Bug#948382: RFP: libpostal -- international street address NLP

[Alessandro Barbieri <lssndrbarbieri@gmail.com>]

Package: wnpp
Severity: wishlist

* Package name    : libpostal
  Version         : v1.1-alpha
  Upstream Author : Al Barrentine
* URL             : https://github.com/openvenues/libpostal
* License         : MIT
  Programming Lang: C
  Description     : International street address NLP

Libpostal is a C library for parsing/normalizing street addresses around the world using statistical NLP and open data. The goal of this project is to understand location-based strings in every language, everywhere.
Addresses and the locations they represent are essential for any application dealing with maps (place search, transportation, on-demand/delivery services, check-ins, reviews). Yet even the simplest addresses are packed with local conventions, abbreviations and context, making them difficult to index/query effectively with traditional full-text search engines. This library helps convert the free-form addresses that humans use into clean normalized forms suitable for machine comparison and full-text indexing. Though libpostal is not itself a full geocoder, it can be used as a preprocessing step to make any geocoding application smarter, simpler, and more consistent internationally.
The core library is written in pure C. Language bindings for Python, Ruby, Go, Java, PHP, and NodeJS are officially supported and it's easy to write bindings in other languages.