[Feature] Search by "Text" and "Near Me"

[elchris]

User Story

Goals:

Location Sniffing Goals:

• Most users just want to find things near them
  • Having to type their location in a box is somewhat overkill and redundant
  • It also requires us to query a Google API to find lat/long pairs

Searching for Things Goals:

• Users also want to search for "things", by typing things in a text search box like they would in google:
  • shoes
  • hair
  • cigars
  • food
  • sports bar
  • drinks
  • etc.

Enabling Factors:

• We could leverage the browser's Geo/GPS API
  • On mobile devices, it can use the device's GPS receiver
  • On desktop/laptops, it uses a combination of things including:
  • Matching WiFi access point's SSID against databases of locations of SSIDs
  • IP Geo-Matching
  • etc.
  • Caveat: When using this feature, the user gets prompted for permission with an optional checkbox to "remember decision for a day"
  • This experience can be somewhat abrasive
  • And this could well invalidate this whole approach
• Since July 2020, the API has supported a "search" HTTP GET Parameter
  • This parameter can be added to any existing query
  • It will return results relevant to whatever the user entered.
  • It matches results against several fields

Proposed Solution:

• A more streamlined Search Experience:
  • [ bbq ] [Near Me] [go]
  • the first box is the free-form search from the user
  • "Near Me" is a pull-down selected by default
    • Its other option is "Near ..."
    • When selected, it presents the user with a box to enter a location they want
• Radius should be kept to whatever we use right now by default

Code Sample:

if (navigator.geolocation) { navigator.geolocation.getCurrentPosition( function (position) { let lat = position.coords.latitude; let lng = position.coords.longitude; } ); }

Acceptance Criteria

• [ ] Search Experience on Homepage
• [ ] Search Experience on Businesses Search Page

[brianjhanson]

I can take a run at this one.