[SOLVED] Get visitors country code.

[lynxus]

Hi all, This isnt a question, Rather its a how to as ive spent ages trying to figure out how to do this without the need of using someone elses database ( that they want money for! )

 

After a while, i came up with this:

 

Here goes,

1) Your php script needs access to run the a whois command.

2) Your server needs to be linux.

 

You will need to have this snippet on the page your visitors land on.

<?php
$ip = $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR']; // Get users IP

$country = exec("whois $ip  | grep -i country"); // Run a local whois and grep for the word country.
$country = strtolower($country); // lowercase everything.
// Get rid of unwanted whois response.
$country = str_replace("country:", "", "$country"); // Clean stuff unwanted from whoisis
$country = str_replace("network:country-code:", "", "$country"); // Clean stuff unwanted from whoisis
$country = str_replace("network:organization-usa", "", "$country"); // Clean stuff unwanted from whoisis
// End get rid of.
$country = str_replace(" ", "", "$country"); // get rid of any spaces.

echo $country; // this will now be a 2char country code, IE:  gb 
?>

 

You can then use flag icons from somewhere like famfamfam to display a flag icon based on the country code.

 

ie:

<?php

echo '<img alt="'.$country.'" src="Images/flags/png/'.$country.'.png" width="16" height="11" /> <b>('.$country.')</b>';

 

 

 

Hope this helps anyone else out there.

 

This code can be changed to take any data from a whois. ( ie the ISP name, town location etc )

 

The whole point of this is so you wont need to rely on a 3rd party database or some other 3rd party website.

Whois is far more reliable.

 

Thanks

G

www.imsupporting.com