GeoNames Forum

Hi there!

I am currently having masses of fun using the HUGE database via web services. I have hit a problem though and hoping someone can help...

I am using the /search web method to get a point of reference for a location then using it to find the closest list of properties in my database.

However, with those properties, I would like to find the closest airport to each location (which I will calculate away from Geonames). But I need to find all the airports within a particular area, eg;

http://ws.geonames.org/findNearby?lat=53.353744&lng=-2.27495&fclass=S&fcode=AIRP&style=full&radius=300

This is a really great method, but I have one little issue... I need to 'get' the IATA code for the airport. Using the search method its available under alternateNames node with the attribute lang. Using the /findNearby web method it doesnt appear like this...

Can anyone suggest where I am going wrong/if there is a work around or if its a limitation and I'm being a fussy git?

Bar this the service has been fantastic up to now! :

Cheers in advance, Stu

Hi Stu

You are right the alternate names are missing from the reverse geocoding. There is an xml element 'alternatenames' with a list of comma separated alterate names. The language code is not in this list, but you can extract it and check for three letter upper case names, and these are the iata codes. It is not perfect, but it should work.

Marc

Thanks Marc, that sounds like the best way at the moment.

Is there any development planned on the method in the near future to bring the schema into alignment with the /search response for the /findNearby?

Cheers
Stu

Stu

At the moment nothing concrete is planned. It would be a major refactoring and we would like to know first everything people would want to know.

Marc