See Also

FireFox Add-on "FoxFind"

The project was done for a premier provider of comprehensive roadside assistance and insurance programs for corporate use throughout the United States and Canada. The goal of this FireFox Add-on is to provide a feedback mechanism for many worldwide users to validate and update GeoIP database.

Solution

The GeoIP development project is focused on IP to Location market. It’s obvious that there’re already leaders in this space – requiring us to have a superior product. At first it is fine to say to the world that SNI has its own technologies for such purposes and demonstrate this using our test results. However, we feel that we should have continually improve the quality and accuracy of the information we store in our geo-location database. The goal of this FireFox Add-on is to provide a feedback mechanism for many worldwide users to validate and update this database. This Add-on should be fun and inviting to the user as well as showcasing SNI’s use of web-based geospatial technology.

Architecture

This Add-on displays current IP address location in text form (Tampa, Florida, United States) and provides a link for showing it on the map as well as the ability to provide the correct address if our database happens to be incorrect.
Additionally, as a fun incentive to use the Add-on, we provide "fly-to" functionality where the user can enter or select a destination and icon and the application "flies" them over the map to that location.
The Add-on also might be designed to collect visited site names for its future functionality. However, due to privacy implications, we want to be extremely careful and transparent with this. If we provide such service we are able to extend it to a tracking service to display browsing history for controlling persons such as parents, system administrators, and so on. The idea is that site names are stored at the external data store so that users would not able to clear their history in any way. In case functionality is desired in the future, it requires additional development, but works with the architecture designed as part of this project.

Tools and Technologies

  • MS Visual Studio 2005;
  • Java Script;
  • Firefox SDK;
  • XUL.

Benefits

The goal of this FireFox Add-on is to provide a feedback mechanism for many worldwide users to validate and update GeoIP database through the GeoIP service. Documentation supplied as a part of delivery package covers all aspects of the Firefox add-on.