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I've just spent a long time reading documentation about the Google API Places, and there's some information I don't quite understand.

I need to build an application that can record a travel plan for a user, so a sequence of places. For this, I need a very simple form, with a "destination" input, which will use "Autocomplete Places". This endpoint return a place_id for the selected location, which is the only thing I'm allowed to store in a database, according to Google's terms and conditions. So in my idea, I'll store this id, and a itinerary would be made of a sequence of place_id, without the need to store the place name or anything else. To display the user's itinerary, I'd just have to make Place Details queries, with the identifier.

But the documentation specifies that these ids can change over time, so they advise to redo queries "periodically" to refresh the place_id.

But how can I redo queries if I haven't stored any information about the place, other than the place_id ? Do I need to store the name of the place (and do I have the right to do that?) to be able to retrieve its ID, or am I missing something?

Another thing: I didn't find, or didn't understand, in the terms of use, if I was allowed to store data generated by my site beside Google IDs, for example, to store comments about places.

Sorry if I make language mistakes, im not fluent in english.

Thanks !

rcepre
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  • Ok I get your point now. Maybe storing the name (or part of the name) of the place plus some anonymized GPS coordinates (say you pick the closest lat/long with only a few decimals)... ? From their example, it could be a valid request to store in database – Bruno Martins Jun 29 '20 at 12:29
  • 1) Save the place ID 2) If you request details about a place using the stored place ID, verify that the returned place ID is identical and if not, you might want to update it 3) You can request a place ID refresh **for free** so you could periodically do that to ensure you have up to date records 4) If the place ID has changed, it doesn't necessarily means that an older place ID will become invalid (actually it probably won't in most cases) 5) A place ID *uniquely* identifies a place which doesn't mean one place can only have one ID. – MrUpsidown Jun 29 '20 at 13:55
  • Store content generated by *your site*? What do you mean? If it is content generated by users on your website (not published on Google), then why could you not store it? If it is data coming from the API, then no, you are not allowed to do that, with the exception of the place ID (see https://developers.google.com/places/web-service/policies). – MrUpsidown Jun 29 '20 at 13:59
  • OK Thank you ! Yes ... it makes sense that I'm allowed to store it. – rcepre Jul 02 '20 at 21:10

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