[Steven Zahm]

@ Royale

The map can be turned of by using the enable_map cMap shortcode option. Add it to the shortcode like so:
[connections enable_map='false']

Showing the categories assigned to the entry is possible but it will require editing the card.php and card-single.php template files. See this forum reply for the instructions:
http://connections-pro.com/support/topic/show-categories-under-the-phone/#post-297757

Oh also, this will not make it occupy the “map area”, doing that would be quite a bit more complicated.

I hope that helps!