Here is my way to get the address even if Geocoder failed... but first let me explain my own experience with Geocoder:
For some unknown reason, Geocoder works fine then, suddenly break!.
What I observed is that, after a while (can be days), Geocoder start to throw "Service not available" exception.
EDIT-> As mentioned by Christian, the exception is thrown even is isPresent() returns true.<-EDIT END
Really weird since it was working fine before and no configuration changed occurred:
- same device
- same Android version
- same app
- same manifest
- WIFI up and running, Device location feature enabled in settings
Of course, something changed, but, for the time being, we don't know exactly what.
There is a bug opened about that: Issue 38009: 4.1.1 Geocoder throwing exception: IOException: Service not Available
Last post on this thread (ATTOW) "Probably it's periodically reproducible in android 4.0.x + target API x"
As a workaround, you can use Google Map
Here is my GeocoderHelper class that provides a 'Google Map' B Plan in case Geocoder start to fails.
In my case, I am just interested in CityName, but you can basically get any data availalbe in google map JSON output
Usage:
new GeocoderHelper().fetchCityName(context, location);
Then do somthing in onPostExecute() of example code (send broadcast, invoke listener method, set a textView text, whatever)
GeocoderHelper Class:
package com.<your_package>.location;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.Locale;
import org.apache.http.client.methods.HttpGet;
import org.apache.http.impl.client.BasicResponseHandler;
import org.json.JSONArray;
import org.json.JSONObject;
import android.content.Context;
import android.location.Address;
import android.location.Geocoder;
import android.location.Location;
import android.net.http.AndroidHttpClient;
import android.os.AsyncTask;
import android.util.Log;
public class GeocoderHelper
{
private static final AndroidHttpClient ANDROID_HTTP_CLIENT = AndroidHttpClient.newInstance(GeocoderHelper.class.getName());
private boolean running = false;
public void fetchCityName(final Context contex, final Location location)
{
if (running)
return;
new AsyncTask<Void, Void, String>()
{
protected void onPreExecute()
{
running = true;
};
@Override
protected String doInBackground(Void... params)
{
String cityName = null;
if (Geocoder.isPresent())
{
try
{
Geocoder geocoder = new Geocoder(contex, Locale.getDefault());
List<Address> addresses = geocoder.getFromLocation(location.getLatitude(), location.getLongitude(), 1);
if (addresses.size() > 0)
{
cityName = addresses.get(0).getLocality();
}
}
catch (Exception ignored)
{
// after a while, Geocoder start to trhow "Service not availalbe" exception. really weird since it was working before (same device, same Android version etc..
}
}
if (cityName != null) // i.e., Geocoder succeed
{
return cityName;
}
else // i.e., Geocoder failed
{
return fetchCityNameUsingGoogleMap();
}
}
// Geocoder failed :-(
// Our B Plan : Google Map
private String fetchCityNameUsingGoogleMap()
{
String googleMapUrl = "http://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/geocode/json?latlng=" + location.getLatitude() + ","
+ location.getLongitude() + "&sensor=false&language=fr";
try
{
JSONObject googleMapResponse = new JSONObject(ANDROID_HTTP_CLIENT.execute(new HttpGet(googleMapUrl),
new BasicResponseHandler()));
// many nested loops.. not great -> use expression instead
// loop among all results
JSONArray results = (JSONArray) googleMapResponse.get("results");
for (int i = 0; i < results.length(); i++)
{
// loop among all addresses within this result
JSONObject result = results.getJSONObject(i);
if (result.has("address_components"))
{
JSONArray addressComponents = result.getJSONArray("address_components");
// loop among all address component to find a 'locality' or 'sublocality'
for (int j = 0; j < addressComponents.length(); j++)
{
JSONObject addressComponent = addressComponents.getJSONObject(j);
if (result.has("types"))
{
JSONArray types = addressComponent.getJSONArray("types");
// search for locality and sublocality
String cityName = null;
for (int k = 0; k < types.length(); k++)
{
if ("locality".equals(types.getString(k)) && cityName == null)
{
if (addressComponent.has("long_name"))
{
cityName = addressComponent.getString("long_name");
}
else if (addressComponent.has("short_name"))
{
cityName = addressComponent.getString("short_name");
}
}
if ("sublocality".equals(types.getString(k)))
{
if (addressComponent.has("long_name"))
{
cityName = addressComponent.getString("long_name");
}
else if (addressComponent.has("short_name"))
{
cityName = addressComponent.getString("short_name");
}
}
}
if (cityName != null)
{
return cityName;
}
}
}
}
}
}
catch (Exception ignored)
{
ignored.printStackTrace();
}
return null;
}
protected void onPostExecute(String cityName)
{
running = false;
if (cityName != null)
{
// Do something with cityName
Log.i("GeocoderHelper", cityName);
}
};
}.execute();
}
}
Hope this will help.
