Simple Zip Code Geocoding
The ability to geocode, or translate into latitude and longitude, postal codes is a fairly useful hack to have in your programming toolbox. Quick and dirty zip geocoding allows you to do some neat things fairly efficiently and with a minimal amount of code. Though it’s U.S. centric, it allows you to add location-based functionality to your apps without requiring any real personal information to be transfered or stored.
If your application only needs to convert a zip code (or any address) into a lat/lon coordinate, say for simple mapping purposes, the easiest solution is to use the Google Maps Geocoding API. In addition to the client-side javascript functionality, you can directly query the geocoding system from php using an http request like this: Read More»








