BETA VERSION: Map Locator Hack

Welcome to my first BETA Release of

Map Locator Hack or How-to-Find members in a nutshell

This is my first try to get help from you guys. I tried to develop this on my own but i failed. I need help from all of you.

Before i start to describe what this hack does please take a look at the live demo. It makes my life much easier. Live demo can be viewed here.

Please move your mouse over the marks. You will see userinformations.

So this hack provides a map for VBulletin to show where your members are living. But i do not have the data for the US. I just have the data for germany and due to this i can only provide the german map. I have added the US map and a map of india but without the data i will not be able to finish this hack for other countries.

Please read my installation instructions completly BEFORE you start installing this hack. This hack is not easy to install and it will take you at least 30 min to get it running with the german map.

I would like to add: This is not an official release. This is a BETA version which is currently in production. I would not post this in this BETA section when i would not need your help. So what i need from you ? Please read my install instructions and read the part about the US data. If someone can provide this kind of data, i will be able to publish this hack.

If no one can provide this data, i will not continue with this hack because it works for me and due to the help of an indian VB member i will finalize this hack for him for india. So it is up to you.

UPDATE BETA 1.01:
After having done the base work, i focused now on the performance. If you have many members in your domain and many people open this map, your server will struggle. The heavy SQL part of this hack will bring down your server. Due to this i implemented a performance improvement.

I created the following logic around the hack:
- check if the number of ZIP code entries of the members has changed.
- if yes, then redraw the map with all queries ( a lot of queries which are required )
- if no, then take the already drawn map and take the userinfo which has been saved into a file rather then redo all queries again

Improvement:
- Up to 800% because people do not change their ZIP code so often
- if new ZIP codes are added only 1 person will issue the heavy SQL load to your server and this just ONCE
- every other person will get the cached version of the map with a really nice performance ( 5 queries in total )

And on top of that i added the Locator template to the cached templates. So this hack should be performing very well now. You can check it on my live demo site.

I have updated the ZIP file with the new locator.php file. For upgraders, just replace the locator.php file in your forum root folder. Then please do a "chmod 777 data" in your forum root folder. All set all done.

Cheers,

[58sniper]

Originally Posted by Pseudomizer

Ui. This looks good. I will install this into a db and i have run a couple of queries to make it distinct but this looks like the best source so far. Let me check now.

Now i have 2 sources where i can check. I hope one of them will work.

Thanks so far and now please be patient. In the meantime i need volunteers to install this hack on their servers and obviously this volunteers should be located in US. Who wants to be the BETA tester ?

Please make sure that you get the prerequisites running before i give you the data.

Cheers,

I've got three installations I can install it on...

[Pseudomizer]

Originally Posted by 58sniper

I've got three installations I can install it on...

Hi 58sniper,

then please install it on at least one. Please try to it to have it ready until i have resorted the data you have given me. Perhaps you run into some problems which we can solve until then.

Cheers,

[oly51]

Originally Posted by Pseudomizer

...Thanks so far and now please be patient. In the meantime i need volunteers to install this hack on their servers and obviously this volunteers should be located in US. Who wants to be the BETA tester ?

I'll give it a shot!

[oly51]

Originally Posted by oly51

I'll give it a shot!

...Well maybe not.
My host will not install the Geo folder to the pear folder. :disappointed:

[Pseudomizer]

Originally Posted by oly51

...Well maybe not.
My host will not install the Geo folder to the pear folder. :disappointed:

Why ? This is no security issue. *strange*

Cheers,

[Dras]

The US maps are not as freely aviable as you think, more than 90% of all mareicans only care about money so it's hard. If you want I can get The microsoft map thingy if you know how to get the data out.

[Gamingforce]

I think I hit Jackpot!
http://www.census.gov/tiger/tms/gazetteer/zips.txt

[Johnny]

good ol goverment sites, they just like telling us everything on their...nice find, maybe that should help out...

[Pseudomizer]

Originally Posted by Gamingforce

I think I hit Jackpot!
http://www.census.gov/tiger/tms/gazetteer/zips.txt

Let me check this. I am a little bit confused because some map details have e.g. San Francisco with -122 and others have +122 for the coordinate. I am not a GEO expert. I have to check this.

At the moment with the current map information i have, it puts San Francisco into the center of Iowa. *weird*

Cheers,

[Bro_Joey_Gowdy]

clicks install