[OSM-talk] features of a given type within bounding box

[Richard Weait]

[set reply back to list]

On Mon, Apr 19, 2010 at 3:19 PM, Dan Yamins <dyamins at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Apr 19, 2010 at 3:03 PM, Richard Weait <richard at weait.com> wrote:
[ trimmed ]
>> You might check with talk-us to see if somebody is already working on
>> zip codes. The first problem might be finding a source for the zipcode
>> data that is license-compatible with OSM.
>>
>
> Got it.   I will ask, as you suggest.     I should have added one more
> question in my list:
>
> 3) Given that OSM does have this capability (module which files are loaded),
> what API syntax do I use to access it generally?   I think I understand how
> to capture lists of counties, states, etc... using the
>
>      /[place=BLAH][bbox=BLAH]
>
> syntax.   But what about zipcodes?  For instance,
>
>
> http://osmxapi.hypercube.telascience.org/api/0.6/*[addr:postcode][bbox=-74,40,-72,42]
>
> yields lists of points.    My question is therefore:  is "postal_code"  even
> going to considered one of the types of "places", in the OSM project? Or the
> equivalent?  Or is this a question I should ask to talk-us specifically as
> well?

The last conversation I recall discussed the relative merits of post
codes as nodes vs. post codes as areas.  Clearly OSM would prefer one
zip code schema for the planet, rather than one per country.  For
context, consider this awesome 3 minute video by Derek Sivers.  The
video is both informative and better than Cats!
http://sivers.org/jaddr

XAPI will certainly be one way to access the data by bounding box.
You may choose to post-process the result, refine the query, or both.
Your query will depend on the implementation decided by the community.

As an alternative, you might consider setting up a local OSM spatial
database so that you can grow your own interesting queries.