Core Google Map API for J2ME - google-maps

I am using http url to show map in J2ME application but it takes more time as it draws image on each refresh. since internet speed is bit slow in GPRS.
Is there any core Google Map API for J2ME??
Is com.jappit.midmaps.googlemaps.GoogleMaps is Authorized Google Map Library for J2ME Application??
Waiting for your reply.
Regards,
Parmanand

No, there is not a core Google Map API for J2ME. No, the Jappit library is not an official authorised product, though it was a good attempt a mapping library based on the technology available at the time.
The reason the update of the map is so slow in the Jappit library, is that the underlying static mapping service behind it is not well suited to refreshing and updating a dynamic map.
Every time the map is shifted or updated, an image the size of the screen is downloaded leading to a large amount of data traffic. A better solution can be found in using a map tile service, implement aggressive image caching and adding overlay objects on top of it. Basically doing everything to avoid downloading more images.
So in summary use a web service like the Static Maps API, if all you need is a single map image. Use a dedicated Java ME mapping library such as the HERE Maps API for Java ME if you want a responsive dynamic map.
As a notice of affiliation, I should mention that I do work for Nokia.

Related

How to track multiple vehicles with Maps API

I'm working on new application in my workplace as described below:
We have tens trucks working for us. I've installed a GPS module on each of them to track their position and store their coordinates in a database.
I need to see their movements in real time on a map (Google Maps, or Bing Maps) but I don't know how to do this.
I don't want code or snippets, I prefer Guidelines and API Docs or framework to build it!
If you have any question ask without problem! Thanks guys
Since you have the data in a database, the first step would be to expose that data to your app. There are a couple of different ways to do this depending on the type of app you want to create, however the most universal solution would be to create a web service that any of your apps can connect to. Here are a couple of good blog post on how to create spatial web services.
http://blogs.bing.com/maps/2013/07/31/how-to-create-a-spatial-web-service-that-connects-a-database-to-bing-maps-using-ef5
http://blogs.bing.com/maps/2013/08/05/advance-spatial-queries-using-entity-framework-5
Once you have a web service you can then create the app that will display the truck locations. You have a lot of options here; web, mobile, desktop (WPF, Windows app), cross platform. Web apps tend to be the most common as they can be accessed from the most locations. Connecting to a REST service from JavaScript is fairly easy. There is a number of different ways to load in real time data. The easiest is to use a timer that calls your web service regularly and grabs all truck locations. A slightly more complex option, but more efficient is to timestamp the last update of each location and then keep track of the last timestamp used to request an update. By doing this you can limit your request to only retrieve updates that have occurred since the last request. This would significantly reduce your bandwidth and make your app faster. Displaying the actual truck location on a map is easy. Your web service will return the location information, likely as either two number properties (i.e. latitude/longitude) or as a well known text string (simply parse this as shown in the previous blog posts). If using Bing Maps and you have two number properties, you can create a pushpin and add it to the map like this:
var loc = new Microsoft.Maps.Location(latitude,longitude);
var pin = new Microsoft.Maps.Pushpin(loc);
map.entities.push(loc);
Here are some useful resources around developing with Bing Maps:
https://www.bingmapsportal.com/ISDK/AjaxV7
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd877180.aspx
Note, if you use Bing or Google maps (or just about any other major mapping platform), they require all asset tracking applications to have a license to use the maps. If you use Bing Maps, you can find details on licensing here: https://www.microsoft.com/maps/licensing/licensing.aspx#mainTab4

Esri Feature Services and Google Maps API v3

Is it possible to overlay an Esri Feature service onto a Google Map using the Google Maps API?
I am using feature services hosted on ArcGIS Online. Keep in mind these are feature services, not tiled map services.
From all that I've gathered, Google Maps only appears to only support tiled map rest services. Is this correct? Has anyone had success overlaying feature services?
If you've made it this far I'll give you a little background. Our systems developer has produced numerous applications using the Google Maps API, so it would be a burden at this point to rewrite everything in OpenLayers, ESRI API, Leaflet, etc. He wants to be able to consume our ArcGIS Online mapping services, which we store as features, aka. WFS. We really do not want to go the route of having to upkeep additional versions (tiles, KML, geoJSON, etc) of the same layers. I've been experimenting with on-the-fly Esri JSON to GeoJSON conversions, but I haven't had success. I'm about ready to call it and rebuild everything with the Esri API, but I figured I'd ask first. Our staff is really in love with Google Maps so it's going to be a hard sell.
Thanks
Yes, it's possible with ArcGIS Server Link for Google Maps JavaScript API V3
https://github.com/googlemaps/v3-utility-library/tree/master/arcgislink
You can retrieve both geometries and attributes from AGS through the REST API, using the Feature Class.
Alternatively, you can implement a Geometry Service on the server side and access it through GeometryService Class.
Check arcgislink documentation:
https://htmlpreview.github.io/?https://github.com/googlemaps/v3-utility-library/blob/master/arcgislink/docs/reference.html
It is viable, but it may have performance issue.
You can make a call to the feature service endpoint and get all the features back as JSON response. As Esri GeoJSON is different from the common one, you need to translate the JSON response to the standard GeoJSON format, and then add to the feature collection in google maps Data Layer and apply styles.
This works if you have simple datasets. However if it is complex large polygon datasets, it will be causing network traffic when making the call. Also Google maps data layer always have performance issue when dealing with large dataset.
I recommend to use dojo/esri js API to develop the app if the data is hosted with ArcGIS server. It just doesn't make sense to buy both licenses for visualization.
Another option is to enable your ArcGIS online data to serve WMS layer too. Through that way your developer can use google maps overlay layer to overlay tiles from ArcGIS online. You can also make standard XMl request to the WMS service to get feature information.
Ok. You can convert to GeoJSON, but you're right, there's some big performance issues.
I found the easiest solution to the problem was to rewrite all our Google Maps API using ESRI Leaflet.
https://esri.github.io/esri-leaflet/
Leaflet is much easier to implement than the standard ESRI API. Didn't take long to rewrite and have the same functionality.

How to create a floormap using google maps api

Im working on a project to create a google map of an internal floorplan of my company's buildings. I dont want to use google's new indoor maps features as we dont want the floorplans available to the public. I was wanting to create an entirely custom map and just use the google maps engine and strip away the traditional world map tileset. Is this possible and how would I go about do it? Currently our floorplans are in an image file so a way to import those easily would be ideal.
I faced this problem creating an app last summer. It does not look like Google Maps (at least at that time) allowed for custom map tiles. I ended up implementing my own Map function, however I used XML files to create colored maps. The functionality would be the same if you wanted to use images, however.
The only drawback is that the features do not have such things that are built in with Google Maps, like dropped pins, etc. due to the fact that it is a custom built module. The repo is on GitHub here: https://github.com/krmannix/SmartMart
The Android Activity that holds the map is located within SmartMart/SmartMart/src/com/example/searchcell3/MapListActivity.java

how to access the google map API dynamically in j2me

I have to include the google map API in j2me application. I want to change the route and change the center position dynamically. I have searched a lot. Now I am using google static map API but it shows the image statically. I want to show the map dynamically.
Using javascript API v3 shall I implement google map API in j2me. But one of forums I have found we can't use javascript API in j2me application. Please Give clear idea about this why we can't implement in j2me.
I haven't taken a deeper look, but I found these two links when searching Google.
http://www.developer.nokia.com/Community/Wiki/Archived:Google_Static_Maps_API_in_Java_ME
http://www.jappit.com/blog/midmaps-google-maps-java-me-library/
Whereas it is technically possible to use a static mapping API to display an map in Java ME, If you want to dynamically update the map, you would be much better off using a library which uses a tile server, caches your map tiles and overlays objects on top of it.
This should result in a much lower data traffic overhead as explained here. Only use a Map Image API if all you need is a single map image.
The dynamic mapping library I would suggest is Nokia's HERE Maps API for Java ME, as you can tell from the name, the API is specifically designed to work with Java ME devices.
The API is currently bundled with the Nokia Asha SDK 1.0, but despite this, it is in reality a separate independent plugin and has been designed to work with the full range of standard Java ME devices.
A similar Stack Overflow question answered here describes how to download it.
As a notice of affiliation, I should mention in passing that I do work for Nokia.

For Developing Location based reminder mobile app, which one is good..... Google Maps or Nokia maps

I am developing GPS based Location reminder in j2me. I am little bit confuse to which maps i use??.....Google maps & Nokia maps. Which one allows me good working... The working of my app are as follows :-
-User will provide a string to app to search a place of his/her desire.
-Then according to given string app will show a place on map by pointing marker on map.
-User can save that place or he/she can select a near by place rather than searched place by clicking on map or any other way.
-app will save that searched place coordinates & remind when it reached to near that place.
-When app remind to user about already stored place... that place should show on map by pointing an marker along with the how far he is from his destination.
The real choice here lies in whether to use a RESTful API like the Google Static Maps (or Nokia's RESTful Maps) or to use a native Java ME mapping library plugin such as the Nokia Maps API for Java ME. The latter has several major advantages:
Static mapping services such as the Google Static Maps API or Nokia's
RESTful Map API do not cache or tile the images when requested,
therefore each request involves a round trip to the server. If the
map on a mobile application needs to be refreshed at any time, using
a caching library will result in a reduction in network traffic after
around three maps have been displayed. An explanation of this can be
found here
As the name implies, Google's Static Maps API can only retrieve over
http static images for a requested coordinate point, image size,
image type and zoom level. Newer libraries offer additional
functionality out of the box offering dynamic Map content and touch
support, where the user can move around his/her current position,
zoom in, zoom out, modify the view mode to satellite or translate an
address to a coordinate point and show that on the map, among others.
This abstraction of the underlying functionality is hidden from the
developer so much less coding is needed in order to achieve the same
result .
Terms and Conditions for Nokia Maps are easier to fulfil than
Google - No legal restrictions of using the API outside a web browser
application or need to provide a link to the native Google Maps App
(if there is one), or to Google Maps (if there isn't one).
Nokia currently offer higher free daily request limits. Nokia Maps
API for Java ME supports up to 50,000 render requests per day and per
unique IP address (as of January 2012), for Nokia Developer
registered users (free of charge) while the limit for Google's Static
Maps API is currently 1000 unique (different) image requests per
viewer per day.
A couple of years ago there wouldn't be a choice, only RESTful solutions existed, but these days I would say a static http solution should only be used if you want a simple single image
As an abstraction of the underlying services, there are already a full set of examples to cover most of your use cases:
-User will provide a string to app to search a place of his/her desire.
-Then according to given string app will show a place on map by pointing marker on map.
http://www.developer.nokia.com/Commu...PI_for_Java_ME
-User can save that place or he/she can select a near by place rather than searched place by clicking on map or any other way.
Maybe you need to use a draggable marker:
http://www.developer.nokia.com/Devel...ples/#standard
Or react to the touch and find a Geocoordinate:
http://www.developer.nokia.com/Commu...PI_for_Java_ME
-app will save that searched place coordinates & remind when it reached to near that place.
This is known as geofencing and is covered by the Location API:
- http://www.developer.nokia.com/Resou...ty-events.html
-When app remind to user about already stored place... that place should show on map by pointing an marker along with the how far he is
from his destination.
Showing a Map with a Marker
http://www.developer.nokia.com/Devel...ples/#standard
For distance calculations, I guess you'd be after the ROUTING example
http://www.developer.nokia.com/Devel...mples/#routing
http://www.developer.nokia.com/Commu...g_with_Java_ME
Now you could re-write and all these services from scratch using RESTful APIs (and then go about debugging your code) , but I'm sure you'll agree it would be much easier to use an existing, working and tested framework for the low level plumbing and then just write your code on top using the services.
It is possible to encapsulate RESTful service in Java ME. As an example, added below is a screenshot from an app encapsulating the suggestion service
It is just a lot easier when someone else has already done this work for you and placed it in a library.