🌍 WWC-ID – Open Specification

Created by: Rüdiger Gums
First Publication: 08 November 2025
License: MIT License

1. Introduction

The Worldwide Coordinate Identifier (WWC-ID) is an open, decentralized encoding system that uniquely describes almost any point on Earth. Each location receives a 9-character alphanumeric identifier, which is fully mathematically defined, reversible, offline computable, and freely licensed.

The WWC-ID is suitable for navigation, humanitarian work, documentation, research, crisis response, and any application that requires a permanent and universal location identification system.

1.1 Historical Context

The term World Wide Code (WWC) was first published on 17 March 2009 by Rüdiger Gums. The original concept appeared simultaneously in several language editions:

German:
“World Wide Code (WWC): Die neue Orientierung”
ISBN-10: 3941756001
ISBN-13: 978-3941756007

English:
“World Wide Code (WWC): The New Orientation”
ISBN-10: 3-941756-01-X
ISBN-13: 978-3-941756-01-4

French:
“World Wide Code (WWC): La nouvelle orientation”
ISBN-10: 3-941756-02-8
ISBN-13: 978-3-941756-02-1

Albanian:
“World Wide Code (WWC): Ky orientim i ri”
ISBN-10: 3-941756-03-6
ISBN-13: 978-3-941756-03-8

Spanish:
“World Wide Code (WWC): La nueva orientación”
ISBN-10: 3-941756-04-4
ISBN-13: 978-3-941756-04-5

These publications from 2009 serve exclusively as a historical reference and document the first use of the term World Wide Code (WWC).

The WWC-ID Specification (2025), by contrast, is a completely newly defined, mathematically reproducible and MIT-licensed system for uniquely encoding geographic locations. The historical term WWC is not part of the modern WWC-ID specification. WWC-ID is an independent, contemporary, and technically distinct system.

2. Fundamentals

3. Algorithmic Specification

3.1 Forward (Coordinate → WWC-ID)

1. Clamp latitude to EPSG:3857 valid range (±85.05112878°).
2. Convert WGS84 to Web Mercator:
   φ = lat × π/180
   λ = lon × π/180
   x = R × λ
   y = R × ln(tan(π/4 + φ/2))
3. Convert to positive indices:
   xIndex = round(x − WORLD_MIN)
   yIndex = round(y − WORLD_MIN)
4. Global index:
   index = yIndex × WORLD_WIDTH + xIndex
5. Base-60 decomposition into 9 characters.
6. Left-pad with “Z” if necessary.
7. Optional output format: AAAA A AAAA.

3.2 Reverse (WWC-ID → Coordinate)

1. Remove all non-code characters (spaces, dots, hyphens).
2. Reconstruct the Base-60 index.
3. Reverse index:
   xIndex = index % WORLD_WIDTH
   yIndex = floor(index / WORLD_WIDTH)
4. Convert back to projection:
   x = xIndex + WORLD_MIN
   y = yIndex + WORLD_MIN
5. Convert back to WGS84:
   lon = (x / R) × 180/π
   lat = (2 × atan(exp(y / R)) − π/2) × 180/π

4. Reference Implementation (JavaScript)

function encodeWWCID(lat, lon) {
  const R = 6378137.0;
  const MIN = -20037508.3427892;
  const WIDTH = 20037508.3427892 - MIN;
  const φ = Math.max(Math.min(lat, 85.05112878), -85.05112878) * Math.PI / 180;
  const λ = lon * Math.PI / 180;
  const x = R * λ;
  const y = R * Math.log(Math.tan(Math.PI / 4 + φ / 2));
  const xIdx = Math.round(x - MIN);
  const yIdx = Math.round(y - MIN);
  const index = yIdx * WIDTH + xIdx;
  const A = "Z5nG%Kb:IeR@3LmD*T7V=W1(YfCM?XdF-H9P/6Ot+8hU~4E)a2#N_A!QrSBJ";
  let n = index, b = [];
  while (n > 0) {
    b.unshift(A[n % 60]);
    n = Math.floor(n / 60);
  }
  while (b.length < 9) b.unshift("Z");
  const c = b.join("");
  return c.slice(0,4) + " " + c[4] + " " + c.slice(5);
}

5. License (MIT License)

Copyright (c) 2025 Rüdiger Gums
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files to deal in the Software without restriction, including use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND.

6. Permanent Reproducibility

The WWC-ID remains permanently reproducible as long as alphabet, projection, world boundaries, and Base-60 algorithm remain unchanged.
The system is completely independent of platforms, organizations, or servers.

7. Archiving

First Publication: 08 November 2025
This version archived on: 16 November 2025
Archived version in the Internet Archive:
Web Archive Snapshot