How to perform geocoding with YU addresses (Yugoslavia)

[Bernd Welter]

Hi,

today a customer asked me how to geocode addresses within the region formerly known as Yugoslavia (YU, capital Belgrade).
In his data the country code is still YU and this doesn't work with the current ISO codes expected by the geocoding engine.
A simple text replacement isn't sufficient because the large region is now split into several countries / capitals:

Country	Capital	ISO2
Slovenia	Ljubljana	SL
Croatia	Zagreb	HR
Bosnia and Herzegovina	Sarajevo	BA
Serbia	Belgrade	RS
Montenegro	Podgorica	ME
Kosovo	Pristina	RS
North Macedonia	Skopje	MK

Attention: Kosovo is still a disputed region. There's no "Kosovo"-ISO2 code in the engine, too.
What I recommend if the input country code is "YU":

• Remove the input country code
• apply the search options: allowed countries with the set of the new countries. This will ensure that only such addresses are returned that are positioned within one of those countries. (hard filter)

Sample request:

Code: Select all

{
  "$type": "SearchByAddressRequest",
  "address": {
    "postalCode": "",
    "city": "Sarajevo",
    "street": ""
  },
  "searchOptions": {
   "allowedCountries": [
      "SL",
      "HR",
      "BA",
      "RS",
      "ME",
      "MK"
    ]
  }
}

Best regards,
Bernd