Mastering Geolocation with JavaScript: Making Geolocation.getCurrentPosition Work with async/await

Learn how to effectively use the Geolocation API with JavaScript by converting callback functions to promises for seamless `async/await` implementation in your web applications.
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The Issue at Hand

If you're like many developers, you may have run into a situation where you expect the user's coordinates to be assigned to a variable but instead get an alert saying they denied access to their location. This behavior suggests that the defaultLocation variable is not being set correctly because the code execution is not waiting for the geolocation promise to resolve.

Here's a brief overview of the problem:

You want to use the getCurrentPosition method from the Geolocation API to get the user's latitude and longitude.

You are attempting to do this within an async function using await, so you expect the return value of getLocationFromUser to resolve before proceeding.

Instead, you find that the function completes before the geolocation request does, resulting in unexpected behavior.

A Solution to the Problem

To resolve this issue, you'll need to promisify the getCurrentPosition method. This means you'll wrap it in a Promise so it can work seamlessly with the async/await syntax. This way, you can ensure the code waits for the geolocation to successfully fetch the user’s location before moving on to the next steps.

Step 1: Promisifying the Geolocation API

Here's how you can adjust your getLocationFromUser function:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

Step 2: Updating the loadApp Function

Now that getLocationFromUser returns a Promise, you can effectively call it using await in your loadApp function without any issues:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

Summary of Changes

Return a Promise: Your getLocationFromUser function now returns a Promise that resolves with the user's coordinates or rejects if geolocation is not supported or permission is denied.

Utilize Try/Catch: In the loadApp function, use a try/catch block to handle any errors that arise from the promise being rejected. This makes your application more robust and user-friendly.

Conclusion

By making these adjustments, you simplify your code and ensure that your weather app can effectively use the user’s geolocation in a responsive manner. It’s a straightforward yet powerful way of using the JavaScript Geolocation API with async/await. Now that you understand the importance of promisifying callback functions, you can apply this concept to other asynchronous operations in JavaScript for more efficient and cleaner code.

Feel free to reach out with any questions or let us know how you incorporated geolocation into your applications!