I'm looking for thoughts on two different ways of entering a property address (i.e. the address of house or business, not an e-mail address) on a web site. What are the pros and cons of separate fields versus a single flexible multi-line entry field? Or multi-line with a separate postal code entry?
Most sites use separate fields and, presumably, store these into separate fields in a database. In other words, input is often some variation of:
House: [input field]
Street 1: [input field]
Street 2: [input field]
Town: [input field]
District: [input field]
Postal code: [input field]
However, the above is a bit clunky to enter for fast typists and it's also a bit restrictive in places that have a more free-form address. It's fiddly to edit if you have to "insert" or "delete" a line because you have to copy every field up or down, or retyping the whole thing may be faster.
An alternative is a free format multi-line input (with optional scrollbar):
Address: |multi-line input field|
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Postal code: [input field]
And how to store the address? If multi-line, store all the lines in a single database field? Or split into separate fields and recombine into a multi-line string when editing?
If split fields, what are the fields you use and what are their widths?
I prefer the split fields, because then it is trivially obvious what the breakup is, and it will also help people who have previously entered information into form-saver type apps. A fast typist knows to press 'tab' to navigate between fields.
In both cases you need to store the address in a 'parsed' form, because you may need to do things with it. (Check the suburb, etc).