Alright! A quick heads up for everyone. We have the front-end points loading with the ClientAPI, and all is a go on that side of the module. The final peice of the puzzle is the ClientAPI integration changes to the javascript for the Edit form (Adding and Editing points) in the control panel, and the callback to the GeoCoder provider. I'll be diligently knocking out that task when my day breaks free today.

The GeoCoder for this release will be specifically built from the Google API which supports 50,000 Geocoded locations daily. For the most part, points are "Set it and forget it", as long as the address doesn't change. However, that limitation, which may be exceeded by large or complicated lists of points is the reason for the dynamic provider model of the map module. I've had many clients in the past who have needed to make revisions to the old source to support other paid geocoding services. To keep this from causing upgrade issues, the entire model is dynamic, so you can quickly build and use an alternate...

After getting some help from Jon (thanks for that btw), I have switched the data incorporation over to the ClientAPI rather than the older AJAX library which was employed. This took a fair amount of the weekend as a few logical issues needed to be addressed. I finally have all the peices in place, and at this point we are finalizing the javascript changes required for the switch - which simply means instead of transmitting the entire form and request querystring to the back end (as happened with the original library), the javascript needs to be aware of which elements should be transferred and those items need to be wrapped into the request to the ClientAPI. After a few hours tonight, and tomorrow and we are done.

Alright - I'm in the home stretch! The interfaces for the Admin are ready and the front end map controls are finally integrated with the the provider database. I've got one final hurdle that im working on tonight and tomorrow morning to swap out the original AJAX library created for the goMap module and use the ClientAPI calls. Thanks to Jon for getting me the samples of its use, looks pretty simple to swap in!

I just wanted to let everyone know also, the Data Provider for the Map module was originally going to only support Users Online, Countries Online and Data Points - which means you would have to manually enter the points into the Map Points database table through the UI, or through some data manipulation. But I was alerted that it may be necessary to pull points from an external table of records (like DNN User Groups), so I have extended the UI to provide the ability to create query variables which bind to a number of runtime values (like the current portal alias, portal id et al), as well as Form...

Just to give a brief heads up - we are moving forward behind the scenes on the completion of the Dotnetnuke Map Project. It was a concern from the existing user base that the old module would not be compatible with the 4.5 framework and that a direct upgrade path would not be possible. So gears were shifted here to make a viable upgrade path available and allow for this direct upgrade. Due to the lack of available time I have had over the last few months I have added an additional resource to the development effort to get this puppy out the door and into your patient hands!

Also, I will be contacting a number of you directly soon for you assistance via information or direct development of the additional map platforms. These are primarily going to focus on the packages from Microsoft and Yahoo, but additional platforms have also been created that we should provide a port to.

Working on a DNN project and contributing to the collective has been something I desired since DNN was in the 1.x release mode. Until recently, I had not the time to assist on any of the framework, but rather have spent countless hours adjusting the core for specific clients and building modules for service contracts. With our popular Map module (originally called GoMap) migrating into the core projects, I finally can contribute my time and energy to something which has already consumed a great deal of my own life.

For those people who are familiar with the GoMap module - thanks for the support - and I am diligently putting together the initial release (with some major enhancements) which will be the base operation of the DotNetNuke Map module. The architecture will be highly extensible - and a full project breakdown will be release in the coming days to identify the improvements and enhancements as well as the full project structure.

Those of you who are not familiar with GoMap, or are interested...