RichardJ's dashboard

RichardJ replied on February 04, 2009 09:37 to the idea "Optimization of Modest Maps for embedded systems" in Modest Maps:

There is a known problem with memory if maps are destroyed, I don't know if this has been fixed in the source you are using. If you search for "memory" on this forum you will find the topic.

RichardJ replied on September 16, 2008 08:07 to the question "Get Marker ID when clicked, flash cs3" in Modest Maps:

What have you tried? Have you attached an event listener to your marker and then stepped through your array to match the marker's ID with the ID of the object in the array?

RichardJ replied on August 21, 2008 08:31 to the discussion "UIComponent markers" in Modest Maps:

Perhaps you could explain why you want a UIComponent rather than a Sprite? If it's because you want to use the layout features in Flex so you can have a complex marker then I would be concerned that the measure and layout phases won't get done on the UIComponent marker if it's added as a child of a Flash object, a Sprite.

An alternative might be that Flex markers are added to the Flex Map (com.modestmaps.flex.map), thus leaving the Flash side (com.modestmaps.map) Flex free? I think this would mean having marker management code in the Flex map to reposition the Flex markers when the map pans, zooms or resizes? But I think this could be implemented outside of the modestmaps too.

RichardJ replied on August 04, 2008 12:40 to the question "my all earlier questions made clear... plz help" in Modest Maps:

To tell if a location is visible or not you could either:

• Use getExtent() for the map and see if your location is in the extent (probably preferred) or


• Get the screen co-ords RELATIVE TO THE MAP (not the polySprite) and compare that to the map's top/left and width/height

RichardJ replied on August 04, 2008 09:19 to the question "my all earlier questions made clear... plz help" in Modest Maps:

If your polySprite is moving when the map is panned then locationPoint should return the same result before and after pan since the location is at the same place relative to the sprite.

When you get a new location from your GPS device then you are panning to it and then using locationPoint for the point, relative to polySprite, of the new location. This should allow polySprite to draw to the new location.

I'm not sure why you need to "stop panning" using the screen co-ordinates, I would have thought just re-centering the map using a location would be sufficient?

RichardJ replied on August 04, 2008 08:02 to the question "my all earlier questions made clear... plz help" in Modest Maps:

Perhaps you could explain what polySprite is, what it is a child of and why you want the x,y co-ordinates (what you are going to do with them)?

RichardJ replied on August 04, 2008 07:41 to the question "my all earlier questions made clear... plz help" in Modest Maps:

I believe the xy co-ordinates returned by locationPoint are relative to the context in the method, the second parameter. If polySprite is moving when the map pans then the x, y values may not change.

Should the context be the map, or the map's parent?

RichardJ replied on July 11, 2008 08:50 to the discussion "Tell Us About Your Experience With Modest Maps" in Modest Maps:

We have used ModestMaps in our AS3 research project, which you can see on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MJ8jK...

The particular advantage of ModestMaps is the ability to use a variety of mapping providers, and this distinguishes it from the Yahoo! and Google components. Many of our customers have existing GIS/map providers so we would need to use theirs, and I can see how this would be possible with ModestMaps.

In terms of improvements, I am using the component in a Flex project and the Flex aspects of the component are less well developed, including the creation policy that I have commented on before. I have had to put in a number of annoying work arounds for this. In future I would be interested in polyline and polygon markers. Knowing about the visibility of markers would be a good thing, there's no built-in way to do this.

As far as I am aware, the code hasn't been updated in some while, despite reports of, and patches for, some serious bugs (I'm thinking of the problem with the clipping/mouse interaction that keeps coming up on the forums, and the memory leak). I wonder whether ModestMaps should be moved to an Open Source Development model? Yes it's already open source but community contributed changes are not included in the source.

RichardJ replied on June 04, 2008 08:00 to the question "How do I take a snapshot of the map image provided through ModestMaps library?" in Modest Maps:

If the map tiles appear to come from the same domain as your Flash application then Flash will allow you to take a bitmap of the map tiles.

RichardJ replied on April 14, 2008 08:02 to the problem "Problems when map at non-zero positions" in Modest Maps:

Have a look at this post for a workaround:

http://getsatisfaction.com/modestmaps...

RichardJ replied on April 07, 2008 08:25 to the problem "Memory leak in MapControls" in Modest Maps:

I have been quite happily using several maps at once generally without problem. With more than one map showing overlapping areas sometimes not all the tiles appear, however I haven't investigated this to try and identify if the problem is to do with the runtime, browser, map service or map component.

RichardJ reported a problem in Modest Maps on April 03, 2008 11:28:

Memory leak in MapControls

There seems to be a memory leak in MapControls and it keeps a reference to the Map this prevents the entire map, and its parent, from being garbage collected.

The problem is with attaching the event listener to the stage in onAddedToStage. By making this use a weak reference the problem is solved.

Changed code, lines 130/1:
if (keyboard) stage.addEventListener(KeyboardEvent.KEY_UP, onStageKeyUp, false, 0, true);
if (fullScreen) stage.addEventListener(FullScreenButton.FULL_SCREEN, onFullScreenEvent, false, 0, true);

Note the extra parameters to the addEventListener call.

RichardJ started a conversation in Modest Maps on March 13, 2008 11:44:

Creation policy

I am struggling to use com.modestmaps.flex.Map in my code because of the current creation policy with respect to its map property. The com.modestmaps.Map object isn't created until drawing (in updateDisplayList()), which means I can't do this code:

var flexMap:Map = new Map(); // com.modestmaps.flex.Map
// configure map here...
addChild(flexMap);
flexMap.map.putMarker(...); // ERROR: flexMap.map is null

Instead I have to wait to add the markers until flexMap's creation complete event, which can be inconvient.

Similary I can't do:
var flexMap:Map = new Map();
// configure map here...
addChild(flexMap);
flexMap.map.addEventListener(MapEvent.PANNED, ...);
for the same reason. And com.modestmaps.flex.Map has no similar event.

It seems the code has changed from creating the map object in the createChildren() override. Is there a workaround to this? What's the reason for the delaying creating the map until drawing?

RichardJ replied on March 04, 2008 09:03 to the problem "MouseOver/Out event raised at unexpected position" in Modest Maps:

This is similar to the problem in this thread: http://getsatisfaction.com/modestmaps..., which also has a possible fix.

RichardJ replied on February 22, 2008 08:59 to the idea "Listing markers" in Modest Maps:

It just seems like a duplication of effort since modest maps has a collection of the markers, and I can query them by name or by display object but not enumerate them or index by position.

Supposing I want to update something else outside the map as markers become visible or invisible? With the MarkerEvents removed I have to enumerate all markers and test. Or if I want to display something based on which markers are currently visible I will probably want to enumerate the markers.

RichardJ shared an idea in Modest Maps on February 06, 2008 10:43:

Listing markers

I would like to list the markers on the map, so that I don't need a separate collection outside the map if I want to enumerate the existing markers. Can you consider adding a method to Map to return an Array of markers?

RichardJ reported a problem in Modest Maps on February 05, 2008 15:20:

MouseOver/Out event raised at unexpected position

The mouseOver and mouseOut events are being raised inside the map rather than at the edge of the map. It appears that the map thinks it is positioned in the top left of the window.

In this example the red square lights on mouseOver and dims with mouseOut. As you move the mouse from left to right through the map the square dims before the edge of the map. This also happens when moving top to bottom. If the map is offset further from (0, 0) then the region where the mouse isn't over enlarges.

This seems to work fine with other Flex objects, is there something missing from my setup of the Map component?

Here is the test code:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<mx:application height="800" width="800">

<mx:script>
<![CDATA[
import com.modestmaps.flex.*;
private function onCreationComplete():void
{
indicator.graphics.beginFill(0xFF0000);
indicator.graphics.drawRoundRect(0, 0, indicator.width, indicator.height, 6);
indicator.graphics.endFill();
}

private function onMouseOut():void
{
indicator.alpha = 0.5;
}

private function onMouseOver():void
{
indicator.alpha = 1.0;
}
]>
</mx:script>
<mx:canvas height="700" width="800">
</mx:canvas><modest:map height="500" width="500">

</modest:map><mx:text>
<mx:canvas height="50" width="50">
</mx:canvas>
</mx:text></mx:application>