Geolocation Service is Discontinued

Using Concrete / Help
1

I had a couple of clients report that their sites were stalling on a couple of functions using Geolocation, and now that I’ve gone in to that part of the dashboard and run the test, it’s telling me:

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2

It looks like this is no longer a free service.

geoPlugin API is no longer available for free use. To continue access, please upgrade to a paid plan by clicking

You could get a paid sub for it then tweak the code to implement the API key or submit a Git hub error and see what @frz and @andrew want to do with this service.

3

Confirm the problem

{
  "geoplugin_status":403,
  "geoplugin_message": "geoPlugin API is no longer available for free use. To continue access, please upgrade to a paid plan",
  "geoplugin_url": "https://www.geoplugin.com/subscription"
}
4

I see you have added this

5

This service is free and simple. Good for a quick fix. https://ipquery.io/ Probably best to cache results as the core service does.

6

Here’s a list of services that provide geolocation info without requiring any registration:

2 Likes
7 
{"status":"fail","message":"SSL unavailable for this endpoint, order a key at https://members.ip-api.com/"}

ipquery.io and ipwhois.io both worked for me.

8

Maybe your browser is trying to automatically use HTTPS instead of HTTP?

9

yes, that was it. All now work for me.

10

More on this:

  1. The terms of ip-api are rather restrictive:

    The use of the API is strictly limited for a non-commercial purpose and in a non-commercial environment.

    Example of forbidden, commercial usage:

    • local currency or closest store for visitors of an online shop
    • geo-targeted ads for users of an ad network
    • fraud prevention for online orders

  2. The Terms of Service link of ipquery.io points nowhere (its target is #).

Given that, I’d go with ipwhois.io…

11

Nope, even ipwhois.io doesn’t allow commercial use of the free plan…

12

Github account for ipquery.io says ‘free’ in multiple places with no other terms.

13

I’ve opened an issue: see Missing Terms of service · Issue #3 · ipqwery/Bugs · GitHub

1 Like
14

I’ve sometimes found the now apparently restricted geoplugin.net API to be a bit flaky on occasion, or maybe having dozens of Concrete sites on the same server causes offence. Fortunately in a couple of cases, I’d rolled out @mlocati ‘s excellent MaxMind addon Geolocation with MaxMind GeoIP2 :: Concrete CMS Marketplace addon, and this has saved my bacon.

Clearly, it’s not a solution for the core due to the need for an account/key, but hopefully, if anyone reading this needs a quick fix, here’s one that worked for me.

2 Likes
15

Here’s another free service (as far as I can tell) https://geoip.fortnic.com/

16

@frz - can you make this a topic for the next town hall please.

1 Like