More Open-Source Goodies for Flash API Developers: DragZoomControl, MarkerTracker
January 26th, 2009 | Published in Google Maps
You know what's awesome about open-source code written in one language? It's fairly easy to port it over to a similar language, and suddenly it's useful for a completely new audience. That's what's happening in our open-source JavaScript/AS3 Maps API utility libraries, and I'm loving it. Check out the most recent ports:
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DragZoomControl: This custom control lets user drag a rectangle on the map to zoom in to just that area, and it's one of my personal favorite ways of drilling down on a map (particularly since I'm usually on a laptop, without a scroll-wheel mouse). The port comes courtesy of developer Brian Richardson. Check out the demo or the reference. |
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MarkerTracker: This class lets you assign "trackers" to markers, so that when a marker moves out of the visible viewport, a ghost marker and arrow points in the direction of the tracked marker. For maps where there's one very important marker/POI, it's a great way of showing the user how to get back to the original marker. This port comes courtesy of developer Michael Menzel. Check out the demo or reference. |
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KMLParser: The KML parsing classes, which were a minimal port of the C++ libkml library, now have support for KML styles. This enhancement comes from developer Cecil Reid. Check out the demo or reference. |
Thanks to all the developers helping to grow the library! If you're a developer with some code to contribute, just follow the steps in the wiki to get involved.