Blog posts

Geocoding Tool for Virtual Earth & Google Maps » Emad Fanous A geocoding API returning javascript calls that can be passed directly to the google maps API. Looks like it supports more locations than most of the (US-only) geocoders out there (tags: apis geocoding javascript) FirePHP - Firefox Extension for PHP Development Somehow lets you write scripts that will integrate PHP debugging into firebug. Looks overly complex for what I need right now, but it’s an interesting idea. ...

For a while now I’ve been wanting to set up one of those fancy del.icio.us posting things, whereby links I’ve added to my account during the day get posted to this blog each evening. But I use my del.icio.us account for a lot more than just topics that are covered here, and I don’t want to clutter it up. Nor did I want to have to switch between accounts to specify which links get posted where. ...

As we plan to move back to a big city, something I’m very much looking forward to, I really enjoyed this piece about an older couple who abandoned the suburbs for downtown Seattle. Obviously the couple in question are affluent enough to enjoy a very particular kind of urban lifestyle, one that perhaps not many could sustain, but after a recent weekend spent in the midst of an ex-urban landscape, I’m happy to take any story I can get of people abandoning that world. ...

There’ve been some problems with the comment form on this site for the past couple of days (that’s what I get for not fully testing my tweaks to wordpress), which should now be resolved. So on the slight chance that someone may have been itching to comment and couldn’t, now’s your opportunity. Thanks to Brandon for pointing out the problem.

acts_as_geocodable ( blog entry, repository) is the newest kid on the rails geo plugin block. It actually consists of two parts, a gem called graticule which handles the actual geocoding, interacting with external services, etc, and the plugin which offers extensions to your models. I like that separation. Having the generalised code in a gem and the rails-specific hooks in a plugin makes a lot of sense and makes it much easier to use the core code in non-rails ruby apps, and having a single gem that supports multiple services allows for built-in failover should the preferred geocoder be unavailable. ...

Like so many others, since I discovered Textmate I’ve not looked back. Except, that is, on the rare occasion when I find myself working on a windows machine, which is usually because I’m debugging a layout. When I’m over there I really miss the many features of textmate that make me more productive. So I was delighted to spot E, a text editor currently using the tagline “The Power of Textmate on Windows”. I watched the video and it looks like a good substitute, almost to the point that it’s tempting to call it a ‘clone’–there are references to distinctive functionality, but information is scarce. ...

I’ve refrained from blogging much about Yahoo! Pipes, mainly because everyone else seemed to be. It’s definitely an interesting development, and shows how far we’ve come with open data, but also how far we still are from that really making an obvious impact for non-geeks. Two of the more interesting pieces on the use of Pipes that I’ve seen so far are two blog entries that Tim McGhee pointed out on the govtrack list. He’s done some work using Pipes to repurpose various feeds about government activity, and they’re worth a look. Check out: Managing the volume of content from Congress and Geek Out: Mashing Yahoo! Pipes and the Congressional Record over on his blogs. ...

There seems to be quite a plethora of Ruby/Rails libraries appearing aiming to simplify handling geography and distances. In some cases these libraries do quite distinct things (zip codes vs. longitude/latitude, map output vs. distance calculations) but they’re frequently lumped together and it’s difficult to tell which will be best to use in your projects. I’ve used several of these projects and have previously blogged about YM4R and acts_as_locateable, but I’m still not sure which I’d pick for new projects. So I thought it would be helpful to try to put together a comparison of which libraries offer what functionality. Here I’ll just offer a quick chart, but I’m hoping to write them up in a bit more detail over the coming days/weeks. If there’s sufficient interest, I’d consider moving this out to a wiki for more general use. ...

I’ve not used it myself, but conceptually I’ve always been very interested in WSGI (the Python Web Server Gateway Interface). WSGI defines a standard interface between web servers and frameworks, giving python web applications the same portability that Java servlets enjoy, and also makes it much easier to layer code—with a standardised interface you can easily add in extra components to process your input and output before or after your main framework has handled it. ...

I’ve been waiting for quite some time to see Open Congress in action, so it was a little frustrating that various commitments mean it’s taken a few days to really explore it. The site gets much of its data from govtrack.us, but provides a more intuitive interface. The index of what’s going on in the US Congress can be explored in a variety of ways, going through bills, senators, representatives, committees, industries, and issues. The senator and representative navigation works pretty well, and its nice to have a feed for each one, but it would also be good to be able to navigate using a map or other visual device rather than having to switch to the state view and then scroll down to find the representative I’m interested in. ...