Introduction

Google My Maps allows you to export a map as a KML file, but without including images, mykml fixes this. mykml exports images as data URLs in the KML file, this format is compatible with umap and allows for portability.

Usage

• Export map data:
  • Open your map in Google My Maps
  • Open the browser console
  • Copy-paste exportPageData.js and press enter
  • Save the downloaded file pageData.json to the exports directory in this repo
  • Export the map as KML (you should find an option Export to KML/KMZ in the three dots menu, but these instructions can change, check online) and save it as input.kml in the exports directory in this repo
• Convert map data:
  • If you followed exactly the instructions above run python mykml.py and you will get an output.kml file in the exports directory of this repo
  • If you save the files with different names or paths than suggested, then run python mykml.py --help to see the different options

Known issues

• Try to make some maps in uMap and see the resulting format, because I don't think it fully supports the Google KML export file, so you could recreate entirely, without using Google's KML export
• Looks like that in the description field Google adds sometimes some HTML (not only text) and that's a problem, I used beautifulsoup to overcome it, but maybe I'm doing something wrong. Look also at "CDATA". - CHECK
• I think uMap has a limit of characters or something in the description field, so you can't have too big images, otherwise in base64 they take all the characters and the image is not rendered.
• The FastKML library has some problems with comparisons with strings... If have a comparison of a placemark value and a string, like this placemark.name == "Test" you could get that the two strings are different even tho printing them, they look the same.

Future improvements

• Either rely on pageData or on the KML export, not on both
• The program assumes that the structure of your map is "folders -> placemarks", while in general it doesn't have to be like that
• Convert the code to Javascript to run in the browser