Yahoo geocoder always used

[David Turner-7]

As I read the source code, it appears that wp_geopress always uses the
yahoo geocoder.  It would make more sense to have geocoder preference be
a user choice.  What do you think?

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[Carl Reed]

How about they use a standard interface (like the OGC OLS geocoder
interface) and then allow the user to choose whichever geocoder they would
like. FYI, the OGC Location Service core service standard is implemented by
dozens of technology organizations, such as Oracle, ESRI, Sprint, and
Autodesk.

Just a thought.

Carl

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Turner" <novalis@...>
To: <georss@...>
Sent: Monday, May 19, 2008 11:00 AM
Subject: [georss] Yahoo geocoder always used


> As I read the source code, it appears that wp_geopress always uses the
> yahoo geocoder.  It would make more sense to have geocoder preference be
> a user choice.  What do you think?
>
> _______________________________________________
> georss mailing list
> georss@...
> http://lists.eogeo.org/mailman/listinfo/georss 

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[Christopher Schmidt]

On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 11:22:27AM -0600, Carl Reed wrote:
> How about they use a standard interface (like the OGC OLS geocoder
> interface) and then allow the user to choose whichever geocoder they would
> like. FYI, the OGC Location Service core service standard is implemented by
> dozens of technology organizations, such as Oracle, ESRI, Sprint, and
> Autodesk.

And none of the people who offer free geocoding use it, so doing that
would be totally useless to the majority of GeoPress users, presumably.

Regards,
--
Christopher Schmidt
Web Developer
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[Andrew Turner-8]

On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 10:22 AM, Carl Reed <creed@...> wrote:
> How about they use a standard interface (like the OGC OLS geocoder
> interface) and then allow the user to choose whichever geocoder they would
> like. FYI, the OGC Location Service core service standard is implemented by
> dozens of technology organizations, such as Oracle, ESRI, Sprint, and
> Autodesk.
>

Short Answer:
GeoPress is open-source - patches welcome! :)


Longer answer:
And as Chris pointed out, we still have to support the free geocoding
options. This is a plugin for free & open-source software with a
customer base that doesn't pay for services like this.

In addition, regarding understanding what the OGC OLS Geocoding
interface could offer, after about 15 minutes of digging, I couldn't
actually find an example or description of the OLS Geocoding
interface. I even looked at the OGC Standards page:
http://www.opengeospatial.org/standards

and searching for geocoder just listed Glossary, FAQ's and
Implementation Statistics (which don't mention any of the companies
Carl mentioned above). Looking for the full "OpenGIS Location Service
Geocoder Interface Specification" revealed more FAQ, Newsletters, and
press releases about the geocoder - but all links to the actual docs
are dead and redirect to OGC homepage:
http://xml.coverpages.org/ni2003-04-22-a.html

I then went back to the Standards page, looked for OpenLS and saw
these documents:
http://www.opengeospatial.org/standards/olscore

But they never really just laid out the interface and examples in a
plain way such that a developer could get up and running quickly with
it.

I finally searched in Google for "OpenLS Geocoder" and finally came
upon an example page:
http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/B28359_01/appdev.111/b28400/sdo_openls.htm

which informed me that it's a SOAP service, and rather heavy at that.

Sorry for the long explanation - especially on the GeoRSS mailing
list. I think it's illustrative of why lightweight community standards
get traction and support from the broader dev community.

Andrew
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[Andrew Turner-8]

On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 10:00 AM, David Turner <novalis@...> wrote:
> As I read the source code, it appears that wp_geopress always uses the
> yahoo geocoder.  It would make more sense to have geocoder preference be
> a user choice.  What do you think?
>

Regarding your very good question - yes, there is code in there for
using Google or Yahoo that could be switched to. What should really
happen is that the geocoding should use the same map interface that is
being displayed (for single positions), since there has been feedback
when using Google Maps to verify a location, but then Yahoo geocodes
to a different (and often only *slightly* different) location.

IIRC, in the Post page, the geometry is stored to a hidden field so
that this is the case (where you see the marker is where the marker
geometry is stored) - but that's not true on the back end for batch
geocoding on the Locations page.
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