bioneural.net

Both the Mac OSX Address Book and Contacts/ Phone apps on the Apple iPhone support a custom "geo" field. You can use this field to store GPS coordinates that will open a Google Map when right-clicked on Mac or tapped on iPhone. The reverse geocoding in Google Maps isn't always perfect; this gives you the option to store a more accurate location alongside a human-readable address.

Creating a geo field in iPhone Contacts

If you have an existing contact with address details in the iPhone Contacts app, tap on the address to launch Maps:

Maps will place a pin at the approximate location of the address for that contact:

Tap the blue and white arrow on the tag to see the Info screen, then tap the Share Location button at the bottom left:

In the mail message body note the GPS coordinate values and jot these down:

Go back into Contacts and edit the address to which you want to add the coordinates. Tap the plus icon to add a new address:

Tap the address type button at the bottom right of the next screen:

Now select geo as the address type:

Enter the coordinates you jotted down earlier into the first field:

After editing the coordinates should display underneath the existing address:

Tapping these coordinates on the iPhone will launch Maps (although you may notice odd pin labels—not sure why that is). After sync you should see the corresponding geo field in Address Book under Mac OSX:

If you don't have an existing Contact address you can of course start with Maps and fine-tune the placement of a dropped pin. You can create a new Contact from within Maps, obtaining the coordinates by sharing as above:

Creating a geo field in Address Book

Say you've opened a geotagged photo in Preview and clicked on Locate to open Google Maps. You'll see a coordinate pair in the info window like this:

Select and copy the coordinates from the search field (this seems more reliable) and create a new contact in Address Book. Use the address-type pop-down menu to create a custom address label 'geo':

Paste in the coordinates you copied earlier and save:

You can right-click on the geo field title to open a Google Map on your desktop:

Alternatively after you sync you can access the coordinates on iPhone:

On iPhone the only downside is that you may need to edit the location field once Maps opens (e.g. to remove the "United Kingdom" which Maps insists on adding during reverse geocoding):

Actions Send this article link by e-mail Print this article without other content Follow responses to this article: comments Follow tag feeds: geotagging, google, gps, iphone, Mac, Mobile, osx, tips. Share on Delicious Digg Facebook StumbleUpon Twitter Translate this page: DE | ES | FR