Platial Facelift-- Whee!

We're so excited about this big release of little things. It's different than many of our releases because there are no new features. This release is really the work of Tracy and David who worked with our users for months to sort through the best ways to view map data and annotate places. It's also the first major release on our new code framework Chris and Jake developed using our new api which Chris pretty much single handedly created. Andrew has been a tremendous help in testing out the api calls and collaborating with what needs to be included. The new formal api release is still to come. Jason of course made it all come together at the end like always!

The reason we're all so excited is that both the code base and the UI are more solid than ever (also lots of back-end tweaking and turning are targeting content eve more effectively!). This was a methodical build and is just the first on the new solid framework which is going to allow us to be even faster and even more responsive to our amazing users!!  Now that the Platial platform is for a good part established we can finally obsess over the details.

So, here are some highlights and as always please let us know if you find any bugs. We are so excited to finally have the first of many launches for the site we always wanted to build! Thanks to all of our beta testers who have helped on QA AND on telling what you wanted.

I. Updates to design and navigation of remote mapkits like these for Ricky Martin and Placebo/Capitol Records.

II. Big navigation improvements including Add a Place tray with all options clearer than ever.

III. Place details where you want them (Not obscuring your marker OR opening a lightbox) (Lots of tiny improvements here)

IV. Add Marker shortcut. Now just grab that magic marker on the bottom of the map and Whee! drop it wherever you want.

   

Comments

[Tracy Rolling]

A few more thank yuos are in order.
To Bob Kim, who worked with us in the early stages of figuring out the front end design for this new UI.
To Bao Ly, our original power user, who didn't help out specifically on this launch but whose feedback after our last big launch fed a lot of the design decisions we made.
To Jim Benson, whose blog post about us hiding context was an inspiration. And by inspiration, I mean kick in the pants.
To all of the members of our Beta Tester Club who hit the development site last weekend hunting bugs for us! I will be designing and printing your special t-shirts this weekend!
Sierra, Tana Butler, Ayogist, Qwick Malik, and Bacchus.

This work has been a long time in coming and many people have had their hand in it. Thanks to everyone!

[Andres]

Nicely done guys! Looks great.