[OpenLayers-Users] Question on using Google Maps API on top of OpenLayers

[Mike Carsella]

What I really like about OpenLayers is the ability to use WMS overlays. 
Will I still be able to take advantage of OL WMS overlays if I use 
Mapstraction?  I think the Google openinfowindow popups are little better 
than the OL popups because of the tab capabilities and pan if needed 
feature.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Christopher Schmidt" <crschmidt at metacarta.com>
To: "Mike Carsella" <carsella11 at msn.com>
Cc: <Users at openlayers.org>
Sent: Monday, July 16, 2007 9:43 PM
Subject: Re: [OpenLayers-Users] Question on using Google Maps API on top of 
OpenLayers


> On Mon, Jul 16, 2007 at 07:45:29PM -0600, Mike Carsella wrote:
>> I'm new to OpenLayers, so bear with me...
>>
>> I'm creating an OpenLayers map and adding Google Maps as a layer.  What 
>> I'd like to do is then use the the Google Maps API to pop up an info 
>> window using openinfowindow or openinfowindowhtml.  Does OpenLayers 
>> expose the GMap2 object?  Is what I want to do possible?  Any help would 
>> be appreciated.
>
> In general, the way OpenLayers works is to *not* expose the lower level
> interface -- in fact, if you just want to use the Google Maps API, you
> probably want to be using something like Mapstraction
> (http://www.mapstraction.com/) instead of OpenLayers.
>
> However, you can use the OpenLayers.Popup classes. These are kinda hairy
> compared to Google's library, probably, but they do exist. examples in
> examples/popups.html
>
> Regards,
> -- 
> Christopher Schmidt
> MetaCarta
>