Geolocation API Support Coming to Safari
Posted on April 8th, 2009 | 15 Comments »
A couple weeks back, Opera made headlines when it released a browser build supporting the Geolocation API as specified by the W3C. That prompted Ars Technica to write an article summarizing current Geolocation API support, which mentioned that both Opera and Mozilla (more on the Firefox implementation can be found at Mozilla Links) have released browsers supporting the API.
Now it appears that Safari will soon be supporting the Geolocation API as well. In documentation that appears to have gone out to iPhone developers regarding new features in iPhone OS 3.0, the following appears:
Safari…supports the Geolocation JavaScript classes, which work with the onboard location services to retrieve the current location of the device.
A Google search for “safari geolocation” doesn’t really turn up much useful information, but it’s obvious from existing WebKit bugs that the feature has been getting some attention as of late.
It’s going to be interesting to see how prevalent the use of this API by web developers becomes as more of the major web browsers add support for its functions.
Tags: Ars Technica, Features, Firefox, Geolocation API, iPhone, JavaScript, Mozilla, Mozilla Links, Opera, Safari, W3C, WebKit