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Final countdown! Google Zurich here we GO!

In exactly ten(10) days I'm moving to Zurich, Switzerland to start as a full-time employee at Google Zurich! Wish me luck with this big move!

OpenSocial article published!

Some time ago, while I was working on friendsmap (find more about it in future posts) I realized that accessing gdata from contained OpenSocial applications was not possible.
So after playing for a while with the Google Data Javascript Library + some hacking I found a way to make it work.

So I contacted Lane from Google's OpenSocial team to share my hack, and he suggested me to write an article & blog post to be published in the official OpenSocial articles page.

Time passed and the article & blog post are out!

• Blog post

• Article

For any question about this or any other OpenSocial topic, don't hesitate in contacting me!

OpenSocial talk @ Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre

Today I gave a presentation in the 8th Jornadas Regionales de Software Libre.

I really enjoyed the talk and meeting people from the OpenSource community.
Unfortunately I did not presence any other talk but I will do so tomorrow and on Friday.

If you are in Buenos Aires I really encourage you to pass by and listen some talks and If you want grab a coffee together :) and if not you can watch some of the rooms live

More information:

• Conference site
• Conference program

My presentation slides:

Social Networks @ Sjsl 20 08 08

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: socialnetworks)

Getting things Done!

I have to admit that after reading the book I decided myself to implement the process described inside in order to organize my day to day job.
And after a week, I can happily announce that I've got my Gmail inbox empty, but not empty cause I removed all my emails, I organized the whole bunch of emails (including some deletions) in Projects & References using also Statuses.
This is just the first step in my implementation (cleaning the inbox & organizing emails) so now I have a beautiful empty Inbox this will become my in-basket.
The following step is to keep stuff in order, and later I will start doing the weekly review.

Just wrote to share a happy moment!

PD: check my empty Inbox :)

Google Maps API cheatsheet

I have been working with Google Maps API this days and I found myself needing some basic features that are available but not so easy to find so I wrote this small cheat sheet to help everybody:

• Using AJAX loader

Some time ago, Google added a cool feature named Ajax loader that allows you to load javascript libraries and toolkits, either from Google (Google Maps, Google Ajax Search, Google Ajax Feeds and Google Data) or third party's (jQuery, prototype, scriptaculous, MooTools and dojo) directly in your code and avoid the hosting of this content in your servers.
This allows Google to host this files in different CDNs allowing better balance.

The API is quite simple, so let's move to the details:

1) Add a link to the jsapi library using the API key provided by Google:
http://www.google.com/jsapi?key=ABCDEFG"

2) Use the google.load function to load the desired library, in the example Google Maps API version 2:
google.load("maps", "2");

3) Use the google.setOnLoadCallback providing a callback function to be notified when the loading finished:
google.setOnLoadCallback(initialize);

4) Define a callback and use the API inside:
function initialize() {
var map = new google.maps.Map2(document.getElementById("map"));
...
}

5) The same applies in the case you need to load more libraries, just add more google.load invocations:
google.load("maps", "2");
google.load("search", "1");

6) The callback will be called when ALL the libraries are loaded.

This is particularly useful when working with OpenSocial applications since it allows you to avoid hosting javascript files making the application lighter.

• Using Google maps for localhost

Usually you develop in your local machine before uploading the content to any server, if this is your case, then you will want to use Google Apis that require a key which is based on the domain that will be loading the desired API.
When working with localhost you just need to go to the API signup page and enter http://localhost[:PORT_NUMBER_IF_DIFFERENT_THAN_80] and get a key for localhost, then just load the APIs as explained in 1)

• Centering & zooming map based on added markers

Another hot requirement when working with Google Maps is to be able to center & zoom the map based on the markers contained in it.
The API provides some methods to do so, but some steps are required:

0) initialize our code with 3 variables:
var map = null; // the Map object obtained by new GMap or new google.maps.Map
var mapBounds = null; // the bound within the map that contain all the markers
var mapCenter = null; // the map center :)

1) create a getMapBounds function that will create a new LagLngBounds object from the API which will basically determine the bounds of the map area we are working on:

function getMapBounds() {
if (mapBounds == null) {
mapBounds = new google.maps.LatLngBounds();
}
return mapBounds;
}

2) create an addMarker function that basically add an overlay to the map note the highlighted lines:

function addMarker(location) {
var point = new google.maps.LatLng(location.latitude, location.longitude);
var marker = new google.maps.Marker(point);
map.addOverlay(marker);
getMapBounds().extend(point); //extend the bound limits to include the marker location
centerMap(); //calls center map using the new bound
}

3) finally create a centerMap function that will get the appropriate zoom level + the center based on the bound we modified before:

function centerMap() {
var center = getMapBounds().getCenter();
if (mapCenter != null) {
center = mapCenter;
}
var newZoom =map.getBoundsZoomLevel(getMapBounds()) - 1;
if (map.getZoom() != newZoom){
map.setCenter(center, newZoom);
} else{
map.panTo(center);
}
mapCenter = center;
}

4) That's it, anytime you add a marker the bound will grow and the map will be centered.

Happy Coding!

Social Networks @ Epidata

Today I gave my second Social Networks talk at Epidata Consulting (first was some time ago, at Inclusion Services).

I was received by a crowded meeting (~20) room enjoying food and drinks (home-like environment). There I was able to met very good friends: Pablo Tortorella, Sebastián Marucci and Diego de Paz Sierra (college mates).

People was quite interested, and many good questions arise from the talk making it even more comfortable.

I hope I will be able to give more and more talks like this related not only to Social Networks.

Enjoy the slides and pics from the talk below.

| View | Upload your own