mapbox-gl-js VS OpenLayers3

Good. Brave's fiddling with WebGL causes >50% of my bug reports from 1% of users.

[1] https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-js/issues/10518

[2] https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-js/issues/8377

It originated as an open-source fork of Mapbox-gl-js before they switched to a non-open-source license on 8th December 2020.

> too bad it doesn't come with some code

Mapbox changed the license of their code last year I think to a proprietary one. https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-js/blob/main/LICENSE.txt

It requires a mapbox user license with billing enabled to use this code, let alone make modifications. But the source is viewable on github.

From https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-js

> Mapbox gl-js version 2.0 or higher (“Mapbox Web SDK”) must be used according to the Mapbox Terms of Service. This license allows developers with a current active Mapbox account to use and modify the Mapbox Web SDK. Developers may modify the Mapbox Web SDK code so long as the modifications do not change or interfere with marked portions of the code related to billing, accounting, and anonymized data collection. The Mapbox Web SDK only sends anonymized usage data, which Mapbox uses for fixing bugs and errors, accounting, and generating aggregated anonymized statistics. This license terminates automatically if a user no longer has an active Mapbox account.

Seems their client code does some things related to "billing, accounting, and anonymized data collection" and they don't want programmers to disable or modify that code.

Is that right? Anyone who has followed this have more information? I haven't used mapbox in a few years but I think it's great technology.

The software stopped being open source from v2 onwards. The new licence makes it merely shared source.

This GitHub issue where this change is announced provides a number of more in-depth explanations why this is a bad thing for most users of the software: https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-js/issues/10162

It's a bummer mapbox isn't open source anymore, now you're (and lots of other peoplare) are stuck pre-2.0.0 :(

https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-js/blob/main/CHANGELOG.m...

Web-site: https://www.mapbox.com/ GitHub stars: 6.1k, https://github.com/mapbox/mapbox-gl-js Pricing: Free, starts from $2.40 for 1000 loads Map Data Source: Mapbox Dependencies: None License: Mapbox copyright Category: Web Application Examples: https://docs.mapbox.com/mapbox-gl-js/examples/

You probably know this, but in Google Maps at least, you can use browser zoom (ctrl/cmd +/-) to change the size of labels without zooming into the actual map.

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Speaking of maps, I got to work a fun zoom project a few years ago: https://map.fieldmuseum.org/

We used https://openlayers.org/ and thought long and hard about how to best handle zooming and variable levels of information density & visual hierarchy. If you zoom all the way out, we just highlight where the building is relative to the surroundings. As you start to zoom in, we start to highlight major exhibitions and entrances. Then as you zoom in more, we start showing recommended paths, smaller exhibitions, etc. The label sizes try to scale up and down at each level, smoothly, in order to balance readability and density.

Eventually you can reach the max zoom level and the labels will just grow bigger and bigger, but the SVGs dynamically shrink so they remain pictograms and not just contextless-lines.

Then if you keep going, you eventually find microscopic easter eggs :)

The code is pretty jank (and abandoned), but it's FOSS vanilla JS/HTML/CSS, and the only dependency is on OpenLayers: https://github.com/arcataroger/openlayers_indoor_map

In order to display the GeoJSON features on a map, we will use OpenLayers, which is a very powerful open-source mapping library that is also very simple to use.

OpenLayers is a modular, high-performance library designed for displaying and interacting with maps and geospatial data. It is a free, open-source JS library released under the 2-Clause BSD License, facilitating the creation of interactive and feature-rich web maps.

OpenLayers is available via the ol npm package, offering developers a powerful toolkit for creating sophisticated maps. Here is a JavaScript implementation that utilizes OpenLayers to showcase a map:

Official Website: https://openlayers.org/

For web maps I'd strongly recommend using OpenLayers. While it's less convenient to get started with compared to the alternatives it's also much more feature-complete and you'll likely hit a ceiling in terms of functionality much later than you would with the others.

Sticking with the roofing theme, you could make an application that shows shingle delivery truck drivers their stops on a map. It would be cool if the user could click on the stop and move it through varying statuses such as pending, en-route, completed or canceled, view the items in the order, and have it send your user a message when the statuses change. It might also be kinda cool if you could allow the delivery driver to start their shift, break for lunch, and end their day. You could have manager users that could log into your site too and export the timesheets for all or a subset of the drivers. You could even use something like d3.js or chart.js to give the managers insights into driver productivity. Some of the data may have to be mocked but it could be a fun project. After a brief search I found this https://openlayers.org open source js map library that could be cool to work with. In the past I have worked with the google maps api which wasn’t terrible. Make sure to set up some testing and a CI/CD pipeline. While not strictly required I think it would go along way to demonstrate that you are well rounded and will prepare you for working with them in the industry.

I will build a location-based application using and comparing three open-source map libraries: MapLibre GL JS, OpenLayers, and Leaflet.

Seems like MapTiler is maintaining an open source full stack vector alternative, and OpenLayers[0] looks good as well, so maybe it's time for legacy libraries to add vector support, or for users to switch libraries? There's even bindings from Maplibre GL to Leaflet [1].

I at least would find it interesting to see the two compared by someone other than me ;).

[0] https://openlayers.org/

[1] https://github.com/maplibre/maplibre-gl-leaflet