README

A GeoNames API Client for PHP.

Install with confidence 🛡️

• Supported OS: Linux, macOS and Windows.
• Supported PHP versions: 7.2 and up.

• Quick Start
• Why?
• Installation
• Other Useful Libraries
• License
• Credits

Quick Start

An overview of available API parameters for each endpoint is available here.

<?php

use GeoNames\Client as GeoNamesClient;

$g = new GeoNamesClient('username');

// get a list of supported endpoints
$endpoints = $g->getSupportedEndpoints();

// get info for country
// note that I'm using the array destructor introduced in PHP 7.1
[$country] = $g->countryInfo([
    'country' => 'IL',
    'lang'    => 'ru', // display info in Russian
]);

// country name (in Russian)
$country_name = $country->countryName;

// spoken languages (ISO-639-1)
$country_languages = $country->languages;

Client Options

Supported client options:

1. username: GeoNames username.
2. token?: GeoNames token (i.e. premium user key).
3. api_url?: URL of the GeoNames web service.
4. connect_timeout?: HTTP Client connection timeout. The number of seconds to wait while trying to connect to a server (default 0, wait indefinitely).
5. fallback_api_url: COMING SOON.
6. fallback_api_url_trigger_count: COMING SOON.

Example: Providing options during instantiation

$g = new GeoNamesClient('username', '', ['api_url' => 'https://custom-premium.geonames.org']);

Example: Changing options during runtime

$g = new GeoNamesClient('username');
$g->setOptions(['api_url' => 'https://custom-premium.geonames.org'])

Why?

This library will allow you to get better insights into the world.

As a developer and a multilingual speaker I've always felt that localization was put on last priority since it was so time-consuming and error-prone.

Getting statistics for each country is a painful process that requires understanding the different ISO standards, and even then you're still left to piece the puzzle together yourself.

Luckily, GeoNames have been collecting statistical data about the world for the past few decades and offers that data via their API.

The aim of this library is to provide a single source of truth for country (ISO-3166), language (ISO-639-1), and other locale related statistical data, so that other developers can write better software which is up-to-date with the latest changes in the world.

Installation

If you're using Composer to manage dependencies:

composer require aternus/geonames-client

Then, after running composer update, you can load the class using Composer's autoloading:

require 'vendor/autoload.php';

Otherwise, you can simply require the file directly:

require_once 'vendor/aternus/geonames-client/src/Client.php';

And in either case, I'd suggest using an alias.

use GeoNames\Client as GeoNamesClient;

Other Useful Libraries

Please make sure to implement some kind of cache mechanism in order to save yourself time, bandwidth and be respectful to GeoNames for providing all that data for free.

If you're making heavy use of the statistical data, you can subscribe to their Premium Data plan.

License

Released under the MIT License - see LICENSE.md for details.

Credits

David Jean Louis for the PEAR package which inspired this GeoNames API Client.