Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
1–10 of 10 posts
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#2Nice, but US limited.
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#3Related: can you expand it to include the reverse (geolocation to zip code)? Anyone know of a restful service that might do that, alternatively?
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#4Related: can you expand it to include the reverse (geolocation to zip code)? Anyone know of a restful service that might do that, alternatively?
That would be very difficult, and couldn't be made deterministic with a typical ZIP code database. The reason is most ZIP code databases list a geological position representing a location within the zone, but not its perimeter or geological extent. Therefore, converting from a geological position to a ZIP code would be a guessing game.
Here's a typical ZIP code database entry:
"74857","Newalla","OK","35.351612","-97.19507","-6","1"
The fields are ZIP code, place name, state, latitude ("-" = south), longitude ("-" = west), time zone, location honors daylight time. So no size or shape for the zone itself, only a location within the zone.
An algorithm might find the geographically nearest ZIP code position for a given argument position and return that result, but it would likely be wrong in many situations where there are a lot of ZIP codes, like urban areas.
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#5Give an example with multiple word city name.
For example, would http://zipasaur.us/state/il/city/east+moline or
http://zipasaur.us/state/ca/city/los+angeles work?
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#6Related: can you expand it to include the reverse (geolocation to zip code)? Anyone know of a restful service that might do that, alternatively?
That would be very difficult, and couldn't be made deterministic with a typical ZIP code database. The reason is most ZIP code databases list a geological position representing a location within the zone, but not its perimeter or geological extent. Therefore, converting from a geological position to a ZIP code would be a guessing game. Here's a typical ZIP code database entry: "74857","Newalla","OK","35.351612","-97.…
that's actually good enough for my purposes :-) (I'm looking to get a zip code from the browser and then show stores, for example, in a 50 mile radius). 2 adjacent zip codes would still be around 50 miles from the store.
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#7Very awesome utility API. A bit targeted (US) but I will be integrating it into 2 projects immediately.
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#8hey thanks everyone for the feedback. GeoNames includes postal code data for many countries. I'll see if I can add more countries in the next week or so!
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#9Give an example with multiple word city name. For example, would http://zipasaur.us/state/il/city/east+moline or http://zipasaur.us/state/ca/city/los+angeles work?
Good catch. I've fixed this and updated one of the examples. You should be able to do just as you described: http://zipasaur.us/state/ca/city/los+angeles
Re: Show HN: zipasaur.us, a simple postal code API
#10Hey Chris, this looks awesome!
I saw the donate button. Are you on Gittip? I'd be happy to set up a recurring donation if I end up using this in some of my projects.