It's here

The stuff I promised in my last post is now live.

• Cleaned up API URLs and "semantic" URLs
• You can now POST MSEC metadata to the poster/jumpmap APIs 
• A blather of additional support for T5 data.

And perhaps least interesting if you're a user of the site - unless I get run over by a cable car or something - is that the source code to travellermap.com is now up on github.

Also:

• Slipped in a few bug fixes. Probably slipped in a few bugs, too. Let me know.
• Added a ton more tests (unit tests, API tests).
• I still need to post T5 data format documentation. (Writing good documentation is much harder and time consuming than writing code.)
• The old-style SEC data output has been changed to match the column widths from the ancient GEnie data drop. This means names get truncated and all that fun stuff. If this breaks anything that consumes the data I would recommend changing to consume the tab-delimited data, which is inherently more flexible.

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Coming soon: Open Source, T5 Data, RESTful URLs, MSEC parsing

I'm taking a week off from work to catch up on personal projects that require more than the usual 20 minutes a day of unbroken concentration I can scrounge up. For TravellerMap.com my big goal is getting the code open sourced, up on GitHub. As a prelude to that I needed to do some cleanup, such as moving some authentication strings out of the code itself, and general polishing. Don't expect it to be beautiful, though!

A few things got done as part of this process:

• More RESTful URLs will be added, with the ugly SomeAPI.aspx URLs relegated to legacy. For a hint of what this might look like (if you're not familiar with the terminology) look at a COTI thread on RESTful Traveller APIs. 
• Nit: it won't be truly RESTful as the site is stateless, so there's no state to transfer. 
• I've implemented T5 "Second Survey" data parsing and a formal format description. Short answer: column-based, but variable width fields with a header that self-documents field widths.
• I've implemented support for sec2pdf's MSEC file format. Not every feature (like label tweaks) is supported, but it will save you from learning the XML metadata format.
• Added honest-to-goodness unit tests for a handful of things. 
• Converted most of the C# to use System.Linq where possible to make the code more readable.
• Squashed various bugs

Expect shiny things over the next few days, and as always forgive the mess.

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Traveller5 Data

You may notice Traveller 5 Second Survey data starting to appear in various places in the site. It's going to be a gradual process to get it everywhere it makes sense. You can track the TODO list on the Trello board.

Where it shows up now:

• SEC API - if you add type=SecondSurvey, e.g.: http://travellermap.com/SEC.aspx?sector=spin&type=SecondSurvey - this is human readable.
• SEC API - if you add type=TabDelimited, e.g.: http://travellermap.com/SEC.aspx?sector=spin&type=TabDelimited - this is easier to parse
• "Data" link at the bottom of the main map page (which uses SecondSurvey, above)
• LBB generator (sector name link at the bottom of the main page) e.g. http://travellermap.com/sector.htm?sector=spin

In addition, I've clarified the credits area to distinguish between the source of the data (i.e. Traveller 5 Second Survey) from any products published by a current licensee (e.g. The Spinward Marches by Mongoose Publishing).

I still need to do something with the data in these parts of the site:

• Search integration - allow search by extension fields
• Display - show indicators for new data when zoomed in
• Document - explain the new T5 fields and data formats
• Accept T5 data in the post.htm / jpost.htm forms

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