# Google Maps Questions **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [August 24, 2006, 1:03pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/google-maps-questions/66260 "2006-08-24T13:03:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/johnnybutler7)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2006, 1:03pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/google-maps-questions/66260/1 "2006-08-24T13:03:56Z")
Hi, Ive used this link to create google maps in my rails app. I have a few questions. This example uses a US Geocoder to find the latitude and Longtitude of an address. Is there 1 available for the UK from google or any other service thats free? I takes a couple of seconds to get the latitude and longitude from the geocoder, is it better to hold the latitude and longtitude in the database? Does anyone know where i can find a UK website that will provide me with the latitude and longtitude of a UK address? Ive looked around the internet and [streetmap.co.uk](http://streetmap.co.uk) gives you the latitude & Longtitude for a particular postcode, not the exact address. Any suggestions would be gretfull. ---
**Author:** ![johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/johnnybutler7)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2006, 1:47pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/google-maps-questions/66260/2 "2006-08-24T13:47:51Z")
There is no data on precise co-ordinates of individual addresses, but post codes are pretty accurate… average of 13 addresses per postcode as far as I can remember. A good place to go for co-ordinates is here: > **[SamKnows](https://www.samknows.com/toys/coords.php?output=xml&pc=se270nb,sw47ln,s118th,s101nu)** > > Internet performance monitoring You can list the postcodes seperated by commas as I’ve shown, and it gives you a nice XML output of postcodes with their co-ordinates. ---
**Author:** ![johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/johnnybutler7)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2006, 3:07pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/google-maps-questions/66260/3 "2006-08-24T15:07:56Z")
yes on the question to store the lat and long in the database. that way, geocode is executed once instead of everytime someone accesses the google map. John B. wrote: > Hi, > > Ive used this link to create google maps in my rails app. I have a few > questions. > > This example uses a US Geocoder to find the latitude and Longtitude of > an address. > Is there 1 available for the UK from google or any other service thats > free? > > I takes a couple of seconds to get the latitude and longitude from the > geocoder, is it better to hold the latitude and longtitude in the > database? > Does anyone know where i can find a UK website that will provide me with > the latitude and longtitude of a UK address? > > Ive looked around the internet and [streetmap.co.uk](http://streetmap.co.uk) gives you the > latitude & Longtitude for a particular postcode, not the exact address. > > Any suggestions would be gretfull. ---
**Author:** ![johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/johnnybutler7)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2006, 3:11pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/google-maps-questions/66260/4 "2006-08-24T15:11:46Z")
koloa wrote: > yes on the question to store the lat and long in the database. that way, > geocode is executed once instead of everytime someone accesses the > google map. I run a cron job to populate the database with geocode info every night, that way data can be added to the database without the potential lag of a geocode lookup. Any record that doesn’t have long/lat fields does a geocode api query . ---
**Author:** ![johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/johnnybutler7)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2006, 3:46pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/google-maps-questions/66260/5 "2006-08-24T15:46:34Z")
Chris L. wrote: > koloa wrote: > > > yes on the question to store the lat and long in the database. that way, > > geocode is executed once instead of everytime someone accesses the > > google map. > > I run a cron job to populate the database with geocode info every night, > that way data can be added to the database without the potential lag of > a geocode lookup. Any record that doesn’t have long/lat fields does a > geocode api query . Both Yahoo and Google offer Geocoding. Give those a shot. [http://developer.yahoo.com/maps/rest/V1/geocode.html](http://developer.yahoo.com/maps/rest/V1/geocode.html) [http://www.google.com/apis/maps/documentation/](http://www.google.com/apis/maps/documentation/) ---
**Author:** ![johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/8491ac/32.png) [@johnnybutler7](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/johnnybutler7)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2006, 4:10pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/google-maps-questions/66260/6 "2006-08-24T16:10:07Z")
John B. wrote: > Is there 1 available for the UK from google or any other service thats > free? There is a duscussion about UK codes here [http://drupal.org/node/19482](http://drupal.org/node/19482) Try these links as well [http://gabriel.gironda.org/articles/2005/12/01/geolocation-in-ruby-on-rails](http://gabriel.gironda.org/articles/2005/12/01/geolocation-in-ruby-on-rails) [http://www.onrails.org/articles/2006/06/01/geoip-data](http://www.onrails.org/articles/2006/06/01/geoip-data) If you have a decent budget, the data can be purchased [http://www.datadepot.co.uk/dept.asp?level=2&id=2250](http://www.datadepot.co.uk/dept.asp?level=2&id=2250)