misc

How To Get Latitude and Longitude From Google Maps

There are times when using Google Maps you need to the the latitude and longitude. However there is an way way to get Latitude and Longitude from Google Maps, even though it doesn’t display Latitude and Longitude coordinates.

The first thing to do to get latitude and longitude from google maps is to get your location on the map. Usually google maps will bring up the location at the center of the map. However if you move the map around, then you will need to re-center the map near the location that you want to get the coordinates of.. In order to do this, right click on the marker of your desired location as close as possible on google map, and select center map here

In the past, you had to enter some crazy javascript code in order to get the latitude and longitude, but not any more. Below is the code you used to have to enter:

javascript:void(prompt(”,gApplication.getMap().getCenter()))

Fortunately, Google Maps has made it much simpler, but its just not quite obvious. just place your mouse pointer ove the location that you want the coordinates of, and right click. A drop down list will appear and at the top are the GPS coordinates that are for that location.

Below is a screenshot:

get latitude longitude gps coordinates from google maps

If you want to copy and paste the coordinates, then all you have to do is click on the coordinates and they will be copied to the clipboard so you can paste them into another application.

This gives the latitude and longitude coordinates in decimal form. If you want it in degrees, minutes, seconds, just go here and copy & paste your latitude / longitude coordinates and it will convert them for you.

This article was originally posted on www.mikestechblog.com Any reproduction on any other site is prohibited and a violation of copyright laws.

How to Open a Stuck CD / DVD Drive

The other day I was asked by someone to look at their DVD drive that had a CD stuck in it. This can be frustrating when even pushing the Eject button, and the CD won’t eject. This is how to open a stuck CD / DVD drive.

There are several reasons why a CD or a DVD will get stuck in the drive. Sometimes the rack and pinion gears inside the DVD will get hung up and not properly move. Sometimes the motor that opens up the DVD drawer will stick. Sometimes the DVD will not properly seat thereby not allowing the DVD eject mechanism to function properly. And lastly, perhaps the CD / DVD drive is broken.

Fortunately, there is an easy solution.

The first thing to do is to turn off the computer. Don’t just press the power button, or unplug the computer. Be sure to do a regular shutdown. Then look closely at the front of the computer. Almost always there is a little hole underneath the CD or DVD tray. The exact location will vary, but it is almost always underneath the tray of the CD drive.

Below is a photo with the hole circled:

Once you have located this hole, you will need a paper clip. Straighten the paper clip out. I usually fashion it like in the photo below:

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How To Build an Arduino Color Organ

I went to a show at a local coffee shop and during the show, I realized their music would be great with a Color Organ. After the show I talked to the shop owner about it, and he was thrilled with the idea. My Color Organ is based on the Arduino Processor, and the SparkFun Audio Spectrum Shield which uses the MSGEQ7 Graphic Equalizer IC. In this post, I will describe how to build an Arduino Color Organ.

Here is a video of my Color Organ set up in my living room.

I am using the 6 PWM outputs of the Arduino to drive a SparkFun Power MosFet shield, which then drives 6 LED strips proportional to the audio level in each of the 6 audio regions. The audio is picked up with a SparkFun Electret Microphone
and then fed into the Spectrum shield. The MSGEQ7 IC on the shield does the audio sampling which is then fed into the Arduino.

I found some LED strips that are 16 ft. long so I bought 6 of them. Each LED strip draws approximately 2 amps each, so directly using the Arduino 6 PWM outputs was out of the question, I decided to use the SparkFun MosFet power driver shield to drive the LED strips.

Additionally, my power supply needs to handle at least 12 amps at 12 volts. For this, I used an old ATX computer power supply I had laying around. However you can’t just use a computer power supply straight away, you have to do a bit of hacking of it to get it to work outside of a computer. Not to worry, here are some directions for hacking a computer power supply.

One thing about the SparkFun Spectrum shield that I wish had been done differently is that they used one of the Arduino’s PWM outputs to reset the MSGEQ7 IC. This seems like a waste of a PWM output to me as they could have just as easily used a non-PWM output, such as Digital Out #7. Since I was going to use the MosFet Power Driver, which has 6 channels, I decided to modify the Spectrum Shield to use output D7. Its not a huge deal, I just cut the trace to the MSGEQ7 and jumpered it over to the D7 output. Doing this modification now gives me 6 PWM outputs instead of 5 for the LED strips.

Here is a photo of the modified Spectrum shield:

Sparkfun Spectrum Board Mod for Mike’s Color Organ. How to build an Arduino Color Organ.

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Enter Latitude Longitude Coordinates in Google Maps

Recently at work, I needed to find a location in Google Maps using latitude and longitude. In order to do this, the latitude and longitude can be in either Degrees, Minutes, seconds, or in decimal form. So by way of example, here is how to enter Latitude Longitude coordinates in Google Maps.

Using the following GPS coordinates as an example:

Latitude: 41 Deg. 43 min. 21 sec.
Longitude: -82 Deg. 30 Min. 52 Sec.

All you do is enter the following into Google Maps search field: 41 43′ 21″ -82 30′ 52″ and this gps coordinate will show up in Google maps.Additionally, if your latitude and longitude numbers are in decimal format, like say,41.7225 -82.4131 there is no need to convert over to the degree minutes, seconds, notation. Google maps will give you your coordinates.

This article was originally posted on www.mikestechblog.com Any reproduction on any other site is prohibited and a violation of copyright laws.