National Postcodes to be introduced

SpaceTime

tvc15 wrote: »

In fairness we could have done it properly with public money but decided to outsource it unfortunately

We hardly have any public money though. The state is trying to make a quick buck on this.

ukoda

FreudianSlippers wrote: »

Although I thought they weren't going to do this, I got a D04 XXXX and D07 XXXX for my house and rental place. I'm glad as it'll be easier to remember, but I could have sworn they said it wouldn't work that way

Retaining the exisiting D codes was always part of the brief

seamus

Eugene Norman wrote: »

Not sure why the tax payer would be subsidising small app developers.

Why not? Someone developing a small hobby application, some community club creating an app. Or even a small business trying to offer a post-related lookup service.

All have been effectively locked out now, instead only wealthy established businesses can capitalise on postcode lookup services.

The negativity on eircode is why we can't have nice things.

No, the shambles that was spending €20m on a proprietary system when better open systems exist, is why we can't have nice things.

This is tribunal number 2 for the next Government after the one on the award of the Irish Water contract.

We have spent €20m that didn't need to spent, re-inventing the wheel when it comes to postcodes.

plodder

TheChizler wrote: »

The randomness of the last 4 digits is actually the next best thing to having an extra check digit. With a sequential system, for people with similar addresses a single digit error in the postcode won't alert someone/something comparing the address to the code location, if you got a digit wrong something might end up at a neighbour's house. However in a randomised code (and they may not be random, they may be intentionally significantly different to local codes) it will be immediately obvious to someone looking up the location that the code refers to somewhere completely different to the address, and to act accordingly. A check digit would be better for this, but at the cost of adding length to the code.

In most cases though, you can check a postcode by calling the address back to the person providing it or returning it to them on screen. So, I wouldn't agree that is a good enough justification for random codes.

SpaceTime

seamus wrote: »

Why not? Someone developing a small hobby application, some community club creating an app. Or even a small business trying to offer a post-related lookup service.

All have been effectively locked out now, instead only wealthy established businesses can capitalise on postcode lookup services.

No, the shambles that was spending €20m on a proprietary system when better open systems exist, is why we can't have nice things.

This is tribunal number 2 for the next Government after the one on the award of the Irish Water contract.

We have spent €20m that didn't need to spent, re-inventing the wheel when it comes to postcodes.

Had we sensible addressing with house numbers and logic and things we could have implemented a continental style postcode 50 years ago.

This is largely about a cludge of a system to map a broken system to a code and make it somehow useable electronically.

Having a short poem as your address is all very romantic but totally useless !

Sam Russell

Eugene Norman wrote: »

The negativity on eircode is why we can't have nice things.

Because we have politicians.

TheChizler

plodder wrote: »

In most cases though, you can check a postcode by calling the address back to the person providing it or returning it to them on screen. So, I wouldn't agree that is a good enough justification for random codes.

I listed an advantage, not saying it was the sole reason.

SpaceTime

At least our phone numbers make more logical sense than most countries though. Ours are pretty organised and hierarchical. The UK used old letter codes that were abandoned decades ago giving you totally whacky area codes that are largely meaningless. The use used random one really there's no logic to them at all.

It was just the post office that was total chaos.

If only we could have come up with a logical postal code system song the same lines as the area codes for landlines
Our current car reg system is pretty human friendly too

eToll managed to implement a national toll payment system using multiple providers and creating a market with innovative products like additional parking etc - that's pretty cool and way better than most systems I've seen elsewhere.

Ireland can and regularly does implement fairly good systems. It's just his is an abysmal example of one!

Sam Russell

SpaceTime wrote: »

Had we sensible addressing with house numbers and logic and things we could have implemented a continental style postcode 50 years ago.

This is largely about a cludge of a system to map a broken system to a code and make it somehow useable electronically.

Having a short poem as your address is all very romantic but totally useless !

As part of the Eircode system/project there should have been a requirement to remove non-unique addresses. It is not rocket science, and even if it was, there is a rocket scheduled to be near Pluto this week and that is billions of miles from here.

The only requirement I can see is the imperative that money was to be made out of what should be a national piece of infrastructure which is paid for from the national purse, and that money was to go to a private company.

oscarBravo

Sam Russell wrote: »

As part of the Eircode system/project there should have been a requirement to remove non-unique addresses. It is not rocket science...

No, it's not. It's just a request that a system be devised that will make other people unhappy, because the current system makes you unhappy.

FreudianSlippers

ukoda wrote: »

Retaining the exisiting D codes was always part of the brief

So it's just outside of Dublin where this is a random assignment?

SpaceTime

To be fair, having working and practical addressing has been part of modern life since the early 1800s and the dawn of postal services in most countries.

It's a bit of an odd scenario that has been allowed to develop here.

SpaceTime

FreudianSlippers wrote: »

So it's just outside of Dublin where this is a random assignment?

Also county Dublin addresses including Swords which gets some K number and Blackrock, Stillorgan, Dun Laoirghe which get A94 and A96 ...

Sam Russell

oscarBravo wrote: »

No, it's not. It's just a request that a system be devised that will make other people unhappy, because the current system makes you unhappy.

That is a nonsense argument.

I do not wish to make anyone unhappy.

I do not think the Eircode is a good system for much the same reasons as many posters on here. It is not something I am invested in, I just think it is a sad result from an Irish point of view that we have ended up with such a poor effort when the starting point was a blank page.

Also, I think your argument that everyone with a non-unique code would be unhappy to get a unique address but are delighted to get an Eircode - even if it puts them into the wrong county.

Those with non-unique addresses but with a house name can check their Eircode easily, but those without will have to pick it out from a map. Solution - everyone must have a name or number on their house. Simples.

OU812

So I guess this thread can be closed now...

Sam Russell

OU812 wrote: »

So I guess this thread can be closed now...

There will still be issues to address, not all of them unique.

seamus

SpaceTime wrote: »

Had we sensible addressing with house numbers and logic and things we could have implemented a continental style postcode 50 years ago.

This is largely about a cludge of a system to map a broken system to a code and make it somehow useable electronically.

And unfortunately they took two cludgy systems and lumped them together.

What's clear is that they have a system which marries up 3 pieces of information:

1. An address
2. A randomly-assigned eircode
3. GPS co-ordinates

There's no reason why 2 & 3 need to be separate pieces of information. The system should have allowed that given any eircode, someone could apply a simple calculation to obtain GPS co-ordinates.

At present 2 & 3 bear no relationship to eachother except an entry in a database.

Or even, as others have mentioned previously, an openly-available grid system could be used instead of GPS, if we wanted to keep it nationally-specific.

Thus, with any eircode, anyone could find a location. If a farmer wanted to give their fields each their own eircode, they could. And it wouldn't require approval from a separate body to do so. We had a prime opportunity here where we weren't hamstrung by having an older archaic set of postcodes. We had a blank page which we could use to develop post codes which worked with modern mapping and navigation. And we messed it up.

Issues around address verification and fraud are separate and specific. Eircode or another company could still provide a system of matching actual addresses to eircodes.

dr.fuzzenstein

Sam Russell wrote: »

As part of the Eircode system/project there should have been a requirement to remove non-unique addresses. It is not rocket science, and even if it was, there is a rocket scheduled to be near Pluto this week and that is billions of miles from here.

The only requirement I can see is the imperative that money was to be made out of what should be a national piece of infrastructure which is paid for from the national purse, and that money was to go to a private company.

We had that before. How much cost would it add to give every single country boreen a unique name? How much of an uproar would there be if a large swathe of the population was assigned a "new" address? How long would it take? How much chaos would it introduce if every single map of the country became obsolete? How much cost and time to update every address database?
With Eircodes none of that applies, everything can stay as it is, every map and database is still accurate, the update and changeover is gradual.

oscarBravo

Sam Russell wrote: »

That is a nonsense argument.

I do not wish to make anyone unhappy.

No; you just want people to have unique addresses: a noble goal. Unfortunately, given that hundreds of thousands of people currently have non-unique addresses, your criterion would have required that hundreds of thousands of people change their addresses, which would have made many if not most of them unhappy.

I do not think the Eircode is a good system for much the same reasons as many posters on here. It is not something I am invested in, I just think it is a sad result from an Irish point of view that we have ended up with such a poor effort when the starting point was a blank page.

The starting point wasn't a blank page; it was a set of criteria, one of which was that people shouldn't have to change their addresses.

Now, you can disagree with that criterion, or you can claim that you don't want to make people unhappy, but you can't do both.

Also, I think your argument that everyone with a non-unique code would be unhappy to get a unique address but are delighted to get an Eircode - even if it puts them into the wrong county.

I don't recall claiming that anyone would be delighted to get an Eircode. It's also tabloid-grade nonsense to claim that an Eircode puts them in the wrong county - it requires that you consciously ignore the oft-repeated statement that an Eircode doesn't require you to change your address.

Those with non-unique addresses but with a house name can check their Eircode easily, but those without will have to pick it out from a map. Solution - everyone must have a name or number on their house. Simples.

Yeah, trivial. If only all life's complex problems could be solved by simply ignoring some of the criteria.

Sam Russell

dr.fuzzenstein wrote: »

We had that before. How much cost would it add to give every single country boreen a unique name? How much of an uproar would there be if a large swathe of the population was assigned a "new" address? How long would it take? How much chaos would it introduce if every single map of the country became obsolete? How much cost and time to update every address database?
With Eircodes none of that applies, everything can stay as it is, every map and database is still accurate, the update and changeover is gradual.

Every property, at a minimum has an address consisting:
Townland,
Barony,
County.

Townlands have about 20 or 30 houses in them. Each haouse only need to be identified one from another, that is all. This can be done simply by giving tham a name or number - but each must be unique. The name can be anything at all. Not rocket science.

If Eircode announced today that anyone could add a house name to their Eircode, I am sure a lot of (most) people would do so. I do not understand the hostility to such an idea, unless people are considered too stupid/cantankerous/bloody-minded or some other negative characteristic to be able to do such a simple task as deciding a name for their house.

I suppose it takes all sorts.

Sam Russell

oscarBravo wrote: »

The starting point wasn't a blank page; it was a set of criteria, one of which was that people shouldn't have to change their addresses.

We had no postcode. That is a blank page.

Someone wrote on that blank page a set of criteria. They could have chosen other criteria than those that ultimately were chosen, and originally did, but they were changed so that a poor system was chosen so that a revenue stream could emerge, the profits of which go to a private company.

oscarBravo

Sam Russell wrote: »

They could have chosen other criteria than those that ultimately were chosen, and originally did, but they were changed so that a poor system was chosen so that a revenue stream could emerge, the profits of which go to a private company.

And if a different set of criteria had been chosen so that Garmin, TomTom and Google had free access to a system that was taxpayer-funded, there wouldn't have been a word of complaint out of anyone.

Hands up: does anyone genuinely, honestly believe that, with a different set of design criteria leading to a different design, we would today have a postcode system that would be receiving universal praise and no criticism?

Anyone with your hand up: you've never met an Irish person, have you?

Nermal

Sam Russell wrote: »

We had no postcode. That is a blank page.

Someone wrote on that blank page a set of criteria. They could have chosen other criteria than those that ultimately were chosen, and originally did, but they were changed so that a poor system was chosen so that a revenue stream could emerge, the profits of which go to a private company.

So how would you pay to maintain the database?

secman

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Why do you need a connection?

Ask for their postcode, go to website, click directions

Why not use an existing Road refetence, makes absolute sense to me to incorporate it into the new one. Why have 2 separate references to a an address ?. Like building 2 Luas lines on Dublin and not linking them ..... oh wait. ...

Bayberry

vicwatson wrote: »

Anyone know what database they've taken adresses from as just checked mine and it's wrong on 2 lines !!

http://correctaddress.anpost.ie/pages/Search.aspx

SpaceTime

Bayberry wrote: »

http://correctaddress.anpost.ie/pages/Search.aspx

Not sure that's true as mine's significantly different on eircode + An Post

It's one line shorter on Eircode ...

GJG

Sam Russell wrote: »

Every property, at a minimum has an address consisting:
Townland,
Barony,
County.

Townlands have about 20 or 30 houses in them. Each haouse only need to be identified one from another, that is all. This can be done simply by giving tham a name or number - but each must be unique. The name can be anything at all. Not rocket science.

If Eircode announced today that anyone could add a house name to their Eircode, I am sure a lot of (most) people would do so. I do not understand the hostility to such an idea, unless people are considered too stupid/cantankerous/bloody-minded or some other negative characteristic to be able to do such a simple task as deciding a name for their house.

I suppose it takes all sorts.

Sam, what you are describing is what we might need to do if Eircodes were not possible. All of what you say would make perfect sense if, for some reason, there was an emergency need to not have Eircodes.

The thing is, apart from a couple of hyperactive sock puppets, nobody feels that need. We were told with absolute conviction that the system was useless because, for example, UCD would get only one Eircode. But looking at the map, it is clear that there is one for each building on their campus.

We now have a system that will be able to guide the emergency service to rural houses, will allow the postie to distinguish between the three Jimmy Murphys on Bog Road, will help eliminate insurance, social welfare and tax fraud, and other tasks.

Sure, it would be possible to do them all if we employed a range of other strategies. But we have this strategy, so why?

Bayberry

MrMorooka wrote: »

But that's the thing, I live in a converted house, 4 flats, and we all seem to have the same postcode(the finder doesn't seem to recognise there being flats here, even though we have separate ESB meters and things). Had a look at the map and it's the same for all the flats in and around Rathmines, and some apartment buildings. So it's not consistent.

Do you each pay Local Property Tax for your flat, or is there just one LPT payment for that "house"?

TheBustedFlush

Tried to find an address - it worked. And it had a code.

Success.

Tried to find an address for a workplace. Not so easy. Eventually found it and it had a code. Except the location attached to it was in another building well away from it.

Fail.

The biggest flaw in the whole Eircode system is the set of coordinates that they are using. In many instances, they point to the right building, but in a fair number of cases they don't. This is not good for anyone wanting to reach that building. Claiming that the Eircodes will be useful to emergency services to reach a building with an Eircode that has its GPS location in another place is, frankly, a dangerous thing to do.

ucdperson

GJG wrote: »

The thing is, apart from a couple of hyperactive sock puppets, nobody feels that need. We were told with absolute conviction that the system was useless because, for example, UCD would get only one Eircode. But looking at the map, it is clear that there is one for each building on their campus.

However none of these have been uploaded into the database.
If you enter in ****, university college dublin it doesn't give you anything, which is rather poor, it should at least be able to identify the campus in this case.