

Google Distance Matrix API for Node.js – Find distance data between locations - etcher
https://github.com/edwlook/node-google-distance

======
konspence
This wrapper should grab more than just distance/duration.text (see
[https://github.com/edwlook/node-google-
distance/blob/master/...](https://github.com/edwlook/node-google-
distance/blob/master/index.js#L41) \- I'm assuming Google's API includes the
distance as a number, and unit of measurement).

If people want to use this API to convert to a different unit, they have to
parse the text which would be very clunky.

~~~
etcher
To use different units, you can specify 'imperial' (default) for miles/feet or
'metric' for kilometers/meters.

The wrapper fetches all of the data returned from Google (except for the value
fields): [http://cl.ly/image/3M003N0s0z3q](http://cl.ly/image/3M003N0s0z3q)

It actually might be a good idea to fetch the value fields as well, since that
would make conversion to other metrics easier. Thanks for the suggestion.

~~~
konspence
I do think it would be valuable to fetch the value field, as then the user can
format the text however they want - for example, I may want to say "96
minutes" instead of "1 hour 36 minutes".

Additionally, it's much easier to compare two values (e.g. if one wanted to
compare distances between X and Y versus X and Z).

~~~
etcher
Good point. The value field is fetched as of version 0.2.0.

~~~
konspence
Awesome! That looks nice. Thanks for taking feedback.

------
mck-
The Google Distance Matrix has a limit of 10x10 locations (25x25 with business
license) -- how do you get around that? I don't see any mention of API-key?

~~~
etcher
The Google Distance API does not require an API key, but this is something
that should be supported for business licenses and per-key quota limit
tracking.

Here are the quota limits:

Users of the free API: 100 elements per query. 100 elements per 10 seconds. 2
500 elements per 24 hour period.

Maps for Business customers: 625 elements per query. 1 000 elements per 10
seconds. 100 000 elements per 24 hour period.

Read more:
[https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/distancemat...](https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/distancematrix/#api_key)

