[whatwg] input type="location" proposals

[Kit Grose]

People update their OS address books already. Think "show me directions to…" and then I pick my friend's location from their address book entry (ideally through autocomplete, as per other input types).

Likewise, there are other precedents for this kind of autocomplete in Mac OS X. iPhoto provides a field like this to help tag photos with geographical locations (I imagine Flickr has a similar concept?), the system preference pane where you select your timezone (based on nearest city) and the Dashboard widget for weather and time all have a facility to autocomplete a city name against some list of cities.

I don't think the list is the hardest part of this sort of a request; for me, it's more whether or not there's enough value in having a dedicated type that only adds autocomplete; perhaps it's a better candidate for some kind of extension to the <datalist> tag (autocomplete if possible using the UA's knowledge of such-and-such).

—Kit

On 19/06/2010, at 1:25 PM, Adam Shannon wrote:

> So, each person will be responsible for updating the address book?
> 
> On Fri, Jun 18, 2010 at 21:49, Kit Grose <kit at iqmultimedia.com.au> wrote:
>> System address book, perhaps?
>> 
>> Cheers,
>> 
>> Kit Grose
>> User Experience + Technical Director
>> iQmultimedia
>> 
>> +61 (0)2 4260 7946
>> 
>> On 19/06/2010, at 12:48 PM, "Adam Shannon" <adam at ashannon.us> wrote:
>> 
>>> How would the "browser" assist you?  Would you start to type in "new
>>> yor" and it would drop down a list giving you options?
>>> 
>>> How will browsers get the list (and future) lists which have to be
>>> customized to the input?  Remote listing?  Buit-in database?
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Fri, Jun 18, 2010 at 12:20, Eitan Adler <lists at eitanadler.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>> Two separate use cases
>>>> 1) For entry of locations into something like Google Maps or
>>>> MapQuest.
>>>> In this case the form should look as it does now (a text box) but
>>>> browsers would be able to assist you in entering locations like it
>>>> can
>>>> for for emails.
>>>> 2) For entry of Lat/Long coordinates which can be entered either
>>>> manually or with some kind of map like interface.
>>>> 
>>>> These are two separate proposals and I both could co-exist one as
>>>> type="location" and the other as type="gps"
>>>> 
>>>> --
>>>> Eitan Adler
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> --
>>> Adam Shannon
>>> Web Developer
>>> http://ashannon.us
>> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Adam Shannon
> Web Developer
> http://ashannon.us