Applying hack directly to maps.google.com

2009-03-06T13:59:00.000-08:00

When I wrote my original hack for navigating google maps on a Mac Book Pro by tilting the computer it was only working in my own page. Someone asked if it could be possible to use the hack for google maps directly on http://maps.google.com

For this I wrote a Greasemonkey script.

Steps to make this work:

First step is the same than for the original hack.So if you did this already you dont need to do it again.

Install the native libraries, I used Daniel Shiffman's Java Native libraries. From his website download sms.zip. Extract:
- sms.jar — contains the Unimotion class
- libUnimotionLib.jnilib — The java native interface to Unimotion
Copy those two files into ~/Library/Java/Extensions/

Install Greasemonkey addon for firefox(I think it may work for Opera too but I have not tried).

Now install the Greasemonkey script, I posted it in userscripts.

Enjoy, and post here if you have any problems

Video of google maps navigation tilting my mac.

2008-07-14T15:26:00.000-07:00

Navigating Google maps using the MAC sudden motion detector

2008-06-24T16:13:00.000-07:00

I will explain here how I can navigate google maps by tilting my MacBook Pro.

1. Install the native libraries, I used Daniel Shiffman's Java Native libraries. From his website download sms.zip. Extract:

sms.jar — contains the Unimotion class

libUnimotionLib.jnilib — The java native interface to Unimotion

Copy those two files into ~/Library/Java/Extensions/

2. Now just go to my example and enjoy (it will ask you to "trust" me, since you are giving the applet access to the native libraries that I told you to install above). You may need to restart the browser if you just installed the libs above. I tried it with Firefox 3.0 and Safar1 3.1.1

If you want to copy and modify the example. Here is the java code for the applet:


package sms;

public class Unimotion {

// Load the JNI Interface
static {    
    System.loadLibrary("UnimotionLib");
}

// Native function
private static native int[] readSMS();

// Return three values as array
public static int[] getSMSArray() {
    return readSMS();
}
}

And the following class:


import java.applet.Applet;
import java.net.URL;

public class MapTiltNavigatorApplet extends Applet implements Runnable {
int initialXYZ[];
float speedXYZ[] = new float[]{0,0,0};

public void init () {
 Thread t = new Thread(this);
 t.start();
 initialXYZ = sms.Unimotion.getSMSArray();
}

public void run() {
 int refreshTime = getParameter("framesPerSecond")==null?
   80:1000/Integer.parseInt(getParameter("framesPerSecond"));;
 while(true) {
  try {
   Thread.currentThread().sleep(refreshTime);
  } catch (InterruptedException e) {
  }
  calculateSpeed();
  sendMoveToClient();
 }
}

void calculateSpeed() {
 int []nowV = sms.Unimotion.getSMSArray();
 for (int i = 0; i <>5.0) speedXYZ[i]=5.0f;
  //decay
  if (speedXYZ[i]>0) speedXYZ[i]-=speedXYZ[i]/5.0;
  if (speedXYZ[i]<0)>1 || Math.abs(speedXYZ[1])>1) {
      this.getAppletContext().showDocument(
        new URL("javascript:click("+speedXYZ[0]+","+speedXYZ[1]+");"));
  }
 } catch (Exception e) {
  e.printStackTrace();
 }            
}
}

Easy, isn't it?

For the Javascript and the exact tag for including the applet just look at the source in my example above.

If you build the jar for the aplet yourself remember to sign it, since it uses native libraries.

Raul's hacks

Applying hack directly to maps.google.com

Video of google maps navigation tilting my mac.

Navigating Google maps using the MAC sudden motion detector