Geocoding contacts using google api

Question

I have geocoding enabled but getting the contacts geocoded seems hit and miss.

I can get them geocoded if I go into the record and resave the address field (without making any changes). The small red "map" icon then comes up and they seem to get geocoded in the saving process. I have only a 1000 records so I can go through them manually.

However when I try to do the batch geocoding I just get this - which I don't understand although it seems to be saying I have an invalid start id. Any ideas how I could start to trouble shoot this?

Parameters raw (from db settings): geocoding=[1 or 0] required parse=[1 or 0] required start=[contact ID] optional-begin with this contact ID end=[contact ID] optional-process contacts with IDs less than this throttle=[1 or 0] optional-1 adds five second sleep

Parameters parsed (and passed to API method): a:6:{s:7:"version";i:3;s:9:"geocoding";s:17:"[1 or 0] required";s:5:"parse";s:17:"[1 or 0] required";s:5:"start";s:48:"[contact ID] optional-begin with this contact ID";s:3:"end";s:62:"[contact ID] optional-process contacts with IDs less than this";s:8:"throttle";s:42:"[1 or 0] optional-1 adds five second sleep";}

Full message: Finished execution of Geocode and Parse Addresses with result: Failure, Error message: start is not a valid integer

Thanks!

Answer 1

It looks like you still need to configure the job parameters for geocoding, for instance for the 'geocoding' parameter it expects 0 or 1, but literally "[0 or 1]" is being passed.

So if I want to geocode starting at cid 1 and end at cid 1000, but skip address parsing, I would pass the following parameters:

geocoding=1 parse=0 start=1 end=1000 throttle=1

If you're running this as a scheduled job, you can go to the scheduled jobs page (administer>system settings>scheduled jobs) and 'edit' your geocoding job. The box called 'Command Parameters' is where you would edit this information.

Some more info here: http://wiki.civicrm.org/confluence/display/CRMDOC/Managing+Scheduled+Jobs

Answer 2

I would also try just switching to the Yahoo geocoder under Settings -> Mapping and Geocoding Providers. Yahoo has been working well and fast for me. Try limit=2000 in the Address geocoder Scheduled Job, though there does not seem to be a rate limit set by Yahoo, at least there was not in October. I geocoded over 100,000 addresses overnight in October.

Here's the result of the scheduled job I just ran manually -

Parameters raw (from db settings): limit=2000

Parameters parsed (and passed to API method): a:2:{s:7:"version";i:3;s:5:"limit";s:4:"2000";}

Full message: Finished execution of Address geocoder with result: Success (Addresses Evaluated: 40 Addresses Geocoded: 40 Street Addresses Parsed: 29 )