[Fwd: Re: [PHP] Maps]

I forgot to CC the list, sorry. -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [PHP] Maps Date: Wed, 05 Dec 2007 20:25:06 +0100 From: Jochem Maas <jochem@iamjochem.com> To: robert@webtent.com References: <1196879273.12363.13.camel@columbus.webtent.org> Robert Fitzpatrick wrote: > Well, I have two clients that both want mapping for their sales people. > I have been looking at the Google API and Phoogle > (www.systemsevendesigns.com/phoogle). I assume with these examples I > will be able to produce what they need? Which is to select several > addresses and produce a fastest route map with directions to those > addresses from a start address. Not clear from my reading yet, but can > someone with some experience tell me if this is possible with the Google > API or some hints that might speed up my process of the best way to go > for this... google maps is no real help here, your able to plot points but there is no API interface with their routing functionality (so you have no idea where roads actually are) ... you've been asked to solve the travelling salesman problem, this is hard. time to start reading: http://www.google.com/search?q=travelling+salesman+problem and more specifically (with an eye to finding something that solves the problem for you): http://www.google.com/search?q=travelling+salesman+problem+google+maps chances are you'll end up building something expensive, likely that offering something that allows these salepeople to quickly/easily link to google/yahoo/whatever maps and then manually view/tweak their route will be a lot less painful to implement and alot more cost effective.