Where is my IP on Earth?

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A new feature on diadanh.net allows you to find location (at city level) of an IP address or a DNS name. Try it now!

Not good news: Coming Soon: IP-Based Geocode Limiting System

Tuesday, September 18, 2007 at 7:22:00 PM

Posted by Pamela Fox, Maps API Team

In the coming week, the Maps API geocode limit will change from a key-based system to an IP-based system, with a new limit of 15,000 queries per day. If you're a developer with a website that's using client-side geocoding via the GClientGeocoder object, this change means that each of your website visitors will now be subject to their own 15K quota, which they'll find nearly impossible to expend. However, if you're a developer using the HTTP geocoder, this change means that all the geocodes from your script will be subject to the same 15K quota (your web server will send the same IP to us with each geocode).

We've made this change in our geocoder due to the number of developers who've had issues with the GClientGeocoder and going over quota in times of high mashup user volume. The new 15K quota per visitor should give you many more geocodes than the previous 50K quota per site.

If you are using HTTP geocoding and suspect that you may be currently issuing more than 15K queries per day, you will need to take action to make sure that you don't go over the new limit (which would result in queries returning a 620 status code instead of a successful geocode). Here are some proposed workarounds:

• Switch over to using the GClientGeocoder. Check out an example from our documentation.
• Supplement your geocoding with another geocoder service. Check out a list of geocoding resources from our forum.

If you determine that you need to issue more than 15K daily queries for a single IP, we are open to the possibility of raising your IP's quota. Please send us an email with a description of your use of the geocoder and links to the website implementing it. We will review your request and let you know if we'll be able to fulfill it.

We apologize for any inconvenience you may experience while transitioning to the new IP-based system. Please post any questions you have about the new system in the Maps API forum.

(Extracted from Coming Soon: IP-Based Geocode Limiting System)


The text in red font is not good for HTTP geocoders. Let's move to GClientGeocoder!

Big News: 54 Countries Added to Google Maps! Vietnam included!

Since the inception of Google Maps Mania I've been trying to keep readers current on what new country updates are hitting Google Maps. Google has announced a significant update to the number of countries with markings for streets, roads, place names and transportation routes on Google Maps. Here are some highlights from Dave Barth's post on the Google LatLong Blog titled: "More of the world for you to explore":

• 54 new countries added
• Double the coverage in Latin America
• Three times the coverage in the continent of Asia

Here's the full list of new countries:

Afghanistan, Aruba, Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belize, Bermuda, Brunei Darussalam, Bhutan, Bolivia, Cambodia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Fiji, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Indonesia, Iraq, Iran, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Kuwait, Laos, Lebanon, Mexico, Myanmar (Burma), Mongolia, Nepal, Nicaragua, Oman, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Papua New Guinea, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Timor-Leste, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Vietnam and Yemen.
(Extracted from Google Maps Mania blog)

So how big is the news for Vietnam? Our thoughts are:

- On maps details: Even with main cities Hanoi, Hochiminh, Nha Trang, Da Nang... supported roads are national level. For example, in Hanoi we can only see national roads such as 1A, 32B, 18... Streets in cities are not yet available :(

- On accuracy: Google maps satellite images and supported roads of Vietnam are not match. Errors at some areas are very large :(

- For us, this news is big news. But we expect a bigger one. From now onward, let's hope for bigger news telling us that most of the streets in main cities of Vietnam are supported...