[OSM-dev] openstreetmap could start at user's approximate location using geo-ip

[Maarten Deen]

Hugh Barnes wrote:
> On Sun, 18 Jan 2009 10:43:46 +0000
> Shaun McDonald <shaun at shaunmcdonald.me.uk> wrote:
>
>>
>> On 18 Jan 2009, at 08:53, Tom Hughes wrote:
>>
>> > Sam Watkins wrote:
>> >
>> >> I had an idea just a small thing, that when you first go to the
>> >> openstreetmap.org site it would be nice if it would check your IP
>> >> address using some geo-ip system and go to that location (zoomed
>> >> out at
>> >> world height) for a start, instead of always starting near
>> >> england / europe.  Has this been proposed before?  I'd be happy to
>> >> help implement
>> >> that I guess it would be an easy thing to do.
>> >
>> > Like it's been doing for the last few years you mean...
>>
>> I'll just add that it does it on a country level, rather than city
>> or state level.
>>
>> I have tested it when abroad in Europe, and it does place me in the
>> appropriate country.
>
> FWIW it doesn't seem to ever work for me in at least a couple of
> environments I've tried. Either it drops me at my last viewport or I'm
> back in good ol' Blighty needing to claw my way back. I actually
> assumed that it was determined by my login status rather than cookie.
>
> In either case, whatever geolocation service is being used doesn't seem
> to cover a lot of providers here in Australia. I know they're not
> perfect. However, I've played with Maxmind in the past and it gets the
> country right. I think it's a pay service, though.

It also appears to me that the cookie has a time-out. At my work (I'm in the
Netherlands) out internet is channeled to out US main offices' servers. So
every day when I go to the OSM map, I end up in the US.
Later tries that day do end up in the Netherlands.

Maarten