Have you looked at PostGIS? It's an open component which is built on
top of PostgreSQL for performing geographic queries such as distances
between two points. You can perform the queries through DBD:Pg.
http://www.postgis.org/
I believe there is also a subgroup working on a geocoder which will use
TIGER data to assign Lat/Lon based on an address.
-Alec
Rutherdale, Will wrote:
Formulas for great circle distances aren't hard to derive using just
basic trig. No calculus required!
That being said, the Math::Trig package comes standard with Perl
distributions and has a function called great_circle_distance(). Try
'man Math::Trig'. If you search PDL::Index on CPAN, I believe you'll
find even more sophisticated resources for longitude/latitude and
distance calculations.
As for tracking data, *of course* you want to use Perl with DBI. :-)
Pick the database you like, for instance PostgreSQL.
Maybe these questions should be posted on more general Perl lists until
you can identify specific DBI problems.
There are general textbooks out there on web programming, for instance
_Programming the World Wide Web_ by Sebesta.
-Will
-----Original Message-----
From: Scott Webster Wood [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Sunday 26 February 2006 11:23
To: dbi-users@perl.org
Subject: Zip Codes, Long/Lat and LAMP?
OK, I think I asked something along these lines before, but I am
actually
starting to code so I wanted to revise the question(s) a bit. I am
looking for
a good way to keep an up-to-date database (or perhaps use an
XML-RPC/SOAP based
service) to translate back-and-forth between information such as
city/state/county, zip-code, and longitude/latitude.
I am currently writing most of my administrative tools in PHP but will
likely
build most of my content delivery items in PERL. I am going to be
dealing with
geocaching on the initial project and thus the locations might be
specified by
the name of a nearby city, a zipcode, possibly even crossroads (I'll
have to
work that one out later) or more often by use of GPS or similar
Longitude and
Latitude coordinates.
My desire is to be as thorough as possible with what is actually stored
and
'fill in the blanks' for the user only requiring them to fill in an
'either/or'
type scenario. (use of an address OR long/lat coordinates)
Thus I am looking for some way to translate one to the other and back
again.
(address/zip/city to long/lat, or long/lat to
zip/city/county/state/etc.)
Ultimately I want to include at least canada and possibly international
locations (although I will likely use different tools for handling
those).
I've started looking at some of the services available at USPS and
zip-codes.com. I'll start looking at map-services next as I would also
like to
be able to generate maps for people as well as possibly have them select
locations on a map rather than enter the specific data. (ugh - I have a
feeling
that might be a nightmare)
Finally, I'm sure if I can get something to work for the above mentioned
translations (so I can store at least an approximate long/lat for all
locations) then I can find the math myself to calculate distances, but I
would
be curious to know if any packages for such already exist. I did a
quick
search of perl but only found one CPAN tool that appeared to do Long/Lat
calculations and it's not one included in the standard CPAN supported
downloads.
All help is appreciated.
SW
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