Question Distance API

[NeutronFlux]

Hello,

I'm currently working on a small database for my company containing a list of suppliers/services and their information. One of the information fields is a distance field, which allows people in the company to search for approved suppliers/services within a certain distance from the company.

I actually have working code for this using both Bing Maps API and Google Maps API. Basically, I have a button with a VBA script that reads in an address from the table, accesses Bing API, extracts the distance from the generated XML file (if it fails to find one, run Google API) and puts it into another field in the table. It will only try to get a distance if there isn't already one. The problem is this implementation breaks ToS for both Microsoft and Google since
1) the application works over an intranet and is not accessible on a public website,
2) it uses an automated script
3) it does not display Bing Maps or Google Maps.

So my question is simply this: Does anyone know of another API or some other method for getting distances between two addresses where I wouldn't be breaking any ToS. Or, is Microsoft/Google likely to even notice/care since I only have 300 records in total and there probably won't be any massive additions?

 

[jdraw]

Since you only have 300 records, one thing you could do is to get the lat/long for each
address. Do this as a 1 time effort to feed a table you control.
Then use a formula (great circle distance) to calculate the distance between 2 points when needed. This way you do not need Bing or Google in your operational database.

You will need to find the Lat/Long of any new address and record same.

see http://www.cpearson.com/excel/latlong.aspx

You can do batch lat/lon from addresses at
http://stevemorse.org/jcal/latlonbatch.html?direction=forward

Good luck.

 

[NeutronFlux]

Thanks for the response. I think I'll try out this solution, although I might need to find something that lets me automate the process since data entry will eventually be handled by other people. Perhaps I'll give geocoder.ca a try.