Thursday, November 4, 2004

What's New at MP2K Magazine

Welcome to another issue of the MP2Kmag Update. If you voted or have been following the U.S. Presidential election, I hope your candidate won. As it appears George "Dubya" Bush will be occupying the White House for another four years, this is used as the example in this issue's installment of Programming With MapPoint and Excel.

MP2K Magazine is your source for independent news and information about MapPoint technologies and products and is home to the popular web forum for MapPoint users and developers. This month we feature an article from Keith Armonaitis, the President and Co-Founder of Cubistix, who discusses the challenges and pitfalls surrounding a implementation of the MapPoint Location Server.

This Issue's Contents at a Glance
 - features: The House of Dubya, Programming Challenge, Upcoming Articles, Winner in Reader Poll
 - articles: MapPoint Location Server Integration, Pocket Streets 2005 FAQ, Interview with Michael Graff
 - news: Pocket Streets 2005, CacheMinder, KeyNote Helps MapPoint Web Service, Free MapPoint Developer Seminar
 - forum: Forum Highlights, Google Search Tool, Nearly 8,500 posts and Over 1,500 Registered Users

Happy Mapping and please forward this newsletter to anyone who would be interested!

Developing with MapPoint and Excel, Part II - Mapping An Address

In the last issue we showed how to set up a VBA macro to instantiate MapPoint. However, we did not do anything useful! In this mini-tutorial we will demonstrate how to read an Excel cell's contents and use it as input to geocode a location on a map. This could be the start of a Excel-based batch geocoder or an element of an Excel application which may perform routing or batch distance calculations. The possibilities are endless.

So that we are on the same page, start by downloading this worksheet: House_of_Dubya.zip You may substitute your own name or address as desired - or needed if you are using the European maps. Next turn on the Visual Basic menu and open the Control Toolbox. Now click on Command Button and draw a button directly onto your Excel spreadsheet. With design mode still on, click away from your new button and then double-click on the button. This should open the Microsoft Visual Basic window and as in the last tutorial you could see the code:

Private Sub CommandButton1_Click()

End Sub

Again, go to Tools | References and include the Microsoft MapPoint 11.0 Object Library. Compared to the last tutorial, there are several things added to the code. The Method we are most interested in and want to take a look at is FindAddressResults.

object.FindAddressResults([Street], [City], [OtherCity], [Region], [PostalCode], [Country])

Here is the complete code, replace the default contents of the Visual Basic window with the lines below.

Dim oApp As MapPoint.Application

Private Sub CommandButton1_Click()

  Set oApp = CreateObject("MapPoint.Application.NA.11")
  oApp.Visible = True
  Set objMap = oApp.NewMap
 
  Set objLoc = _
  objMap.FindAddressResults( _
    Worksheets("Sheet1").Cells(2, 2), _
    Worksheets("Sheet1").Cells(2, 3), , _
    Worksheets("Sheet1").Cells(2, 4), _
    Worksheets("Sheet1").Cells(2, 5))(1)
 
  objMap.AddPushpin objLoc, _
  Worksheets("Sheet1").Cells(2, 1)
  'objMap.DataSets.ZoomTo

End Sub

Close the Visual Basic window, turn off design mode, and click on your button. If you run the code exactly as shown above, you should see a small Pushpin near Washington D.C. Now uncomment the last line and run the code again. It should zoom into the heart of Washington D.C. and center on the Pushpin. You have located Dubya's home for the next four years. See the help file for more examples and detailed descriptions of the parameters for the statements above.

In the next issue we will show how to add a textbox to the maps. Again, if something is not working right or you need additional help, feel free to post your question in the forum area for this mini-tutorial. Also, let me know if there's any technique or topic you would like to see in future installments of Programming MapPoint and Excel.

 - Eric Frost

BONUS TIP: It's a little late to be of use to anyone in the United States general election earlier this week, but this map uses simply a list of states and url's in a text file + MapPoint 2004 to create a hyperlink map linking to information on how to determine your polling place in each state.

Interested in authoring a "HOW TO" article or tutorial about working with MapPoint? Inquire about our submission guidelines.

MapPoint Programming Challenge - Submit Your Solution and Win!

Time to show off your MapPoint development skills! Take a look in the forum at this MapPoint Route Optimization anomaly for your chance to receive recognition and win prizes.

Route Optimization in MapPoint will sometimes hang. Often it is due to a bad stop which can be detected and adjusted, but it can also occur even when all the stops check out as OK. Share your solution on the best way to handle these situations.

MP2K Magazine Upcoming Articles

Next month we will be publishing Part II of Richard Marsden's popular article on creating maps of earthquake hazard data and recent earthquakes. Also look for articles on Creating a MapPoint Add-in,  using MapPoint in PowerBuilder, and programming MapPoint 2004 with Python.

If you have a MapPoint presentation, neat programming technique, or would simply like to share the ways in which you are using MapPoint technology, contact us to discuss how we can turn your knowledge into an article and share your experience with the rest of the MapPoint community of users and developers.

Reader Poll and Drawing - How Do You Use MapPoint?

Congratulations to Brian McGrath who wins a Large MapPoint Mug for having responded to our poll - How Do You Use MapPoint? Brian uses MapPoint as the GIS brains of an Emergency Services dispatch training simulator that operates as an interface to a computer-aided dispatch system. More details can be found on his web site - http://www.brimacsystems.com.

Would you like a mug? For your chance to win, please share how you use MapPoint.

 - Fleet / Vehicle Tracking and Management
 - Site Selection or Demographic Analysis
 - Professional Developer / Varied
 - Real Estate
 - Health Care Industry
 - Delivery Routing or Analysis
 - Marketing
 
Click here to respond to the poll and enter this month's drawing.

Some notable posts and solutions from the forum over the past few months are listed below. Keep up with the latest news and information about MapPoint by bookmarking the forum and visiting regularly. There are now nearly 8,500 posts and in the forum and over fifteen hundred registered users.

In addition to the Search function built into the forum near the middle-top of the page, forum members frequently use Google to search the MP2Kmag forum. You can now find a search box at the bottom of the forum to aid in your searches and make your hunt for valuable MapPoint knowledge a little easier.