It looks very complicated. It's unlikely that anyone will be able to guess the syntax for using them by reading the code. Perhaps Google will be passing on the syntax to the guys who're at Where 2.0, and they'll clue us in when they come back.
I don't see anything in there about what exactly the daily quota of geocoding requests is. Anyone run into the limit yet? Yahoo!'s limit is 5000/day and I use about 500/day. I doubt I'll run into Google's limit but I'm curious.
2. Enter that code in your location bar: javascript:geocoder.getLocations("NY", function(e){ alert(e.Status.code)})
3. Hit enter.
Google returns itself the G_GEO_BAD_KEY (610) status code when a geocode action has been executed. So whats up with it? Guess the GBoys are still tweaking...
> I don't see anything in there about what exactly the daily quota of > geocoding requests is. Anyone run into the limit yet? Yahoo!'s limit > is 5000/day and I use about 500/day. I doubt I'll run into Google's > limit but I'm curious.
[It was down for a while because it originally used Google's original spelling of G_GEO_SUCESS, and they've now changed that to G_GEO_SUCCESS.]
It seems a bit odd that it works with France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Japan, but not with the UK. It seems to know they're there because it returns an "unavailable address" error for genuine UK addresses, and "unknown address" for bogus ones.
We've just made the official announcement for the Maps API with geocoding at Google's Geo Developer Day here in Mountain View, CA. Geocoding through the API is available in the US, Canada, Japan, France, Italy, Spain, and Germany. We're working to expand our capabilities, and you'll see additional countries added in the future.
Additionally, we're launching Google Maps Enterprise (GME). Developers will have complete control over their implementations (yes, you can use it on an intranet!). This won't change the current license for the Google Maps API. For more information, check out http://www.google.com/enterprise/maps/
> [It was down for a while because it originally used Google's original > spelling of G_GEO_SUCESS, and they've now changed that to > G_GEO_SUCCESS.]
> It seems a bit odd that it works with France, Germany, Italy, Spain and > Japan, but not with the UK. It seems to know they're there because it > returns an "unavailable address" error for genuine UK addresses, and > "unknown address" for bogus ones.
That's great, but -- and I hate to be so cynical -- but there doesn't seem to be anything to stop people from abusing someone else's API key! For a service like this, shouldn't it be keyed to the IP address or something?
Adam Schneider wrote: > That's great, but -- and I hate to be so cynical -- but there doesn't > seem to be anything to stop people from abusing someone else's API key! > For a service like this, shouldn't it be keyed to the IP address or > something?
>That's great, but -- and I hate to be so cynical -- but there doesn't >seem to be anything to stop people from abusing someone else's API key! > For a service like this, shouldn't it be keyed to the IP address or >something?
When geocoding from the client side, the API key will have been validated against "windows.location.host".
I can't see if there's a similar check when geocoding from the server side, because my server doesn't run scripts.
TranzNDance wrote: > The api key is associated with the domain name that was registered with > the key. If the key is used elsewhere, there will be an error.
That's what I thought, but it doesn't seem to be true. My Google API key is associated with www.gpsvisualizer.com. But if I pull up a geocoding URL in my Web browser (which is a comcast.net IP address), it works. It also works when I retrieve it from a perl script on a completely different Web server. It works when I run it through the CGI test program at http://www.htmlhelp.org/tools/cg-eye/interactive.html. If you gave me your API key, I could probably make that work too.
> I have converted ACME Mapper to use Google's geocoder, via the > server-side HTTP request interface. Works great! Hello Parisian > street addresses!
I'll probably switch over to Google for most of my remote geocoding purposes (remote as opposed to the local TIGER database that I use whenever possible), but I've noticed that there are at least a few things that Yahoo's service does better.
For instance, Yahoo seems to be better at converting a city name with no other input. Yahoo and Google can both give me coordinates for "Paris" or "Tokyo," but Yahoo can also give me "Timbuktu" or "Hanoi," whereas Google fails if you don't also give it "Mali" and "Vietnam" respectively.
Also, if you enter "Portland" into Yahoo's service, you get multiple results in Oregon, Maine, Texas, etc., whereas Google assumes you meant Oregon. Of course, this may be your desired behavior -- but maybe not. It'd be really nice if Google would give you all the choices, but in the order that it thinks are most relevant. (Yahoo alphabetizes them, I think.)
