Posted by Steve on 11/28/06 19:47

"Pupkin" <spamagnet@dorrk.com> wrote in message
news:MPG.1fd6204510852de598978a@news.giganews.com...
| Hey,
|
| Anyone know of a good PHP-based store/dealer locator app that can handle
| international locations?
|
| We have a hand-built app from a previous programmer, but the thing is
| always breaking (Javascript errors, stores not showing up inside their
| own zip code).
|
| We'd like the user to be able to type in an address or zip code and be
| shown a list of dealers within a certain radius. Integration with Google
| maps would be ideal.
|
| I've found a few on Hotscripts, but most are US-centric. If anyone knows
| of a tried and trusted app, links are welcome!


don't know of any off hand.

it shouldn't be that hard to do at all. all you need to do is have the user
supply an address that you feed to google maps. using their object model,
get the long/lat of that address. your store table would just need to have a
column for long/lat. all you'd need to do from that point is query your
stores where the top n stores are nearest the long/lat of the user supplied
address. that shouldn't take more than about 10 lines of javascript code to
return the long/lat of the user's address and about as many for the php code
to query the stores. getting directions from google maps is a snap
too...and, there are PLENTY of examples for getting directions from google
maps (have a look at their api docs.). you can even implement getting
directions from the original map that shows all n nearby stores, i.e. the
user clicks one of the plot points representing a store.

hth,

me

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