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Comment by berkes | Hacker News Reader

Some alternatives that I am aware of:

https://wikimili.com/en/Natural_Area_Code , https://what3words.com/ , https://geokey.io/ , http://geohash.org/ , https://www.mapcode.com/ .

Some of which are proprietary.

Edit: plus.codes was this same proposal. Removed from the list.

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This is why these technologies never get mass adoption; so many solutions duplicating themselves trying to solve the same thing. Fact is, most users would care less about numerous implementation, they need to be educated just one solution which works fine. Personally I find plus.codes from Google user-friendly. They are already integrated in Google Maps which has over 1 billion downloads. They are free and opensource which means they can be used in third-party apps. Why is someone is reinventing the wheel is beyond me.

Where do I find them in Google maps? what is the plus.code for the Eiffel tower? https://www.google.com/maps/place/Eiffel+Tower,+Paris,+Franc...

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Eiffel+Tower/@48.853909,2....

V75V+8Q Paris, France

I don't know about that specific listing from your link, but I dropped a pin right on l'avenue Gustave-Eiffel behind the tower and got the code V75W+43 Paris, France. Plus codes appear right under the address line.

Thanks. It seems you have to specify a pin, and not an area to get a plus code.

Hi - plus codes founder here.

We display the plus codes in Google Maps on all business listings.

We don't display it on political features or boundaries (typically because having a lat/lng for "France" isn't super useful).

That particular Eiffel Tower result is for the area, not the tower itself, so it doesn't get a plus code.

The entry specifically for the tower, https://g.page/toureiffelofficielle?share, should display the plus code on it.

If you're on mobile, you can get the plus code for any location by just holding your finger on the map, and then expanding the card that appears. It should include the lat/lng and plus code.

Hope that helps!

The eiffel tower search result is the whole park, which is larger than the area spanned by a single plus code and therefore does not display it's plus code.

picking a smaller location displays the plus code, for example https://imgur.com/0YoSuWz

As usual there is a relevant XKCD. This time it is https://xkcd.com/927/

That xkcd is very common around here I noticed. We often get brilliant ideas that someone else already had.

Some of which are mentioned here:

https://github.com/google/open-location-code/wiki/Evaluation...

Also, much older systems: QRA Locator and Maidenhead Locator System.

There's also this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_Grid_Reference_System

I just got more and more frustrated reading the README because I kept thinking this has already been done brilliantly and in multiple languages. It’s called What3Words.

No. W3w is not open and not brilliant precisely because it exists in multiple languages.

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