I see many websites such as dating sites/car sites that let users search for something and lets them enter the number of miles within a certain city or zip code.

I tried googling on how this can be done in php but couldn't find any good source. Is this possible in php or is it ASP only?

Any info is appreciated, thanks.

10/26/2006 11:20:31 PM

what makes you think it can only be done in asp?

10/26/2006 11:28:08 PM

he doesn't know how to do it with PHP so he assumes it's only capable with ASP

are you dense or just trolling

10/26/2006 11:33:18 PM

they don't support that.

10/26/2006 11:58:38 PM

you'll need a database of coordinates for zip codes, there's no magic function for this. then just use some simple algebra and find the distance between the points.


or search google and click the first result
http://www.google.com/search?q=php+distance+between+zip+codes&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a

10/27/2006 12:46:52 AM

^not very reliable.

What you need is a geocoder. http://geocoder.us/ is a free one, but you can only use it for non-commercial use, otherwise you have to buy a data package.

I actually wrote a geocoder that uses google maps as the query source, but it aint free.

To answer the original question, yes you could do it with PHP or any other language. You also are going to need a few billion bits of information and a monstrous database too though.

10/27/2006 1:45:22 AM