Very Basic Question about DefaultUI

[Rhino Smith]

I've had a bit of practice playing with the V3 API now and feel like I can do or figure out most of the stuff that I need to do. However, there is one very basic thing that is eluding me: how is the end user supposed to know what to do with the controls provided by the DefaultUI, let alone any custom controls that might get added?

I haven't been able to find anything like a Help option on the DefaultUI that a user new to Google Maps could click to find out what the various controls actually do. I can well imagine a great many users, especially those who aren't very computer-savvy, just ignoring the controls as some kind of imponderable mystery. People like that would never realize that they can move the map by dragging with their mouse, click to zoom in, right-click to zoom out, change the orientation, switch to StreetView, etc. etc. In other words, I have to believe that many users would think that they have no ability to interact with the map to make it more useful to them.

I realize that I could create my own custom control that would essentially be a Help button which the user could click to bring up verbiage explaining what options he has for working with the map. But I can't be the first person to make the realization that the controls aren't documented. In fact, I have a nagging suspicion that there must be a standard set of documentation for the controls which users can invoke very easily if that feature is just turned on. The problem is that I haven't yet found any such thing in the V3 API documentation.

I'm sure many of you on this forum have far broader experience with Google maps than I do. What are you folks doing so that your least experienced end-users can easily discover what they can do with their mouse and/or the controls on the DefaultUI?

[RichardK]

 Your custom button could link to this http://maps.google.com/support/bin/static.py?page=guide.cs&guide=21670&topic=21671&answer=144350

[Rhino Smith]

I've knocked together a simple custom control that displays the page you've cited in a separate browser window when the user clicks on the control.

It's not exactly elegant but it will do for now. Thanks for the suggestion.

I've also found a video on YouTube that shows users the basics of the UI. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ic9A1FB7PKM&feature=relmfu. An alternative would be to point users to that.

Frankly, I'm really surprised that the good folks at Google didn't anticipate this need and build a flashy video that all of us could link to that shows all of the standard controls and how to use them. Maybe I'll have to do that myself.....

Thanks again for the link.