The Geographical Oddity of Null Island. A blog post at "Worlds Revealed: Geography & Maps at The Library Of Congress" on 2016-04-22.
It doesn't seem like much of a place to visit. Granted, I've never actually been there, but I think I can imagine it: the vastness of ocean, overcast skies, a heavy humidity in the air. No land in sight, with the only distinguishing feature being a lonely buoy, bobbing up and down in the water. It almost seems like a "non-place," but it may surprise you to learn that this site is far from anonymous. This spot is a hive of activity in the world of geographic information systems (GIS). As far as digital geospatial data is concerned, it may be one of the most visited places on Earth! This is Null Island.
Null Island is an imaginary island located at 0°N 0°E (hence "Null") in the South Atlantic Ocean. This point is where the Equator meets the Prime Meridian. The concept of the island originated in 2011 when it was drawn into Natural Earth, a public domain map dataset developed by volunteer cartographers and GIS analysts. In creating a one-square meter plot of land at 0°N 0°E in the digital dataset, Null Island was intended to help analysts flag errors in a process known as "geocoding."
Geocoding is a function performed in a GIS that involves taking data containing addresses and converting them into geographic coordinates, which can then be easily mapped. For example, a data table of buildings in Washington, DC could include the Madison Building of the Library of Congress (where I'm reporting from) as a feature and include its address: 101 Independence Avenue SE, Washington, DC, 20540. This address typically makes sense to the layperson, but to put the address on a map using a GIS, the computer needs a translation. A "geocoder" converts this address into its location as set of coordinates in latitude and longitude, a format that a GIS understands. In this case, the Madison Building's geographic location becomes 38° 53′ 12″N, 77° 0′ 18″W (38.886667, -77.005 in decimal degree format). Anyone who has ever typed in an address on Google Maps or looked up driving directions on Mapquest has been a beneficiary of this tool: type in an address, get a pin on a map.
Unfortunately, due to human typos, messy data, or even glitches in the geocoder itself, the geocoding process doesn't always run so smoothly. Misspelled street names, non-existent building numbers, and other quirks can create invalid addresses that can confuse a geocoder so that the output becomes "0,0". While this output indicates that an error occurred, since "0,0" is in fact a location on the Earth's surface according to the coordinate system, the feature will be mapped there, as nonsensical as the location may be. We end up with an island of misfit data.
https://blogs.loc.gov/maps/2016/04/the-geographical-oddity-of-null-island/
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 01 2016, @09:21PM
If we nuke it, will that help? I feel like that would help.
(Score: 2) by BK on Sunday May 01 2016, @10:03PM
Would a wall around it be to keep them out, or to keep them in? How high does it need to be to prevent fallout?
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 02 2016, @02:01AM
Make sure it's uninhabited first. If you look on Google Maps, you'll see there is a "Social Media Training" pin right next to the island. That's quite the commute for whoever visits! :)
(Score: 3, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 01 2016, @10:03PM
the output becomes "0,0". While this output indicates that an error occurred
So the problem is horrible APIs that, instead of outputting an error, output valid coordinates.
null != 0
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Monday May 02 2016, @02:03AM
Further, if you try to type 38° 53′ 12″N 77° 0′ 18″W into google maps you almost always get it wrong. Especially on a cell phone. Even copy and paste isn´t reliable.
Why can google puzzle out the common coordinate systems of the world, even if there is a spacing error or comma out of place.
Turns out the some countries (Russians) normally give the Latitude first, then the Longitude, and so Google doesn't understand that either.
Decimal coordinates make the most sense, but you still have to type the DMS ones into a converter to get there. Most annoying.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 02 2016, @01:06PM
Try this: http://what3words.com/ [what3words.com]
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by frojack on Monday May 02 2016, @03:07PM
Yeah, I was the one that submitted that to Soylentnews, remember...
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 02 2016, @06:27PM
Hey, it's not like you and I are the only ones here... there must be what, six or seven other people who post regularly...
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 02 2016, @12:16PM
The NULL macro for my C compiler disagrees with you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 02 2016, @02:12PM
It may, but it is wrong. Your NULL macro is an approximation. NULL really should have been aliased to void.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 01 2016, @10:11PM
IT is why when you code functions that return data, you ALWAYS need a out-of-bound single method to let you known if the answer is good ot bad or by how much.
Did Geocoding for large bug kill company. When a Lat/Ling/hieght pair is returened the quaility of that pair was also returned. It ranged from -1 to 100.
-1: It is completily crap
35: with-in about 25 miles of actual location - namely a phyiscal post office
65: with in 5 mile - the route of the mail delivery
75: with in a mile - it is the street
85: mailbox at end of drive
95: front door
100: GPS reading by the driver ON the front door!
using this other address we with similar look anmes and number we got most in the 85+ range.
Issues are when new streets are coming on-line... Batten Rouge, LA had new development with streests called northlake, southlake, eastlake and westlake. When the GIS softeare was trying to work with those names, the ran to lake street 10miles away. IT took the post office about 6months to get htem corrected and then GIS software updated (monthly), to get it correct.
PS: out-of-bounf signalling is also goes for date conversions, so if 99/99/99 is feed into it is is possible to get back a "meaningfull" date, but also an error flag telling you htat date is "wrong". every helpful finding the last day of month (y/m/d) 99/03/00 would return 99/02/28, with flag that this is questionable.
Sometime good enough is what is needed. - ie autometed interfaces - so information comes in and maps to the best guess and not just "lost".
(Score: 3, Informative) by darnkitten on Sunday May 01 2016, @11:00PM
Coding isn't the only problem--data sources can also be at fault.
For instance:
I live on Ruby Street in a small rural town. For the past 12 years, we had a persistent error in every database I know of, where addresses on the street were autoconverted to "Ruby Road," which is in the next town. This, despite there being no addresses along that stretch of road. Packages were delayed or lost, mail wrongly routed (fortunately, these being small communities, the post offices knew everyone and were also able to redirect UPS/Fedex drivers).
The error was even in the commercial databases, and because these databases all cross reference, when we attempted to correct the error (say, at the bank), within a quarter, "Ruby Street" would revert to "Ruby Road." This made it difficult to get credit reports or to pursue transactions requiring address verification, because there would always be address conflicts somewhere in the system.
Ultimately, it turned out that when the USPS digitized their address system, they left out our street and a few others, due to a postal regulation that required addresses within a certain distance of the Post Office to use a PO Box, so they wouldn't wast money on deliveries within walking distance. Because there were no postal delivery addresses on our street, it didn't get entered in the postal database (If it had had even one delivery address, they would have entered the non-delivery addresses, due to the need to track delivery distances/times); and when the system saw something addressed to a "non-existing" street, it assumed the address was referring to the nearest "existing" street, and auto-corrected or -routed accordingly--in this case, to the nearest town with a similar street name.
Thus, because UPS, Fedex, commerce, government and commercial databases quite reasonably use the USPS for address verification, residents of these ghost streets ended up in a sort of limbo, until a few months back, when our new Postmaster realized what was happening and corrected the databases.
So now we exist, the databases are slowly correcting themselves, and we are receiving deliveries correctly addressed; though slower than formerly, due to the USPS closing all but one processing facility in the state (but that's another story).
(Score: 2) by deadstick on Sunday May 01 2016, @10:17PM
...is latitude zero in the South Atlantic?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 01 2016, @11:20PM
They pay me by the word, buddy. When you take words out of my stories, you're taking food out of my kids' mouths.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 02 2016, @01:10PM
Even a few miles north of 0,0 is in the "South Atlantic" - when you are that close to the coast of Africa, it doesn't make sense to have a long skinny sliver of ocean called North Atlantic.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by deadstick on Monday May 02 2016, @07:47PM
OK...is there an agreed boundary between the North and South Atlantic?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday May 02 2016, @07:56PM
I'd put it in the middle of the equatorial current, which comes together off the south-west corner of West Africa. Some people agree with me, some don't.
If you simply look at a globe, that body of water south of West Africa "seems" to belong to the South Atlantic nametag, just like I'd say that the north facing shore of Brazil should belong to the North Atlantic, but other people will draw a bright line on the equator and claim that's the simpler way to describe it.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Monday May 02 2016, @10:12PM
The online dictionaries I consulted (that had entries for it) all say it stretches from the equator southward.
http://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/the-south-atlantic [collinsdictionary.com]
https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/South%20Atlantic [vocabulary.com]
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/south-atlantic-ocean [dictionary.com]
(Score: 2) by kazzie on Tuesday May 03 2016, @06:12AM
OK...is there an agreed boundary between the North and South Atlantic?
I think it's the Mid-Atlantic.
(Score: 2) by gznork26 on Sunday May 01 2016, @10:31PM
The hypothetical island located at 0, 0 was used a whole lot earlier, by the cartoon character Colonel Bleep. The series was the first color cartoon made for TV, and I watched it as a kid. You can find them on YouTube these days.
Khipu were Turing complete.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 01 2016, @11:02PM
It's like that place Greenwich where the time is always 0. I've been there, it's completely black and time just seems to stop. Creepy place.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 01 2016, @11:22PM
Creepy, and crawling with mean people.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Tork on Monday May 02 2016, @04:46AM
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Monday May 02 2016, @02:11AM
What about 0°S 0°W?
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 02 2016, @09:59AM
The summary makes it clear that this is the place where socks are teleported to when you put them in the dryer.
Your socks are quantum entangled. You put 2 in the dryer and one will be instantly teleported to null island.
This means that over time enough socks must have accumulated to begin building up an island in much the same way that this island in the pacific was built up over millenia
http://www.strangehistory.net/2013/01/20/forgotten-kingdom-the-bird-shit-island/ [strangehistory.net]
I hereby claim the island and all socks which have made it here.
(Score: 1) by Ambient Sheep on Monday May 02 2016, @05:52PM
Shurely it should be Zero Island?
As others have pointed out, Null Island is a misnomer...
(Score: 2) by devlux on Monday May 02 2016, @06:22PM
NaN island would make more sense to my mind.