Php – “Find nearest location” by Zip/Postal Code

google mapsMySQLPHP

I need a "find nearest location" on our website.

Where visitor enters their zip/postal code, then they are redirected to specific webpage for our nearest location. We have forty USA and Canada locations.

How can I build something like this? Could I do this with the Google Maps API? I already have a custom map on Google Maps. It's plotted with our locations. It would be nice to send Google Maps a command to say "what's our nearest location at ________ zip code".

Any suggestions?

Best Answer

if you have the longitudes and latitudes of each zipcode (search google) you can use the Haversine Formula to calculate nearest neighbours.

http://www.codecodex.com/wiki/Calculate_Distance_Between_Two_Points_on_a_Globe

Related Solutions

Javascript – Adding a search by zip code in a custom Google map

One option is to use the geonames web service that returns locations from zip codes. Here's a quick example of how to use that web service with dojo.

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
<html>
    <head>
        <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
        <title></title>
        <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="layout.css">
        <script type="text/javascript">var djConfig = { parseOnLoad: true }</script>
        <script type="text/javascript" src="../dojo-release-1.3.0/dojo/dojo.js"></script>
        </script>
        <script type="text/javascript">
            dojo.require("dojo.io.script");
                function getPlace() {
        var zip = dojo.byId('zipcode').value;
        console.log('zip is ', zip);
        //use country code to get results for a specific country
        //var gn_url = 'http://ws.geonames.org/postalCodeLookupJSON?postalcode=' + zip + '&country=US';
        var gn_url = 'http://ws.geonames.org/postalCodeLookupJSON?postalcode=' + zip;
        console.log(gn_url);
        dojo.io.script.get({
          url: gn_url, 
          callbackParamName: "callback",
          load:function(response, io) { 
            console.log('got json.'); 
            console.dir(response); 
            places = response.postalcodes; 
            var infos = []
            dojo.forEach(places, function(p, i) {
                infos[i] = p.placeName + ', ' + p.adminName1 + ', Lat: ' + p.lat + '; Long: ' + p.lng + '<br />';
            });
                dojo.byId('postalCode').innerHTML = infos.join('');
          }, 
          error:errorCb
        });   
        }

        function errorCb(type, data, evt){
                debug(data);
        }
         </script>
     </head>
     <body class="tundra">
    Enter a zip code: <input id="zipcode" type="text" /> <button onclick="getPlace(); return false;" value="Find Place.">Find Place.</button>
      <div>Places:</div><div id="postalCode"></div>
    </body>
</html>

Google-maps – How to add a zip code search box to the Google Map that will only search the markers

You will need to geocode the zip code and use the results to center the map, then show the markers that fit the bounds of the map if they are not already shown.

See http://code.google.com/apis/maps/documentation/javascript/geocoding.html

There is an example with a search box.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Javascript – Adding a search by zip code in a custom Google map

Google-maps – How to add a zip code search box to the Google Map that will only search the markers

Related Topic