Digital Mapping Project

This Chisago County History site is the final GeoDiary project for a GEOG 3523: Digital Mapping class at the University of Minnesota - Spring 2011. I chose to show historic places of interest in Chisago County, specifically focused on my contributions to the Chisago County Historical Society (CCHS) Cemetery Project and sites owned or maintained by the CCHS.

Technical Design and Approach

Due to the large number of locations represented, it was important that the design offer the ability to show/hide categories of data, and to easily navigate to other listings. The main Digital Map is dynamically created using javascript and XML. Additional technologies used include HTML, css, the Google Map API and kml files.

An initial prototype constructed using Google Sites proved to have significant limitations. The further I got into using javascript, embedding kml and displaying the data using gadgets, the more I realized I was forced to jump through too many hoops to make this 'simple' approach do what I wanted. I scrapped it and switched to a site hosted on Tripod.

This project includes over 250 images. Each digital map location has a small image displayed in the balloon and a larger one displayed when clicked. The markers on the map are created using javascript and xml, but the markers displayed in the scroll panel are each individual images. The pictures, and the vintage buttons for navigation, were formatted and given a common style using Picasa and Piknic.

Acknowledgments

The high-level site design and navigation were adapted from a Week 3 example posted on the GEOG 3523 Moodle site as 'Alyssa Erickson's Web Resources' – the Corcoran Murals project.

The front-gate cemetery photos were taken by Robert Chudek for the CCHS Cemetery Project.