Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Mapcode – A short address for any location on Earth

mapcode.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 124 posts

Re: Mapcode – A short address for any location on Earth

#12

Post by bitJericho »

codeduck wrote: post #7

Mapcodes are a free, open way to make every house or location on Earth addressable by a short code. With nothing else except your mapcode, for instance, a navigation system will bring someone to within meters of your front door. So what happens if you live in a multi-story block of flats?

I think this is to improve on postal codes, not address multiple-person dwellings. The flat/apt/suite number would take care of that.

Re: Mapcode – A short address for any location on Earth

#14

Post by grey-area »

Objections:

1. This mapcode is country specific (!)

2. Many locations need altitude or fine lat,lon differences to differentiate them (e.g. blocks of flats, offices).

3. What's wrong with altitude, lat and lon on a given projection which can be as precise/imprecise as you want?

IMO it'd be better to have a hash of lat,lon,altitude which was globally unique for each level of precision.

A system like this needs to be globally unique without specifying country, or you may as well use a postcode. The only advantage over postcodes at present is it's slightly shorter.

Re: Mapcode – A short address for any location on Earth

#19

Post by ekidd »

Overall, this looks pretty interesting, assuming your goal is to communicate physical locations with an accuracy of a couple of meters using a format that fits on a business card. It can also be used without country names, if you prefer it that way (just select "International" when generating the code.)

Developer downloads here: http://www.mapcode.com/downloads.html?iso3=112&mapcode=49.4V

This is patented, with an ISO standard in progress, and the following licensing terms (from their developer page):

    The mapcode algorithms and data tables may not be
    altered in any way that would result in the production
    of different (and thus incompatible) mapcodes. The
    mapcode algorithms and data tables may not be used in
    any way to generate a different system that produces
    codes to represent locations. In order to prevent
    misuse, unauthorised alterations, copying or commercial
    exploitation, please note that the ideas and algorithms
    behind the mapcode system have been patented and that
    the term "mapcode" is a registered trademark of the
    Stichting Mapcode Foundation.
Part of the motivation is the lack of usable postcodes in many countries:

Unfortunately, a large part of the world population has no address. In India alone, well over half a billion people live in houses that have no street name.

They play some interesting tricks with population density and country "contexts" to shorten codes:

4. People live within a “country context”. Addresses seldom include a country name. Unless clearly stated otherwise, they can safely be assumed to be in “this” country. Codes that are known to be within a particular territory can be designed to be much shorter.

6. Short codes are reserved for areas where the population density is high.

Post reply on HN