[whatwg] Supporting more address levels in autocomplete

[Charles McCathie Nevile]

On Sat, 22 Feb 2014 05:05:06 +0100, Ian Hickson <ian at hixie.ch> wrote:

> On Fri, 21 Feb 2014, Kevin Marks wrote:
>> On 21 Feb 2014 17:03, "Ian Hickson" <ian at hixie.ch> wrote:
>> > > Those names come from vcard - if adding a new one, consider how to
>> > > model it in vcard too. Note that UK addresses can have this too - eg
>> > > 3 high street, Kenton, Harrow, Middlesex, UK
>> >
>> > That's actually a bogus UK address. I'm not sure exactly which town
>> > you meant that to be in, but official UK addresses never have more
>> > than two "region" levels, and usually only one (the "post town"). The
>> > only time they have two is when the post town has two streets with the
>> > same name.
>>
>> The real address, where I grew up,  was:
>> 2 Melbury Road, Kenton, Harrow, Middlesex, HA3 9RA
>
> Today, the address of that building is:
>
>    2 Melbury Rd
>    Harrow
>    HA3 9RA
>
>
>> Damn humans, not following specs. Actually UK addresses have a huge
>> amount of leeway, as they are routed by postcode in the main (though I
>> did receive a postcard addressed to "Kevin, Sidney, Cambridge" once).
>
> The post office will deal with all kinds of stuff, sure. But Web forms
> only have to accept the formal address format, which in the UK only ever
> has a street, a locality (sometimes), a post town, and a post code.

That depends on whether you want to force your customers to think like the  
Post Office, or whether you prefer to be responsive to your customers.  
Speaking without data, I suspect that nervousness at not being able to put  
*what someone thinks* is their address translates fairly readily into a  
certain amount of failure to proceed with a transaction.

Providing specification purity over the concerns of both users and  
developers trying to use the Web to successfully interact with them seems  
like a pretty basic mistake to me.

cheers

Chaals

-- 
Charles McCathie Nevile - Consultant (web standards) CTO Office, Yandex
       chaals at yandex-team.ru         Find more at http://yandex.com