Friday 5 September 2014

2/3

After lots of trial and error, I am finally able to output features from MapGuide as CZML to Cesium via mapguide-rest


However, only 2 out of the 3 geometry types are working (points and polygons). I'm still trying to figure out:
  • How to properly output CZML for line features
  • How best to apply Z extrusion where it is defined in the Layer Definition
  • What parts of a Layer Definition are transferable/translatable to CZML? Doesn't have to be 1:1. KML-level visual/information fidelity would suffice here.
If only there were more comprehensive CZML examples I could refer to that would make implementing this stuff much easier! All the examples I could find try to demonstrate every bell and whistle when all I want to know is where do I stick the lat/lon/elevation coordinates from my source geometries? Their CZML documentation could do with some improvement, a single-page document is terribly hard to navigate and without reference examples it's amazing I was even able to get this far!

But in the end, all this pain and struggle will be worth it because Cesium is just plain awesome! I truly believe that Cesium will be to 3D maps what OpenLayers is to 2D maps: A powerful web-based map viewing platform that is rich in features and support for many different vector and raster data sources.

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