On Fri, Sep 05, 2008 at 09:26:23PM -0000, Eddie Babcock said:
> This problem has been fixed since 25 June.  The status is set to 400
> Bad Request, and the response is in JSON.  If you are seeing anything
> else, please let us know.

Oh, I could I have sworn i'd checked and it still wasn't right.

My mistake - all apologies.

Simon

This problem has been fixed since 25 June.  The status is set to 400
Bad Request, and the response is in JSON.  If you are seeing anything
else, please let us know.

Eddie Babcock
Yahoo! Geo Technologies

--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, Simon Wistow <simon@...> wrote:
>
> Any movement on this?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Simon
>
> On Thu, Jun 12, 2008 at 10:15:46PM -0000, me said:
> > If I send this request
> >
> > http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/places
> >
> > then I get an error in XML, which is good. However
> >
> > http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/places?format=json
> >
> > also returns the error in XML which is ... less good.
> >
> > Also, the errors are returned as 200 OKs which is ... well, wrong.
> >
> > Instead of sending a 200 OK, shouldn't it send a 400 Bad Request -
> > <error code>. Sticking a formatted error in the body would then be ok
> > but at least make it in the format requested.
> >
> > Thanks,
> >
> > Simon
> >
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------------
> >
> > Yahoo! Groups Links
> >
> >
> >
>

Any movement on this?

Thanks,

Simon

On Thu, Jun 12, 2008 at 10:15:46PM -0000, me said:
> If I send this request
>
> http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/places
>
> then I get an error in XML, which is good. However
>
> http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/places?format=json
>
> also returns the error in XML which is ... less good.
>
> Also, the errors are returned as 200 OKs which is ... well, wrong.
>
> Instead of sending a 200 OK, shouldn't it send a 400 Bad Request -
> <error code>. Sticking a formatted error in the body would then be ok
> but at least make it in the format requested.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Simon
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>

GeoPlanet is now returning the current Olson time zone name for India.

Eddie Babcock
Y! Geo

--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "v1cch1" <garyg@...> wrote:
>
> Hi Dave,
>
> We have refreshed the timezone names in our latest software release;
this is not currently
> publicly available but will be made so as part of our next public
push of updates.
>
> As soon as this is available we'll let you know.
>
> Regards
>
> Gary Gale
> Yahoo! Geo Technologies Group
>
> --- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "v1cch1" <garyg@> wrote:
> >
> > --- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "Dave Murdock" <dave.murdock@> wrote:
> >
> > Hi Dave,
> >
> > Thanks for bringing this to our attention; this is a great problem
report as it provides
> not
> > only a description of what you've found but also lots of
additional data and examples.
> >
> > I've passed this onto our Geo Data Engineers and they're looking
into it now.
> >
> > Regards
> >
> > Gary Gale
> > Yahoo! Geo Technologies Group
> >
> > > If you make a call like this:
> > > http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/place/28350818?appid=[yourappid]
> > >
> > > that is supposed to return the the time zone for India. This
used to be Asia/Calcutta,
> > but
> > > has been renamed to Asia/Kolkata. However, GeoPlanet is still
returning Asia/Calcutta
> > as
> > > the time zone name for any city in India. Doing this:
> > >
> > >
http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/place/2295411/belongtos?appid=[yourappid]
> > >
> > > That is the woeid for Mumbai (formerly Bombay), India. The time
zone listed is
> > > Asia/Calcutta.
> > >
> > > The popular tz database, http://www.twinsun.com/tz/tz-link.htm,
has Asia/Kolkata
> as
> > > the current time zone name for India. A number of other
development frameworks,
> e.g.
> > Cocoa on OS X and Cocoa Touch on the iPhone, use the most up to
date version of the
> tz
> > > database to get time zone names and data. A mismatch like this
makes it more
> difficult
> > to
> > > integrate the data from the GeoPlanet service with these frameworks.
> > >
> > > Is there are workaround, other than me writing my own logic in
these cases, to get
> the
> > > newest time zone names?

Thanks to the good folk of the Yahoo! Developer Network we now have a set of
forums
dedicated to discussing all things associated with Yahoo! GeoPlanet .

You'll find forum categories for requesting enhancements, showcasing
applications or demos
which make use of GeoPlanet, requests for using GeoPlanet in a commercial
environment and
general discussions, conversations and Geo related chat.

Members of the Yahoo! Geo Technologies group will be on the forums and we look
forward
to meeting and chatting with you all there.

You can find out more by pointing your browsers to the Yahoo! Developer Network
GeoPlanet
forums at http://developer.yahoo.net/forum/index.php?showforum=31 now.

Cheers,

Gary Gale, Head of UK Engineering, Yahoo! Geo Technologies

Posted on behalf of Gus Maldonado, Snr. Product Manager, Yahoo! Geo Technologies

Hi Anshul,

Thank you for your recent feedback.

Draggable turn-by-turn directions have been considered but we have not
implemented
this feature as it would have had a negative impact on performance, which in
turn would
lead to a bad user experience.

We have also looked at icons such as the US Highway shield; this is currently
being
considered but needs further effort and investigation on our part in order for
us to make
this available.

Your other comments regarding tighter integration with Yahoo! India Maps are
underway
and we expect to have this completed sometime in the near future.

Best regards,

Gus Maldonado
Snr. Product Manager, Yahoo! Geo Technologies

Hi Anshul,

Thank you for your comments; I've passed these on to members of the team who are
in a
better position to comment and I will, of course, pass on any feedback back to
you and to
the group.

It's always good to get detailed focused feedback; thank you for taking the time
to mail us
and thank you for your continued interest in Yahoo! Geo Technologies.

Best regards

Gary Gale
Yahoo! Geo Technologies

--
--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "Gary Gale" <garyg@...> wrote:
>
>
> Sent on behalf of Anshul Agrawal and posted to this group with his
> permission:
>
> Its good to see the improvements. I have a couple of concers though.
>
> I requested the improved print options long ago at
> suggestions.yahoo.com. Of the orginal  request, now only couple of
> things are missing.
>
>     * Zoomable and dragable maps even for turns. That is the place where
> we mess things up  most and would be better if I can adjust it to my
> needs.
>     * This one is not critical but adds value. Use of icons for
> Interstate, SR, US highway etc. like  a colored shield having the number
> of the interstate.
>
> Another is more of a glitch.
>
>     * I am right now in India and its great to see the map data
> integration from Yahoo India  maps with world maps. however when I try
> to get directions between any two points, the  app lets me select the
> points but returns an error on asking directions.
>     * I am unable to go to my hometown via the search "Indore, India". It
> just wont let me select  the place (Indore Madhya Pradesh India). Search
> for a major town "Surat, India" doesn't  yield any results. It seems the
> integration of data for India needs a rework.
>
> Hope it helps.
>
> Best Regards,
>
> Anshul Agrawal
>

Sent on behalf of Anshul Agrawal and posted to this group with his permission:

Its good to see the improvements. I have a couple of concers though.

I requested the improved print options long ago at suggestions.yahoo.com. Of the orginal request, now only couple of things are missing.

• Zoomable and dragable maps even for turns. That is the place where we mess things up most and would be better if I can adjust it to my needs.
• This one is not critical but adds value. Use of icons for Interstate, SR, US highway etc. like a colored shield having the number of the interstate.

Another is more of a glitch.

• I am right now in India and its great to see the map data integration from Yahoo India maps with world maps. however when I try to get directions between any two points, the app lets me select the points but returns an error on asking directions.
• I am unable to go to my hometown via the search "Indore, India". It just wont let me select the place (Indore Madhya Pradesh India). Search for a major town "Surat, India" doesn't yield any results. It seems the integration of data for India needs a rework.

Hope it helps.

Best Regards,

Anshul Agrawal

Today we're proud to introduce a new version of Yahoo! Maps, which includes an
update to
Yahoo! Local Search integration, usability, and Print Page improvements.

These past few months we've focused on improving the usability of Yahoo! Maps,
and we
encourage you to try them out.

See the Yahoo! Geo Technologies blog post at
http://www.ygeoblog.com/blog/2008/07/31/yahoo-maps-gets-a-summer-time-refresh/
for more information.

Gary Gale
Yahoo! Geo Technologies Group

Sure; I read too quickly and was thinking on XSL....

Yahoo! -- and certainly Y!OS -- standardize on RNG, so we wouldn't
provide and support both Schema and RNG for GeoPlanet.  We would of
course not object if someone were to create a third-party XSD if this is
more convenient for transformations.

TB

Tyler,

Thanks for responding. As far as the XSD goes - I'm wanting to make
REST calls to the geoplanet service and then parse the results.
Typical web services and even very basic rudimentary XML formats
define a schema so that client apps can understand the XML data that
is returned. It looks like you guys have used Relax NG as your schema
format, but from what I can gather RNG is not supported nearly as much
as XSD.

Thoughts?



--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, Tyler Bell <bell@...> wrote:
>
> Hi rwwade,
>
> GeoPlanet is indeed very much alive -- we're busy on the Yahoo! side
> creating services that build significantly upon it.  In answer to your
> specific questions:
>
> -- No one has posted an XSD to the forum yet, so we haven't heard
> directly.  I am assuming you're talking around an XSD for GeoPlanet XML
> -->HTML rendering rather than converting to another XML application.
>
> -- Geonames: I have huge respect (though never met) Marc, and the output
> of the GeoNames community.  We've had GeoPlanet in Yahoo! for years
> however, and we wanted to open it up and get it out -- the offerings are
> therefore very similar, but I'll enumerate the at-a-glace differences:
>
> - GeoPlanet provides richer navigation of the geo hierarchy
> - GeoNames offers an open data dump (this is also our intention)
> - GeoPlanet has richer global coverage
> - GeoNames has more, and more granular natural features
> - GeoPlanet's Web service is more performant (this is a finger in the
> air estimate and I don't have numbers at hand to back it up)
>
> We're working on concordance so I can qualify this formally, and I am
> sure the GeoNames lads have their own assessment so don't take our word
> for it only.
>
> -- Tyler
>

Hi rwwade,

GeoPlanet is indeed very much alive -- we're busy on the Yahoo! side
creating services that build significantly upon it.  In answer to your
specific questions:

-- No one has posted an XSD to the forum yet, so we haven't heard
directly.  I am assuming you're talking around an XSD for GeoPlanet XML
-->HTML rendering rather than converting to another XML application.

-- Geonames: I have huge respect (though never met) Marc, and the output
of the GeoNames community.  We've had GeoPlanet in Yahoo! for years
however, and we wanted to open it up and get it out -- the offerings are
therefore very similar, but I'll enumerate the at-a-glace differences:

- GeoPlanet provides richer navigation of the geo hierarchy
- GeoNames offers an open data dump (this is also our intention)
- GeoPlanet has richer global coverage
- GeoNames has more, and more granular natural features
- GeoPlanet's Web service is more performant (this is a finger in the
air estimate and I don't have numbers at hand to back it up)

We're working on concordance so I can qualify this formally, and I am
sure the GeoNames lads have their own assessment so don't take our word
for it only.

-- Tyler

Is this group (and the geoplanet stuff in general) dead? The
http://www.ygeoblog.com/ blog hasn't been updated in nearly 2 months
and I'm not seeing a lot of exchanging of information.

With that being said, does geoplanet have any advantages over
http://www.geonames.org/?



--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "rwwade" <rwwade@...> wrote:
>
> Has anyone created an XSD for the GeoPlanet output?
>

Has anyone created an XSD for the GeoPlanet output?

This looks like a bug.  GeoPlanet has zip code children for each of
the counties covered by New York City except Manhattan (New York
County).  The Manhattan zip code areas are parented by New York City.
  We'll investigate the cause of this issue.

Since New York City appears to have only Manhattan zip code areas
among its children, you may assume that a zip code area parented by
New York City (woeid 2459115) is actually parented by Manhattan (woeid
12589342).

Thanks for bring this issue to our attention!

Eddie

Y! Geo

--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "bretwalkernu" <bret-walker@...> wrote:
>
> I am trying to develop an application that can take a ZIP code and
> normalize to its parent county (basically, give me a ZIP, and I'll
> find the Admin2).
>
> I've run into a problem with Manhattan ZIP codes (and I'm sure there
> are others).
>
> ZIP code 10027 = WOEID 12761358
> 12761358's Parent is WOEID 2459115 (Town New York)
>
> Why isn't it's parent Manhattan or New York County (WOEID 12589342)
>
> Similarly, New York County (12589342) does not show ZIP codes as
> children, neighbors, ancestors, belongsto, siblings or parent.
>
> It's almost like the Manhattan ZIP codes are not at all related to
> Manhattan.  How can this be?
>
> Any info would be greatly appreciated.
>
> Thanks!
>

Here are some Manhattan ZIP codes:
http://www.unhp.org/crg/indy-maps-manhatzip.html

I am trying to develop an application that can take a ZIP code and
normalize to its parent county (basically, give me a ZIP, and I'll
find the Admin2).

I've run into a problem with Manhattan ZIP codes (and I'm sure there
are others).

ZIP code 10027 = WOEID 12761358
12761358's Parent is WOEID 2459115 (Town New York)

Why isn't it's parent Manhattan or New York County (WOEID 12589342)

Similarly, New York County (12589342) does not show ZIP codes as
children, neighbors, ancestors, belongsto, siblings or parent.

It's almost like the Manhattan ZIP codes are not at all related to
Manhattan.  How can this be?

Any info would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Hi Manpreet,

We've identified this as a valuable feature and it is on the
enhancement list.  We will post new release announcements to this
forum, so you'll read about it here first.

Cheers,

Tyler
Yahoo! Geo Technologies


--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "manpreets7" <manpreets7@...> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> Just went through the API docs and had the following question:
>
> Is there a direct way to map GPS coordinates (lat, long) to a WOEID?
> If not, it would be nice to add that.
>
> Would appreciate your help.
>
> Thanks,
> Manpreet.
>

Hi,

Just went through the API docs and had the following question:

Is there a direct way to map GPS coordinates (lat, long) to a WOEID?
If not, it would be nice to add that.

Would appreciate your help.

Thanks,
Manpreet.

We pushed a bug fix release (1.0.5) of GeoPlanet to production on 2
July.  This release fixes two recently reported problems:

1) A missing place element within the places collection for JSON responses
2) Incorrect place type names for dependencies that are returned in
the country element within the place resource.

We are currently developing release notes that will be added to the
documentation at http://developer.yahoo.com/geo/guide.

As always, we aim to please our developer community by responding to
questions and issues in a timely manner.  Please let us know how we
are doing and how we could do better!

Eddie Babcock
Y! Geo

Hello Jim!

Yes, we love YPlaces, and there is certainly no problem using Google Maps --
your work demonstrates exactly the kind of open, cross-platform application we
envisioned when we designed GeoPlanet.

I will investigate its status in the Gallery and give it a kick.

Great Stuff,

Tyler
---
Dr Tyler Bell
Yahoo! Geo Technologies


________________________________

From: yws-geo@yahoogroups.com on behalf of Jim Hamilton
Sent: Sun 7/6/2008 12:45 PM
To: yws-geo@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [yws-geo] YPlaces revisited



Hello Yahoo!

I created a pretty cool little app a while back called YPlaces, using
this API. I'm pretty sure I was one of the early users and I havn't
noticed any other apps appearing. This group would seem a logical
place for them to show up...

Anyway, I submitted it to the Yahoo! Gallery well over a month ago and
it's just sitting there awaiting approval. I have six other apps in
that gallery and it's never taken this long. What's up? Did the
approval person get layed off?

I really don't care, I make no money on these things, but I find it
interesting.

Perhaps their upset because I used Google maps :)

http://www.transpomans.com/yplaces/ <http://www.transpomans.com/yplaces/>

Hello Yahoo!

I created a pretty cool little app a while back called YPlaces, using
this API. I'm pretty sure I was one of the early users and I havn't
noticed any other apps appearing. This group would seem a logical
place for them to show up...

Anyway, I submitted it to the Yahoo! Gallery well over a month ago and
it's just sitting there awaiting approval. I have six other apps in
that gallery and it's never taken this long. What's up? Did the
approval person get layed off?

I really don't care, I make no money on these things, but I find it
interesting.

Perhaps their upset because I used Google maps :)

http://www.transpomans.com/yplaces/

Hi Dave,

We have refreshed the timezone names in our latest software release; this is not
currently
publicly available but will be made so as part of our next public push of
updates.

As soon as this is available we'll let you know.

Regards

Gary Gale
Yahoo! Geo Technologies Group

--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "v1cch1" <garyg@...> wrote:
>
> --- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "Dave Murdock" <dave.murdock@> wrote:
>
> Hi Dave,
>
> Thanks for bringing this to our attention; this is a great problem report as
it provides
not
> only a description of what you've found but also lots of additional data and
examples.
>
> I've passed this onto our Geo Data Engineers and they're looking into it now.
>
> Regards
>
> Gary Gale
> Yahoo! Geo Technologies Group
>
> > If you make a call like this:
> > http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/place/28350818?appid=[yourappid]
> >
> > that is supposed to return the the time zone for India. This used to be
Asia/Calcutta,
> but
> > has been renamed to Asia/Kolkata. However, GeoPlanet is still returning
Asia/Calcutta
> as
> > the time zone name for any city in India. Doing this:
> >
> > http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/place/2295411/belongtos?appid=[yourappid]
> >
> > That is the woeid for Mumbai (formerly Bombay), India. The time zone listed
is
> > Asia/Calcutta.
> >
> > The popular tz database, http://www.twinsun.com/tz/tz-link.htm, has
Asia/Kolkata
as
> > the current time zone name for India. A number of other development
frameworks,
e.g.
> Cocoa on OS X and Cocoa Touch on the iPhone, use the most up to date version
of the
tz
> > database to get time zone names and data. A mismatch like this makes it more
difficult
> to
> > integrate the data from the GeoPlanet service with these frameworks.
> >
> > Is there are workaround, other than me writing my own logic in these cases,
to get
the
> > newest time zone names?
> >
>

We apologize for introducing a regression bug in our JSON response for
the places collection and causing a disruption of your application.
The place elements should be part of the place array and not part of
the places associative array.  The proper way to access a place in a
collection is using result[`places'][`place'][i].  We will fix this
bug in the next release of the API.  Since the bug fix will restore
the original behavior, it will also break your client-side fix.  We
suggest that you first look for a place array in the JSON response,
and if one is not returned, then use your client-side fix to find the
place elements.

Bug releases are expected to be backward-compatible, and not require a
version bump, as was the case here.   We fixed a bug dealing with the
element names containing the URI and language values, and
unfortunately caused a new issue which was not covered by our
regression tests; we have since updated our test suite to ensure that
  it does not recur.

While we cannot always share with you upcoming features and bug fixes,
we will add release notes to our API documentation at
http://developer.yahoo.com/geo/guide, and will post messages on
yws-geo informing users of new releases.  We value your interest in
GeoPlanet, and want to provide the best support possible.

Eddie Babcock
Y! Geo

--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "Aral Balkan" <aral@...> wrote:
>
> Hi guys,
>
> Could you please _at least_ give us some notice when making an API
change that is not
> backwards compatible (or can someone please give me a feed  I can
subscribe to to get
> notified of such changes if there is one?)
>
> I just realized that you removed the 'place' array from the JSON
object returned from
> places.q() calls (e.g., of form
http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/places.q('city
> name');count=0?format=json) and that the returned places object now
has the place
> indices as strings.
>
> This requires code to be changed from, for example,
result['places']['place'] to
> result['places'] and also requires that numeric indexed loops be
changed to use string
> indices.
>
> The net result was that it started causing 500 errors on my live app.
>
> Also, since you've got a version string in there, my expectation
would be that the API
> would _not_ change and such a change would be rolled out as /v2/ etc.
>
> Where can I find out about such API changes in the future before
they happen and are you
> planning on similar changes in the future?
>
> Thanks,
> Aral

Hi guys,

Could you please _at least_ give us some notice when making an API change that
is not
backwards compatible (or can someone please give me a feed  I can subscribe to
to get
notified of such changes if there is one?)

I just realized that you removed the 'place' array from the JSON object returned
from
places.q() calls (e.g., of form http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/places.q('city
name');count=0?format=json) and that the returned places object now has the
place
indices as strings.

This requires code to be changed from, for example, result['places']['place'] to
result['places'] and also requires that numeric indexed loops be changed to use
string
indices.

The net result was that it started causing 500 errors on my live app.

Also, since you've got a version string in there, my expectation would be that
the API
would _not_ change and such a change would be rolled out as /v2/ etc.

Where can I find out about such API changes in the future before they happen and
are you
planning on similar changes in the future?

Thanks,
Aral

After some further digging in it seems that the Local Administrative Area is
where the
problem is located. That's where the swedish names are coming from if the town
also has a
swedish name.

This isn't a big deal anymore, but it still seems a bit odd.

--- In yws-geo@yahoogroups.com, "Dave Murdock" <dave.murdock@...> wrote:

Hi Dave,

Thanks for bringing this to our attention; this is a great problem report as it
provides not
only a description of what you've found but also lots of additional data and
examples.

I've passed this onto our Geo Data Engineers and they're looking into it now.

Regards

Gary Gale
Yahoo! Geo Technologies Group

> If you make a call like this:
> http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/place/28350818?appid=[yourappid]
>
> that is supposed to return the the time zone for India. This used to be
Asia/Calcutta,
but
> has been renamed to Asia/Kolkata. However, GeoPlanet is still returning
Asia/Calcutta
as
> the time zone name for any city in India. Doing this:
>
> http://where.yahooapis.com/v1/place/2295411/belongtos?appid=[yourappid]
>
> That is the woeid for Mumbai (formerly Bombay), India. The time zone listed is
> Asia/Calcutta.
>
> The popular tz database, http://www.twinsun.com/tz/tz-link.htm, has
Asia/Kolkata as
> the current time zone name for India. A number of other development
frameworks, e.g.
Cocoa on OS X and Cocoa Touch on the iPhone, use the most up to date version of
the tz
> database to get time zone names and data. A mismatch like this makes it more
difficult
to
> integrate the data from the GeoPlanet service with these frameworks.
>
> Is there are workaround, other than me writing my own logic in these cases, to
get the
> newest time zone names?
>

This one didn't turn up to be a language specific issue after all. When I look
at the list of
belongtos, there are names in both languages, as there should be, since the
western parts of
Finland are bilingual.

The problem, however, is the order in which the names come in: you get the
swedish name
first. That doesn't make any sense. If I'm looking for my nation's capital, why
would I want it
to be "Helsingfors" instead of Helsinki?