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Enumeration class for string parameter

iron9light — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 08:52:01 +0000

When I write the Google API for .NET, there are a lot of string parameters, like imageColor and safeLevel etc.

So I create an enum for every kind of parameter.

public enum SafeLevel
{
    off,
    moderate = 0,
    active,
}

I even set the moderate of SafeLevel as default value. And I can use the ToString method to get the string value most of the time.

Not every string parameter are so readable. They use “r” for relevance and “d” for date for instance.

At this time, I use extension method + switch.

public string GetString(this SortType value)
{
    switch (value)
    {
        case SortType.relevance:
            return "r";
        case SortType.date:
            return "d";
        default:
            return null;
    }
}

Or I use some helper class like LanguageUtility.

Everything is OK until Google add more choices of parameters.

Someone complained Google now can translate XXX language. Then I have to release a new version to follow the pace of Google!

The bad day has gone. Now I use string parameter directly. One can translate any language Google supported without complain and waiting.

But without enum and the helper class, API user need to check every parameter code from Google (like me).

For keeping life easy for all of you, I create the simple Enumeration class

public enum SafeLevel
    /// 
    /// The enumeration. For parameters of Google APIs.
    /// 
    public abstract class Enumeration
    {
        private readonly string name;

        private readonly string value;

        private readonly bool isDefault;

        /// 
        /// Initializes a new instance of the  class.
        /// 
        /// The value.
        protected Enumeration(string value)
            : this(value, value)
        {
        }

        /// 
        /// Initializes a new instance of the  class.
        /// 
        /// The name.
        /// The value.
        protected Enumeration(string name, string value)
            : this(name, value, false)
        {
        }

        /// 
        /// Initializes a new instance of the  class.
        /// 
        /// The name.
        /// The value.
        /// if set to true it is default value.
        protected Enumeration(string name, string value, bool isDefault)
        {
            this.name = name;
            this.isDefault = isDefault;
            this.value = value;
        }

        /// 
        /// Gets a value indicating whether this instance is default.
        /// 
        /// 
        ///     true if this instance is default; otherwise, false.
        /// 
        public bool IsDefault
        {
            get
            {
                return this.isDefault;
            }
        }

        /// 
        /// Gets the value.
        /// 
        /// The value.
        public string Value
        {
            get
            {
                return this.value;
            }
        }

        /// 
        /// Gets the name.
        /// 
        /// The name.
        public string Name
        {
            get
            {
                return this.name;
            }
        }

        /// 
        /// Performs an implicit conversion from  to .
        /// 
        /// The enumeration.
        /// The result of the conversion.
        public static implicit operator string(Enumeration enumeration)
        {
            if (enumeration.IsDefault)
            {
                return null;
            }

            return enumeration.Value;
        }

        /// 
        /// Returns a  that represents this instance.
        /// 
        /// 
        /// A  that represents this instance.
        /// 
        public override string ToString()
        {
            return this.Name;
        }

        /// 
        /// Determines whether the specified  is equal to this instance.
        /// 
        /// The  to compare with this instance.
        /// 
        ///     true if the specified  is equal to this instance; otherwise, false.
        /// 
        /// 
        /// The  parameter is null.
        /// 
        public override bool Equals(object obj)
        {
            if (ReferenceEquals(this, obj))
            {
                return true;
            }

            if (obj == null)
            {
                return false;
            }

            if (!this.GetType().IsInstanceOfType(obj))
            {
                return false;
            }

            return this.Value == ((Enumeration)obj).Value;
        }

        /// 
        /// Returns a hash code for this instance.
        /// 
        /// 
        /// A hash code for this instance, suitable for use in hashing algorithms and data structures like a hash table.
        /// 
        public override int GetHashCode()
        {
            Debug.Assert(this.Value != null, "Value cannot be null.");

            return this.Value.GetHashCode();
        }
    }
}

It has three readonly properties: Name, Value and IsDefault.

It can also convert to string implicitly. Then you can use it as string. Or you can make it looks like the type of parameter is Enumeration but not string.

TranslateClient client = new TranslateClient();
string translated = client.Translate(text, Language.ChineseSimplified, Language.English);

It looks the same of the old enum parameter version. But the Language is not a enum but a subclass of Enumeration and the English is a public static readonly field.

public static readonly Language English = new Language("English", "en");

Here I want add two more static method and a implicit convert method.

public static Language GetDefault();

public static ICollection GetEnums();

public static implicit operator Language(string value)

It’s not hard using reflection. But I need repeat them in every subclasses of Enumeration.

Although code template tool can help me a lot, but I do not think it’s a good I idea. Don’t repeat yourself!

So I create a generic Enumeration class:

public abstract class Enumeration : Enumeration, IEquatable where T : Enumeration

This class has a very interesting constrain. We can only create a subclass like this:

public sealed class SortType : Enumeration

The subclass must pass itself as the generic parameter. (Tell me if I’m wrong.) In other words, the T in Enumeration is must be the type of subclass.

Here I marked SortType as sealed, because the Enumeration can only know it subclass but not sub-subclass.

Here is the whole code of Enumeration:

    /// 
    /// The enumeration. Provide more static methods and properties for every concrete enumeration.
    /// 
    /// The type of concrete enumeration.
    public abstract class Enumeration : Enumeration, IEquatable
        where T : Enumeration
    {
        private static T @default;

        private static IDictionary dictionary;

        /// 
        /// Initializes a new instance of the  class.
        /// 
        /// The value.
        protected Enumeration(string value)
            : base(value)
        {
        }

        /// 
        /// Initializes a new instance of the  class.
        /// 
        /// The name.
        /// The value.
        protected Enumeration(string name, string value)
            : base(name, value)
        {
        }

        /// 
        /// Initializes a new instance of the  class.
        /// 
        /// The name.
        /// The value.
        /// if set to true it is default value.
        protected Enumeration(string name, string value, bool isDefault)
            : base(name, value, isDefault)
        {
        }

        /// 
        /// Gets the dictionary of value and enumeration.
        /// 
        /// The dictionary.
        protected static IDictionary Dictionary
        {
            get
            {
                Initialize();
                return dictionary;
            }
        }

        /// 
        /// Gets the default enumeration.
        /// 
        /// The default enumeration
        public static T GetDefault()
        {
            Initialize();
            return @default;
        }

        /// 
        /// Gets all enumerations.
        /// 
        /// All enumerations
        public static ICollection GetEnums()
        {
            return Dictionary.Values;
        }

        /// 
        /// Indicates whether the current object is equal to another object of the same type.
        /// 
        /// An object to compare with this object.
        /// 
        /// true if the current object is equal to the  parameter; otherwise, false.
        /// 
        public bool Equals(T other)
        {
            if (other == null)
            {
                return false;
            }

            return this.Value == other.Value;
        }

        /// 
        /// Initializes this instance.
        /// 
        protected static void Initialize()
        {
            if (dictionary == null)
            {
                dictionary = new Dictionary();

                var type = typeof(T);

                ////var enums =
                ////    from propertyInfo in
                ////        type.GetProperties(
                ////        BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.DeclaredOnly | BindingFlags.GetProperty)
                ////    where
                ////        propertyInfo.PropertyType.IsAssignableFrom(typeof(T)) &&
                ////        propertyInfo.GetIndexParameters().Length == 0
                ////    select propertyInfo.GetValue(null, null) as T;

                var enums =
                    from fieldInfo in
                        type.GetFields(
                        BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.DeclaredOnly | BindingFlags.GetField)
                    where fieldInfo.FieldType.IsAssignableFrom(type)
                    select fieldInfo.GetValue(null) as T;

                foreach (var @enum in enums)
                {
                    Debug.Assert(@enum != null, "enum cannot be null.");

                    dictionary[@enum.Value] = @enum;

                    if (@default == null && @enum.IsDefault)
                    {
                        @default = @enum;
                    }
                }
            }
        }

        /// 
        /// Converts the specified value to this enumeration.
        /// 
        /// The value.
        /// The constructor function.
        /// The enumeration.
        protected static T Convert(string value, Func construct)
        {
            if (value == null)
            {
                return GetDefault();
            }

            T @enum;

            if (!Dictionary.TryGetValue(value, out @enum))
            {
                @enum = construct(value);
            }

            return @enum;
        }
    }

Here I use the lazy load trick but not initialize in the static constructor, because the static constructor will run before than the static fields in subclass have been assigned.

And the implement convert operation can only defined in the subclass. So I put most of the logic into the Convert method.

Here is what a subclass looks like:

    /// 
    /// The search safety level.
    /// 
    public sealed class SafeLevel : Enumeration
    {
        /// 
        /// Disables safe search filtering.
        /// 
        public static readonly SafeLevel Off = new SafeLevel("Off", "off");

        /// 
        /// Enables moderate safe search filtering. Default value.
        /// 
        public static readonly SafeLevel Moderate = new SafeLevel("Moderate", "moderate", true);

        /// 
        /// Enables the highest level of safe search filtering.
        /// 
        public static readonly SafeLevel Active = new SafeLevel("Active", "active");

        private SafeLevel(string value)
            : base(value)
        {
        }

        private SafeLevel(string name, string value)
            : base(name, value)
        {
        }

        private SafeLevel(string name, string value, bool isDefault)
            : base(name, value, isDefault)
        {
        }

        /// 
        /// Performs an implicit conversion from  to .
        /// 
        /// The value.
        /// The result of the conversion.
        public static implicit operator SafeLevel(string value)
        {
            return Convert(value, s => new SafeLevel(s));
        }
    }

Although the solution has some smell, like visit static method in superclass and static protected method.

I hope it can solve my problem well.

Thanks for reading.

Retrieve driving directions from google maps with server-side HTTP calls and show results with static maps for WAP

mufumbo — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 08:32:34 +0000

Mobile phones are not famous for supporting javascript. A problem arises when you need to use google API to retrieve the driver directions for a mobile site, or when you just don’t want your site to be overloaded with the complete maps toolkit to show a simple map.

Google provides a good directions-static demo but, unfortunately, it’s javascript-only. They don’t have any example or documentation about how to generate the directions through server side HTTP call.

The driving direction API doesn’t seem to be 100%. I wasn’t able to find examples of how to use the directions API with google maps API-V3 javascript, it seems that it’s not ready yet. I’ve founded this issue tracking in gmaps-api-issues (by the way, the most voted issue) that says that there isn’t support for google maps directions through server side http calls.

Putting all together: I have decided to check what HTTP calls the directions API of google maps API-V2 does and to use it in the server side. I don’t know if it’s forbidden in the terms of service, but it works!

Basically, my PHP server-side is doing the exact same thing that the google directions-static demo is doing in javascript (checkout the source code of the page). It retrieves the answer from the server and write the coordinates information in the static maps URL.

Note that HttpHelper::doGET downloads the string, you can substitute that part with CURL or fopen. Here is the code to make the HTTP calls to get the driving directions and to create the static map image link:

class GoogleGeo {
    public static function buildStaticMap($center, $markers=array(), $width=400, $height=400, $zoom=12, $directions=null) {
        $strMarkers = "";
        foreach($markers as $marker) {
            if (!empty($strMarkers)) $strMarkers .= '|';
            $strMarkers .= urlencode($marker);
        }
        if ($width > 640) $width = 640;
        if (!empty($center)) {
            $center = "&center=".$center;
        }
        if (!empty($strMarkers)) {
            $strMarkers = "&markers=".$strMarkers;
        }
        if ($zoom > 0) {
            $zoom = "&zoom=$zoom";
        }

        $steps = "";
        if (!empty($directions)) {
            foreach($directions['Directions']['Routes'][0]['Steps'] as $step) {
                $lat = $step['Point']['coordinates'][1];
                $lon = $step['Point']['coordinates'][0];
                if (!empty($steps)) $steps .= "|";
                $steps .= $lat.",".$lon;
            }
            if (!empty($steps)) {
                $steps .= "|".$directions['Directions']['Routes'][0]['End']['coordinates'][1].",".$directions['Directions']['Routes'][0]['End']['coordinates'][0];
                $steps = "&path=rgb:0x0000ff,weight:5|".$steps;
            }
        }

        $staticMap = "http://maps.google.com/staticmap?maptype=mobile&size=".$width."x$height&maptype=roadmap&key=".GOOGLE_MAPS_KEY."&sensor=false$strMarkers$center$zoom$steps";
        return $staticMap;
    }

    public static function retrieveDirections ($from, $to) {
        $params = array('key' => GOOGLE_MAPS_KEY, 'output' => 'json', 'q' => "from: $from to: $to");
        $url = "http://maps.google.com/maps/nav";
        $result = HttpHelper::doGET($url, $params);
        $result = json_decode($result, true);
        return $result;
    }
}

A example how to use this code is:

...
    /* FROM and TO coordinates */
    $markers = array("37.262568,-121.962232,redr", "37.229898,-121.971853,blueg");
    /* Get the driving directions from google api */
    $directions = GoogleGeo::retrieveDirections("485 Alberto Way, Suite 210. Los Gatos, CA 95032", "14109 Winchester Bl, Los Gatos, CA");
    /* Create the map image url with the directions coordinates */
    $staticMap = GoogleGeo::buildStaticMap(null, $markers, 640, 240, null, $directions);
....

In this way you will have $staticMap with a value similar to the image urls in the directions-static demo. In this case it will be:

http://maps.google.com/staticmap?maptype=mobile&size=640×240&maptype=roadmap&key=YOUR_GOOGLE_KEY&sensor=false&markers=37.262568%2C-121.962232%2Credr|37.229898%2C-121.971853%2Cblueg&path=rgb:0×0000ff,weight:5|37.22898,-121.97104|37.22818,-121.97112|37.22597,-121.97231|37.22892,-121.98063|37.23713,-121.97714|37.26301,-121.96088|37.262282,-121.961628

The variable $directions will contain a array with the complete direction steps, so you can easily loop through it and print it out on your WAP application. For example:

Embed Google Search in Your Custom Applications

vinayhatwal — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 05:36:05 +0000

Embed Google Search in Your Custom Applications

Written by – Vinay Hatwal

Dt. 03-Jul-2009

Dear all,

This time I came with the topic “Embed Google Search in Your Custom Applications”. With this we can embed Google search in our application. First of all I will discuss the tools which you need to install on your PC to use the Google Search

.Net Framework 3.5
Google Search API for .NET 0.2 (GoogleSearchAPI_0.2.zip)
GoogleSearchAPI_0.2.zip
GoogleSearchAPI.dll

Steps to do

1) Create a new project with vb.Net 2.0 or 3.5.(Windows Application)

2) Add Reference of GoogleSearchAPI.dll

3) Add following controls

RichTextBox – RichTextBox1
Label- Label1
TextBox- TextBox1
Button- Button1

4) Your Interface will look like

5) Add the following coding in your Form1.cs file

Public Class Form1

Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click

‘Declaring Generic IList for IWebResult Interface

‘You can use -

‘1) IWebResult

‘2) IVideoResult

‘3) INewsResult

‘4) INewsResult

‘5) IImageResult

‘ AND MORE

Dim results As IList(Of Google.API.Search.IWebResult)

‘Taking result

‘calling of Google.API.Search.GwebSearcher.Search(search text, Number of search result would be returned at a time)

results = Google.API.Search.GwebSearcher.Search(TextBox1.Text, 10)

Dim str As String = “”

RichTextBox1.Text = “”

For Each r As Google.API.Search.IWebResult In results

‘Fetching Title

str = str & “Title :” & r.Title & vbCrLf

‘Fetching URL

str = str & “URL :” & r.Url & vbCrLf

‘Fetching VisibleUrl

str = str & “VisibleUrl :” & r.VisibleUrl & vbCrLf

‘Fetching Content

str = str & “Content :” & r.Content & vbCrLf

str = str & “=========================================================================================” & vbCrLf

RichTextBox1.Text = str

End Sub

End Class

6) Now Enter the text to search on text box and click on Go. The result will look like –

Google SpreadSheet、お世話になりました。

miwaza — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 02:05:10 +0000

最近4ヶ月ほどやっていたビッグプロジェクトでGoogle SpreadSheetとFormには、受注管理、決算、お問い合わせフォームとかのために、とにかくお世話になりまくっていたのもあって、Google SpreadSheet APIに興味がある（受注管理スプレッドシートと納品書出力のためのスプレッドシートを連動させたかったな－…）。

Google Formは知っている限りは自分でスタイルシートとかテンプレートを作る、ということができないので、APIを使って自分のFormを作れば、スタイルシートでもなんでも書けるのかなー、という事もあるしね。どうなのかな？調べてみようか。取り組んでみようか。

Gtalk Bot

coolgarg — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 17:15:20 +0000

You can create a gtalk bot, add it to anyone gtalk id, then he can take services from his chat box by simply cahting with the bot.

apis

in java :

smack.jar
http://www.igniterealtime.org/projects/smack/

in C/C++

libjingle

http://code.google.com/apis/talk/index.html

RSS, Really Simple Syndication

coolgarg — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 09:53:00 +0000

For Monitoring Site that do not publish RSS Feed,

http://page2rss.com/

FeedBurner

Google talk transliteration

coolgarg — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 17:31:51 +0000

Add en2hi.translit@bot.talk.google.com to your friend list in google talk. Now invite your friend for chat, add this id to group chat, and see the magic.

for other languages

Kannada (en2kn.translit), Malayalam (en2ml.translit), Tamil (en2ta.translit) and Telugu (en2te.translit).

wow.

Google Search API for .NET 0.2 beta and Google Translate API for .NET 0.2 beta released

iron9light — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 10:23:10 +0000

Update4

No more default http referrer. User must set it as a parameter of constructor.

Delete old Translator and Searcher classes.

Updated comments for better document.

Update3

Change all API Using string parameter instead of enum parameter.

Add new Enumeration class and enumerations for API parameters.

The API changed a lot this time. Please let me know whether you like these changes or not.

Update2

All codes are refacted (StyleCop format).

Update the APIs to support latest Google APIs.

Now can customize referrer, accept language, API key and timeout times.

Update1

Update the supported language list for Google translate api.

Set “http://code.google.com/p/google-api-for-dotnet/” as the default http referrer. (Now you cannot set your own http referrer)

No more v0.2, new features will come with v0.3.

Google APIs for .NET

Provides simple, unofficial, .NET Framework APIs for using Google Ajax RestFULL APIs (Search API, Language API etc.)

How LAZY I am. I should release nearly a month ago.

Indeed, 99+% of source have been finished when I release the Google Search API for .NET 0.1 and Google Translate API for .NET 0.1.1.

I just wait some bugs from the last versioin, so I can do some change.

I do fixed one bug, only one.

Ok, see what’s new.

The new versions are nearly no different for using, but the foundation is changed.

Replace Json.NET 2.0 by Microsoft official WCF.

And implement the HttpUtility, so not need the System.Web any more.

It now support .NET 3.5 sp1 Client Profile.

You can download here:

GoogleSearchAPI_0.3.zip

GoogleTranslateAPI_0.3.zip

More in formations, please visit the project’s site:

http://code.google.com/p/google-api-for-dotnet/

iContact - Free Fridays #16

Gilbert — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 04:01:25 +0000

iContact is more of a “one to watch” than a fully fledged application at the moment. It

Google Search API for .NET 0.1 alpha 5

iron9light — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 06:40:12 +0000

Google Search API for .NET is a part of Google APIs for .NET.

This project will provides simple, unofficial, .NET Framework APIs for using Google Ajax RestFULL APIs (Search API, Language API etc.)

The Google Translate API for .NET will also be a part of it (Indeed I have just released a new version there).

Now it support the Google Web Search API ,Google News Search API, Google Blog Search API and Google Video Search API.

I’ll add the support of all Google Search APIs(GwebSearch, GlocalSearch, GvideoSearch, GblogSearch, GnewsSearch, GbookSearch, GimageSearch, GpatentSearch) in the future.

Google Search API for .NET 0.1 alpha 5

Description:

Provides a simple, unofficial, .NET Framework API for using Google Ajax Search API service.

Feature:

Now support the Google Web Search API ,Google News Search API, Google Blog Search API, Google Video Search API and Google Book Search API.
CLS compatible. It can be used by any .NET languages (VB.NET, C++/CLI etc.)

Required:

.NET Framework 2.0 or newer version.

Example:

Google Web Search:

class Example
{
    public static void Main()
    {
        // Search 32 results of keyword : "Google APIs for .NET"
        IList results = GwebSearcher.Search("Google API for .NET", 32);
        foreach(IWebResult result in results)
        {
            Console.WriteLine("[{0}] {1} => {2}", result.Title, result.Content, result.Url);
        }
    }
}

Google News Search:

class Example
{
    public static void Main()
    {
        // Search 16 results of keyword : "Olympic", local : "Beijing"
        IList results = GnewsSearcher.Search("Olympic", 16, "Beijing");
        foreach(INewsResult result in results)
        {
            Console.WriteLine("[{0}, {1} - {2:d}]{3} => {4}", result.Publisher, result.Location, result.PublishedDate, result.Title, result.Url);
        }
    }
}

Google Blog Search:

class Example
{
    public static void Main()
    {
        // Search 32 results of keyword : "Coldplay"
        IList results = GblogSearcher.Search("Coldplay", 32);
        foreach(IBlogResult result in results)
        {
            Console.WriteLine("[{0} - {1:d} by {2}] {3} => {4}", result.Title, result.PublishedDate, result.Author, result.Content, result.BlogUrl);
        }
    }
}

Google Video Search:

class Example
{
    public static void Main()
    {
        // Search 32 results of keyword : "South"
        IList results = GVideoSearcher.Search("South Park", 32);
        foreach(IVideoResult result in results)
        {
            Console.WriteLine("[{0} - {1} seconds by {2}] {3} => {4}", result.Title, result.Duration, result.Publisher, result.Content, result.Url);
        }
    }
}

Google Book Search:

class Example
{
    public static void Main()
    {
        // Search 10 result of keyword : "Grimm's Fairy Tales"
        IList results = GbookSearcher.Search("Grimm's Fairy Tales", 10);
        foreach(IBookResult result in results)
        {
            Console.WriteLine("{0} [by {1} - {2} - {3} pages] {4}", result.Title, result.Authors, result.PublishedYear, result.PageCount, result.BookId);
        }
    }
}

You can download here:

GoogleSearchAPI_0.1_alpha_5.zip

Visite the Google APIs for .NET project for more information.

Το Google Earth συναντά τους browsers

altervedo — Fri, 30 May 2008 07:59:57 +0000

Με ένα νέο plugin για Internet Explorer και Firefox, οι άνθρωποι του Google μας δίνουν την δυνατότητα να απολαύσουμε κάποια από τα βασικά χαρακτηριστικά του δημοφιλούς software Google Earth, μέσα στον browser μας. Βασική διαφορά…από αυτό που είχαμε ως τώρα, δηλαδή το Google Maps; Η δυνατότητα εμφάνισης στο παράθυρό του browser μας ενός πραγματικού 3D μοντέλου της Γης.

Στην ουσία δεν πρόκειται για ένα software που σας δίνει δυνατότητα οποιαδήποτε στιγμή να δείτε τρισδιάστατη τη γη. Για αυτή τη δουλειά υπάρχει το Google Earth. Πρόκειται απλά για ένα plugin που δίνει δυνατότητες στον browser σας να εμφανίσει 3d χάρτες όταν αυτοί περιέχονται σε κάποια σελίδα.

Ταυτόχρονα παρέχεται σε developers και ιδιοκτήτες σελίδων η δυνατότητα να εισάγουν τους τρισδιάστατους χάρτες στις σελίδες τους εύκολα και απλά, με την χρήση της Google Earth API. Αν έχετε δημιουργήσει ένα Maps API key για το url της σελίδας σας, μπορείτε όχι μόνο να εισάγετε σε σελίδες σας 3d χάρτες, αλλά και να ζωγραφήσετε γραμμές, να τοποθετήσετε markers, να εισάγετε 3d μοντέλα ή και να φορτώσετε KML δεδομένα για την δημιουργία ενός “πλούσιου” τρισδιάστατου χάρτη-εφαρμογή.

Η επιτυχία των τρισδιάστατων χαρτών στο web θα κριθεί από το πόσο θα διαδοθεί το σχετικό plugin.

Μπορείτε να εγκαταστήσετε το plugin διαμέσω της ιστοσελίδας: http://code.google.com/apis/earth/
και να διαβάσετε περισσότερα στην σελίδα Google Earth, meet the browser.

Προβλήματα:

Η εγκατάσταση δεν είναι πάντα με την πρώτη επιτυχημένη.
Δεν σου δίνεται η δυνατότητα να επιλέξεις για ποιόν browser θες να εγκαταστήσεις το plugin. Μόλις προχωρήσετε στην εγκατάσταση, το plugin γίνεται διαθέσιμο σε όλους τους browsers που υπάρχουν εγκατεστημένοι στο σύστημά σας. Για μένα πραγματικά ενοχλητικό γεγονός και σημείο στο οποίο κατάλαβα ότι πρέπει να ψιλοκαίγονται στην Google για την διάδοση του plugin τους.

Τέλος,

παραδείγματα χρήσης του νέου Google Earth API: Google Earth API Examples

και ένα σχετικό βίντεο:

more about “Google Earth API“, posted with vodpod

Google I/O 2008, San Francisco

thomasgallagher — Wed, 28 May 2008 21:28:42 +0000

Morning Keynote – “Surf Report: Surf’s Up on the Open Web!”
The first keynote of the day was focused on the latest Google technologies that are driving forward development of the ‘Open Web’ concept. Primary topics included leveraging the Google Cloud deployment platform through Google App Engine (now available to all), and making use of the Google Web Toolkit (a suite of tools, primarily focused around a Java cross-compiler) to provide desktop-style rich functionality on the web browser.

There was also a ‘Celebrity Fan Site’ demo that showed just how easy it is to add multilingual search, news, videos, images and maps to a static website using the Google Web APIs and Javascript.

Google OpenSocial Campfire Chat
I found this campfire interesting as it focused on the development of the platform as much as the actual implementation of the technology. Emphasis was also placed on the importance of remembering that as we are dealing with an open standard, we as developers and consumers can contribute to the Google OpenSocial Specification and shape its future development.

Many of the floor questions seemed a little misguided as they were rather specific to an individual’s company or website. In reaction to this, panelist Dan Pieterson (Google, seventh from the left in the photograph) raised a very valid point that “OpenSocial provides common APIs, not common policies”. On a personal level I thought this was particularly valid as I have sometimes found that people have a tendency to seek reassurance for their business decisions from service providers when it is not really within their remit to comment.