GeoNames Forum

Hi

In Australia, when we deal with states, we mostly use abbreviations, e.g. NSW instead of New South Wales when dealing with data.

So when we look for a location, we use abbreviated state, and GeoNames search doesn't support this.

For example, to look for Manly in NSW, we would use the following query string:

Manly, NSW

Searched GeoNames with the above query string, it returned:

Manly wharf, Manly, Sdyney, NSW

Which not what we expected.

However, if a full state name or FIPS is provided, GeoNames returned the expected result:

Query: Manly, New South Wales
Result: Manly

Query: Manly, 02
Result: Manly

I believe adminCode1 plays a role in this and it would be good if ISO is used instead of FIPS for adminCode1.

Are there plans to use ISO and what is the time frame for the switch?

Thanks

I have just seen that this thread has not yet received an answer.

Switching from fips to iso would in this case actually be easy for us but probably not so transparent for the users if we switch one country after the other. I think it would be better to switch as many countries as possible.

Adding the abbreviations as alternate names will help to find the admin divisions but it is not yet included in the search index when searching for another place name. The search service will have to be modified for this to work.

Best

Marc

the search service has been improved and is now also searching over all alternate names of a toponyms admin division.

Marc