It’s been a while since my last blog update, but I think tonight’s updates warrant a bit further reach than my usual Facebook and Google Plus postings.
Tonight I pushed live a new export feature that uses HTML5 Canvas to do its job, rather than PHP. That may not mean much to non-techie mapper users, so here’s the gist of it: You can export any map type now, and it should allow you to save it to PNG just fine. All the work is done on your computer’s side, so you’ll need a modern browser to do this. Large maps might hog memory and crash your tab, window, or even the full browser. You’ve been warned! (PHP export is still supported – hover over the export buttons to see which is which.) At the very least, this now allows export of side-view maps, staggered-mode maps, and cubes.
In addition, I’ve been working on a whole mess of new tiles in my gridded steno pad. I don’t know what it is about a fresh notebook that gets my creative juices… all… juicy… but it happened. I’ve been sharing some snapshots of the tiles in progress on Facebook, and after the cut, here they shall be too.
What a great app! I’m using it to generate maps for some facilities in my giant ruined starship game loosely based on Metamorphosis Alpha.
What is the logic it uses to block exporting? Even when I try to export a 10×10 map it says “This map looks too big to export to PNG without causing an error. Sorry! OK”
I can do 8×8 but anything larger errors.
Currently 64 tiles is the maximum, but I plan to increase it. The main problem is the server choking on larger maps and me not having enough experience to handle scaling of this sort of back-end system. For the next few weeks I’m dedicating my full effort to my puzzle work, but after that I plan to continue work on the mapper. This issue is one very close to the top of the list.