Option to use `+` in `req_url_query()`

[AGeographer]

For the Nominatim API[1] I need to submit my request using plus signs (+) instead of %20 (spaces). I looked at all parameters of req_url_query(), but couldn't find how to tweak this. Is this not yet implemented?

By the way, no rush, I have used the httr package in the meantime...

[1] Sample API call: https://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=135+pilkington+avenue,+birmingham&format=xml&polygon_kml=1&addressdetails=1

Thanks,
Tim

[hadley]

Can you show the code you're using for httr?

[AGeographer]

Sure. See below.

I also found this StackOverflow discussion on the matter: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1634271/url-encoding-the-space-character-or-20

So, maybe there could be a parameter .encoding = in req_url_query() where you could choose url which would encode whitespace to %20 and form which would encode whitespace to +. Following the discussion in the link above, the plus sign could even be the default for the query part.

library(dplyr)
library(stringr)
library(httr)

x <- tibble(place = "135 Pilkington Avenue",
            city = "Birmingham",
            zip = NA,
            state = NA,
            country = "UK")

req <- 
  paste0('https://nominatim.openstreetmap.org/search?q=',
           str_replace_all(
             paste0(x$place, ", ", 
                    x$city, ", ",
                    if_else(is.na(x$zip), "", paste0(x$zip, ", ")), 
                    if_else(is.na(x$state), "", paste0(x$state, ", ")),
                    x$country),
             "\\s", "+"),
         '&format=jsonv2&limit=1')


get_nominatim <- 
  function(request) {
    r <- GET(request)
    if (r$headers$`content-length` > 2) {
          r %>% 
          content() %>% 
          unlist() %>% 
          matrix(nrow = length(.), byrow = T, dimnames = list(names(.))) %>% 
          t() %>% 
          as_tibble()
    } else tibble()
  }

get_nominatim(req)
#> # A tibble: 1 × 17
#>   place_id  licence        osm_type osm_id lat   lon   category type  place_rank
#>   <chr>     <chr>          <chr>    <chr>  <chr> <chr> <chr>    <chr> <chr>     
#> 1 241320786 Data © OpenSt… way      90394… 52.5… -1.8… building resi… 30        
#> # ℹ 8 more variables: importance <chr>, addresstype <chr>, name <chr>,
#> #   display_name <chr>, boundingbox1 <chr>, boundingbox2 <chr>,
#> #   boundingbox3 <chr>, boundingbox4 <chr>

^{Created on 2024-01-31 with reprex v2.1.0}

Session info

sessionInfo()
#> R version 4.3.2 (2023-10-31 ucrt)
#> Platform: x86_64-w64-mingw32/x64 (64-bit)
#> Running under: Windows 10 x64 (build 19044)
#> 
#> Matrix products: default
#> 
#> 
#> locale:
#> [1] LC_COLLATE=English_Canada.utf8  LC_CTYPE=English_Canada.utf8   
#> [3] LC_MONETARY=English_Canada.utf8 LC_NUMERIC=C                   
#> [5] LC_TIME=English_Canada.utf8    
#> 
#> 
#> attached base packages:
#> [1] stats     graphics  grDevices utils     datasets  methods   base     
#> 
#> other attached packages:
#> [1] httr_1.4.7    stringr_1.5.1 dplyr_1.1.4  
#> 
#> loaded via a namespace (and not attached):
#>  [1] vctrs_0.6.5       cli_3.6.2         knitr_1.45        rlang_1.1.3      
#>  [5] xfun_0.41         stringi_1.8.3     generics_0.1.3    jsonlite_1.8.8   
#>  [9] glue_1.7.0        htmltools_0.5.7   fansi_1.0.6       rmarkdown_2.25   
#> [13] evaluate_0.23     tibble_3.2.1      fastmap_1.1.1     yaml_2.3.8       
#> [17] lifecycle_1.0.4   compiler_4.3.2    fs_1.6.3          pkgconfig_2.0.3  
#> [21] rstudioapi_0.15.0 digest_0.6.34     R6_2.5.1          reprex_2.1.0     
#> [25] tidyselect_1.2.0  utf8_1.2.4        curl_5.2.0        pillar_1.9.0     
#> [29] magrittr_2.0.3    tools_4.3.2       withr_3.0.0

[hadley]

Thanks for the link. My interpretation is different, as I think using + is a dated convention and it's better to default to percent encoding, but it's probably worth making this an option.

[jennybc]

This is bringing back memories of r-lib/httr#335.

[AGeographer]

.., but it's probably worth making this an option.

Option would be appreciated! Thanks!