>I did a quick check on the census site and found the following file:
>
>http://www.census.gov/geo/www/tiger/zip1999.html
>
>It is a zip file for the US from November of 1999. I don't know if Alison's
>is newer or if this is the latest available.
Here's the Census Bureau FAQ on where this comes from. Note that it
is not complete, although it probably has most zip codes anyone will
need (42192 records).
Q17: Does the ZIP Code file you have available for downloading
contain a complete and
up-to-date list of ZIP Codes?
The ZIP file doesn't include all ZIP Codes because it was based only
on those areas
for which we had city-style addresses (which leaves out a lot of rural
areas). The file was created as a byproduct of another operation (a data
product based on the ZIP codes we collected with the 1990 Census data). For
this Census data product, we took advantage of the fact that we had some
ZIP Code data as a consequence of trying to collect addresses for the Census
questionnaire mailout so we published data for those ZIP Codes. This ZIP
internal point file is basically the lat/long for the ZIPS in that product.
We put it on the Web in case anyone found it useful. It was not intended to
be an authoritative source on ZIP Codes.
>The zip file is accompanied by a Word doc that explains the contents. The
>data included is: 5 digit zip code, latitude, longitude, zip class, post
>office name (city), state, and county.
State and County are listed in this file by a numerical code, not
name. For example, 53 for Washington and 033 for King County. Seems
like this code would be easy to find at the Census Bureau, but I
can't see it. Not real useful unless this gets decoded. Anyone have a
lead?
>I have not tried integrate the file into ebase. I would welcome others'
>experiences on how this works. I did try to open the file on my Macintosh
>with FileMaker 5, Excel, and Word. Word was the only one that would open it
>(it's a DBF file). From Word there should be a straightforward path to
>having the data made e-base-accessible (i.e. saving as comma delimited, tab
>delimited or as an Excel spreadsheet for direct importing into e-base).
The file is delivered as a zip archive. After unpacking, it's a
Windows-format text file (DBF). For us Mac users, it would first need
to be translated into Mac Format, either with a utility like MacLink,
or simply opening it with a work processor and saving as a text file
to get Type and Creator codes assigned.
At that point, FileMaker will open it happily, if you have All Files
selected in the File Type pulldown in the File Open dialog box.
--
Dave Shaw Northwest Classics, Inc
tel: 206-954-7526 fax: 206-625-1338
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