Geocode an address with Algolia

Algolia is sunsetting its Place services. We recommend that you use the Google service instead. Learn more.

This example shows you how to use an autocomplete address smart field to update a PostreSQL geography point (lat, long).

Requirements

• An admin backend running on forest-express-sequelize

• An algolia account

• algoliasearch npm package

How it works

Directory: /models

This directory contains the events.js file where the model is declared.

models/events.js

module.exports = (sequelize, DataTypes) => {
  const Model = sequelize.define('events', {
    name: {
      type: DataTypes.STRING,
      primaryKey: true,
    },
    locationGeo: {
      type: DataTypes.GEOMETRY('POINT', 4326),
    },
    address: {
      type: DataTypes.STRING,
    },
  }, {
    tableName: 'events',
    underscored: true,
    timestamps: false,
    schema: process.env.DATABASE_SCHEMA,
  });
  
  Model.removeAttribute('id');
  Model.associate = () => {};
  
  return Model;
};

Directory: /forest

This directory contains the events.js file where the Smart Field Location setteris declared. This smart field will be used to update the value of the addressand locationGeo fields.

/forest/events.js

const algoliasearch = require('algoliasearch');

const places = algoliasearch.initPlaces(process.env.PLACES_APP_ID, process.env.PLACES_API_KEY);

async function getLocationCoordinates(query) {
  try {
    const location = await places.search({ query, type: 'address' });
    console.log('search location coordinates result', location.hits[0]._geoloc);
    return location.hits[0]._geoloc;
  } catch (err) {
    console.log(err);
    return null;
  }
}

async function setEvent(event, query) {
  const coordinates = await getLocationCoordinates(query);
  event.address = query;
  event.locationGeo = `{"type": "Point", "coordinates": [${coordinates.lat}, ${coordinates.lng}]}`;
  console.log('new address', event.address);
  console.log('new location', event.locationGeo);
  return event;
}

collection('events', {
  fields: [{
    field: 'Location setter',
    type: 'String',
    // Get the data to be displayed.
    get: (event) => event.address,
    // Update using Algolia.
    set: (event, query) => setEvent(event, query),
  }],
});

The field Location setter should use the address edit widget to enable address autocomplete.