The Google Geocoding API
<https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/geocoding/intro> now
supports plus codes in addresses, and includes them in responses. This has
required a big effort by the team and I'm really excited by this.
I'm going to provide some information about the API, and some caveats. As
always, if you send me feedback I can work with the API team to make
changes.
This is primarily about Google's *Web Services Geocoding API*. I'm also
going to mention the *Javascript Geocoding API*, but not the Android, iOS
or any other geocoding SDK yet since I haven't done any testing myself.
The first change is that each result may* include a plus code. For example,
doing a geocoding search for Google Zurich contains:
"plus_code" : {
"compound_code" : "9G8F+6W Zürich, Switzerland",
"global_code" : "8FVC9G8F+6W"
},
*Some results will not include plus codes, such as political features, or
large natural features.
*Converting a plus code to a location*
If the address parameter is a global code, or a local code and locality,
the API returns a single result, with no address components, no formatted
address and no types.The location field gives the code centre:
{
"results" : [
{
"address_components" : [],
"formatted_address" : "",
"geometry" : {
"location" : {
"lat" : 47.3655625,
"lng" : 8.524812499999999
},
"location_type" : "APPROXIMATE",
"viewport" : { ... }
}
},
"place_id" : "ChIJAAAAAAAAAAARAAAAAAAAAAA",
"types" : []
}
],
"status" : "OK"
}
*Converting a location to a plus code*
When you do a reverse lookup to the web service API, it converts the
latitude and longitude into a 10 digit plus code. This is returned outside
of the results list so it did not affect existing behaviour:
{
"plus_code" : {
"compound_code" : "9G8F+6W Zürich, Switzerland",
"global_code" : "8FVC9G8F+6W"
},
"results" : [ ... ]
*Caveats:*
1. Only 10-digit codes are returned by the API.
2. The viewport coordinates in the response to a plus code search, are
not the bounds of the plus code box.
3. Converting a location to a plus code is only possible with the web
service API. The javascript API only returns the result list and the status
code, although we're working on this.
Please try it out and let me know what you think!
Ngā mihi,
Doug Rinckes, Technical Program Manager, Google Switzerland GmbH; 9G8F+6W Zü
rich <https://www.google.com/maps/search/9G8F%2B6W%20Z%C3%BCrich>
--
Public site: http://www.openlocationcode.com/
Github project: https://github.com/google/open-location-code
Demo site: http://plus.codes/
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