andrewmc2/googleMapXMLWriterApplet
When I first had the idea of using Toronto Open Data to create my park finder app, I didn’t know too much about the Google Maps API. I assumed that just having the address of the park would be sufficient. Unfortunately, to actually place markers on the map, I had to know the latitude and longitude of the address. I thought that this problem would be easily solvable with the Google Geocoding API, but it had limited free usage. I then decided that I had to make a new XML file with the latitude and longitudes of the parks. There were some web apps out there that could find the points, but I would have to do over 800 searches to make my app. So after doing some research, I created my own little applet that allows you to give the program an existing XML file with addresses, and ultimately make a new XML file that includes both the latitude and longitude of the address in addition to the original information. Although the applet has to be customized depending on the actual XML input sheet. Please note that for demo purposes, the applet will spit out the new XML into the console after 10 address are completed. And please close after the demo, since I don’t want to get in too much with Google for overusing their API.