# Web Survey asking for map input... **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 1, 2012, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-survey-asking-for-map-input/636403 "2012-10-01T16:24:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![aaelghat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c5a1d2/32.png) [@aaelghat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aaelghat)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2012, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-survey-asking-for-map-input/636403/1 "2012-10-01T16:24:56Z")
Hi - I want to send out a customer web survey, and one of the things I want to ask about is for people to tell me \*where \*they experienced something (in this case, chronic cell phone problems). But, I don’t want people to give me addresses, or cross-streets, I’d rather them just click on a point on a map, and have that collected as a survey response. Then ideally, I could get a summary on a map of all the problem areas. In the past I’ve used things like Survey Monkey to collect data. Can anyone think of a tool that will let me collect location information on a survey in the manner I’m describing? Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Fuzzy\_Dunlop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/848f3c/32.png) [@Fuzzy\_Dunlop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuzzy_Dunlop)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2012, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-survey-asking-for-map-input/636403/2 "2012-10-01T16:58:17Z")
It’ll be easy to do using Google Map’s javascript API if you have someone on staff who can develop javascript. [Documentation sur Google Maps Platform  |  API Maps JavaScript  |  Google for Developers](https://developers.google.com/maps/documentation/javascript/) ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2012, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-survey-asking-for-map-input/636403/3 "2012-10-01T17:01:48Z")
In fact I just used the google API to do exactly that for one of our surveys. We have our own survey solution however, we don’t use web services like Survey Monkey so I’m not sure how much customization can be done with those systems. ---
**Author:** ![aaelghat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c5a1d2/32.png) [@aaelghat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aaelghat)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2012, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-survey-asking-for-map-input/636403/4 "2012-10-01T17:30:43Z")
Thanks for the responses! OK, I took the sample here… [http://gmaps-samples-v3.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/geocoder/v3-geocoder-tool.html](http://gmaps-samples-v3.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/geocoder/v3-geocoder-tool.html) …and copied it into my own html document, and it does the trick. So, I’m thinking I can just ask people to copy and paste the resulting latitude/longitude into a field on the survey? Is that the easiest route? ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2012, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-survey-asking-for-map-input/636403/5 "2012-10-01T18:25:57Z")
Sure, though the more steps required of the respondent the less likely he is to complete the survey 🙂 I would capture the result of the textbox and place it wherever it was that I needed it. Or simply tie that textbox in the example to the html form and pass that through. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2012, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/web-survey-asking-for-map-input/636403/6 "2012-10-01T18:43:22Z")
Nobody is going to bother copying and pasting specific coordinates for you. See if you can use the API for user-added locations; let them point and click where the markers should be. And make sure you keep the search field in too so they can find specific addresses instead of using the graphical map (which can be slow and annoying).