michaeldrennen/geonames

A Laravel (php) package that interfaces with the geolocation services on geonames.org.

geonames v7.x

, _(*1)

A Laravel (php) package to interface with the geo-location services at geonames.org., _(*2)

Major Version Jump

I jumped several major versions to catch up with Larvel's major version number. Makes things a little clearer., _(*3)

Notes

There is still a lot that needs to be done to make this package "complete". I've gotten it to a point where I can use it for my next project. As time allows, I will improve the documentation and testing that comes with this package. Thanks for understanding., _(*4)

Installation

composer require michaeldrennen/geonames

And then add geonames provider to providers array in app.php config file:, _(*5)

MichaelDrennen\Geonames\GeonamesServiceProvider::class,

After that, Run migrate command:, _(*6)

php artisan migrate

Want to install all of the geonames records for the US, Canada, and Mexico as well as pull in the feature codes definitions file in English?, _(*7)

php artisan geonames:install --country=US --country=CA --country=MX --language=en

Want to just install everything in the geonames database?, _(*8)

php artisan geonames:install

Maintenance

Now that you have the geonames database up and running on your system, you need to keep it up-to-date., _(*9)

I have an update script that you need to schedule in Laravel to run every day., _(*10)

Some info on how to schedule Laravel artisan commands:, _(*11)

https://laravel.com/docs/5.6/scheduling#scheduling-artisan-commands, _(*12)

You can read this notice at: http://download.geonames.org/export/dump/, _(*13)

The "last modified" timestamp is in Central European Time. , _(*14)

It looks like geonames updates their data around 3AM CET., _(*15)

So if you schedule your system to run the geonames:update artisan command after 4AM CET, you should be good to go., _(*16)

I like to keep my servers running on GMT. Keeps things consistent., _(*17)

(Central European Time is 1 hour ahead of Greenwich Mean Time), _(*18)

Assuming your servers are running on GMT, your update command would look like:, _(*19)

$schedule->command('geonames:update')->dailyAt('3:00');

The update artisan command will handle the updates and deletes to the geonames table., _(*20)

By default, GeonamesServiceProvider will run it for you daily at config('geonames.update_daily_at')., _(*21)

Gotchas

Are you getting something like: 1071 Specified key was too long, _(*22)

@see https://laravel-news.com/laravel-5-4-key-too-long-error, _(*23)

Add this to your AppServiceProvider.php file:, _(*24)

Schema::defaultStringLength(191);

A quick word on indexes

This library contains a bunch of migrations that contain a bunch of indexes. Now not everyone will need all of the indexes., _(*25)

So when you install this library, run the migrations and delete the indexes that you don't need., _(*26)

Also, Laravel doesn't let you specify a key length for indexes on varchar columns. There are two indexes suffering from this limit. Instead of creating indexes on those columns the "Laravel way", I send a raw/manual query to create the indexes with the proper lengths., _(*27)