Family Historian User Group

I don't use Map Life Facts extensively so have no idea when it went wrong if earlier than yesterday. I ran it yesterday (and today) having first done a check of the installed plug-ins against the store. It updated Map Life Facts to 4.4.

Immediately it started complaining - but the error message is not helpful for diagnostics. See below I have previously set up my Google API stuff and successfully run the plugin. Searching through the FHUG and finding little to help me diagnose an issue, I did find the recommendation to check the contents of the Plugin Data folder. That looked like this while the plugin was running (failing) Note that I double clicked the Map Life facts.htm file and got told "Sorry, your PC appears to be offine, so maps cannot be shown" - needless to say, it isn't offline - the .html files above work fine.

Having closed the plugin, the relevant files revert to just Map Life Facts.dat for this folder.

Err - basically - help?

Sorry, I have to admit I am a bit mystified too.
The error is referring to a https://maps.googleapis.com/ ... /map.js JavaScript file on the Google Maps API website.
That is probably being invoked as part of the standard Google Maps services employed by the Plugin, but not directly by the Plugin.

Correctly, only the Map Life Facts.dat file survives in C:\ProgramData\Calico Pie\Family Historian\Plugin Data.
Carefully opening that file in say Notepad should look like: Try downloading/installing the Map Life Facts Plugin directly from the Plugin Store.

If that does not improve matters, try clearing the Internet Explorer history, or resetting IE entirely.
Like me, you probably don't use IE for anything, so a complete reset will not harm anything.
It must be IE and not your default browser as that is what Plugins have to use for Internet access & mapping.

BTW: Regarding Write Registry Internet Explorer Shell Version (16284), what is the state your your IE Shell version?

There is good news and bad news - first the bad.

tatewise wrote:...
Carefully opening that file in say Notepad should look like:

Code: Select all

return {
-- Table: {1}
{
   ["Balloon"]="NO",
   ["API_Key"]="aIzaSyA2TnfDqunY3BBiafZmT2iPcSLLoHcIQfG",
},
}

...

It looked exactly like that. (Apart obviously from a different API Key)

tatewise wrote:...
Try downloading/installing the Map Life Facts Plugin directly from the Plugin Store.

Deleted the MLF, closed FH, downloaded it from the browser session and reinstalled. No effect

tatewise wrote:...
If that does not improve matters, try clearing the Internet Explorer history, or resetting IE entirely.

I went into my desktop IE (v 11.407.17134.0) and deleted the history, temp files, cookies - everything on that screen. No effect.

tatewise wrote:...
BTW: Regarding Write Registry Internet Explorer Shell Version (16284), what is the state your your IE Shell version?

Current shell was set to 11 - I even went in as Admin, clocked it down to 10, back up to 11 just to make sure it knew, rebooted - no effect.

The good news (maybe) is that it appears to work with the Leaflet mode maps. I can Geocode locations with the Google API, see the result of the Geocoding in the plugin on a Leaflet map, and create a map for someone in Leaflet. (So clearly(?) my Google API key is fine...)

Now, frankly, if that's all there is to it, then I'm not too bothered - especially since an NLS map from Leaflet looks really rather nice. But what are the issues about using Leaflet maps? I didn't read the Leaflet stuff when it popped up because I was still getting my head round the "ordinary" maps so are there disadvantages?

Thank you for being so thorough.
Now I know it is a Google Maps display Map problem, rather than a Geocoding or more general problem, I am getting the same error message (I had been in Leaflet Maps mode earlier)
So I will have to investigate what is going wrong there.

There are no significant issues in using Leaflet Maps, and some significant benefits.
The only minor thing I've noticed is the Google plotted Markers sometimes don't align so well with place names as on Google Maps.

For some users a big advantage is that it does not need the Google API Key embedded in online Maps.
The API Key is quite deeply hidden inside scripts, and if set up with Quota Limits as advised the only risk is that someone 'borrows' the Key and exhausts the Quotas, but it is easy to regenerate a new Key.

The Open Street Map mode is similar to the FH Map Window.

Beware that the NLS Historic UK mode only covers the UK, and any plots elsewhere just have a blank grey background.

Thanks Mike for the heads-up on Leaflet maps. Yes, I twigged that the NLS maps are just the UK. I think elsewhere in here I saw that coverage of Norwegian farms isn't as good but I think that won't worry me.

I'm (sort-of) glad that you're getting the same issue now - shows it's not something I've screwed up and you will be able to understand diagnosing the stuff better than me. I hope you can sort it - or perhaps, get Google to sort it, if it's in their area.

I have tracked down the problem
For the technically minded it is a conflict between a variable named Map and a class named Map where both are involved with the Google Maps API but that was not an issue until a recent revision to the Google scripts.
However, I have changed the variable named Map to Pane throughout and it is no longer a pain!

Please try the attached Map Life Facts Plugin Version 4.4.1 Date 03 Dec 2018 ZIP file that needs extracting.
[EDIT: Attachment deleted as Plugin V4.5 now in Plugin Store.]

Let me know if it works OK or not.

Many thanks Mike - that works fine - I tried geocoding using my then current Leaflet maps, then generated a couple of Leaflet maps - still OK. Then I swapped it to Google Maps, did some more geocoding and generated a couple of Google Maps fine.

Good job you managed to spot that clash - it's the sort of thing that I can (and have) read umpteen times without realising the clash / dubiety because I automatically read the right context - without realising it's wrong...

The Map Life Facts Plugin Version 4.5 Date 05 Dec 2018 is now in the Plugin Store.