timwalling.com

I packaged up the first release of FlexMap over the weekend. The source code is being hosted by Google Code but I’ll maintain a page for the project here as well. As soon as Yahoo! releases an updated maps API, this will obviously become defunct, but I wanted to follow through with it anyway. It was an interesting challenge to create a Flex 2 component which exposed much of the same API as the Flex 1.5 version, while doing all of the communication via LocalConnection to a Flash 8 SWF.

I plan on adding some more features so I’ve dubbed this the 0.4 release (I’m guessing I’m about 40% done). Hopefully this is useful for anyone looking to quickly get started with the maps API in Flex 2.

Project home and documentation:
http://www.timwalling.com/flexmap/

Source code:
http://code.google.com/p/flexmap/

My sample application has been updated and the source code is available along with the component source. Some more things might need to be documented, especially my MapEvent addition but hopefully it’s apparent in the sample app.

FlexMap Example

I’ve been working on a Flex 2 component which exposes the Yahoo! Maps API similar to the official Flex 1.5 version. There seems to be a lot of interest in getting an official, updated version of the maps API and in the meantime several people have blogged about ways of communicating to a Flash 8 SWF which contains the Yahoo! Maps Flash component.

I played around with this a while back going with the ExternalInterface approach. I’ve since dumped that approach in favor of using LocalConnection. I’ve encapsulated all the communication into a Flex 2 component which you can just drop into your Flex application. I’m going to be finishing up a few things on it this weekend after which I’ll release the component, along with source. I’m posting a preview of it now to see how much interest there is in the project. The first release of the component will only expose the most common API elements and then I’ll plan out a roadmap for adding more of the Flex 1.5 API.

You can view the demo here:
http://timwalling.com/sandbox/flexmap/preview/

The code for the demo:

Since all of the communication is taken care of by the component, you should be able to use the component just like the Flex 1.5 version using all of the standard map events and map methods.

Update:
I’m open to project name ideas. For obvious reasons, I won’t be keeping the component name “YahooMap”.

I’ve added two more charts to analyze Jack’s kill stats.

http://timwalling.com/bauerkills/

Yes, I’m obsessed with Jack Bauer. The site bauercount.com keeps track of every kill he makes on 24 so I decided to chart all of his kills against the hour of the show in which he made the kill.

Which time of day is Jack’s deadliest? When is it safe to be around Jack Bauer? See for yourself:

http://timwalling.com/bauerkills/

The company I work for is looking for solid developers, preferably with some Flex experience, to work either full-time or contract (on-site). I say preferably with Flex experience because we’re always looking for people who have good OO design and development skills but right now getting people who have experience with UI development is more important. If you’ve worked with Swing or some other UI library, that’s a plus too. So if anyone in the Boston area is looking for work or a job change please check out our job listings.

Feel free to contact me with any questions as well. I know I’m leaving the description of “developer position” pretty wide open but I think we really value strong development skills regardless of language. It would be a shame to miss out on a good developer who could quickly pick up the Flex specifics of our work.