Easy as 123: Performing a ProximityCast

step #1. Enter your Cast Initiation Point (CIP).
a. The CIP is the anchor point from which the cast net is tossed to find the closest establishments that meet your desired category.
b. The CIP is ideally entered as a Latitude and Longitude, however ProximityCast now accepts street address for your convenience.

step #2. Select your desired search category. e.g. Sushi will search for all restaurants that offer Sushi. Restaurant will search for all restaurants not considered fast food: e.g. steak, seafood, mexican, chinese, etc. Making no category selection will search for the closest establishments to your CIP regardless of category.

step #3. Click the "Perform Proximity Cast" button causes the search to commence. NOTE: you may skip steps #1 and #2 by simply doing step #3 to cause the featured location to be used as the CIP and shown in the Cast Results.

Doing a ProximityCast is as easy as 123. Please consider contributing images of your favorite establishments to make ProximityCast more useful for its users, including you!

Location Technology the ProximityCast Way!

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The left half of the image shows a partial screen shot after performing a ProximityCast.
The closest establishment is initially displayed as the large cynosure image with the thumbnail images, closest to farthest stacked on the right.
Clicking on any thumbnail image makes it the cynosure image.
Clicking on the current cynosure image opens an "Establishment Details" page where alternative images, reviews, and outside links to the establishment can be found if they exist.

On top of the thumbnail stack is a "MAP VIEW" button that opens a google map mashup with the returned establishment thumbnails stacked on the right.
Clicking any thumbnail opens an info box point to the corresponding location marker on the map. Each establishment info window has a "Directions" link that opens a google map with driving directions from the "Cast Initiation Point" to the selected establishment.

Swiss Chalet Restuarant

It has been awhile since I've last submitted to the blog. I've been staying quite busy. I've committed myself to putting in a solid 8 hours of coding during the week days. There is so much to do, but by the inch it is a cinch. I completed Another method for extracting coordinates from Google Maps on Friday. I thought it was pretty cool and hopefully helpful. Check it out!

19263 E US Highway 24, Woodland Park, CO
or
38.97800 -105.04117
Which is the superior address and why? Both will work in Google Maps.
Do you own a GPS? If so which one?

Till next time,
ciao my friends!