Question for App Makers Using Tiny GeoCoder
Thanks to you, our fabulous community of users and developers, we’re coming up on our 20 millionth API query (since we started counting). It’s an amazing thing to watch something like this take off as it has. I’m honestly taken aback every time I think about how many apps and people are using this extremely simple geocoder. So first, thank you.
Now, because you’ve been so amazing as a community, I’d love to get your feedback. I’ve been racking my brain on what I could potentially do to help you more. Tonight I came upon an idea and I wanted to see what you all thought.
The Question for Geo Coder Application Developers
The open ended question is… What else can we build for you?
The more direct question/idea I had was whether or not statistics would be helpful for you? Similar to Bit.ly or Su.pr and their url shortening, I thought perhaps you would like to know things related to your apps geo-coding like:
- Regions, countries, states, etc, are being geocoded the most?
- How often your API key (if we made one for you for trackability) is being used? (how many queries has your app hit us with?)
- What IP addresses are using your API key?
- What regions, countries, states, etc, are using your API key?
That’s just some of the ideas I came up with off the top of my head and some of them might not be useful at all since I would assume you might be tracking this data yourself. But if you liked these and/or had any other ideas that you’d like to see, I’d love to hear what they are.
So? What else can I do for you? What would be the most valuable stat or service I could produce using this information for you?
16 Responses to “Question for App Makers Using Tiny GeoCoder”
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davey-lad on November 8th, 2009
I used your service while working on the online training portal for the Tourism Australia Aussie Specialist Program (goes live in december).
What i loved about it was it simplicity, it was a breeze to implement geocoding compared to the hoops i had to jump thru with the google api (for example).
I think that’s what makes it great… so simple… why change that ? If you’re getting request from users for enhanced functionality then fair enough (perhaps a commercial version ?). Othwerwise, i’m of the opinion – if it ain’t broke da da da.
BTW, when i get round to it i plan on writing a blog article on how to implement tiny geocoder in C# (from a business layer perspective)… i’ll let you know when it’s up (on http://www.softwarenation.co.uk/Articles.aspx) … rather busy at the moment however.
Nate on November 8th, 2009
Thank you for the comment. Yes we do get some requests for more feature-filled responses, which I usually decline if they change the output into a more complicated response. I agree, I don’t think it’s broken either.
However, these new features I’m thnking of would most definitely not complicate things. There would still be the same version and responses from the API that already exist. The key I was talking about would be an optional component which would be used for identification more than anything. It would allow all those stats to be aggregated per app that puts it in use.
Obviously you might not use this feature now that your product is complete, but I’d love your, and anyone else’s, opinion on thus too.
Thanks again for taking the time to reply.
Jakob on November 18th, 2009
Hi Nate,
Would it be possible to geocode multiple addresses at a time, in order to keep down the number of requests?
Nate on November 18th, 2009
I’ve had that request in the past, Jakob, and I haven’t done it yet. How many would you like to do at one time?
Jakob on November 19th, 2009
Well, actually I don’t know yet. But let’s say at least 10 addresses? I really like the simplicity of Tinygeocoder btw!
Nate on November 19th, 2009
Yea, that’s a possibility. I’ll have to think about it a little more, but I’ll put it on my list of features people want.
Thanks for the feedback.
harryteguh on December 5th, 2009
Hi, Nate
First of all let me say that your website is great.
Second, as my final year project, I’m trying to develop a Java ME application that can track a GPS-enabled, and Java compatible mobile phone. I’ve managed at making the application acquire it’s current coordinates, and I’m also using your website as a coordinate translator into a place name so, hope you don’t mind :)
But I found problems that sometimes my application shows an error message that reads “602: Address isn’t known” or the “620″ error code. I also have another application source code that is trying to do the same thing as mine. But it works well and doesn’t have this kind of problem at all. Do you know why is this happening?
Thanks in advance
-Harry
Nate on December 7th, 2009
Harry,
First, Thanks for the kudos. I appreciate it.
Second, I don’t mind at all. Thank you for letting me know what you’re working on. I love hearing what people are doing with it.
Third, yes, we do server out 620 errors every now and then. These come about because when we are over capacity with our data providers in a 24 hour period. We have multiple providers, but because of the popularity of the service, we still go over every now and then. It usually takes a few hours to clear up.
We do cache the queries though, so once you’ve sent it in once, we don’t incur another hit against our providers. But, the big question is… how many unique queries will you be running through?
harryteguh on December 8th, 2009
Unique queries as in place names of a coordinates, right? Let’s say 5
Anyway, Do you have any experiences with J2ME Programming? If you do, I really2 need your help. I still can’t get over this “602: Address Isn’t known” error message on my J2ME application. I also have an example code I got from the following address:
http://mobilepit.com/02/javame-jsr-179-example-code-detect-location-via-tinygeocoder.html
It works well and doesn’t have this kind of message.
Nate on December 10th, 2009
Yes, that’s correct – place names of coordinates.
Right now, we’re working on putting together a co-op of sorts, so what I might suggest is hitting us up via email and we’ll talk more about what we need there.
No, unfortunately I don’t have any experience with J2ME.
harryteguh on December 11th, 2009
I see.
It’s okay, Nate. I finally got it figured out :)
As for the queries, I’m going to need about 10 unique queries for now.
Thanks a lot for your help :)
Nate on December 11th, 2009
@harryteguh,
If you wouldn’t mind, please send me a message via http://blog.perfectspace.com/contact so I can include you in on a discussion we’re getting started regarding the co-op.
Thanks.
Jason on February 6th, 2010
Hey, thanks for making a resource like this available. I’ve got a new site I’m developing that’s going to make heavy use of Google maps, and the GClientGeocoder isn’t really viable for it. I basically need to batch process about 100,000 addresses. I’ve got a java application that’s using Google geocoding, but I’m running up against the query timing limits, so it’s a lot slower than I would like.
Are you using Google for geocoding, and if so, is Google getting the request from the client (which wouldn’t fix my problem), or your server (dev key, special request, whatever). Finally, would you have a problem with me using your service for this? It would most likely be a one time job, with much smaller updates every month or so. Just my own code, not for distribution.
Thanks.
Nate on February 23rd, 2010
Hi Jason,
We do use Google as one of our data sources, but batch processing that much would be too much for us to handle right now all at once. We are looking into some solutions for something like that, but haven’t finalized any plans quite yet.
Nick on February 25th, 2010
I couldn’t find a list of sources for this site’s API geocoding service. The previous post says Google is one of them. Google has a TOS defined, so users of this site’s API service must also inherent google’s TOS + those of any other data sources [right?]. Can you provide a list of your API geocoding sources or a TOS.
Nate on March 19th, 2010
Nick,
That’s a great set of questions. It’s true that Google is one of our data providers. It’s also true that we do have explicit permission to run the service the way we do. Your suggestion of providing a list of our API geocoding sources is a great idea and we’ll definitely add a page to display those sources and link to their TOS. Thank you for the suggestions.