returning variable from javascript function

Question

I'm trying to return longitude and latitude from this function, I can console.log both of them, but when I try to return one of them, I get undefined.

How can I return latitude, longitude?

function latLong(location) {
    var geocoder = new google.maps.Geocoder();
    var address = location;
    var longitude;
    var latitude;
    geocoder.geocode({
        'address': address
    }, function (results, status) {
        if (status == google.maps.GeocoderStatus.OK) {
            latitude = results[0].geometry.location.lat();
            longitude = results[0].geometry.location.lng();
        } else {
            alert("Geocode was not successful for the following reason: " + status);
        }
        console.log(longitude);
    });
}

adeneo · Accepted Answer · 2014-04-05 17:55:07Z

4

The geocoder is asynchronous, and you can't return data from an asynchronous function, you could however use a callback

function latLong(location, callback) {
    var geocoder = new google.maps.Geocoder();
    var address = location;
    var longitude;
    var latitude;
    geocoder.geocode({
        'address': address
    }, function (results, status) {
        if (status == google.maps.GeocoderStatus.OK) {
            latitude = results[0].geometry.location.lat();
            longitude = results[0].geometry.location.lng();

            callback(latitude, longitude);

        } else {
            alert("Geocode was not successful for the following reason: " + status);
        }
    });
}

and to use it do

 latLong(location, function(lat, lon)  {
     // inside this callback you can use lat and lon
 });

answered Apr 5, 2014 at 17:55

adeneo

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MightyPork · Accepted Answer · 2014-04-05 17:55:38Z

You don't.

The generally used technique is to pass a callback to latLong function as a parameter, and run this function when you receive the result.

Something like:

function latLong(location, callback) {

    var geocoder = new google.maps.Geocoder();
    var address = location;
    var longitude;
    var latitude;
    geocoder.geocode({
        'address': address
    }, function (results, status) {
        if (status == google.maps.GeocoderStatus.OK) {
            latitude = results[0].geometry.location.lat();
            longitude = results[0].geometry.location.lng();
            callback(latitude, longitude);
        } else {
            alert("Geocode was not successful for the following reason: " + status);
        }
        console.log(longitude);
    });
}

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