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I want to build a website/mobile app for my school that shows the direction between two points similar to Google's directions API, but not with Google maps. I've got map shapefiles and GPS coordinates of buildings in the school and some programming knowledge (javascript, php, mysql), Please how do i go about it, I'm quite new to GIS programming. Thank You

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Hi Steve, welcome to the forums! Can you please provide further information on the "map shapefiles" that you have - do they show a road network, and do they have "routeable" attributes like turn restrictions and connectivity? – Stephen Lead Sep 9 '12 at 7:33
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Thank you, as for the shapefiles, i don't think they have all that, they are just shapefiles for digitized road layers and a raster image of the school, please advice me on what kind of shapefiles i would need and how to put it all together. Thanks – steve Sep 9 '12 at 9:19

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This is a challenging problem to start with! A good place to start is this tutorial on pgRouting, an extension to the PostgreSQL database with PostGIS, from one of our moderators. She has other posts on the topic here.

Once you have pgRouting working (no small task!) then you might want to check out Geoserver and OpenLayers for building a web-based interface. On your way feel free to post questions back to this forum for help.

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A suggestion is to start small, and build up to the routing as your ultimate goal. Eg, make the first step a website/app showing the school's buildings on top of a basemap, then add the roads shapefiles as a layer, then add routing. – Stephen Lead Sep 9 '12 at 23:11
+1 this rule is named 'from general to specific' like @Stephen said you should try to build a very simple app and then extend it funcionality. It is the best practic IMHO – Krystian Sep 10 '12 at 7:55

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