Undo' or 'Delete Last Point' button, just in case you clicked in the wrong place after lovingly spending 20 minutes designing an intricate route... :-/ Regards, Chris. | |
ChrisM 12:11 Location: Phone Model: | Hi Stephen, Somthing like this: http://www.zonums.com/gmaps/digipoint.html Would work for me, until you develop the Java all singing, all dancing version... :-) Cheers, Chris. | |
Stephen 14:33 Location: Phone Model: | How is this page? (You'll need to be logged in to view it) Largely untested as yet... And I know I still need to add an 'insert new point after point xx' option, before you say it...! ;-) Cheers, Stephen | |
ChrisM 16:52 Location: Phone Model: | Wow, you're good!! I only had a quick look, but that seems to be exactly what I had in mind. You can even edit and delete 'mid-route' points. Can't think of any more functionality that I'd need really. Ok, being able to add points in the middle might be useful, but can't really see how much I'd need to be able to do that... Thanks a lot! Chris. | |
ChrisM 8:35 Location: Phone Model: | Stephen, Just to let you know; Used TMJ for navigating 'properly' yesterday. Up until now, I've only really been 'playing', following routes I already know, and just recording Tracks for walks or drives when I already knew where I was going. Went on an 8 mile walk following a Route that I plotted using your new screen. (Although I did also have a written guide to follow), the Route worked absolutely brilliantly, and helped quite a lot where the written guide was a bit ambigous in a couple of places. I was using a 1:25000 OS map loaded into TMJ and the combination was excellent. MUCH better than just having a paper map!! Regards, Chris. | |
Stephen 12:03 Location: Phone Model: | Nice one - glad to hear its been useful, i've used it a few times myself too, its certainly easier to create the route on the website rather than on the phone! | |
ChrisM 12:46 Location: Phone Model: | Something that crossed my mind, yesterday... How tricky would it be to get the webpage to load up a .TMJ map file, and use that as a background to plot the Route? Using a combination of the Google road map, and the aerial photos (for paths that aren't on the map) worked really well, but being able to plot the route directly from an OS map would be brilliant! I'm guessing that this would be difficult to implement, as I assume the current page makes use of the GoogleMaps SDK wheras if you were using your own map as a background, this may not be possible(??) Chris. | |
ChrisM 15:40 Location: Phone Model: | Just bumping this thread up to the top so that I don't lose the link to the 'Create A Route' page... Apologies for any inconvenience caused. Stephen, are you hoping to add this to the website's menu system soon? IMO it's a very useful tool! Regards, Chris. | |
Stephen 18:05 Location: Phone Model: | Hi Chris, " How tricky would it be to get the webpage to load up a .TMJ map file, and use that as a background to plot the Route? " Sorry, forgot to reply to this previously... To be honest I'm afraid this is pretty unlikely, certainly on the website at least. The main problem is the file size of the TMJ file - these can get pretty massive (>100Mb) so wouldn't be ideal for uploading/downloading. I guess it could be done via a Java applet or program (probably a program, as I don't think applets are allowed access to the local hard drive), a bit like the TMJ-MapOrganiser but for editing routes. I don't think its likely to be anytime soon, but it might be something I'll look into in the future... " Just bumping this thread up to the top so that I don't lose the link to the 'Create A Route' page ... are you hoping to add this to the website's menu system soon? IMO it's a very useful tool! " I've been working on a few updates to the website which I'll make live in the next few days - will add this link also. Had to search through the forum myself the other day to find it as well!! Cheers, Stephen | |
ChrisM 8:13 Location: Phone Model: | " I don't think its likely to be anytime soon, but it might be something I'll look into in the future... " Yea, the more I think about that, the more problems I can see, don't blame you for putting that one on the back burners a bit!! :-) " I've been working on a few updates to the website which I'll make live in the next few days - will add this link also. " Excellent! Thanks. Cheers, Chris. | |
Stephen 11:07 Location: Phone Model: | Hi Chris, I've added a link to the Make Route page at the bottom of the Routes folder (and any folder that has the 'Make Available to Mobile' option set). I've kept it fairly discrete for the moment since the Make Route page is still pretty crude, I need to work on it a bit more at some stage... Cheers, Stephen | |
ChrisM 14:17 Location: Phone Model: | Marvellous! I won't mention it to anyone else... :-) Thanks Stephen. Cheers, Chris. | |
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