Save Location & Save Preferences

If you're a long-time user of the site, you may not have noticed some options that I added recently under the settings (gear) menu:

• Save Preferences
• Save Location

If selected, these use your browser's local storage mechanism to persist the settings options (style, what to show, etc) and location (what coordinates are centered in the view) for the next time you visit the site. These options are particularly valuable on devices like the iPhone where you can "Add Link to Home Screen", so that if you switch away from the app and back again you won't lose your context.

These days, I find I usually check the options "Filled Borders" and "Dim Unofficial Data" since I want to look for flaws like missing borders or incomplete routes and prioritize corrections, but you may have different options you want to keep.

Anyway - use 'em if you want 'em. Each device you use to access the site will "remember" your settings differently. If you check "Save Location" but want to get back to an overview of Charted Space, click the "Home" button.

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Option: Dim Unofficial Data

I just tossed another feature up under the settings (gear) menu. You can now "Dim Unofficial Data" - anything that hasn't gotten the "final" T5SS seal of approval is slightly grayed out.

It's not on by default. This feature has been on the "to do" list for a while but I was overthinking the problem - this is a quick hack, but I think it's kinda pretty.

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Cursors and Glyphs

More To-Do items To-Done:

• The mouse cursor over the map is once again a crosshair. When you start dragging it will change to a drag-hand.
• Per discussion in a previous post, base symbols have been overhauled and the legend has been updated. Following precedent in paper publications from the CT and MT eras, there is no attempt to make map symbols universally unique. For example, non-Imperial naval bases all use red stars ★ regardless of allegiance (Vargr, Aslan Tlaukhu, Solomani, Federation, K'kree, Droyne...). I've tried to follow established precedent wherever possible.
• In addition to Research Stations, symbols are now rendered for Imperial Prisons (code: Pr), Imperial Reserves (code: Re) and Exile Camps (code: Ex), following the Spinward Marches Map symbology.

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Beta: Overlay Rectangle

On request, I've added a follow-on to the You Are Here feature in Beta for iframe:

Overlay Rectangle:

• Specify ox, oy, ow and oh as the x, y, width and height of an overlay box in map coordinates.
  
• This is rendered as a translucent overlay on top of the map. The appearance is hard-coded.
  
• This is supported for IFRAME only. There is no option for the user to move or remove the overlay.
• The details of this API are subject to change without warning.
  

Atlas of the Imperium coverage area:
http://www.travellermap.com/iframe.htm?ox=-111.95&oy=80&ow=166.614&oh=200

Spinward Marches:
http://www.travellermap.com/iframe.htm?ox=-112.104&oy=80&ow=27.776&oh=40 Ω

Jump Maps, You Are Here, and More

I was out of town for several days with my computer but no Internet connection and evenings to myself, so I did a fair bit of work on the site. A lot of the work went into fielding requested features.

What's New:

• Added JumpMap API - generate a Jump-N map for any location

• Keyboard scrolling is now enabled in IFRAMEs
• You will want to specify SCROLLING="no" in the IFRAME tag on your site
• Asteroids are now rendered as semi-random clusters of ellipses at high scales
• Add MapOptions.ForceHexes (add 8192 to always draw hexagonal parsecs, not squares)

[UPDATE 2008-02-03] Fixed use of ForceHexes for the main page and IFRAME - it was being masked out. Should work now.

• Tweak min scales for features to support 24 & 48 pixels/parsec more nicely
• Lots of API documentation cleanup
  

Beta:

• iframe.htm now takes "You Are Here" parameters (yah_sx, sah_sy, yah_hx, yah_hy) that define a sector/hex pair to put a marker on - example. There can be only one such marker, and there is no UI (or finalized script API) to set, move, or clear it.

Fixes:

• Combat client-side memory bloat by:
• Clearing tile cache after following a non-animated link
  
• Request metadata with a time threshold, to avoid hundreds of aborted HTTP requests
• Fix candy background tiling for legend (caused by a floating point underflow issue in GDI+)

Plus lots of (hopefully) invisible internal changes. Ω

TODO List

Here's my "To Do" list for the site. Many of these are probably incomprehensible, but I thought I'd share anyway

• FEATURE: Support custom data for sector.htm LBB generator
  
• LOC: Detect language setting "Accept-Language:", serve Japanese version (it turns out a lot of the site traffic is from Japan. Go figure!)
  
• IMPL/FEATURE: Style object that's data only
• Cache object for brushes, etc
• Allow passing in via parameters (options and scale are presets)
• Scale is just a seed - use next-highest scale
• FEATURE: Search by regex on (UWP, PBG, ...)
• BUG: Terra should look like Earth in Candy style
  
• BUG: iframe doesn't show if "Disable script debugging" is unchecked (WTF?) - IE bug? Maybe cookies can't be loaded or something?
  
• IMPL/PERF: Add more condensed route storage (perf, size)
• QUALITY: Investigate DrawClosedCurve for candy borders
• FEATURE: Style options - hexes at every level
• QUALITY: Up the JPEG quality for Candy a bit
• DATA: Incorporate Theron sector from BeRKA (?)
  
• DATA: Incorporate Uistilao sector from BeRKA (?)
• DATA: Use Kaa'G!kul data from HIWG (?)
• DATA: Incorporate MWM's new T5 data
• IMPL: Reconsider JavaScript class/object style
• Use Class.prototype.func = function() ... rather than this.func, and other extern logic
• Verify that inline functions for event handlers aren't leaking memory
• FEATURE: Support different data sets (Judge's Guild, etc)

What else should I have on the list? Ω

LBB Generator

I played a bit more with the sector.htm page - adding a title page, tweaks to the layout, and so forth. The page code is also slightly more interesting to peruse - to make it easier to modify I wrote a JavaScript Template mechanism that defines the transform using XSLT-like constructs (if, foreach) embedded in the HTML as attributes (jt_if, jt_foreach) itself, and JSONT-like expression embedding sequences ({$.index}, {$.title}), and operates over a JavaScript data construct. The expression language is JavaScript itself and "$" is set to the current object as the parse descends. Check the page source for details.

It ended up working pretty well, once I sorted out some cross-browser issues (IE doesn't have a convenient mechanism for enumerating explicitly specified attributes, alas). Tested in Firefox 2, IE7, Opera 9 and Safari 3 on Windows XP. Ω

We're out of beta - we're releasing on time!

I'm calling the credits experiment done, and out of beta. Shipped!

You'll now see metadata in the page footer for the area on which the map is centered - including world data if you're over an occupied parsec. The data shown will include:

• Sector Name
• World Hex
• World Name
• World UWP
• Sector Era
• Author
• Source
• Publisher
• Hyperlink to source of data
  

Although not present in the beta, I've added in the Era ("circa 1117") if this is known for the particular dataset - corrections welcome!

Another feature that was in beta was a map legend, a new link in the lower left. This launches a popup window (your browser might block it) which uses the current map style to explain the details. (Question: with J-6 and unlimited fuel, how long would it take to get from Regina to Tertius?)

Also, I've added an experimental new API: /SEC.aspx?sector=SECTORNAME - this dumps a standard SEC file for the specified sector. The column widths are undefined - you'll want to use a regular expression to parse it.

Finally, per request on COTI, you will now see UWPs when zoomed in to 128 pixels/parsec. Ω

Map API Updates

A bunch of internal cleanup and refactoring, which will hopefully have no noticeable impact on the site, and three subtle changes to the Poster API:

• Extra-sector worlds no longer rendered - borders and routes will be shown, but the worlds themselves will not be.
• Added an optional subsector=X argument where X is the A...P index of the subsector. If specified, only that subsector is rendered.
• If no render options are specified, by default a sector poster elides the sector grid lines and a subsector poster elides the subsector grid lines as well.

This should make it easier to use the site as an API for static navigation. For example, the following image is embedded in the blog via the following markup:

<img src="http://www.travellermap.com/Poster.aspx?sector=Spinward+Marches&subsector=C&options=2928&scale=64" border="4" />



The API documentation in the last post was incomplete, so here's another shot:

/Coordinates.aspx?sector=SECTORNAME[&hex=XXYY]

• Maps a sector name (and optional hex coordinate) into sector/hex coordinates
• Results are in XML, or JSON if Accept: application/json is specified
  
• example

/Credits.aspx?x=XCOORD&y=YCOORD

• Looks up the data and credits for a given location, including UWP if available
• Coordinates are in tile-space coordinates (optimized for tile rendering, not navigation); conversion functions are in the script
• Results are in XML, or JSON if Accept: application/json is specified
• example

/MSEC.aspx?sector=SECTORNAME

• Generate a plain tes.MSEC file for use with the sec2pdf utilities
• example

/Poster.aspx?sector=SECTORNAME[&scale=N][&subsector=X][&options=O]

• Generate a GIF or JPEG image of the specified sector (or just subsector). Scale (pixels/parsec) and options can be included
• Image format depends on selected options ("Candy" produces JPEG, otherwise GIF)
• Options are defined in the script
  
• example
  

/Search.aspx?q=QUERY

• Perform a free-text search of names for matching sectors, subsectors and worlds
  
• Results are in XML, or JSON if Accept: application/json is specified
• example

/Tile.aspx?x=XCOORD&y=YCOORD&scale=N&options=O[&w=WIDTH&h=HEIGHT]

• Generate a GIF or JPEG image of the specified region.
  
• Coordinates are in tile-space coordinates (optimized for tile rendering, not navigation); conversion functions are in the script
  
• Image format depends on selected options ("Candy" produces JPEG, otherwise GIF)
• Options are defined in the script
• example
  

In case it isn't obvious, the map page itself works by calling these APIs from JavaScript (primarily Tile, but also Coordinates and Search depending on user actions; use of Credits is still "in beta")

Please feel free to make use of any of these APIs. If you encounter any issues with them, let me know! Ω

Metadata/Credits Preview and other Minor Updates

I've updated the code behind the site (both the server side and the client side). There aren't any dramatic changes noticeable by users, but there might be bugs - so let me know!

New stuff:

• You can now specify ?sector=name&hex=xxyy, for example: http://www.travellermap.com/?sector=Verge&hex=2612 - the page will automagically navigate for you, if it can find the sector. You can leave out the &hex=xxyy part too.
• MSEC.aspx and Poster.aspx now return an HTTP 404 error if they can't find the target sector, instead of defaulting to Spinward Marches
• Ran jslint.com over the client side scripts, and did some cleanup.
• Added preliminary sector data and metadata for Kaa G!'kul/Numbis based on work by Mike McKeown
• Created routes, cleaned up borders for Verge
  
• Trojan Reach, Riftspan Reaches and Ealiyasiyw borders cleaned up a bit
• Canopus subsectors added
  

The big pending change can be seen in-progress here:

http://www.travellermap.com/index_creditstest.htm

As you scroll/zoom the map, world data and sector metadata (author, source, URL, etc) will be shown at the bottom of the page. The metadata isn't formatted in a particularly attractive way at the moment, nor is it complete, but this is the direction I'm planning to take with metadata. I may overlay the data on the map itself (lower right corner) rather than having it outside the frame - I'm not sure Ω

New Features: Options, Styles, and Eggs

While moving to the new host I snuck in a few more features:

• Simplified options - there's really no need for the "minor borders" and "minor names" label options, and it just made the page harder to use.
• New rendering style - toggle the Poster and Atlas radio buttons at the top to see the map in the "Imperium Map"/"Spinward Marches" Poster-style (color-on-black) or the Atlas/LBB style (black-on-white).
• One new easter egg added: type "(Arrival Vengeance)" (with parenthesis, but no quotes) into the Search box and you can retrace the last epic journey before night fell on the remnants of the Third Imperium. (And see some glaring examples of sector data issues.)

I haven't tested the map in Opera or Safari for a bit, so please report any issues encountered.

[Update: January 25th, 2008]

D'oh... I'd spelled "Vengeance" as "Vengance". Fixed in the blog and on the site.
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Sector/Subsector Search

Searching now returns matching Sector and Subsector names, and will navigate at the appropriate scale. This required changes to the search engine and the web page, so you may need to Refresh your browser window.

And a few more tweaks while I was there:

• The label option for Sectors - Selected now implies all sectors once you have zoomed in.
• There is now a "Large" option on the mobile page which makes the tile size 192x192, which is better for QVGA screens like Pocket PC

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Mobile (for fun)

Out on the road, and desperate to answer a question about Charted Space on your Web-enabled phone or PDA?

No, I didn't think so. But because it was easy, try out Traveller Map Mobile. Ω