Anyone know of any good (free) software for making a course map?

I have made a couple for Mackenzie Park in Lubbock, Texas. I used JASC Paint Pro and Adobe Photoshop- neither are specific to map making, but they worked for me. The first one I did was all freehand, very time consuming, and I always wanted to tweak it some...Then I got my hands on a black and white aerial map of the course, and I just overlayed color and marked waters and ob lines...It was much easier and true to scale.
In the newest DGWN (i think, maybe 2nd to newest)there is a section on disc golf art, and there are some really great maps in there. These look to be top-notch professionally done maps, where mine have that really cool and hip "ametuer" feel to them. :D:cool:

The other benefit of using Paint Shop or Photoshop is the ability to draw the course maps in layers. This allows you to trace out the terrain features in the upper layers and drop the aerial map when you have to print the map in greyscale and still have the scale correct.

It's not free but I use Topo USA from Delorme to get the basic topo map. I copy this into PowerPoint to do the drawing which I find easier than Paint Shop Pro. Then, I copy this into Paint Shop Pro to save as a JPG in resolutions for web and for printing. PPT only has one low JPG resolution so Paint Shop is better in this regard. You can see several example maps of this process on the Disc Golf link at: www.highbridgehillssc.com (http://www.highbridgehillssc.com)

Anyone know of any good (free) software for making a course map?

GIMP (http://www.gimp.org/). It's fast, it's flexible, it's <font color="red">FREE</font>: it's what Photoshop� wants to be when it grows up, and it even does Windows (http://www.gimp.org/windows/)!

-----
Do you GNU (http://www.gnu.org)?

Thank you folks for your input. I guess now all i have to do is get my hands on a good topo. :cool:

Here's a good way to start, get an aerial photo of your course:

http://www.terraserver.com/search/search.asp

I got mine but the photo was taken in 2002 right before I started cutting fairways so all I see is woods. Just a solid swath of green. Can't wait for the update so I can see fairways from the sky.

By far the best way to make a course map is by getting a GPS device. It costs $200 at Walmart, use it to get lattitudes and elevations and stuff, and then return it to Walmart.

Anyone know of any good (free) software for making a course map?



Go to www.globexplorer.com (http://www.globexplorer.com) it has their logo in the photos but they're free. If you go to paint you can edit the logo out. :cool:

Don't know how many of you have seen Google Maps. Here is a version of it for the Houston area.

DGHOU - Houston Course directory (http://www.dghou.com/maps/dghou_courses.html)

With the recent release of the new API's for maps, it is even easier to create a course directory that is interactive. The PDGA should look into coding the nation wide course directory into the Google Maps interface.

I try and check-out the highest resolution, if possible; to many instances of underpass becoming an overpass, a cul-de-sac where a through street was previously indicated, etc.

...the 'drag' method of centering is quite cool! :cool:

Go get google earth already! Geez people, all you got to do is ask. I am not going to steer you wrong. Now get off your bum and go get it! You will be glad you did.

The PDGA should look into coding the nation wide course directory into the Google Maps interface.




Google maps are SAWEET your idea is probably the best I heard on this board in awile!

Can't see it on my Mac......

I was working with Temple and started putting a course map together for them. Take the arial view and just overlay the course on the image. Its that easy. Go check it out already. I was identifying cars in the friggin parking lot of the course.

Go get google earth already! Geez people, all you got to do is ask. I am not going to steer you wrong. Now get off your bum and go get it! You will be glad you did.



This is quite cool, but be aware that it's only as good as the resolution of the satellite images available for your area of the world. I can see cars in parking lots at some course locations I put in (La Mirada, Ann Morrison), but others are quite fuzzy at the same altitude view. You *can* zoom out, but then your detail is not as good.

With the GPS coordinates available on the PDGA Directory, you could input those for any course and get a nice aerial view. Also, if you put in a street address, sometimes you get a dead-on hit, but other times it gets you in the neighborhood, but you can edit the spot and get it right on, if you recognize the features.

Thanks for the tip, grunion.

After you zoom it should clear back up after it streams the new resolution. If not, well I think its the best I have found yet. Oh, your welcome people.

Can't see it on my Mac......



If the page is blank it may be the browser. I built the page on my Mac so its not the platform.
Are you able to see the regular Google Maps (http://www.google.com/maps)?
If the Maps there won't load, it will at least tell you what browser you should be using.

If Microsoft Terraserver has higher resolution but less coverage. They don't always have the spot you want. In Houston you can zoom in closer than with Google.

Can't see it on my Mac......



If the page is blank it may be the browser. I built the page on my Mac so its not the platform.
Are you able to see the regular Google Maps (http://www.google.com/maps)?
If the Maps there won't load, it will at least tell you what browser you should be using.



It says right on the first page of Google Earth that it is not available for the Mac platform yet, but they are working on it.

It says right on the first page of Google Earth that it is not available for the Mac platform yet, but they are working on it.



Wasn't talking about Google Earth. I was talking about not being able to see this page:

Disc Golf Houston Course Directory (http://www.dghou.com/maps/dghou_courses.html)

Just like Google Maps, it won't load on older browsers.

I am familiar with Terraserver as we use it at my work. Google just has the newest and accurate services from what I can tell from all the free services.

The PDGA should look into coding the nation wide course directory into the Google Maps interface.




Google maps are SAWEET your idea is probably the best I heard on this board in awile!

we are looking into it - this week as a matter of fact. i hope to report back to theo, cliff and rodney this weekend as to the feasability of laying the lat/lon values we have onto the google map interface.

on a related note, i just got a garmin handheld GPS, and used it at lunch to grab tee and pin locations at the local rec nine-holer. i grabbed two readings as i played the course twice, and averaged them. the units reported accuracy was +/- 10 feet average, so i got some excellent marks. in addition to the pdga directorywork, i am looking at plotting tee and pin points onto google maps. this will only get better as google delivers better resolution. Keyhole offered a higher resolution product before it was acquired by google, so hopefully the G-men have plans to launch a hi-res product soon.

We are designing our own GPS system that incorporates the google maps. Maybe we could offer some assistance if you get stuck in a rut.

Depends on the location. Google has the best user interface by far. Terraserver and the USGS have higher resolution for free but only in the big cities. Best thing is USGS is downloadable in large chunks and geo-referenced.

I like this guy! :cool:

Google Earth is awesome!

I did a great map yesterday in no time. If I knew how to post the map on here I would. I think it looks great.

Thanks for the information GrunioN. This was among the most useful information I have seen on this board.

Brian

host the file at one of these sites to get it linked here:

Eagle Image (http://www.eagleimg.com)

Image Host (http://www.imghost.com)

or email it to me and I will do it for you
[email protected]

http://www.centxdglove.com/imageupload.html

Lets not forget this location to. :D

Google Earth is awesome!

I did a great map yesterday in no time. If I knew how to post the map on here I would. I think it looks great.

Thanks for the information GrunioN. This was among the most useful information I have seen on this board.

Brian



Thank you very much Brian! Let me know if you would like anymore help as I live to educate.

Thanks guys but Sandalman has the image now and will post it soon.

Brian

whats up shoeless one? ;)

as requested, here is the map.

And i think it looks great, by the way!

http://2.eagleimg.com/6/00490.gif

yo all,

here is a live, geo-referenced course map of willow creek park in saginaw, texas (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/googletest.html)

yes, i know its a lameass course, but its the closest one to my office. i am working on a better basket icon - this one doesnt show up too well on the satellite imagery.

major props out to rodney for helping on a couple of technical issues on this. he also has a sweet demo amp that shows how we can paint turns in the fairway and add images to the popup info boxes.

i will be gps'ing audoban and veterans in the very near future and will post demo pages for those courses soon.

look for some of these features to come to the pdga course directroy very soon.

awesome. this would be very useful!!

http://www.centxdglove.com/imageupload.html

Lets not forget this location to. :D

And thanks again jsims. :cool:

Are you guys saving an image/file, or tracing over one, or what? An answer in plain English would be appreciated. :confused:

in my version, it is built on the fly by the webserver. google graciouslly allows us to access their map and satellite imagery, which forms the background. then some code we write creates the overlays that shows the tee and pin locations and information popups.

doing it on-the-fly will permit us to create maps of an infinite number of courses... all we need is the latitude and longitude for the tees and pins. the pdga course directory has quite a few courses with tee 1 already located that way.

i believe brian's pic is handmade. it is pretty, but that approach is not efficient for large quantities of courses

yo all,

here is a live, geo-referenced course map of willow creek park in saginaw, texas (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/googletest.html)

yes, i know its a lameass course, but its the closest one to my office. i am working on a better basket icon - this one doesnt show up too well on the satellite imagery.

major props out to rodney for helping on a couple of technical issues on this. he also has a sweet demo amp that shows how we can paint turns in the fairway and add images to the popup info boxes.

i will be gps'ing audoban and veterans in the very near future and will post demo pages for those courses soon.

look for some of these features to come to the pdga course directroy very soon.



<font color="red"> This is by far the best example of a course map I have ever seen! Nice work!</font> Once you get the kinks worked out, I would love it if you would share the method to you sweet madness so the rest of us webheads could follow suit.

Here is a basket icon you can use if you like. Re-size to your liking.
http://www.centxdglove.com/basket.psd

Is webserver.google a program, then?

I hope that magic knowlege gets dribbled down to those of us mere EEdiots...eventually. :)

"webserver" means my own webserver.

"google" (of google.com search engine fame) has a mapping webserver at maps.google.com. it is still "beta" (unreleased) but it is so good that programmers all over have been hacking the code. so many in fact, that google finally said "OK you win", and they published a guide on how to use their maps.

so my webserver gets the maps from google. i send google the latitude and longitude, and they send back the map for that area. then my webserver sends the tee and pin latitude/longitude information, and google "paints" the tees and pins on top of their map.

the confusing thing is that while google is doing a lot of the work, its all happening on MY webserver! very nice of google to allow this.

anyway, i am storing the latitude and longitude information in a database that is located at the same place as my webserver. so, you can select a course from my database, and the database will find all the lat/long data, and send it to my webserver, which then talks back and forth with the google server to build the course map.

the url i posted previously is for a STATIC map - meaning that my database is NOT involved.

tonight i did a bunch of work with the database, and am happy to report that i now am able to serve database created disc golf course maps!

go here for an example of a database generated course map (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/coursemap.php?playerid=10)

IMPORTANT: for now you MUST choose Willow Creek Park in Saginaw, TX! thats the only xourse i have lat/long data for so far.

ALSO: where it says "which layout", you MUST select "Use a Stored Layout"

THEN: it will ask you which layout... choose "Standard 9"

the resulting map is created using data from the database.

the fact that we can create a map from the database means that as we acquire tee and pin locations we can createthese maps for AS MANY courses as exist - with no additional programming beyond what you are using right now!

sweet, huh!

i'll take a peek at he basket icon on thursday (if the boss aint looking :) ) thanks!


BTW - anyone who wants to get their courses into the database, just PM me and we'll talk about the process/procedure.

Here's the quick-and-dirty demo app I made:
http://home.carolina.rr.com/rodneyg/meadowback.html

I stole the basket icon from the Houston map and I'm linking to the centxdglove photos (click on the markers).

I stole the basket icon from the Houston map and I'm linking to the centxdglove photos (click on the markers).


Glad to see that Google Maps (http://www.google.com/apis/maps/) is being used by other WebHeads. You welcome to "steal" the basket icon but how about a credit line below the map and maybe a link back to where you got it. http://www.dghou.com/maps/dghou_courses.html
I like the course photo in the popup window.

One thing really cool that you did was put the 9 tee pad marker on the front so that when you zoom out all you see is the "9" marker. If you did all the courses in the area like that, you could have an easy guide to all the courses with both street maps and course maps a click of the button away. And you would know which courses are 9, 18, 24, etc. holes.

sandals that is freakin awesome!

once you dumb it down a little, I'll give it a shot!
;)

dumb it down how? the course setup or the course selector?

Neither, I meant making them myself!

I think this is the best example of how a nation wide course directory should be done. Each state has a marker and as you "drill down" to the local level more info is revealed. The best part is the summary info for the region that is contained in the pop window (i.e. number of restaurants). Check it out!

toEat.com: online restaurant services (http://www.toeat.com/)

When we get dont doing the GPS I will have learned some tricks and plan on bringing them to the board. ;)

If you don't have GPS receiver to carry around the course and you are lucky enough to have the hi-res imagery in your area use this:

Finding Lon. Lat. (http://www.dghou.com/maps/find_lon_lat.html)

That Google site is awesome.

One thing really cool that you did was put the 9 tee pad marker on the front so that when you zoom out all you see is the "9" marker. If you did all the courses in the area like that, you could have an easy guide to all the courses with both street maps and course maps a click of the button away. And you would know which courses are 9, 18, 24, etc. holes.



Actually, from what I've read, the programmer is not (yet?) able to control which markers end up on top of which other markers. So the '9' was luck.

Also, the number of markers placed has a HUGE impact on how fast the map loads. For this reason, I think the mapping of course locations and actual course layouts are best left as two separate functions. In my opinion. Of course level of integration of the two functions could be very high and nearly seamless given enough programming effort.

I think this is the best example of how a nation wide course directory should be done. Each state has a marker and as you "drill down" to the local level more info is revealed. The best part is the summary info for the region that is contained in the pop window (i.e. number of restaurants). Check it out!

toEat.com: online restaurant services (http://www.toeat.com/)



The problem I see with that app is that state-by-state is cumbersome for locations near a border (Charlotte/Rock Hill, Augusta/N. Augusta, Omaha/Council Bluffs, etc.).

This is a pretty cool implementation, though I don't like their starting map:
http://www.satellitefriendly.com/search

Once you click the starting map, you are shown the X number of markers closest to where you clicked. If you then scroll the map, you can click a hyper-link to re-query the X closest markers. (I think you could automate that re-query after scroll with enough programming, though that might not be desired.)

Also note their different markers to indicate initial information about the location.

As a demo, I made this one:
http://home.carolina.rr.com/rodneyg/charlotte3.html

The large markers indicate courses of 18 holes or more.
The small markers indicate courses of less than 18 holes.

The blue markers are for GPS exact locations.
The red markers are for zip-code locations.

Then of course you can put additional info and appropriate links (to the course directory page) on the pop-up balloons, which I did not do for this demo.

we played Audubon in Garland, TX last nite for our roving doubles weekly. i gps'd it as we played. only one round and some thinck trees, but judging from the satellite underlay, its pretty freakin accurate.

here is a launch page for the courses so far (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/coursemap.html)

i tweaked a couple things since yesterday:

1) added legend with hole lengths and pars
2) zoom level is now dynamically determined depending on how many holes are on the course

check it out... its coming along nicely. if you are familiar with Audubon, make sure to check out hte satellit view... its amazing how accurate the tee and pin placements are! :D

btw - Audubon is without a doubt the BEST course in DFW! i cannot believe there are no longer any sanctioned events at this gem. talk about under-used! :(

new demonstratable features added this weekend...

1) after loading all the markers, the map recenters on the center of the course
2) elevation changes displayed in info popups (altho the data i am using to test is not always correct... problem is with the data, not the website)
3) optional scorecard displays below the map
4) added ability to choose holes manually rather than just using stored course layouts

i also did veterans's park in arlington, tx. 60 tees and 50 pin positions make this the most extensive course that has been detailed in gps yet. for those of you who are familiar with the Vet, check out some of the tees up on the flats - such as 12, 13, 14. you'll notice the teepad is quite clear in the satellite map - and the tee pointer is exactly on top of it! pretty awesome matchup between the photos and the handheld unit!

here is the launch page to check it out (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/coursemapcard.php?playerid=10)

Sandalman, you rock.

If there has ever been a better purpose for the PDGA directory than hosting the raw data for a national version of these maps, I can't think of it. In my book, this should be the number one priority, far outpacing the disscusion side of the webservice.

This is absolutly sick. It blows away everything I have ever produced, but I am very happy to see it come to be. These maps have the ability to desiminate a huge amount of information, all from walking the course with a gps receiver. My days of piecing together images and using my best (educated) guess are coming to a close. Really, all I wanted to do was get the info out to the world, to promote the sport and get more people involved. It seems a better way has evolved.

Since this is database driven, I imagine an input form (linked from the existing directory page, like "add layout") could be fairly easily designed to take the number of holes and aggregate gps info, and then generate a form for input of special info for each hole (thumbs with links to photos (offsite), mando info, ob, hazards, amazing feats, etc). Links to the various layouts (example: Fall classic round 1, shorts, longs, Joel's Saturday Safari, etc) could be listed on the on the directory page for the course, without having to re-do the entire directory (which I think is in pretty good shape).

Again, I know this was not entirely your doing alone, but, Sandalman, you rock.

thanks, j...

actually, the whole database behind this is my own work. rodney did help me get going with the google stuff, but the database and course/tee/pin/hole, etc stuff is mine. i've had it for several years, and have tracked my rounds hole byhole for quite some time.

its finally starting to get some new users, so hopefully we can add a load of courses in the near future. its kinda been the coolest thing no one knows about... hopefully the addition of the gps and google maps will move the site into more of the mainstream.

pat erley has been working on an upgrade to a lot of the admin features you mentioned. i have had the basics but they are ugly and not super efficient. the new stuff is way more user friendly for adding/editing the details of the courses. i'm not sure if the new admin tools will get released before or after worlds.

thanks again for hte kind words and encouragement. any input on what features would be good is very welcome!

and if you or anyone else wants to get their courses in here, PM me!

wow, this is now officially beyond trivial... tonight i was able to build a "zoomer" that:

1) provides an icon that tells you how many courses are in the state
2) as you zoom in the state icons go away and are replaced by icons depicting each course
3) when clicked, each course icon's info popup contains a hyperlink that opens a new browser window and loads the coursemap page i had already created... there you pick the layout, holes, etc, and get the detailed map


so... what this means is we can go from a planet (or continent or country) level view and drill down/zoom in til you get to the general area you want and can see the individual courses, then seamlessly jump into the detailed course mapping application!

check it out!!! (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/coursemapzoomer.php)


notes: only showing a couple states, and with incomplete courses, but you get the idea... only use the texas courses in the demo - the MI courses are not yet gps'd so they do not show up at the individual course zoom level...

next step is too load this puppy up in demo mode with a sinful number of courses and see if it can handle the pressure :)... but thats for tomorrow, now i need sleep

Bravo, sir. Bravo!

ok, heres something new for you all:

all courses mapped in google! (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/twocoursemapzoomer.php)

well, its not really all. i do get a state count for each state. and then all texas courses are mapped and show up when you zoom in.

i tried it with ALL courses, but it was just too slow - close to 2000 course points is too much for the browser to handle.

so, what i'll have to do is provide a linkin the state info popup that launches a new window with the course points.

even texas, with 120 some courses is a bit slow.. but worth the wait to see it in action.

if you zoom into dallas area, you will notice that three of hte icons have "G" on them. this indicates that those courses are fully gps'd. clicking on the link in the info popup takes ya to the detail course map.

Damnit Pat. I'm sure this is a great thing, but this technically challenged person is very confused. I try to zoom in and nothing happens. Same with Rodneys. Just a map of Charlotte.

Hepmeplease.

here is the new version (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/coursemapzoomer.php)

i cleaned it up a good bit, and added instructions for James :cool:

all courses in the directory are shown! now all we need is some gps'ing work to get tee and pin locations, and this thing is gonna be out of control.

Pat, that's darn cool.

But I still don't like the state-by-state for the reasons listed previously.

Here's something I dummied up today:
http://home.carolina.rr.com/rodneyg/demonc.html

Click somewhere (like Charlotte) and it shows you all the courses within X miles of your click, where X is selectable from 25, 50, or 100.

This works very well on a fast computer. But it's fairly painful on an older computer.

For this demo, I only have data loaded for NC, TN, GA, SC, and VA. In the real world, this would all come from the database and would work for anywhere in the world.

James, I don't know what to tell you. If you're not seeing any markers, then it must be a browser thing or version thing or maybe just too much Shiner.

i totally agree with the problems of the state-by-state thing. i was knocking that off because that approach is understandable enough, and also delivers a worldwide directory by geo-political bounday (check out the addition of all courses worldwide in my demo... except for the ones where i couldnt come up with a latlon for the city name)

i think a zip code search makes sense, and so does a click search like you have. the problem with a click search is that you need to load all courses and it takes a substantial time and memory space to load and hold 2000 courses worldwide. i do not know of a way to hit the database without reloading the page... i spose it could be done with javascript... but i havent gotten that far. it is a good goal, and we might be able to achieve it with some thought and work.

the problem with a click search is that you need to load all courses and it takes a substantial time and memory space to load and hold 2000 courses worldwide. i do not know of a way to hit the database without reloading the page... i spose it could be done with javascript... but i havent gotten that far. it is a good goal, and we might be able to achieve it with some thought and work.



For sure. I assumed any true click-search would go back to the db to requery based on the new click. I don't know how to do that (without page reload), but I'm guessing it can be implemented one way or another. I'm not even sure that click-for-new-search is the best user interface, just an option.

And in case it wasn't clear to others, I think what Sandalman is doing is totally cool. I'm just throwing out additional thoughts and ideas.

Pat, that is some sick-[I'm a potty-mouth!] stuff you got going on there. Amazing!

I tried using google maps for some of the local courses and unfortunately our area has crap for satellite imagery available. I am going to see who has a gps that can map out some of the courses around here, even a street map would be better than nothing.

This stuff is so incredibly cool! Both yours and Sandalman's. Great work! It is a lightyear ahead of where things were before the PDGA did the zip code search, and it is at least half a lightyear better than that.


Click somewhere (like Charlotte) and it shows you all the courses within X miles of your click, where X is selectable from 25, 50, or 100.



One nit-picky idea I think might make this more useful is to have the distances show up as driving distances rather than "as the crow flies" distance. Is there a way to do this? I assume there must be since Google has the ability to calculate routes to and from places.

If I had my own helicopter I would not worry about this. :D

I'll agree that y'alls work is totally cool, but I still can't see it? :D

It's not the Shiner, so it must be the browser or the computer. Definitely not the user. :p

One nit-picky idea I think might make this more useful is to have the distances show up as driving distances rather than "as the crow flies" distance. Is there a way to do this? I assume there must be since Google has the ability to calculate routes to and from places.



I thought of that too.

Possible? Probably.

Practical? Not from what I've seen.

But my skill and knowledge level on this stuff is somewhere around a 3 out of 10, so who knows.

Actually now that I think about it, there is no "Routing" in the API (yet?), even though it is in the Google Maps service, so that makes it even less practical to implement at this time.

Here are some screenshots to give you an idea. My neighborhood course. :)

http://www.charlottedgc.com/images/misc/gmoney1.jpg


http://www.charlottedgc.com/images/misc/gmoney2.jpg

It seems that when you enter 18 holes for a course (that only has 9) it freezes up. That might be a problem if you don't know how many holes are at a course.

you asked for it, you got it! (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/clickcoursemapzoomer.php)

this one is for rodney! load the page, then click on the map in your approximate location... the nearby courses will be displayed...

you can zoom in (or out) from there, click the baskets for course info, etc.

if you are lucky enough to find a course that is fully gps'd, then you'll get a special basket icon with a G on it... and can click on the link in the info popup to create a course layout map.

cool things about this are:

no state boundaries involved;
ALL courses are loaded and the processing time is within acceptable limits (<40 seconds for first load on my office machine... <5 seconds to display nearby courses);
worldwide navigation

check it out... this revision is well worth playing with. lemme know what ya think.

props to rodney for the overall concept and certain code chunks.

Nice job sandals. You the man as always. :D

Very nice. You can go live with this when you get the dynamic links in this to go to the individual course pages on the PDGA site.

And to think I was way ahead of the curve when I made this interactive map (http://www.charlottedgc.com/ncsc_courses.htm) 18 months ago.

I travel some for my job and was always frustrated that I could not quickly figure out what courses were close to my out of state destination.

Now...if this had course SSA in the pop-up bubble as well, one could very quickly figure out what courses you wanted to visit and which ones you would want to avoid. :D

Actually, in another thread I suggested a course rating scale that would simply be SSA multiplied by 1.3. That way a really tough course with an SSA of 77 would have a course rating of 100. An easy course of SSA = 44 would have a course rating of 57. For courses without established SSA's guestimates would work well for this purpose.

Did you loose the tee markers?

oooops, i see wot ya mean... i changedthem from png to gif format today, and i changed the code, but forgot to upload the new image files... i'll get it first thing in the morning.

thanks for the headsup!

you asked for it, you got it! (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/clickcoursemapzoomer.php)

this one is for rodney! load the page, then click on the map in your approximate location... the nearby courses will be displayed...



sandalman, needless to say, that is very cool. The dream is becoming a reality.

Thank you for your creations.

my pleasure.

since we have two different ways of searching (ie, by state/country and by clicking/zooming) i have combined both into a single presentation and wrapped the beginnings of an interface around it.

here it is (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/coursedirectory.php)

for those of you trying to keep up with the myriad different URLs i've published, this page is now the permanent launch page for whatever new versions come along.

next will be a new search that uses zippostal code as the starting point. zip should be straightforward enough, just a question of time.

after that, i plan on buffing up the interface, and working on some speed improvements on the click/zoom search technique.

If you don't have GPS receiver to carry around the course and you are lucky enough to have the hi-res imagery in your area use this:

Finding Lon. Lat. (http://www.dghou.com/maps/find_lon_lat.html)



Richard R posted this example.

An admin GUI could be built from this. This lon. and lat. feature could be used to input data directly, if high res images of the area are available. Not quite as accurate as walking the course, but it would be a good start.

thats a cool tool jsims! - if anyone wants to use it to get their course data into the google map course directory, PM me and i'll send you a spreadsheet that makes entering the data (and loading it into the database) easier.

hey got some good news... i recoded the click&amp;zoom search function - and severly reduced the amount of time it takes to initially load. it went from 35-50 seconds to less than 10 seconds (in most cases).

and the file size of the resulting html page went frm 1.8 Mb down to just under 570 Kb! thats a huge savings for most computers.

the load after clicking a location is dependent on how many courses are found within the selected radius and the zoom level. for some reason, firefox browsers seem to load this one slower than IE. i had to reduce the 250 mile radius to 150 because of firefox, and even at 150 it can take quite a while. but firefox handles the initial load just fine.

anyway, if you tried it before and thought the click&amp;zoom was slow, give it another go - i think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

link's in my sig

THE best to use would have to be OCAD. Designed for orienteering mapping, it is able to draw vector maps with different symbols, lines, curves, areas and text, with variation in colour, fill, outline, linetype etc.
You can also use a topo in the background for reference.
And because it is vector based, you can print it as big or small as you want without a reduction in quality, or export to eps, etc.

The website is:
http://www.ocad.com/en/index.htm

and if you go to the download page,
http://www.ocad.com/en/downloads.htm

you can download a fully functional previous version (6, now 8) for free. While there isn't a DG symbol set (have thought of a mapping standard for DG before) its easy enough to use the Orienteering symbols one to start with.

Hope this helps.

Tim.

well dammit, everything we've been doing is for naught :(

Don't talk like that, Pat. I like what you are up to just fine. check you pm

Pat, you are the bomb diggy. You helped me solve a puzzle!!!!

That mapping you have done is great!

I am very limited in my computer programming experience (one semester of Java, and fiddling with BASIC on an Apple IIE), so take this question with that in mind. Would it be possible to divide the database by course as well? I am wondering about the load times. My computer at work is terrible, but the connection is fast. I get impatient also with loading. But, it seemed long and I worried about it freezing.

I guess what I am wondering is, could you divide the database or the map into a sort of three tiered approach? A global version. A state-by-state version. A course version. I am not even going to begin to know if the code for that is possible, but it would seem to be the best of a couple of worlds. You could see the courses in a larger area if you were willing for the load times. You could see the statewide course for a little less load time. And if you were impatient like me, you could see the course only and shorten the load time a lot.

I love google. And I love Chacos. I love the map stuff you have already done! I love life!

those are some good questions. i've already done some of that... for example, if you look at the course detail maps (veterans in arlington tx is one), you'll notice it loads in a seperate browser window. this allows us to only load the tees and pins for one course, rather than all courses in the world.

as far as world/ state dividers, as others have pointed out upthread, the state approach fails because it does not function well for people near state borders.courses in the neighboring state would not show, even if they are 5 miles away. you could do country dividers, but then the same issue arises for most countries outside of the US. check out sweden or the netherlands for good examples.

you'll prolly notice that the state search is not much faster at all compared to the click/zoom search - even though only the info for the courses in the state are loaded. most of the time is actually for google to serve the maps.

with the recoding i did yesterday, the click/zoom search is not too bad at all, especially for searches within the 100 mile radius.

the only other solution would be to contantly refresh the page whenever a click occurs. the advantage is that only the course info you want would be loaded. the disadvantage to that approach is that you'd wait for the browser to laod a fresh page. plus you'd still be waiting for google to serve the map images. the overall result would probably be more time waiting if you are doing more than a couple searches, not to mention the frustration of either having a bunch of browser windows open, or navigating back to the origianl search page.

thats kind of a rample, i hope it makes sense. i think the best solution is still to load all courses at the start, like we do on the click/zoom search.

well dammit, everything we've been doing is for naught :(



I'd disagree, I was just commenting on the first question regarding the best free software for map making.
The question is:
Are these maps to show the location of the course or for the map of the course that enables players to play the course?

They are actually two different things, and so two approaches are suitable. I was just talking about actually on the course.

Imagine zooming in from Google & finding a full course layout, and if we go further, see who's on the course playing, or during a tourney, and even further, if discs had chips.....?

If you want another approach to on-line course maps check out:
http://www.hyzernauts.de/index_news.html
Cool clips on there too!

A couple of thoughts


Tim.

Sandalman sent me the spreadsheet, I looked up the gps co-ordinates using the link Richard R posted, and I sent them in. Now, Searight in Austin is mapped and ready to go.

Look forward to more in the very near future!

Imagine zooming in from Google & finding a full course layout

thats what we're already doing. now, i dont know about seeing whos playing at the exect moment... thats a different problem :) these maps are to shw where the course is, and to help the player play by providing a detailed course map. topo maps would be fine, but road maps and satelitte imagery are free and have certain other advantages. our technololgy supports the addition of OB markers and other course features, although we havenot added those to any ofthe detailed maps yet.

i'm not a big fan of the basket and tee icons we're using for hte detail maps... especially the shadow. the icons are too big and the shadow adds zero value while cluttering the presentation. i'll prolly make some new icons and post an alternative page for review/comment today.

I just built a shadow file with an empty mask.

A few of those holes are off. I'll fix it and re-send it later tonight.

ok cool, i'll look for it. after the initial load its a snap to do the updates.

i'm happy to announce the completion of the zipcode search feature! click my tagline to check it out.

joel, searight is updated. i'll get zilker tomorrow... gotta get some decent sleep tonight so i dont boink two 15 footers tomorrow like i did today

I can't get any detailed courses to load MSIE or NS.

The problem exists from both work and at home.

I get to the page where you select the layout from the list, then the map never loads.

BTW. the coordinates for the Cedar Hill Parking lot are -96.99207901954651, 32.55703219383499

Coming from orienteering, where vegetation, water, land, rocks, etc is shown in colour, I guess I have a different concept of a detailed map for DG than others.
If all people want / need is tee & pin positions then that's all that's needed.
What I'd like is a colour map showing trees & vegetation, contours, water, OB, roads, etc that enables me to picture what the gaps are & where the options are.
Why? Well this would enable me to visualise the hole & the potential throws required without necessarily having to be a local to get to know the course.

I can't get any detailed courses to load MSIE or NS.

The problem exists from both work and at home.

I get to the page where you select the layout from the list, then the map never loads.


gary, what course, what layout? its working fine for me.

There is a better way to accomplish course familiarization than an orienteering map. It's called "Be The Disc!". Here is one of our courses - our newest:

http://www.charlottedgc.com/sugaw_be_the_disc.htm

joel, zilker front nine is detailed. looking forward to the rest of 'em!

now its off to see if i can hit a $2600 ace pot at the vet :)

Those google aerial photos are not very clear and you can't zoom in close enough to see anything.

Better stick with Terraserver (http://www.terraserver.com)

Last time I checked, Terraserver did not provide an API that allows you to create customized maps on top of their service for free.

I think it is working, but the load times are very slow.

some areas are not good resolution yet. however, the road maps are fine for the US, canada and europe.

gary, its your machine or connection. even on my old laptop i am getting loads of less than 10 seconds for the click/zoom and a bit longer for the state/country. if you set radius to 150 that takes longer also. as for the detail course maps, what course, and what layout??? its loading in 5-15 seconds as far as i know.

gary, and all, i might have found the source of gary's slow load problem... when i do not check the "scorecard" box, it is way slow... but when it IS selected, the speed is fine.

could a few of you try the same experiment and let me know if the results are the same? if so, i'll know a lot closer where to start looking for the problem.

thanks!

That was it, I wasn't selecting scorecards. The loads are below 5 secs with the scorecards.

I agree.

I sent you Wells Branch. :cool:

Sandal,

While I know how much you rock, and love what you are doing, I'm not so fond of the new icons you are using on these maps.

IMO, the tees need an outline, and the baskets should be baskets. Some of the tees and pins are close together and sometimes they obscure each other. Also, I don't think the baskets need hole numbers as they are connected by a line to the tee.

If you would like me to put a basket icon together, just say the word.

yeah, those are an experiment.. i like certain aspects of the smaller icon, but agree with your comments also. i still believe there is a need for a small icon, but do feel that the previous basket icon was a better presentation.

i can easily switch back to the previous basket, or if you come up with a new one, we sure could try it out.

joel, Wells Branch is in and tested.

for anyone keeping score, i opened the email joel sent me (containing the spreadsheet) at 23:07. the course detail was loaded, and a map with scorecard was on my screen at 23:20. wells branch is a 9-holer, but adding an 18 hole course would have taken less than a minute longer. that time is spent creating the basic layout. 13 minutes is pretty acceptable to load the detail on an entire course after the data is gathered, i would think. altho if a number of people start sending in spreadsheets i might have to make some major improvements to the existing web-based admin interface and get out of the loop. but its good for now... keep them coming! (austin is gonna be the leader on this stuff at this rate!)

gary, joel, and all... i think i fixed the slow/never laod when scorecards are not selected. i tested it ok, but if somebody could confirm i got it that would be most righteous indeed.

nothing like misplacing a incrementor - can you say infinite loop? :D

It's working now.

You could probably get rid of the "number of holes" question.

I tried to select the holes for Audobon and Veteran's but couldn't get it to function.

It would be quicker to load the default layout if there is only one stored, and display a choice only if there is more than one layout stored.

Much better....infinitely faster loading!

There is a better way to accomplish course familiarization than an orienteering map. It's called "Be The Disc!". Here is one of our courses - our newest:

http://www.charlottedgc.com/sugaw_be_the_disc.htm



I agree that being able to see the hole visually is better than a map, but I thought we were talking about something you could print out onto paper etc.

If not, yes, I have thought of something similar to what you have done & so like the idea & your course page.

A couple of comments though..
The videos are pretty big (OK, 2Mb isn't huge, but it's considerably bigger than say 400k) which doesn't make them super-user firendly & because the camera operator is walking, they are bumpy.
Can't really escape those two with video except with $$$$$, but is video needed?
I've done similar stuff using multiple frames in an animated GIF achieving greater / similar / sufficient detail but lower size, and also plan to include marking up each image to show relevant detail, eg pin position, OB, gaps, etc.

I guess it comes down to what you like.

Tim.

i hacked a bit on the course detail map page... get it all on one page rather than loading pages in sequence as you go thru the process.

minor change, and still needs some sizing/positioning work, but should enhance the user experience.

Tim,
I agree, course maps need to have enough detail to be useful for the player while at the course. Here are two maps:
***Powell (http://www.dghou.com/powell.html)
***Miramar (http://dghou.com/dghou_images/miramar.gif)

Both maps show exact tree location and the Miramar map shows the terrain changes around the middle of the course. It also has transparent fairways so you can see the objects that the disc must fly over.

I think we are talking about 2(or 3) different things here.

Pat is building a great tool for the traveling player to be able to go to an area that they will be traveling to and see what courses are in the area. Once more courses are detailed, they will be able to get a feel for the general layout of the course, and find the first tee when they drive into the park.

Having spent a lot of time traveling and playing, knowing exactly where the course is on the park is a great time saver.

I agree the maps from Google are not detailed enough to be very helpful in actually playing the course, but I don't think that is their intended purpose. It's like driving around down town with a US atlas. Just doesn't really work.

The 2 posted course maps are designed to assist players play the course, and do nothing to help the player reach the course. They are not intended to help you find the course, only find the holes and shots.

The videos are a great feature as well, but without a course map, they don't help travelers get from basket to tee. Each type of map has a purpose, and I think Pat's interactive map is the best I've seen for traveling players.

Yes 2 different things. I think the Google thing is best for locating courses but not showing layout. The other concern is accurate data. When I set up the Houston Directory (http://www.dghou.com/maps/dghou_courses.html) I placed the basket markers in the actual location of the first basket on the course. The PDGA data is not always accurate so that baskets on Pat's directory can appear several blocks away from the course which would be frustrating to a traveling player. Also, the PDGA data includes the coordinates of the first tee so when you zoom in there is a basket where the tee should be.

Compare:
http://www.dghou.com/dghou_images/tom-bass1.gif
http://www.dghou.com/dghou_images/tom-bass2.gif

The PDGA directory has the Idaho Falls Disc Golf course in the wrong park according to the coordinates.. :o

That's a problem with the stored data, not the application.

Once the presentation side is worked out, the local course Pros or clubs should work to get their data in the PDGA directory correctly.

<--Is agreed with gnduke

Yes 2 different things. I think the Google thing is best for locating courses but not showing layout. The other concern is accurate data. When I set up the Houston Directory I placed the basket markers in the actual location of the first basket on the course. The PDGA data is not always accurate so that baskets on Pat's directory can appear several blocks away from the course which would be frustrating to a traveling player. Also, the PDGA data includes the coordinates of the first tee so when you zoom in there is a basket where the tee should be.


as gary and others have pointed out, the problem is with the data. your houston guide might have the correct coords, but if the pdga site does not, its because whoever sent the info to the pdga sent the wrong data. my data is the pdga data, so i am using whatever they have. you'll notice that the powell course DOES have correct coords, and is mapped correctly on my directory. refer to the images you pasted to see what i mean.

on the pdga directory, if we do not have actual tee one coords, we use the zip code coords. in my mapping, i might want to indicate whether or not the map position is a tee one actual, or just a city zip code estimation.

the application i am building has a couple huge advantages over the local maps:

1. standard presentation for any course in the world
2. infinite number of layout maps - no matter what the hole sequence or tee/pin configuration, my application can map it.
3. no need to have every website out there create their own maps - which to be completely useful would require #2 above.
4. scalable to however many courses can be built
5. a single web site sering the entire dg community.

not to take anything away from the frequently awesome job the local websites do. there is a place for those. but my interest is in building a scalable application that delivers a local benefit to a worldwide audience.

oh, btw, my application also allows players to log their rounds, creating long term historical records of rounds and hole-by-hole averages. this is beyond the scope of all but a very very few local websites.

btw, i just noticed my hacking today broke a couple of the mapping options... i'm going to go do my putting practice, then i'll get it fixed... prolly by about 8:30PM central

The PDGA data is not always accurate...



Yes, Gary pointed it out and so did I. Apologies if you thought I was slamming your code. The Google Maps is THE WAY to go. That is why I posted my example on this thread back on July 11 just after the new API's were released. I am glad to see it has taken off for the disc golf community.
Data is data and in this case it relies on the correct info from locals or anyone who has visited a course. There are already web sites to log scores on courses but who really believes people are putting in real scores. So, how do you verify course data and validate scores?

The other factor here is Google itself. They do warn that the API's will be updated over the next few months. They suggest not using it for a mission critical website. They also reserve the right to change the service agreement which could include charging a fee.

i didnt really think you were slammin the code, just the google thing and how the pdga data is structured. god knows i slam my code constantly... in fact i am about to nuke my computer... IE doesnt seem to like having the DIV that holds the google map itslef living inside of an outer DIV. but firefox doesnt mind a bit... and my laptop (which admittedly has a chinese XP operating system of dubious origin) is showing errors that no other computer i've tested this on is showing ... why am i bald you ask? :D

as for people who log incorrect scores into websites, they must really be in need of an ego boost... 'nuff said.

in defense of my overall system, it iswill be rather cool to plan which holes/layout you're gonna play, then go play it, then log your scores for the precise hole configs. i do this for local minis also where i dont alwaysd know which tees will be used before i get there. its a level of detail not everyone needs or wants, but for the nit-pickers, its fun :)

Actually I think the Google Maps is the best thing for disc golf since the invention of the Pole Hole itself. This type of directory will help all kinds of players find new courses to play. It also helps legitimize the sport since it shows visually the sports penetration in certain urban areas.

Not every emerging player knows where all the courses are. Last summer, for example, I met two players that had been playing for about a year and were getting really addicted. I met them at the Seabrook course which was about 7 miles from where they lived. They were glad when it was installed and told me they had been playing what they thought was the only other course in town, the Woodlands 50 miles away :D

hi y'all, new to the conversation. gnduke was kind enough to point me out to this thread. i can see i'm not the only one with the idea to fuse gmaps &amp; the course listing.

I'd already started a gmap disc golf app, and i have it located at:

http://www.referential-integrity.com/DiscGolfCourseGmap/
(UPDATED)

i'ma go thru and read what y'all done, but from what i browsed, it looks like i can dive straight into the details of mine:

-I do NOT actively scrape pdga.com. i can rebuild my list from pdga, but building the xmldata is a mantenance rather than active task.
- I use only static html/js/css/xml, no server-side processing. mostly so my server doesn't need to work hard.
-I corrected a decent amount of lat/long info &amp; duplicate courses in my home state of wisconsin and some odd others like hawaii.
-I used a database of zipcode/lat/long info to gain approximate locations for courses with no lat/long. i add a slight randomizing factor so that if there's two nongeocoded courses in one zip, the icons aren't directly atop each other.
-I made one xml file, states.xls, which y'all may find useful, it's a table of statename-lat-long-zoom simply to define the initial view for each state. some are arguable, like alaska, where the vast majority of northern land is unpopulated.
-each state has it's own xml file, within each is the courses

the rest is obvious. lemme know what y'all think, whether anyone wants to get together on this [I'm a potty-mouth!], i'll check out what y'all got too.

maybe you are working on it as i type, but i dont see nuttin.

regarding one of your to dos:

test latency over large datasets - why can't load whole USA?

you can... you just need to be a bit tricky about it


how are you going about getting the data from the pdga site?

btw, you might wanna check out this (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/coursedirectory.php)

forgot the http:// prefix, duh -_-
thnx for the correction.

i DID check yours out and there's definetly parts of it i like better than mine. (nice layout). i think i like my detail click tho. i have a more asthetic version without those ugly colors, and the xml has more info than it needs, but i've been a little busy this week. i'm kind of at work now too, which is why i'm not reading this whole thread and thoroughly checking your app right away...

so, don't tease me, what's to know about large datasets?

re: how i got the data
-automated http requests w/ regex scraping. it's slow, it's impolite--i only did it once. i'd rather give you an excel sheet than encourage it's repitition. same thing for some of the zip/lat/long info i was missing. here's the monster expression, if you're curious:
hmm.. i can't quote it in here correctly, so here it is in a txt:
regex (http://www.referential-integrity.com/pdgaregex.txt)
(UPDATED *sigh*)

Hey Pat,

Can you get rid of that annoying "you clicked here" icon ?

It tends to get in the way. Maybe replace it with a small X with no infowindow.

yeah i figured out the http mistake. your is just taking a while to load, when i went back to it the map and the state pulldown was there.

while i have planned to put that course data into the info popups, i have not bothered to put in yet as i've been working on the core functionality.

my web app is actually two parts. the first, the overall search stuff, is being developed specifically for use on the actual PDGA site. (which means i dont need to automate the regex scraping :) ). it will include the state/country, zip, and click/zoom features you see on mine already, but with a more standard PDGA page wrapper.

the second part of mine is the detailed course maps - see the right column on my main page to experience those. this part will be hosted on my own servers, as it is now. my site also allows players to record rounds in order to track hole-by-hole averages, etc.

as others have pointed out way earlier, the problem with state searches is that some people are interested in finding course near state borders. states searches only deliver a subset of relevant courses in those situations. the click/zoom approach is far superior, but requires the tricky coding.

without going into the gory details, all you need to do is stash the coords for all courses, but dont do anything with them until they match a search. matching a search means they are within X miles of the search center. you'll need to do an on-the-fly calc of the distance between the search center and each course, then create and display the gpoints. not that hard once you get a stable architecture. have fun!

(btw, the link to your loca drive for the regex thingie doesnt work either :) )

gary, that seems like a worthy way to waste the last work hour of the week :)

Just as long as you have nothing better to do. :cool:

I finally got my new GPS/WAAS toys. I'll be trying them out over the weekend so I'll have the GB and Porter coords for you next week.

excellent! i sent back my gpsmap60c and ordered a gpsmap60cs (the one with barometric altimeter), hoping it comes in today. but prolly monday :(

the click icon is now a small red cross with no info popup. 30 minutes :) ... and thats with a serious code refactoring yet to do (some chunks have several versions around the site... now that everything is working pretty well its time to refactor a bit)

remind me to send you a spreadsheet for collecting hte gps coords... makes it super easy to send to me and for me to get them into the database.

oh yeah, i made some improvements on the detail map user interface... kinda along the lines that you suggested

Cool, I got 2 Rino130s.

They have barometric altimeters as well. I just have to go to google earth and find the altitude of the parking lot before I go so I can calibrate them before I start wandering around.

I'm not sure how reliable they will be for distance yet, so I will be using a laser range finder as well to validate the distance measurements.

if they are reliable for lat/ong, then how they do with distance is irrelevant (altho its just a simple calc) i calc all distances on the fly anyway, cuz that way people can build all kinds of adhoc tee/pin combos

>your is just taking a while to load,
well, it's on my meager server for one, second the xml is pretty beefy what with all the descrip info et al. i don't see much avenue for optimization, but i'd be curious if you do.

>first, the overall search stuff, is being
>developed specifically for use on the
>actual PDGA site.

no kidding! excellent!
i never got a single peep of a reply when i had emailed pdga about mine, must have been because you're already working with them, huh?

the detailed course maps and especially the score cards are the shiz-nitty-bing-bang-kaboom. i don't want to even think about the amount of work it'll take to get those right.

score-saving is imho TOO ambitious.. much like hosting email, you gain responsibility to keep that data safe.. i'd rather give the user some way to save it themselves and then load it in your app. ...not ciritcising, just brainstorming.

as for zipsearch, sure. i didn't want to recode the wheel tho; if i were to go after that, i'd want some cooperation from the pdga like you got so it's not the most inefficient thing on the face of the planet.

btw:
your map div scrolls with my mousewheel and has "select courseid,coursename,city,state,latitude,longitude, citylatitude,citylongitude,isgps from coursetwo where citylatitude is not null" below it.

regex link doesn't work for you? does for me.
**** messageboard html replacement muffs me every time...

gladtameetcha btw

btw:
your map div scrolls with my mousewheel and has "select courseid,coursename,city,state,latitude,longitude, citylatitude,citylongitude,isgps from coursetwo where citylatitude is not null" below it.

cool, you found my easter egg! i used to have the winning numbers for tomorrows mega millions there, but i decided that some nice sql code was a better gift :)

i've been working on score retention and scorecard thing for a coupla-few years now. i have personal data back to 2001. its gone thru phases of activity... probably about the equivalent of 9-12 months parttime programming effort so far. its actually pretty nice, altho its not so polished as far as interface goes.

i've been working on the course directory for the pdga for about a year and a half now. last weekend i was talking to Theo and got the go-ahead to finish up the user interface for the front end search stuff, and to create a plan to deploy it to the site. am worlds is coming, so that'll prolly happen in september. should be cool when it goes.

btw, your solution to the identical coord problem is exactly what i planned to do but didnt get to yet. i guess great mindsthink alike :) ! (i'm debating on an on-the-fly vs store it in the database options at the moment. )

They are FRS/GMRS radios as well as GPS units. They show the heading and distance between the 2 units in realtime. Just with the +/- 3m reliability of GPS, they have not been completely accurate at short distances. I'll be able to test them better when I can get them more than 30' apart. I'll still use the laser range finder for the Tee signs though.

>re: score retention

a year and a half already, wow, what all does it do? averages, maybe pdga points calculation?

>re:identical coord prob

yeah, i was stumped for a while about what to do. i figured use a handy unique number (the nearest loop iterator) contain it's variation with a mod, add it to the lat so they'll move 1-10 miles or so. since doing it though, i came across.. i think it's the hotornot gmap, and it has a nice iterative one.. i bet it'd be possible to have paging links for course 1..x in that zip within one popup. i'm not sure the impact on how the xml's shaped/parsed.

something i thought i knew a way to do, but now i'm having trouble re-finding info about, i thought there was a dhtml way to lay dynamic text over an image (ala automatic watermark), which i would like to use to replace the 1-9, 9-18, 18+ sets with precise numbers.

thinking aloud here in case you have an answer handy: is there a way to minimize image requests..? i thought i saw newer browsers request the 3 course icons once, but older ones request as many times as there is to display.

oh, and mine doesn't work in safari so i'm told. i presume that's the xml parsing at fault and not ajax, as gmaps proper does work, again, so i'm told.

fixed the regex link btw. duhhhh. i reccommend http://www.regexlib.com/RETester.aspx

just added three more courses (total of 4 so far this weekend) - the two carrollton, tx courses and the Our Saviour course in Austin. TSU in San Marcos went in yesterday. thanks joel for the courses down your way!

adding carrollton pointed out a couple things i need - a couple more tee images - altho i am working on some dynamic gif/png image creation to see if that will solve that problem.

also i think i'm gonna try to set things up so that it detects the max/min lat/lon for the course and adjusts the zoom level accordingly (on the course detail page)

gnduke came up with a great idea for a new search technique.. but its a surprise... i think i can knock it out in a good few hours of hacking.

thanks for all the encouragement folks... this is starting to shape up into a decent product... i am looking forward to converting the search stuff over to the official pdga site as soon as i get back from am worlds.

if anyone is interested in adding their local courses to the system in order to do the detail maps, lemme know. i gotta believe that there's more interest than just idaho, austin and dfw! i mean, i know texas rules, but comeon now :D

Pat, what do you need to be able to do this for Round Rock?

we need the lat/long for all tees and pins.

there's two ways to get this data... you could either walk the course with a handheld gps device, or you could use the little utility i have on the website to get a best guess of the data. both work pretty good. all of joel's austin data data came from an online tool.

i have a spreadsheet on the website also that you can use to save all the data. when its ready, just email to me and i'll put em into the database and you'll be groovin

It takes about 20-25 min for an 18 hole course. Minimize the excel speadsheet and the page with the lat long info, so you can view both and it's easy to go back and forth.

It's way easy and very cool!

Thanks Pat!

coupla new things... first, gary wanted a search feature that displays all courses within the boundaries of the map. pretty easy to do, actually. but i had to restrict it to the higher resolutions, otherwise too many courses would crash the browsers.

also, i converted the tee icons over to on-the-fly generated images rather than standard pre-fab image files. this is insignificant to the viewer, but adds a ton of flexibility to the presentation of the course maps. and a lot less hassle since no pic generation is required.

Where was this last time I planned a trip ?

Pat,
The tee markers now are small yellow squares with "Te".
I like the size, but can you get hole numbers back?

thanks,
jon

ooop... my bad... its fixed.

sandalman, everything is looking fabulous.

One minor thing is that the click-to-search appears to default to 50 miles, but the dropdown is defaulted to 25 miles.

Another minor thing: Not sure about other browsers, but in IE 6.0, if I type in a zip code and hit my ENTER key, it appears to perform a search and plot markers, but it uses whatever the *previous* zip code was. In order to actually plot a zip code, I have to click the button. Forcing the user to click the button isn't the worst thing in the world, but the the ENTER key is kind of misleading in its action.

Also, did you implement that code I e-mailed you that plots an array of markers all at once? It supposedly makes marker placement 20 to 30 times faster. It's not in the official API, but I wouldn't be surprised if something similar appears before long.

Thanks again for working on this cool application.

i'll change the dropdown to reflect the 50 mile coded default.

i'll have to dig into the zipcode/enter key issue. sounds interesting.

hmmm... i dont remember seeing a code snippet. could you resend to [email protected]? thanks!

hey, i need from help from ya'll.

first, who else has problems printing? specifically on the course detail maps. i can from the office, but not from home. i suspect its not my code, because i cant print from maps.google.com either. could you let me know if you can/cannot print, and what operating system, what printer and what size of machine you are using.

another question: how you want hole lengths calculated and presented as tee to pin (as the crow flies) or through obvious fairway points (as the disc flies). or both? using fairway points can lengthen the distance hole substantially... using a direct calc can be misleading... but both have the potential to be confusing. what do you all think would be best? (my inclination is to see if i can work both into the presentation.)

hey, i need from help from ya'll.

first, who else has problems printing?



Prints fine from a P4 3.0GHz with 1GB RAM running IE6.0 on XP SP1 to a networked HP5si (except that the little basket icons aren't transparent when printed).



another question: how you want hole lengths calculated and presented as tee to pin (as the crow flies) or through obvious fairway points (as the disc flies).



My opinion: Shortest reasonable fairway route.

hmmm... i dont remember seeing a code snippet. could you resend to [email protected]? thanks!



Sent.

After a little more skimming, it looks like each call to addOverlays can only produce a single style of icon. As such, I'm not sure it will be useful to you on the course layout maps. But it still would be for the course locator maps.

Of course, there is the outstanding enhancement to use different icons for GPS locations versus ZIP Code locations. So if you implement that, you might have to build one array for GPS and one for ZIP and call addOverlays twice. Or something.

Sandalman,

I just PM'd you GPS coordinates for all of the courses in and around Augusta, GA. including the National Disc Golf Center. Please let me know what information you need to generate the individual course layouts. I'd be more than happy to supply that information to you as well.

Many of these courses will be used in the PRO Worlds next year. Thanks for all of your hard work.

Regards,
Brian Graham

1.8GHz Centrino checking in (Toshiba notebook). XP 5.1 SP 2 build 2600, 512MB RAM, Lexmark Z705 printer.

Course detail maps prints fine. But, all text areas surrounding maps do not print. They show up fine in print preview, but they are just blank areas on the printed sheet.

brian, got em, thanks! i'll put these into the directory prototype now. in the long run though, you (or whoever manages such things in your area) should submit an update request via the official pdga directory site. that will get the data in the actual database-of-record.

for the detail maps, we need lat/long for all tees and pins. i have a handy little spreadsheet for data collection and submission on the prototype site. (see my sig line). if you cant go out to all the courses with a handheld gps, you can use the "online latlon" tool, also on the prototype site. it would be sweet indeed to get representation of the courses at and near the National Center!!!

Gman, thanks for the test. mp3_, wtf... thats a new one :D

1.8GHz Centrino checking in (Toshiba notebook). XP 5.1 SP 2 build 2600, 512MB RAM, Lexmark Z705 printer.

Course detail maps prints fine. But, all text areas surrounding maps do not print. They show up fine in print preview, but they are just blank areas on the printed sheet.



Hey Dave,

do you have the font loaded?

or

If you have the file in a native form (freehand Illistrator ect) select all, then convert the text to paths, should show up fine.

rodney, i did the enhancement to show different icons depending on how much we know about the course:

blue balloon icon = we know the city/zip
basket = we know the course's tee 1 lat/lon
basket with G = we have detailed gps data for entire course

i'm not a big fan of the blue balloon... can anyone think of something better to use (ideally something that can be the same size)

Course detail maps prints fine. But, all text areas surrounding maps do not print. They show up fine in print preview, but they are just blank areas on the printed sheet.



Hey Dave,

do you have the font loaded?

or

If you have the file in a native form (freehand Illistrator ect) select all, then convert the text to paths, should show up fine.

...or one of your printer cartridges may be out of ink - with the text pulling from the empty one(s) and maps pulling from the others.

rodney, i did the enhancement to show different icons depending on how much we know about the course:




Cool. I'm not sure the balloon is all that bad. It clearly indicates there is something different. I was thinking different color basket, but that's racist against people who don't see colors well.

My dropdown is still defaulting to 25. Is it a browser thing, or has that change not made it to the demo?

As for printing, when I did File..Print, I only got the map. I didn't get the side panels (or top panels) at all. Don't know if that is normal.

Lots of crazy new non-API "extensions" are being built. One guy has shapes (like circles and ovals), and you can even fill them. Another guy has a new smaller cooler popup bubble. Some have added mouse-over (instead of click), but I believe the Google team has said that will be added to the API very soon.

Your interface, with the 3 or 4 search methods, will be (is already) a great example of the usefulness of the API.

I was looking at the mouseovers last night. It looks like it may be very useful.

i just now made the change to the dropdown to preselect the 50 mile

we also have color filled shapes, etc. the detail maps are using that stuff for tee markers already. could be useful in other places as well, such as showing how many courses are in a state/country (instead of having to click the popup to see it.)

i was thinking about colors, but was holding off on any action until we discussed different coloring schemes for different level courses. this might only be a factor at the detail course map level though.

on printing, make sure you are choosing "scale to fit" from your printer options. could explain part of the legend/card printing issues.

1.8GHz Centrino checking in (Toshiba notebook). XP 5.1 SP 2 build 2600, 512MB RAM, Lexmark Z705 printer.

Course detail maps prints fine. But, all text areas surrounding maps do not print. They show up fine in print preview, but they are just blank areas on the printed sheet.



Alrighty then...I am confused. What I reported previously was is now working fine. I did not change any settings either. :confused: :confused:

I have the font and have ink for those who offered those as possible solutions.

I suppose you can change my feedback to "prints fine on my system".

another question: how you want hole lengths calculated and presented as tee to pin (as the crow flies) or through obvious fairway points (as the disc flies). or both? using fairway points can lengthen the distance hole substantially... using a direct calc can be misleading... but both have the potential to be confusing. what do you all think would be best? (my inclination is to see if i can work both into the presentation.)



My suggestion is that you measure as the disc flies. This is only important, IMO, on real dogleg holes. I noticed that you do not have an option to input GPS dogleg turning points into your .xls input form.

I realize that this will make things more complicated and cumbersome, but there are places where your maps would show crossing fairways(like where Renny #16's basket is inside the L of the dogleg of #17). And, of course, not having data for doglegs will report distances quite inaccurately.

good points. i will add a fairway point page to the spreadsheet. using fairway points to show doglegs will certainly solve the mapping issue you pointed out. and its super simple to add them to the database data.

i'm gonna go ahead and buiold the code for calcing distances along fairway point paths.

tanx!

And, of course, not having data for doglegs will report distances quite inaccurately.



Not always, the difference can be very small. it all depends on how severe the dog leg is and how long the hole is. Considering the use of a consumer GPS to plot tees and baskets there will be at least +/- 10 feet accuracy for both the readings. The calculation of a straight fairway will have a margin of error of at least of 20 feet. On a 250 foot hole this is an 8 percent error.

On a slight dog leg the arc of the fairway compared to a straight line is minimal. On a more curved fairway there is a bigger difference but still less than the 20 ft. error created by the GPS plots. Here are two examples:
http://www.dghou.com/dghou_images/distance-example.gif

You are correct when talking about slightly curved fairways like you show. I was talking about real doglegs. For example a 500 ft hole with 250 to a landing zone and then a right angle turn and another 250 feet to the basket. The hypotenuse is 354 ft. GPS distance would be 146 ft off = 29% error.

I love your map btw. Being able to see topography is a very cool map feature.

Agreed, and the solution is right on since a long hole with a dog leg (and a landing zone) would be best represented by an intermediate plot.

I think it really comes down to whether a real landing zone exists. I practice shots on an open field, and know how far I can throw, not how far the disc traveled to get there.

What I mean is it is useful to know how far away I have to land the disc. I can then decide if I can put enough turn/height/distance to get that far on the desired line, or if I have to lay up at the turn.

On holes where there is a true landing zone, then the distance to the landing zone becomes the important distance.

a first take that displays tee-pin vs tee-fairwaypoint-pin distances is up.

not too bad, and definitely some decent info. i think it would be good to show segment distance is the info popups... that is, in a hole with one fairwaypoint, the info info popup for the tee would show the strraightline distance to the pin and also the distance to the fairway point. the infor popup for the fairwaypoint itself would include the distance from the tee, and the distance to the pin.

not all detailed courses have fairwaypoints. cedar hill's coyote layout is a good example of one that does.

woooohoooo! we now have mandos! after wasting a BUNCH of time today trying to get it coded, i took a break to mow the lawn and pratice putts, then came back and solved in like 30 minutes...

the computer generated image is even smart enough to know what direction to point :eek: !

see hole 4 on the beaver layout at lester lorch park in cedar hill, tx for an example. it is a bit hidden by the tee 4 marker, but click it (or zoom in first to find it more easily) and you get the playing rules for the mando.

the system supports multiple mandos per hole (no limit).

Run with it!

Pat,

Cool mando feature. Doglegs are nice too. Did you get the course layout I sent you for Southwoods in West Des Moines?

More beta testing comments:

- Click to zoom/search isn't working for me this morning. Could be my system. I don't know. It plots the red crosshair but then nothing more. And control is returned to me, as if it is done.

- Southwoods (West Des Moines) has a "tee one" icon, but it is not in the location in the directory. I just added the tee one coords to the directory within the last couple days, so maybe something is out of sync with your db? Anyway, whatever, yours is showing a basket icon but it is pointing to the zip code location. I checked the tee one coords in the directory and they are correct.

- Doing a state search, do you re-add the markers each time the zoom level is changed? If so, this is a big impact on slower machines.

Continued thanks for the cool stuff.

- Click to zoom/search isn't working for me this morning. Could be my system. I don't know. It plots the red crosshair but then nothing more. And control is returned to me, as if it is done.




Hmmm, nevermind. It's working now.

More regarding the Southwoods icon: In state search, it is a basket icon in the zip code location. In click-to-search, it is a balloon icon.

By the way, they released a new version of the API in the last 24-48 hours, and they fixed an annoying bug in doing so. If you had an info-window open, clicking on the map didn't return the correct coordinates. Therefore, if you were trying to do a new click-to-zoom/search with an info window open, your new search wasn't taking place where you clicked. This is now fixed and appears to work fine.

Rodney, the issue with the Southwoods icons is that i updated one version of the search code but not the other. i'll try to fix that today. (i REALLY need to re-factor this code a bit!)

the other issue overall is that i took a snapshot of the pdga data a couple weeks back. there is no auto-updaet link between the official pdga database and my development database, so any changes submitted to the pdga will not be reflected in the development directory until i take another snapshot. i will go grab those coords though and get them in by hand, no problem.

also, rodney, i did not get any file for Southwoods! please resend to [email protected] thanks!

(Repost from 2006 Pro Worlds - Augusta thread)

Lake Olmstead Park (http://www.earthoffice.net/discgolf/coursemapcard.php?playerid=10&courseid=4039) in Augusta has now been added to the new Google Maps disc golf course directory that Pat Brenner (aka Sandalman) is currently developing. The Lake Olmstead layout will be improved and lengthened for the 2006 Pro Worlds and this course will more than likely be used in the finals. The detailed course layout is best viewed in "Satellite" mode.

Fun Facts:

Zoom out two levels and you will see Riverview Park, another 2006 Pro Worlds site, in North Augusta, SC (ball fields on right side of map) just across the Savannah River from Lake Olmstead. A detailed course layout will soon be added to the Google Maps course directory.

Hole 9 at Lake Olmstead is only about 3,000 feet (as the crow flies) from hole 1 at Riverview Park.

The Augusta National Golf Club is the golf course visible just above and to the left of Lake Olmstead Park. The Augusta Country Club is the golf course just below and adjacent to Augusta National.

Hole 1 at Lake Olmstead is only about 3,000 feet (as the crow flies) from Amen Corner at Augusta National.

The Augusta National is located on Washington Road, which is the same road that Wildwood Park and the National Disc Golf Center is on.

Rodney, the issue with the Southwoods icons is that i updated one version of the search code but not the other. i'll try to fix that today. (i REALLY need to re-factor this code a bit!)

the other issue overall is that i took a snapshot of the pdga data a couple weeks back. there is no auto-updaet link between the official pdga database and my development database, so any changes submitted to the pdga will not be reflected in the development directory until i take another snapshot. i will go grab those coords though and get them in by hand, no problem.




I figured it was something like that. Don't go updating your snapshot by hand. Not that important. Other than for demo purposes once you get my layout data for that course.


also, rodney, i did not get any file for Southwoods! please resend to [email protected] thanks!



I swear maybe something is broken in sending from my e-mail to yours. I'll try it again. Thanks. I just re-sent a couple e-mails. Let me know if you don't get them.

r, on the state search issue, a big slowdown was drawing (for some strange reason) all the state markers even after a state was selected. i killed that off and the drawing of the state's courses is way faster. however, now i need to fix it so that if the zoom goes back out to a high level the state markers reappear. should be do-able.

rodney, southwoods in in... is hole 4 really 53 feet?

rodney, southwoods in in... is hole 4 really 53 feet?



Cool thanks.

Hole 4 is actually 116 feet.
http://www.geocities.com/poorputterbrewery/images/swhole4a.jpg

The coords I gave you were from me clicking your lat/long finder. Not bad for clicking from that zoom-out level and in the woods. Of course the tee and basket may be way off from actual locations (as I haven't been there in 4 years), but it's good enough until somebody goes out there with a handheld.

Actual distances are 535, 275, 250, 116, 273, 686, 304, 570, and 287, in case you have a spot in the db for them. Holes 1, 6, and 8 are par 4's.

Here's an old webpage from 4 or 5 years ago, like anybody cares. There are now cement tees.
http://www.geocities.com/poorputterbrewery/description.htm

as it so happens, i do have a spot in the db for sign lengths. those are entered, and pars are updated. the map will hafta show the 53foot version until we get a better coord for that one. the rest looks good

Very cool, thanks. I obviously missed (the pins) on a couple of others as well. No big deal. I could have guessed at elevation, but might as well just wait and hope somebody takes a handheld out at some point.

I reckon if I'm grabbing an OnLine Sandalman Course Map, any of these will be good enough to get me around the course. I wouldn't use the actual lat/lon to find each tee, I'd just use a picture of the overall map. And what a joy it would be to have them all in one place instead of having to search all over a bunch of different course web-sites.

You are the man.

Mr. Graham, Pendleton and Riverview are now officially GPS detailed! maybe some questions on riverview 15-18 (or not)

Riverview #4 features the directory's first reallife double dogleg hole.

i will add the code for practice basket position this evening, i hope.

practice baskets are now working. see SC's Riverview for example. actually, i built it to support any number of "course features". these could include restrooms, parking, handicapped entry, water, nearby convenience stores... anything you all can think up - all we need to do is build an icon for it and register it in the database.

tomorrow we're driving to flagstaff... i am taking the laptop with me, so keep that course data coming! i probably wont have time to build much in the way of new features, but getting additional courses detailed is just a simple process at this point.

when i get back i would like to start building the code for OB and other boundary lines. this should be fairly straightfoward also - we'll just need enough points to map a reasonably accurate line

sandalman and all, check this out:
http://home.carolina.rr.com/rodneyg/latlon_getter.html

It's hopefully an easier way to get approximate lat/lon values in those cases where you can't go out to a course with a handheld.

Just type the hole number in the box, then click the map for the Tee/(optional)Dogleg(s)/Target, change hole number in box, click Tee/(optional)Dogleg(s)/Target, rinse, repeat. When done, the data is suitable for parsing with Excel or whatever.

I hope you like it. Steal it if you want. I stole the concept from here:
http://www.ovationmarketing.com/MapMaker.asp

Very Cool!! and SOOOO easy! :cool:

gmoney:
nice! i can't wait for more detailed sattelite maps in my area. it needs a reset button so you're not just adding more doglegs. i wonder where i could borrow a gps unit.. with whom should i get chummy? i didn't see anything less than 120$ to suit.

sandalman:
doubleclicking isn't responding so well, it takes the second click to be located post-movement of the first click, and basically moves twice as far away from the orig center.

you can work more directly with the live pdga course db? can i give you an xls or csv for the courses i've updated instead of trudging through the form submittal? i see a lot of work to do just getting tee 1 gps info for a thousand courses that i'm thinking about taking on now and then.

you've got great bells & whistles, but i'm surprised you're missing the main point of why i did mine: instant driving directions! you've likely got variables ready for lat/lon/courseid at the ready, it's a 5 minute coding, or 30 seconds copy/paste form mine ^^
i've a more asthetic course infowindow i've not yet put up on mine, would you want that from me?
are you redoing the orig course info pages at all?

and actually, thinking aloud on the individual hole infowindows, all i'd care about is distance, elevation CHANGE from tee to pin, and any freehand comments. it's of course best to keep a prog in development verbose, but with so many courses to browse, getting just the most important facts quickly makes the difference between handy and frikkin awesome.

gmoney:
it needs a reset button so you're not just adding more doglegs.



Not sure what you mean? If you change the hole number, it starts a new tee/dogleg/target series. If that's not what you mean, can you explain further? Thanks.

as in if you misclick one of the doglegs / one dogleg too many, and want to undo one click / one hole, however you work it.

one thought:
leftclick drops one new dogleg/ending, rightclick removes one?

actually, as i think of it, back on the doubleclick-mapmove problem, i never liked the single-click centering. you miss a mapinfo window by a smidge and d'oh. click-dragging is easy to mess up too. i'd much rather the doubleclick lay the red x.

as in if you misclick one of the doglegs / one dogleg too many, and want to undo one click / one hole, however you work it.

one thought:
leftclick drops one new dogleg/ending, rightclick removes one?



Okay, I thought of features like that. Unfortunately, that is out of the scope of my javascript programming knowledge. I'm sure if it's needed that some other volunteer will step up and code it.

I made a click or two mistake when I did a couple courses. I just noted which points were erroneous, and eliminated them from the data before passing it on. Not fancy but it got the job done.

Very nice!

Okay, I thought of features like that. Unfortunately, that is out of the scope of my javascript programming knowledge. I'm sure if it's needed that some other volunteer will step up and code it.



i can do it--let's figure out what we want.
how should it output? i figure show a display on bottom, plus a button to save it all to csv, which could be made in a format ready for sandalman to accept via email or whatever. or would this go on his site where he could just accept the submission?

i guess you'd have to explain how the course layouts work. btw, is there any solution to when you have pro/am tees and 2 pin positions per hole than having 4 layouts? i have a course like that near me that mixes up its' pin positions. i'm stumped myself.

actually, this aughta get tried out on a few courses you already have done, just to see how well you can guess and if it's worth it. i know it's not in my area bcz of the lack of high-res sattelite.

hey you guys, i'm out in flagstaff for am worlds...

these are good ideas, rodney, i like the data builder. defintiely could work if it and the spreadsheet were synched up layout wise.

evilmousse, i'll do driving directions as part of the course search stuff when the my prototype moves over tho the pdga site. as you noted, getting directions is trivial, so i wasnt worried about it yet.

i've got six new courses to add this evening... catch you all later. keep those ideas coming, they're right on the money.

sandalman, thanks for adding those courses I sent you.

It appears the Winthrop layout might be exposing a bug of some kind. The distances for 5, 12, and 13 look way out of whack. All of those are double-doglegs. However, the double-dogleg #18 at Circle R Meadow appears to be just fine.

sandalman, not surprisingly, Google has changed the API to speed up the adding of markers. So if you haven't implemented that "addOverlays" function yet, it looks like you don't need to. From a Google person:

Prior to this version, calling map.addOverlay(overlay) was slow for
large numbers of overlays. As some of you discovered, the reason was
the repeated internal calls to reOrderOverlays method. Several people
found a work-around by creating the 'addOverlays' method which added
an array of overlay markers and called reOrderOverlays just once.

the reOrderOverlays method was responsible for determining the
stacking order of overlay markers based on their latitude so that the
marker icons and their shadows would appear on the correct zIndex.

In the new version of the API, there is no longer a need for calling
reOrderOverlays since the stacking order of each overlay is computed
directly based on its latitude. This change should remove the need
for 'addOverlays' method because the regular addOverlay is be about as
fast.

much appreciated, i could tell SOMEthing had changed because my messagewindows weren't rendering quite the same.

where'd you find this info?

They seem to be tweaking the API about once a week. They're up to v17 now. I think the API came out around v11 or so.

Got the info here, where two (that I know of) different Google people post:
http://groups.google.com/group/Google-Maps-API?lnk=li

The info in question came in a recent post by Pasha entitled "ANNOUNCEMENT: Some modifications to Google Maps API".

thanks for the heads up G! once less thing for me to deal with upon my return home.

obviously i have been slacking with my coding this week... but one or two rounds each day followed by naptime, dinner, hot tub and sleep isnt so bad for a week or so :)

i got all the coords for the flagstaff four, but only had time to get two in. i left my download software at home, so i had to do those two point by point. no fun.... the other two will wait til next weekend.

i have no inside info, but wouldnt it be cool if (when?) google includes the detailed NGS mapsas an underlay option? we'd have incredibly terrain detail at that point, and very accurate elevation data. mmmmmmm....

i'm gonna go check out the site and see if its faster... c u later

nice, that group was helpful in finding a resolution to the infowindow rendering problems that were introduced to my app in the new upgrade.

to save anyone some time in the future:
i'm not sure why this is hard, but laying out a tabular infowindow is troublesome in both IE and firefox. Though code will work on it's own--not when it's given to the marker.openInfoWindowHtml(html). Differing results will be had depending on how you assign the width: on a containing div element, table element, td element; in or out of stylesheets.
The most common error I had was firefox refusing to wrap text.

so the solution, so it turns out, is to assign the width via stylesheets in a containing div. both browsers get that right. here's an example from mine: http://www.referential-integrity.com/DiscGolfCourseGmap/infoWindow.html

finally got caught up enough to get the last couple rodney sent me into the database... should be able to start thinking about code again this week.

i think the next major step is gonna be to get the directory part ready for deployment on the pdga site.

but please keep the ideas for the detail course maps coming... i'll slip some of that work in also!

Hey - would one of you guys like to write a step by step "How to make a course map" article? We could use one. I would publish it up at the PDGA Affiliate Clubs " How To" section at:
http://www.pdga.com/club_affiliate/club_affiliate.php

Thanks, Cliff