Easy way to categorize Favorites?

How many different Favorite categories do you (or did you) have?

Such events are a reason to periodically make a full backup.

On my 765T (which lets me define my own Favorite categories by editing on the unit and lets me assign multiple categories to each Fav.)..

Provided there is at least one Favorite already in the unit and assigned to the category name(s) I want, I open Current.gpx directly using EPE (ExtraPoiEditor) while connected via usb cable.

I then assign the categories in EPE, save to the nuvi, and disconnect using "Safely remove..". On unit reboot the categories are assigned.

My 765T won't recognize an EPE assigned category name unless it has the same name as an existing Fav category name that was assigned using the unit's edit menu. But interestingly, if I use EPE and then edit one manually on the unit to add a new category(ies), being careful to use the exact spelling & upper/lower case as I used in EPE then all of them get assigned.

If you want different sets of categories but want to do it in 'bulk' rather than editing each favorite individually in EPE, then start with a small set in Current.gpx, assign the cats using "Edit, Replace Field" to replace all then save Current.gpx. Open the next 'batch' in EPE & do the categories then save it to the unit as Temp.gpx in the same dir as Current.gpx, disconnect & reboot, reconnect & add another Temp.gpx batch, reboot, and so on. Each Temp.gpx should add itself to your favorites when it reboots.

If you don't have all of your Favs backed up on your pc, then save a copy of Current.gpx to the pc & you'll have your current favorites anyway so you can break them up etc. if you add them in chunks by saving as Temp.gpx

In the latest version of EPE you can assign multiple categories when using Edit, Replace Field by separating the cat names with a comma.

I'm not sure if the 255s will act the same as my 765T, but if so these methods should work.

Clear as mud?

It's pretty easy to do this in Mapsource as well.

First open Mapsource and go to Edit - Preferences and then select the Waypoint Categories tab. On that screen you can set up to 16 categories. Click Apply and close the Preferences window.

Now with the Nuvi attached to your PC transfer your waypoints to Mapsource using Transfer - Receive From Device.

Once all your Favorites are loaded into Mapsource, open the Waypoints list to the left of the map window. Now select each favorite by double clicking on the enter and assign the category from the list that will appear on the right side of the Waypoint Properties window. Click OK after you have selected the category and it's saved.

Once you have done this for each of your Favorites/Waypoints use Transfer - Send to Device to save them back to your Nuvi.

To avoid having duplicate entries you may wish to delete all your favorites from the Nuvi, using the "delete all" process specific to your Nuvi before you SEND the categorized items back to the device. It will be something like Tools - My Data - Delete Favorites(s) - Select All. I'm not sure that this is the exact menu commands on your Nuvi or not.

While your in the Waypoint Properties window you can also add additional items like a discription or icon symbol to each of your favorites.

Nicely done, t! I didn't know that. No wonder I love this place.

Thanks.

The one thing I'm not sure of is if you can end up with duplicates as I always deleted all of them before sending the categorized items back to the Nuvi. If you don't delete them and do end up with duplicates then just delete ALL of them and resend the categorized items a second time.

I've also found that if you setup the categories properly you can control the order in which they appear on the Nuvi. For example I use categories like Local Places, Provincial Places, Hotels, Restaurants, etc. Leaving them with these names would mean they would appear in alpha order, which may not be the most convenient order if you have to scroll to get to a category you use every day.

To solve this, I took some time to decide which of my categories I would use the most and then named them so the most used one would appear first, followed by second most used, as so on.

What I ended up with where categories called:

A-Local Places
B-Provincial Places
C-Restaurants
and so on up to F-

Now when I want a favorite in the local area it can be found in the very first category listed. I find that taking this time at the front end has made look up a lot easier over time.

This is the kind of tip that needs to be put into a FAQ so it can be referenced WHEN this comes up again.

If you want someone to follow the steps in a FAQ as if they knew nothing, I resemble that person and would be glad to help.

One other note (at least with the 765T)-
If you categorize using EPE and/or the unit itself, each Favorite can have a max of 20 categories assigned, and the unit/EPE will hold 50+ unique categories. I'm not sure if there is a max. string length if you use EPE's replace field and commas.

I think MapSource is limited to 16 per Fav, & 16 total. Still probably enough for most cases.

I agree that all of this would make a nice faq. It would be good though if someone knew the various unit's abilities and included that too.