Talk:Address geocoding

Research
The research section was not representative of the research on this topic, and was relying basically in one source which is a PhD thesis at Curtin University in Australia. There are tons of surveys etc. on this topic see e.g. — ChaTo (talk) 10:43, 13 April 2015 (UTC)

Removed/Proposed external links

 * Guide to current consumer-facing technologies
 * About GIS & Geocoding - The basics of Geocoding and real time applications of GIS Technologies.

Controversies
Pizza Deliveryis a critical service, when you stop and think about it.

Especially if you make a living out of it and your customers won't pay you when the pizza is cold, or just delayed to the door.Ragnvald 21:49, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

A VERY STRONG OPINION IS EXPRESSED WITHOUT CITATION: "Because of this, it is quite important to avoid using interpolated results except for non-critical applications, such as pizza delivery. Interpolated geocoding is usually not appropriate for making authoritative decisions, for example if life safety will be affected by that decision. Emergency services, for example, do not make an authoritative decision based on their interpolations; an ambulance or fire truck will always be dispatched regardless of what the map says.[citation needed]" Jim.Callahan,Orlando (talk) 12:43, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

Apparently the "avoid using interpolated results" OPINION is interpreted to mean never, ever use US Census Geocoder, Google Maps and Microsoft Bing Maps because all of those links have disappeared. Apparently, the US Census, Google and Microsoft and their users have different OPINIONS. Jim.Callahan,Orlando (talk) 12:43, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

MY OPINION (imho) is that we should INCLUDE the US Census, Google and Microsoft Bing geocoding services links ALONG WITH an opinion/warning about life-critical operations (such as a 9-1-1 emergency call centers) like that above (provided it is properly cited). I do not believe we should CENSOR access to commonly used inexpensive or free geocoding services -- just because more accurate and expensive alternatives exist. Yes, in an ideal world, it would be nice if every address were geocoded on the ground with a military grade GPS -- but that is not an affordable solution for many at this time. We don't burn all our paper maps because they are not perfect. Jim.Callahan,Orlando (talk) 12:43, 12 May 2015 (UTC)

Main definition
I am wondering if this definition of geocoding might be more to the point: "Geocoding is to transform one spatial reference into another more general reference". Comments? Ragnvald 07:40, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Way too obscure. My doubts to the current definition are with the source material.  I generally use MS Photo Pro Tools or Geosetter and drag the pinpoint on the map to where I was when I took the picture.  Should this process escape the "geocoding" definition because it works from a map rather than from alphanumeric data?  Jim.henderson (talk) 00:56, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Dictionary is a bad source of definition
Please use some scientific foundation or technical source. Dictionaries are not correct "source of Truth", are only sources for terminological use. --Krauss (talk) 12:52, 11 August 2019 (UTC)

Some good sources for definition
There are a "best source" or, ideal, a collection of sources that are showing some consensus? Lets check first,


 * According to ref1 (2014), “... geocoding is explicitly defined as the act of transforming descriptive locational text into a valid spatial representation using a predefined process.”
 * According to ref1 (2014), “... geocoding is explicitly defined as the act of transforming descriptive locational text into a valid spatial representation using a predefined process.”


 * According to ref2 (2009), "Geocoding is an expression that has been usually associated with the idea of locating points in the surface of the Earth  from  alphanumeric  address  information", and "... assume that geocoding is being performed in order  to  establish  a  location  for  a  real  world  event  or  phenomenon – even though this location can be approximate."



Other comments:


 * ref1 "Today, the US Census Bureau’s TIGER/Line files are the most commonly used reference dataset in geocoding"
 * ref2 "The geocoding  process  includes  the  treatment  of  semi-structured  alphanumeric  addresses  of  events  (which  we  call parsing),  the  establishment  of  a  correspondence  between the structured address and the addressing database (matching),  and  the  actual  assignment  of  coordinates  to  the  event  (locating)."

Some bad sources
Add invalid refs here.



List of Geocoding systems
Why does this article have a list of 33 Geocoding systems, yet no entries for the main 3 geocoding systems, namely: (1) Google Maps, (2) Yahoo PlaceFinder and (3) Bing maps? I just added them, but I'm not sure why they weren't there originally. Tcotco (talk) 02:18, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Someone removed your (updated) list but I just reinstated Julian Brown (talk) 21:56, 26 December 2013 (UTC)


 * I have moved the list to its own page, which seemed appropriate given how long and detailed it is. - Lawsonstu (talk) 15:24, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Accuracy
How accurate are commercial geocoders in the US? This article currently has estimates for TIGER datasets. I'm looking for figures/studies estimating geocoders from Google, Yahoo, Bing etc. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.66.147.165 (talk) 00:19, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Google Maps waypoints
How could the article not mention the curious system used for Google Maps waypoints?! maps.google.com/maps?saddr=...&daddr=...&geocode=...%3BFSICcQEdQGY0Bw%3BFV8HcQEdRWk0Bw... Note these are point encodings, not path encodings. Jidanni (talk) 15:02, 19 March 2012 (UTC)

Forward geocoding vs reverse geocoding
From article:

Geocoding (sometimes called forward geocoding) is the process of enriching a description of a location, most typically a postal address or place name, with geographic coordinates from spatial reference data such as building polygons, land parcels, street addresses, postal codes (e.g. ZIP codes, CEDEX) and so on. Geocoding facilitates spatial analysis using Geographic Information Systems and Enterprise Location Intelligence systems.

But this process should called reverse geocoding not forward geocoding. Because forward geocoding is process of enriching a geographic coordinates from address or name. (https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/geocoding/?hl=en#ReverseGeocoding) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Caiiiycuk (talk • contribs) 03:14, 2 April 2015 (UTC)

Rebuild a list of geocoding systems?
Hi guys. I would think an unbiased list of geocoding services would be useful to people. Seems there was a list here, then it got moved to its own article, then got deleted as it was deemed to be written in a rather advertising way. Taken a lot of digging to find helpful info. The best I found was https://geoservices.tamu.edu/Services/Geocode/OtherGeocoders/ which is probably most useful, but out of date even though only 3 months old (some links don't work, others have significantly changed prices?). I think it might well be useful to the public to put together a straightforward table of geocoding services, basics of free\pay structures\rates, their data sources, API access options, and coverage areas. Certainly it can easily be fiddled with to mislead\advertise... but so can any wikipedia article. And in many ways, I'd consider it more unbiased than finding a similar list on a forum or company website, as at least the community can work to keep it in check (and up to date). Perhaps the TAMU person can be convinced to be a watcher of the page. So was wondering what the position would be on such a page before jumping into it, given that past versions didn't stand up well. JeopardyTempest (talk) 11:02, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
 * After looking through https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:What_Wikipedia_is_not#Wikipedia_is_not_a_directory in more detail, wondering if perhaps making the free\pay structures\rates would just be better as Availability, and then list free quota or just simply paid if none exists. That would prevent it from being a continuing pay update, and at least still allow users to have a central compilation to search from?.

Also wondering what the page title would be (as I'm quite convinced it still doesn't belong on this page, only linked). Is the List_of_geocoding_systems page a bit confusing title to others as well, and such a list would belong properly back on that page? I know it's a be bold world out here, but wanted to get opinions before doing something poor in this case. Thanks! JeopardyTempest (talk) 11:08, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

Illustrations?
See eg. this what-is-geocoding with similar content but very better presentation... Because have illustrations. There are also good references with graphics comparing geocoding techniques, as this one. --Krauss (talk) 11:13, 14 May 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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External links modified (January 2018)
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"The best geocoding service in europe"
This really doesn't sound like the kind of facts I expect to find on Wikipedia. I peeked in the history and it didn't seem to be a recent edit (or maybe I just missed it). I'm not going to try to edit it and trigger an edit war, so I'm just bringing it to your attention. 172.220.16.4 (talk) 17:47, 23 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I checked the history and sure enough, it is a recent edit.  Still, I'm going to let someone else undo the changes 172.220.16.4 (talk) 17:51, 23 February 2018 (UTC)

Geocoding is a transformation


The term geocode is a noun: the code that represents a latitude/longitude in a compressed way (like Geohash or OLC or other) or that represent a "geographical context", like country code, postal code or area code.

The term geocoding as synonym of "geocodification" is a data transformation: from a something to other thing... Defining labels to be short:
 * LatLong is the pair of coordinates defined by ISO 6709, Geo URI or similar standards.
 * (location) Context is any spatial contextualization, that can't be associated to a precise latLong. Locality code, locality name, etc. also can be used as context.
 * geocode (GC)
 * fine_GC is a "fine grained" geocode system that endode/decode LatLong.
 * coarse_GC is "coarse grained" geocode that only assign location context or macro regions.
 * address is an ordinary address composed by street name and house number.
 * reliable_address is a "checked and reliable" address... To enhance the integrity of the address (like when using check digit or check sum).

Transforming to a LatLong (to a location on the Earth's surface), so, "ordinary Geocoding":
 * {|class="wikitable"

!width="180"|Geocoding !! From !! To !! Names and comments
 * fine_GC &#8658; LatLong || geocode || LatLong || ... decoding a geocode
 * fine_GC &#8658; LatLong || geocode || LatLong || ... decoding a geocode


 * address &#8658; LatLong || address || LatLong ||  ... ordinary "geocoding process"
 * address &#8658; LatLong || address || LatLong ||  ... ordinary "geocoding process"


 * }

Other (non-ordinary) "geocoding" transformations:
 * {|class="wikitable"

!width="180"|Geocoding !! From !! To !! Names and comments
 * coarse_GC &#8658; Context || geocode || context || See postal code or country code translation to complete name, or to a polygon (spatial representation).
 * coarse_GC &#8658; Context || geocode || context || See postal code or country code translation to complete name, or to a polygon (spatial representation).


 * Context &#8658; coarse_GC ||context || geocode || E.g. translation from complete name to country code or abbreviation.
 * Context &#8658; coarse_GC ||context || geocode || E.g. translation from complete name to country code or abbreviation.


 * Context+address &#8658; reliable_address ||context || geocode ||  postal codes are for it.
 * Context+address &#8658; reliable_address ||context || geocode ||  postal codes are for it.


 * Context+local_geocode &#8658; reliable_address ||context || local geocode ||  see OLC's "local codes" vs "global codes" and the use of context to transform local into global.
 * }
 * }

Reverese geocoding transforms: transforming from a LatLong or equivalent geocode. (conventional and non-conventional reverse geocoding), sometimes named "decode",
 * {|class="wikitable"

!width="180"|Geocoding !! From !! To !! Names and comments
 * LatLong &#8658; fine_GC|| geocode || LatLong ||  ... encoding a geocode
 * LatLong &#8658; address || LatLong || address || ... ordinary "reverse geocoding process"
 * }
 * LatLong &#8658; address || LatLong || address || ... ordinary "reverse geocoding process"
 * }