The word “cyberhobo” is an attempt to invent the kind of web developer I want to be: flexible, enthusiastic, mobile, savvy, unconventional, freedom-loving, honest, and determined to keep things simple. You may be able to benefit from my efforts to become a cyberhobo. If you’re a Geo Mashup user, you already have.
| Specialties | Google Maps (and other AJAX services), WordPress |
|---|---|
| Rate | Project-based, potential discounts for individuals and nonprofits. |
| Contact | cyberhobo@cyberhobo.net |
| Resumé | LinkedIn Profile |
| Support Sample | Geo Mashup Group |
| Documentation Sample | Geo Mashup Documentation |
| Code Sample | Geo Mashup Repository |
Client: Vernal Creative
The locations of Tata’s impressive video teleconferencing rooms are presented on a customized Geo Mashup map, with the both an info window summary for each marker, more information about a selected location in the sidebar, and a list of locations by continent below. The CSS wizards at Vernal managed the stylish info window, and I tricked out a few jQuery video slideshows like the one on the home page.
This site extolling a gypsy jetset lifestyle had a few special Geo Mashup requests for its atlas: custom markers, tabbed info windows, and a user submission form. I decided to do the form using a standard WordPress page template – almost everything needed is already available right there. A little extra help from the cookies for comments plugin helps keep spam away. Now I just need to trot the globe for a few years to find the perfect submission.
This is one of a couple of projects I’ve been working on with Dr. Sorin Matei at Purdue University. The website is related to content in print books, with Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days illustrating the launch. Geo Mashup maps represent locations in the book, which contains print links that can be scanned using a cell phone camera. I did customizations on the maps, and added a radius search to Geo Mashup with a companion plugin that enables radius searches from an Ubimark iPhone application. Fun stuff!
This business directory wanted to combine Geo Mashup’s built-in category filters with a custom slider to filter businesses based on a custom field. This required some additions to Geo Mashup’s javascript API, which will be included in the next (1.4) release. The slider filter has minimal effect at release time, but should become pretty fun to play with as the number of entries grows.
A small Geo Mashup customization for Laini’s Little Pocket Guide adds a link in the info window to Street View where it is available. Street View is loaded over the map, similar to Google’s interface, with a close button up top to return to the map. This is good stuff – some of this code may have to go into future versions of Geo Mashup…
Some time has passed since I worked with WordPressDevelopment.com on this site for athletes using the Trakker GPS system, but I see the site has since gone live. This was a heavy customization involving a modified Geo Mashup 1.2 and ExtInfoWindow library. There are a lot of little visual treats awaiting visitors in the various maps on the site. Other challenges were highly specific templates – the info window in some global maps behaves differently than in similar maps on other pages. I learned some good things that will increase the flexibility of Geo Mashup in the future, although I still don’t have an easy solution to things like visually customized info windows.
People like me who use a GPS unit to track their movements often end up with a GPX file full of incomprehensible data at some point. There are many ways to make sense of the data using maps and graphs, but my favorite so far is Jürgen Berkemeir’s GPX Viewer. Unfortunately, it wasn’t clear how to make good use of it in a WordPress post. To remedy that, and add some US English user features (while preserving the German and metric originals), I worked up a new WordPress plugin. It’s quite simple and lightly tested at this point, but feel free to take it for a spin.
This will be my last release announcement here, for version 1.2.9 of Geo Mashup. If you’re listening here for release announcements, subscribe instead to the project download feed:
http://code.google.com/feeds/p/wordpress-geo-mashup/downloads/basic
The change log will be tracked by version in the Milestone field on the issues page:
http://code.google.com/p/wordpress-geo-mashup/issues/list?can=2&q=milestone=1.2.9
Happy upgrading!
Sometimes quickie projects are the most fun. Vernal had me write the recipe changer for Square Deal Farm’s new website in exchange for maple syrup. Can’t wait to try it!
The crisp design of this wildlife sanctuary and retreat center site is by Free Range Studios. My contribution was to implement some jQuery interactivity, like the expanding footer menu, and a fairly complicated navigation system. No Google maps this time around, but I did work a bit on the fun little sanctuary map. Now I want to visit this place!
