I am looking to create a WebAR app which recognizes custom image markers and show content augmented on top of them, have looked in to "blippar" and "zappar" both of which are a no go because of pricing.
8th Wall and amazon sumerian combo seems the best solution forward, but since 8th wall has multiple solutions for platforms. none of the documentation is satisfying enough to clarify if what i want to achieve is possible using it for the web.
Finally, After actually developing the application using 8th Wall and sumerian, Here is my answer to the feasibility of this option-
Yes, 8thWall provides proper marker based WebAR solution for amazon sumerian, They have a very active slack channel which you should join, It contains code snippets to primary issues faced by users in the chat history.
Related
I am new to app making, but I have a small tech review site that I am trying to grow and I want to make an app for. Its pretty simple what I am setting up. To start, I am using MySQL to have three basic things. The review's picture, the title, and the review itself. The idea of this is so I can have other users log in to write reviews and it can load easily on an app, the website, etc... The most trouble I am having is in Xcode trying to make an app for this. I want two basic screens. A list of all the reviews with the picture on the left, and the title, and when you click on it, it takes you to the second screen displaying the review itself. Does that make sense?
(I am using Xcode 5 on Mac OS X 10.9. This App is intended for iOS)
-Thank You!
*Moderators, I apologize if this is a duplicate question, I have searched and have not found an answer.
If I understand correctly what is your asking then you probably need to rephrase the question and edit the tags. Because it has nothing to do with xcode5, mysql, uitableview or even iOS.
Before you start designing your iOS app, you need to think the overall architecture for your service. The client iOS app shouldn't (and usually can't) communicate directly with a database server (mysql in your case), you need to think about a server side API layer for your iOS app to consume.
You need to outline your web API and decide what is its interface (entry points, resources, data structures), take a look at REST architecture, for example. Decide on your data exchange format (e.g. JSON, XML). Then decide what platform and framework you want to create your API layer with (e.g. PHP, Python, Ruby on Rails, Asp.net etc).
Your iOS app itself sounds like a simple classic Master-Detail pattern and what you wrote is a good start (Google for master detail examples, plenty of them for iOS as well). Your question is too broad here, you need to be more specific in order for people to be able to help you with the app itself.
Currently I have an openlayers web page which querys a tilelite server serving up mapnik tiles with various shapefiles (rivers, lakes, fire boundaries, time zones, nat forests, BLM land, tv reception contours ...) added through layers-shapefiles.xml.inc.
Soon I will be traveling extensively around the western US. I'm looking for a system that can generate tiles locally so I don't use up my data usage (my current setup works well for this), but has a little more capability when it comes to querying shapefile data. My current setup is pretty limited when it comes to this. I can turn on and off shapes and names depending on the zoom level but I'm looking for something that might let me query individual shapes and present the cooresponding data (from the shapefile db) in say a popup window or slide out frame. I'm OK with constructing the popup or slideout frame if needed.
I'm thinking of installing mapserver and seeing what it can do, and I will probably do that today, but I just thought I would ask if anyone might help steer me toward a tool with the capabilities I'm looking for.
Update:
I've taken a day to familiarize myself with mapserver. I can turn on and off layers, which I couldn't do with mapnik tiles served up by tilelite and screened by openlayers. However, I couldn't find any examples of people doing what I previously described which was querying an individual shape and getting the attributes for that shape from the shapefile attribute table and presenting it somehow on the web page via balloon, popout... Is what I'm asking possible yet?
Thats possibl. Check here
http://openlayers.org/dev/examples/getfeatureinfo-control.html
http://demo.mapserver.org/tutorial/section3.html
Can anyone give me some basic directions to keep me going?
My general requirements for this application
country street map (ok)
Six different categories of PINS for volunteers to use eg Lost, Found, Alert etc (no idea how to provide that
Pin category filter to show on the map
permanent pins and non permanent
it will also be linked to website
Are there any tutorials or advice you can provide to help get me going on this project?
I would check out appcelerator.com it's mobile development product titanium I think has everything your looking for. Maps are quite easy to do in it and the pins your talking about are called annotations in the API you are able to specify images for them, this could be how you categorise them by showing a diff color or image all together, then by using an SQLite db in ur app you can make a list of them and pull out which ever ones you need.
I wanna start developing a map-based web site.
At first I ordered a regulat Gps device just to test the site, later on I would like to use Iphone's gps and other cell devices.
So I need something pretty generic.
I searched the web for map-based development framework and come up with too many of them :
Geo server, Map server, Open layers, Geoext , Google maps's api , and more.
I'm not a seasoned web developr (more of a c++ kind of guy) so I need something pretty straightforward , though robust at the same time.
Moreover, I need one which is free, and won't have licensing problem down the road.
At first I just need basic capabilities as displaying the gps data on my web site in real-time.
Can someone experienced recommend one ?
Thanks
Client
I'd go with OpenLayers - this is an opensource JavaScript client library, similar to the Google Maps API, or Bing API. However OpenLayers will free you of any licensing worries, or changing APIs as the source is available and can be modified - this is not the case with the Google/Bing/Yahoo APIs. You can however use the data from these services as layers in OpenLayers and drop them if they suddenly become filled with adverts or have commercial restrictions.
Have a look at examples to see if there is one you can use to make your first test application - http://openlayers.org/dev/examples/
GeoExtJS is a collection of extra tools and widgets that work with OpenLayers, built on top of another JavaScript framework ExtJS - also open source. ExtJS is mainly used for building user interfaces - data entry forms, grids etc. using JavaScript, to display in the browser.
If you are looking for tree structures to switch layers on and off and other more advanced UI widgets then GeoExtJS is worth looking into.
Server
If you are only displaying points then you can create dynamic KML or GeoJSON on your web server and reference this in OpenLayers. There are libraries in all languages that you can build on. Python has become a key languages in geospatial technologies, and has GeoJSON libraries you could script with.
GeoServer and MapServer are both server-side programs that allow you to serve out spatial data from databases with symbology, labelling etc. If you are having lots of different datasets then its worth spending time setting this up.
MapServer is written in C++ so it is probably easier for you to try this - however you may be able to get away without needing any specialist server side software, especially if your data consists of X,Y / Lon,Lat values that can be easily plotted as points.
For the beginning (you said that you need to show gps position in a real time) I think that Google Maps are good option here. This solution has very simple API and community support is also an advantage here (I've never compared with something else but I have good experince with GMaps and its tutorials/resources). This is for the client side, for server side any web framework should do the work (I use Django and it also have dupport for some geo things - mentioned later in this answer).
You need probably to build application that follows this rules:
Your GPS device sends data to your server(web application) periodically, data is stored in a db.
Users use browser to display data with map (eg. Google Map) which updates position periodicaly on some scheduled interval (eg. ajax calls to the server for the most current position). Each time response is recieved map need to be updated.
I don't know if there are more specialized solutions for this case.
If you need to improve your application and add some features you need to consider some more sophisticated geo frameworks. I have heard some positive opinions on GeoDjango, mainly because it can be easily incorporated with Django(which is very easy web framework to learn and it has a lot of capabilities).
All technologies I mentioned here are free.
I can recommend using the Google Maps API to render your maps in a browser. You can find my reasons in this answer.
The current version of the API has support for getting geo-location information for mobile devices.
I use Bing Maps for mobile. Mainly because its fast, and provides much better looking maps, 3d models, and satellite views for the UK than Google maps does.
I have also had issues with Google changing their service to provide some enhancements and it breaking my app, where at least with the Bing API theres a bit more compatability considered for existing apps. Not that I dont like the Google maps, I do. Its a backup service for me..
I generate maps from both providers, Bing as the primary, Goole secondary... this means that if ones offline of not working, which happens, my users still get to use my app.
Heres a link to Bing Maps Dev on a WIndows Phone for example
I'd take a look at Cloudmade. They have a number of API's, free options, paid options and use OpenStreetMap which for many places is one of the most accurate mapping solutions out there.
free , open source:
www.openstreetmap.org,
u can build ur own server as well using the same technolgogy:
http://weait.com/content/build-your-own-openstreetmap-server
API: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OpenLayers
Although its still in draft form, HTML5 will be supporting Geolocation API. Most major browsers and hand held devices should be supporting it in the near future and should make life a lot easier for developers who want a service independent solution. You would however still need a mapping service like google maps if you need to display locations.
function showMap(position) {
// Show a map centered at (position.coords.latitude, position.coords.longitude)
}
// One-shot position request.
navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition(showMap);
EDIT:
Its already supported in several major browsers:
Mozilla Firefox: supported in Firefox
3.5 and later versions.
Chrome: Supports thru Google Gears
Geolocation API
Opera: Supported in
nightly builds
Safari: Support is
coming soon in the IPhone’s Safari
browser.
Internet Explorer:
experimental support available from
IE8.
I want to create an application where users can mark on map location of polluting factories. Google map provides a MAP editor feature. We would like to have our own website like www.toxic-map.org where people could mark these locations. What would be the best approach for this?
Additionally we should be able to backup this database which could be cross checked or used for other purposes.
This will enable us to have little accurate census of such entities and thereby helping us in the fight against these environment harming, illegal factories. Most of our work is focused on developing countries of Asia.
Edited: Google maps is one of the options. I am open to other possible solutions as well. I am looking at something we could do quick prototyping in.
Thank you in advance!!
On the client side, I recommend you to have a look at OpenLayers, a free and open source web mapping framework released under a BSD-style License. It is completely written in Javascript and offers a lot of functionality, including the features that your application may need (Add markers to the map, drag them to adjust the locations, ...).
It also supports dozens of different geographic data formats and services such as WMS, KML or Google Maps.
If you are worried about licensing issues regarding the use of Google Maps, you can use other global data sources like OpenStreetMap or a public WMS if they provide enough coverage of your area of interest.
On the server side, I agree with the answer provided by Daniel Vassallo. I will just add a little detail and recommend you to serve the markers in a standard format natively supported by OpenLayers like KML, GeoJSON or GeoRSS. It will make really easy to draw the markers on the map.
Looks like a really interesting project, I hope you are lucky starting it up.
I seem to remember that there are restrictions to what you can do with the coordinates if you enter them through Google's interface, but if that doesn't bother you then sure, Google might be the way to go. (It may just pertain to geometrical figures entered into Google Earth or something like that.)
Google seems to be in line with your ideology anyway, as they're doing a lot of green power development. Might even be a selling point.
But if you can input the data separately and have Google Maps just display it for you then I wouldn't think they could hold claim to the data.
I think your best bet is to use the Google Maps API instead of the map editor in My Maps.
With some basic JavaScript, you will be able to allow users to drop markers on the polluted locations they would want to tag.
You will need a database on the server-side, and a thin application layer that:
Accepts and validates new markers added by users.
Serves the markers from the database to the browser.
You may want to use AJAX to interact between the browser and the application layer.
I think this type of project would be an excellent candidate to be hosted on the Google App Engine. You will be able to leverage on the simplicity of the webapp framework, and the Google Datastore appears to fit well.
As a side-note, you might be interested in checking out the Heat Map API for Google Maps. I think heat maps would look good in a project like this.
The approach is this:
1. User can drag the marker to the location of toxic factory.
2. A simple form opens to enter details of the toxic factory.
3. The latitude, logitude and other datails are then saved in database.
Please refer www.loppee.com They have a similar solution where user can mark the location of people or places of interest. Loppee uses LeafletJS javascript framework. It is a simple framework. You would be able to develop quick prototype. LeafletJS.com has simple and easy to use code samples.
Additionally, you can enable Geolocation and IP triangulation. Refer: Longitude and latitude value from IP address