New Map Feature

I'm putting out a new map feature that I've been working on for some time now.

Once this gets dialed in, and we get more area locations, this will enable some cool new features on the mobile app.

It is now possible for anyone to tell MP where an area is located. Look for the button on any area page, especially if your favorite area is missing from this map tool.

Here's the new feature:
mountainproject.com/scripts…

Looking forward to your suggestions and feedback!

Some important notes:

1. We don't know the location of many areas, which makes it tricky to work well in all areas, but it's still fun.

2. It will be slow to load the map data at first. Give it a minute and it will speed up as our caching system does its work.

3. Changes to routes and areas will not be visible on this map tool immediately (it might even take days). The full route and area pages update immediately as normal.

Cool work, Nick!

Very cool! Excited to use the new tool.

One piece of feedback:

If I navigate, for example, to Destinations -> Colorado -> Browse this area on a map, I see a map of Colorado with all the various high-level destinations on it (e.g., Golden, Boulder, Colorado Springs). Super.

When I start to zoom in, all the smaller-level destinations start to show up (e.g., for Colorado Springs, you see Garden of the Gods, Red Rock Canyon Open Space, etc.), but all the higher-level destinations are still there (e.g., "Colorado Springs" is still showing). That makes it look like there's more total routes than there really are.

In this example, I believe it would be more intuitive to have the destination "Colorado Springs" drop off the map when the smaller destinations that make up the "Colorado Springs" destination appear on the map.

Second piece of input:

Not even remotely a big deal, but if it's easy to implement, allowing the scroll wheel on a mouse to be used for zooming in and out (as with Google Maps) would be handy.

michaelp wrote:I believe it would be more intuitive to have the destination "Colorado Springs" drop off the map when the smaller destinations that make up the "Colorado Springs" destination appear on the map.

This would be ideal (and how I originally programmed it), but the problem is that we only have reliable location data for those upper levels. If we pull them off the map as you zoom in, MANY areas will not be represented.

This will solve itself over time as we get the location for more areas, but that will take a long time.

Nick Wilder wrote: This would be ideal (and how I originally programmed it), but the problem is that we only have reliable location data for those upper levels. If we pull them off the map as you zoom in, MANY areas will not be represented. This will solve itself over time as we get the location for more areas, but that will take a long time.

Ah, interesting.

Well thanks for listening. :)

The new map feature is awesome -well done.

Nick Wilder wrote: This would be ideal (and how I originally programmed it), but the problem is that we only have reliable location data for those upper levels. If we pull them off the map as you zoom in, MANY areas will not be represented. This will solve itself over time as we get the location for more areas, but that will take a long time.

Perhaps instead of having the bigger area disappear, you could have the dot for the bigger area change colors or turn into a square or something. That way one could visually distinguish the differences between the levels of each area.

Jeremy Bauman wrote: you could have the dot for the bigger area change colors or turn into a square or something. That way one could visually distinguish the differences between the levels of each area.

Great idea! I've done just that - the shade of blue gets darker as you get to smaller areas.

michaelp wrote:Second piece of input: Not even remotely a big deal, but if it's easy to implement, allowing the scroll wheel on a mouse to be used for zooming in and out (as with Google Maps) would be handy.

+1

Love the new feature, thanks!

Any way this could be brought into the mobile version? I live at the NRG permanently and will go walk entire cliff lines and log coordinates all day if possible.

Nick Wilder wrote: Great idea! I've done just that - the shade of blue gets darker as you get to smaller areas.

Great solution. :-)

Another suggestion: Is it possible to add an inches-to-miles scale?

Pretty cool feature. Thanks!

One suggestion that might make it easier to get locations entered for areas that currently don't have one:

Can you set up some kind of filter that will list all areas missing coordinates? This way we could look through the list and see if there is any area that we know the location to, rather than having to randomly check areas to see if they have coordinates.

I really like it. Especially the pop-up interface where I can browse without leaving the map feature. Cool graphics too. On a slightly different note, I'd really like to be able to sort climbing areas and my ticks by name, location, date, grade, type… I realize you can do some of this (sort types of climbs for an area) but it'd be nice to be able to sort by each category.

Nick Wilder wrote:I'm putting out a new map feature that I've been working on for some time now. Once this gets dialed in, and we get more area locations, this will enable some cool new features on the mobile app. It is now possible for anyone to tell MP where an area is located. Look for the button on any area page, especially if your favorite area is missing from this map tool. Here's the new feature: mountainproject.com/scripts… Looking forward to your suggestions and feedback! Some important notes: 1. We don't know the location of many areas, which makes it tricky to work well in all areas, but it's still fun. 2. It will be slow to load the map data at first. Give it a minute and it will speed up as our caching system does its work. 3. Changes to routes and areas will not be visible on this map tool immediately (it might even take days). The full route and area pages update immediately as normal.

Two main gripes:

1. A single click on one of the area circles shouldn't open up the window to that area, it should zoom into the area, then a double click should open up the area.

2. you should be able to use the scroll wheel to zoom in and out, it is super clunkey having to go up and click on the zoom bar.

Thank you!

Thanks! Great new feature!

Great new feature, thanks very much for putting the work in on it. And special kudos to incorporating the locating feature into the area pages, I tagged a couple areas as I was looking for routes to do this coming Tuesday post-work. Nice.

You could also change the shape depending on size of the area.

Or you could shade in the circle. So a solid shaded circle is a big area versus a lightly shaded one would have fewer routes. Kinda shows density

Not working on my iPad. Can't zoom or navigate.

The new maps do not give specific locations... just thought I point that out. Unless is being built at the moment, and in the process of being improved, is not better than the old maps.