<p><div><div><div><div data-width="100" data-show-faces="false" data-send="true" data-layout="button_count" data-height="21" data-href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/simple-offline-airport-wi-fi-tracker-in-r/"></div></div><div></div></div><div></div></div>
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(This article was first published on <strong><a href="https://rud.is/b/2017/04/02/simple-offline-airport-wi-fi-tracker-in-r/"> R – rud.is</a></strong>, and kindly contributed to <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/">R-bloggers)</a> </div>
<p><a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://twitter.com/visualisingdata">@visualisingdata</a> rebroadcast this tweet today:</p>
<blockquote data-lang="en" class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">Wireless Passwords From Airports And Lounges Around The World <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="https://t.co/OV0WJfwj8E">https://t.co/OV0WJfwj8E</a></p>
<p>— deb verhoeven (<a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://twitter.com/bestqualitycrab">@bestqualitycrab</a>) <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="https://twitter.com/bestqualitycrab/status/848501004567957505">April 2, 2017</a></p></blockquote>
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<p>The Google Maps interface is a bit meh and the “formatted” data is also a bit meh but the data is useful when travelling (NOTE: <em>always</em> use a VPN in airports on both your mobile devices and laptops).</p>
<p>You don’t need their app or online access to take advantage of this data if you’re willing to do a tiny bit of work. </p>
<p>You’ll find an R-generated version of the airport Wi-Fi finder below or via <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="https://rud.is/airport-wifi.html">this direct link</a>.</p>
<p>The premise is simple:</p>
<ul>
<li>grab the airport data KML that the Google Maps interface uses (NOTE: Visit the original URL from the Tweet occasionally to see if the KML URL changes)</li>
<li>make cleaner, more formatted text for the popups</li>
<li>toss up a <code>leaflet</code> map</li>
<li>add a searchable <code>DT::datatable</code> interface</li>
<li>render the R markdown page to HTML and keep it with you</li>
<li>refresh the generated HTML right before you go on your world tour</li>
</ul>
<p>The code is directly embedded in the generated R markdown document and also <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="https://gist.github.com/hrbrmstr/1b7f72aaac8b1bb0c4c99b549eb4a467">in this gist</a> so I won’t pollute this post with code blocks.</p>
<p>I’m hoping <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://twitter.com/bhaskar_vk">@bhaskar_vk</a> will apply is mad, l33t Leaflet h@x0r $k1llz to this crude, quick hack and kick this up a notch as there is substantial room for improvement. If you give that a go as well, drop a note in the comments or on Twitter. Some ideas for improvement:</p>
<ul>
<li>better markers (please, not those airplane ones <img alt="🙂" class="wp-smiley" src="https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/2/72x72/1f642.png"></li>
<li>way better text cleanup</li>
<li>link the table and map (I think that means using Shiny but I’m likely wrong about that)</li>
<li>make it better on mobile (it works on mobile but there are different design considerations to make it more usable on tiny glowing rectangles)</li>
<li>make a “trip planner” Shiny app, letting folks select their airports and produce a handy digital reference card for them as they move about the globe</li>
</ul>
<p><iframe height="1250" width="100%" src="https://rud.is/airport-wifi.html"></iframe></p>
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<div>To <strong>leave a comment</strong> for the author, please follow the link and comment on their blog: <strong><a href="https://rud.is/b/2017/04/02/simple-offline-airport-wi-fi-tracker-in-r/"> R – rud.is</a></strong>.</div>
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