[thelist] ?? How To: Search Zip Codes within x Miles ??

Matt Warden mwarden at gmail.com
Fri Jan 19 09:13:59 CST 2007


On 1/19/07, Casey Crookston <caseyc at intellisoftmn.com> wrote:
> We've all seen the tools that allow you to search for a business within
> 10, 50, 100, 500 miles of a given zip code.  Can anyone point me in the
> direction of how this is done?  We have not yet determined if the site
> will be in PHP or .NET, so we are open to all suggestions.

You need a database that relates zip codes or addresses to lat/long
coordinates. You then take a supplied zip or address, convert it to
lat/long coords using your DB, convert the destinations to lat/long if
not already done, then use simple trig (can find this algorithm
anywhere via google) to determine the distance between the two
lat/long coords.

The more precise you need it, the more precise your database has to be.

-- 
Matt Warden
Cleveland, OH, USA
http://mattwarden.com


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