Yahoo! Internet Location Platform (New Geocoder)

Yahoo! Internet Location Platform (New Geocoder) New!

"The Yahoo! Internet Location Platform provides a resource for managing all geo-permanent named places on Earth. The purpose in creating the Internet Location Platform is to provide the Yahoo! Geographic Developer Community with the vocabulary and grammar to describe the world's geography in an unequivocal, permanent, and language-neutral manner.

The Internet Location Platform is designed to facilitate spatial interoperability and geographic discovery; users can traverse the spatial hierarchy, identify the geography relevant to their users and their business, and in turn, unambiguously geotag, geotarget, and geolocate data across the Web."

Basically this is a Geocoder for Places across the World. The accuracy is fairly precise and the easy to understand.

Here is an example:
http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/places.q('10%20downing%20street%20london%20uk')

and also you can geocode UK Postcodes - full UK Postcodes!

http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/places.q('SW1A2AA')
*link fixed

Centroid is the postcode centre. So 51.503201, -0.12617

Checking... on the map.



http://developer.yahoo.com/geo/

Rate Limits
Currently, users of the Internet Location Platform are limited to 50k queries per day.

Terms of Use (Please check this if you intend using this service with other non Yahoo Applications)
http://info.yahoo.com/legal/us/yahoo/api/api-2140.html

Geeky Stuff

"In simple terms, the Service allows you to look up the unique identifier - called the Where on Earth ID, or WOEID - for almost any named place on the Earth; it also allows you to resolve a WOEID you have received from a third party - such as Fire Eagle™ or Upcoming - to the place it represents.

The API is accessed via HTTP GET; the following examples can be cut-and-paste into a web browser to view the results:"
http://developer.yahoo.com/geo/

Mapperz