GFY programmers - I need your help
 

I want to overlay a heatmap onto a google/yahoo any world map. It doesn't have to be resizable.

I've spent the last weeks hard on this, and found some great OS solutions, the best being in flex (that I don't know) and in python (requires fuck off server installs that I don't even want to try)

I thought this would be simple at the start (how naïve :winkwink: ), but it's a big deal! I've seen a frikken beautiful heatmap from a guy that is mapping all internet traffic, but that is waaaay overkill.

Basically, I have this free geolocation thing going on that is serving some 2million+ per day lookups, and I want a heatmap of all those lookups (ie daily refresh of the map, live would be too much to ask) to show on the homepage where all the lookups are for (eg a world map, not country etc) - all data is available in mysql as lat/long points and at a push country code and can be presented in any format required.

I tried it initially with georss or kml with google/yahoo points and fuck did it grind the browser to a halt with ~1000 points. Like I said, naive :winkwink:

A heatmap overlay with these web api maps is quite poss - I've got heatmapsapi working, but that's an offsite thing, and it's limited to 100 points per overlay, some few hundred thousand short of what I need.

There are great brains on this board - help a fellow programmer out with this solution for a free service. If you want paying though, I'm willing, cos I've gotten this heatmap bullet between the teeth now, but free help to help the service is always welcome :winkwink:

Thanks for looking

Stop trying to rewrite the bible... google analytics and be done.

analytics doesn't work for a webservice

Just map long/lat to x/y on an image of a map? Which part is tricky?

Not sure why you think Python requires 'fuck off' server installs? I'd go the Python route personally, it's an excellent albeit underused language that deserves more exposure anyways :winkwink:

I don't know what your servers are, but just use yum, apt-get or your fave package manager to install whatever python stuff you need in few seconds and be done with it.

I know a programmer who can do it with flex and yahoo maps api, but he does not work for free. Also, there are limits to the yahoo api on the amount of requests for free service. If you are interested I can try to hook you up with the programmer

At first, I kinda discounted your post, cos it's not points I need, but heatmap. But then on reflection, it's ideal as I can then use the clickheat php class to generate the heatmap. Convert the coordinates into x/y then it's just like generating a heatmap from clicks on a web page. Cheers :thumbsup

Now I just need to search around for how to convert lat/long to x/y, cos you've got to take into account the curvature of the earth. Damn maths *again* :Oh crap

Think I'll have a bash at this when my head is clearer and kids aren't running around like nutters.

Happy Christmas

Mister Fiddy to the rescue!

You writing this to go along with your Geo services? If so, let me know when it's ready and I'll just rip out the geo shit I have in my cms, and just incorporate yours.

Hey Josh,

It wasn't the plan initially - what I want it for is to show on the homepage where all the lookups are for. Rather than showing a number of lookups executed, show a heatmap.

What were you wanting precisely? The analytics statistics that comes with registered users already has a basic heatmap per country to show where visitors are from. I could swap that out for a more accurate heatmap if I get this sorted out, but it would be for the signup service (ie statistics) - still free though.

Thanks for the support :thumbsup

I love this geo stuff, have done since I launched one of the first aff-geo ads for the masses (one of my very first posts on gfy).

What has kept me going with it is the feedback I've had from people - some people are using it for stuff I would never have thought of - mailing lists where the receipient receives ads from eg amazon and better ebay based on their locality, whale watching where they tie in some university api on tracking whales, to inform people when is the best time to go whale watching in their area - imagination is the key.