[OpenLayers-Users] Mapping website visitors with OpenLayers?

[Alexandre Leroux]

Hi list,

Thanks to David and Christopher. I was hoping to be able to do it with 
OpenLayers alone :-)

I am not familiar with MapServer (or MapGuide or PostGIS, etc). I will 
not have access to the server, so setting up a webmapping server seems 
improbable. I'll try finding an easy solution.

Maybe one day OpenLayers will be able to do this (e.g. mapping huge 
number of markers and mapping densities)? I hope so ;-)

Thank you and have fun,

Alex


Christopher Schmidt wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 07, 2007 at 08:49:24PM +0000, Alexandre Leroux wrote:
>> Would using a thousand markers from a textfile with 
>> OpenLayers.Layer.Text be advisable? 
> 
> Definitely not. Even without the IE issues that come with displaying
> large numbers of markers, OpenLayers is only tested with up to 500
> markers in Firefox. Performance beyond that level is simply degraded too
> much.
> 
>> Is there another mean with 
>> OpenLayers that would be more appropriate that I haven't discovered? 
>> Would there be a way to generate "density maps" (the density of visitors 
>> in that case; colored pixels based on the number of dots below each 
>> pixel) directly with OpenLayers?
> 
> WMS. PostGIS can serve as a backend, MapServer can create the overlays,
> and you can make it an untiled image so that you don't have to split it
> up. I'm with David here: this is definitely the path you want to follow.
> 
> Regards,

-- 
Alexandre Leroux, M.Sc., Ing.
Environnement Canada / Environment Canada
Centre météorologique canadien / Canadian Meteorological Centre
Division de la réponse aux urgences environnementales /
Environmental Emergency Response Division
alexandre.leroux at ec.gc.ca