Is there any gMap viewing limitation/day from AFC or Google?

[opusdei]

I mean I'm testing my swf each time I make a modification. Sometimes, the map don't want to appear anymore... until the day after. It's not a connection problem because other people can view the map.

Is it limited by google / IP / day? Or is it limited by an AFC server or something else?

Thanks!

[andreit]

We are not aware of any set limits. Does the problem occur with the Map or Satellite view? Or both. Read more on the satellite issue here.

[joby1]

I've had it too today, maps wouldn't show in satellite or hybrid, but then tried google maps (uk) and had the same problems there too.

noticed they have introduced a traffic jam option over canada, perhaps they are testing that and it has screwed things up a bit...

[opusdei]

It was the same today in France. I think there is limitations, and their servers might be too busy...

[robbajamez]

I'm having the same problem. I built an aplication that loads 8 gmap components simultaniously. when testing the app for half a day, it will stop providing the map images. The million dollar question: does this happen because of the component's limitations or because of a limitation on google map requests. switching IPs seems to help, also the stop working and come back next day approach seems effective so there must be an IP/DAY limitation, as far as the component's documentation, there is no limitation on using it, so I suspect google pulls the plug.

any further thought?

[robbajamez]

Found out, the error comes from google. Too many requests from the same ip is interpreted as an automatic request, wich makes it unable to bypass google's security system. When I checked the datatransfers in my browser I'm getting the following error:

...but your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application. To protect our users, we can't process your request right now. blablabla...


Their is no available fix or known workaround to this problem.

What I did found out and still cannot understand:

When I set the gmaps alpha to 50%, I noticed the component builts the map 3 times! It first builts the top layer of images, then it builts them again, and then once again behind it. Why this happens I don't know and I could not find any other posts about this... idea anyone?

stopping the gmap after it has build the first layer of images would give you only a third of the usual request amount, thus making you able to use the component a lot more per day. (also it would speed up the component when zooming, because it doesnt download useless images when you are downloading usefull new images for a different zoomlevel.

The only way I found to stop the datatransfer was removing the component from the stage.... not so usefull :S

Anyone has an idea on stopping the component from further loading the images? let me know


Now this problem hits people who run their gmap from an online swf(i guess most of you..) but for the ones who run their applications from their computer, or if you need more IP/DAY to test your application here's my workaround:

1. built the component
2. addEventListener MAP_PROGRESS to it, wich will call a function everytime an image is received
3. devide the total to be received images to three
4. when the first layer of images is built, draw the gmap into a bitmapdata and replace the gmap with a new movieclip containing that bitmapdata.

Maybe not so usefull for most of you but, it was usefull for me.

the reason why you cant use this method when you run the apllication from a network is because the bitmapdata functions will not work for externally loaded images. The flash sandbox will prevent you from copying external images.

[opusdei]

Humm interesting!

I was sure of the limitation... Thanks Google!

A question to admin : couldn't you find a solution to stop charging 3 times the map each time we load/zoom a map?

Thanks a lot!

[dvs_code]

Actually only 2 layers are loading per view. The repeat of the first layer will come out of cache, so it will not be loaded from Google. The second layer will be loading so that when you zoom out, the map image won't vanish.
_________________
Dmitry Stolyarov
AFC Team

[robbajamez]

I understand the construction as you explained, and it makes sence.

I started to doubt my statement so I double checked with an experiment:

I built one aplication that fully loads the gmap, and one that will check the total incoming images and stops it before building the second layer.(removing the gmap from the stage)

here's the code for the first app:

GMap.addEventListener("MAP_LOAD_PROGRESS",progressHandler);

function progressHandler(event:Object){
trace(event.totalTiles); //showed a total of 47 total tiles (gmap size dependant)
trace(event.currentTile);
}

I checked the datatransfer in firebug and it showed me a total load of 47 images.

this would mean that when there are only 2 layers, it would only load about 23 images?

Instead I rebuilt the progressHandler function so that it stops loading after 1/3 of 47 , about 16:

function progressHandler(event:Object){
//trace(event.totalTiles); //showed a total of 47 total tiles
//now if we only load 1/3 of the total:
if(event.currentTile == 16){
removeMovieClip(GMap);
}
trace(event.currentTile);
}

the first layer had been built completely, and in firebug i see it stops loading after I removed the component.
wich leaves me with the question, if a second layer (of aproximately 16 images in this case) is yet to be built, why does it load even 15 more after that and what for?

Is this suppose to happen?

also about the requests, I get the whole 47 google request errors when my request limit has been reached, i asume this does not come from the cache..

[s3rge]

I think a solution is also a commercial API key from google maps.

[infinitation]

Being able to use Individual API keys would be great, especially if one of us needs to use this at the enterprise level. I would love the ability to be able to switch it to know that we are only relying on our key for data and nobody else's.

[paul ferrie]

I have saw this happen with various flash map api's like this one.

[hauraki]

Hi,

I would like to know if you consider using your gmap component is a good solution in case of high traffic website. We are working on a big project which is something like 50 000 users / day for a race tracker.
When you see the terms of google :

1.6 Geocode Requests. You may make up to 15,000 geocode requests per day. If you exceed this value within a 24-hour limit, the Maps API geocoder may stop working for you temporarily.....

(http://code.google.com/apis/maps/terms.html)

These limitations have an impact on the use of your component.
Could you confirm this ?

Thants a lot

Regards
Hauraki

[andreit]

Hi Hauraki, this map has been used on a number of high traffic websites like Nike Japan and ABC Elections (there are a bunch of other examples). It has been confirmed by our users that there is a limitation on a number of Satellite map views from a single IP [ at this moment we are not aware of any issues with the standard map view, satellite only ]

[stijnr]

Any news on this? I'm having the same issue. After a number of requests, access to satellite's images is closed and you get a page with a "We're sorry..." message instead, like this: http://sorry.google.com/sorry/?continue=http://kh2.google.com/kh%3Fn%3D404%26v%3D24%26t%3Dtqsrss

The javascript GMap allows you to enter a personal key: http://code.google.com/apis/maps/signup.html
which would, I imagine, solve the problem.

Is there a way to enter a Google key into the (AS 2.0) GMap component?