Proximity Alerts NOT on roadway

Welcome to the site, foghorn! You came to the right place.

When you set up TourGuides for specific POI files, they alert within a radius rather than just straight ahead along a road. There are several FAQs on this site. Here is one -

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/13958

Gary Hayman's nuvi tips, tricks site is excellent. Page down to TourGuides on this very long page -

http://home.comcast.net/~ghayman3/garmin.gps/pagepoi.04.htm

Organize the POIs by keeping them in subfolders on the PC which become categories inside the GPS menu. Run POI Loader in manual to set custom alert distances for each category. Here is my FAQ on that -

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/30728

You can make .csv or .gpx POI files.
.csv is simple - it is just a text file, and each POI is one line. See -

http://www.poi-factory.com/garmin-csv-file-format

It is simple to use Notepad to create or edit .csv files even though .csv opens Excel. I don't like Excel because it is difficult to see if an extra space was mistakenly added.

Be careful what you ask for, you just might get it! If there are a number of TourGuide POIs in an area and the proximity alert distance is set too long, you could get very many alerts all at the same time. If you just want to "search" for the POIs nearby, set the proximity distance very short. Either way, you can see all the nearest POIs in "Where To" "Extras" "Custom POIs."

I am sure other forum participants are ready to show you their favorite way of accomplishing the same thing!

dobs108

Hmmmm. Gary's site was where I started reading that the proximity alerts didn't work off-road. I tried adding the TourGuide keyword to the file name and it just made the alerts stop working altogether.

I'm relatively new to mobile GPS products. I've been using cartographer GPS's for years and importing the routes into Google Earth then manually checking for overlaps, but I was doing a shelter site assessment the other day and realized after I'd spend a lot of time that it was too close to a chemical plant. A proximity alert when I pulled up would have saved me a lot of time.

I am concerned about too many. My plan is to attach a silent wav file to them so I only SEE the alerts.

But, that sort of leads to another ponder I've had. Do proximity alerts impact performance. I usually only drive local, but I have a lot of nationwide POI's in the event I'm called away. Does it hurt performance to have too many POI's or proximity alerts installed? May be another post.

I am going to suggest that you download Extra POI Loader (EPE).

http://turboccc.wikispaces.com/Extra_POI_Editor#toc5

Take a look under the Help screens at the TourGuide POI tutorial. You can take .csv files, convert them to .gpx files which give you the great feature of setting distance inside the file itself

For example, take one of your POI files and open it in EPE. While in EPE, press the CTL-R key sequence and then the letter P until PROXIMITY is displayed. Key in the distance, select Replace All and confirm. Save the file as a GPX. This file can be loaded with POI Loader operating in Express

You can easily link to a silent .wav file
which can be made using Audacity, which can be downloaded from
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

Take a look at these tools and then get back to use with questions, if any.

My understanding is that a tour guide alert needs two things for each poi- a proximity, and a sound file with "TourGuide" (exactly as typed, no quotes) in it's sound file name.

In a GPX file you can assign both to each poi individually and POILoader will compile it correctly. You can also give each poi a proximity only, and put a sound file with TourGuide and the GPX filename in the same directory to use the same 'alert' sound with all the pois in the file.

With a CSV file you need the sound file in the same directory as the CSV file but you also need to put TourGuide in the filename if you want POILoader to use either it's default proximity values for all the pois, or pause and prompt you for the proximity values automatically before continuing. In POILoader manual mode, you don't need TourGuide in the filename, but it won't automatically select "This file has proximity alerts" so you have to select it and enter/edit the values manually before you go to the next step.

I think I got that right!

But I believe you need "TourGuide" (CaSe SenSiTiVe!) in the name of the POI, sound and image files, and all three need to match for the combined .gpi file to have an icon and sound.

I haven't found TourGuide in the poi name to make a difference (for sure it doesn't in GPX), but I'm also pretty sure I haven't tested (or remembered if I did!) all of the possible combinations!

..btw, TourGuide isn't necessarily needed in the GPX filename either as I recall.

Simple way to do is just leave all your files like the are except for one change.Put TourGuide in the file name ,wav and bmp file.When you run poiloader set the radius distance to want.Example for file set up.

TourGuide tornado sirens.csv
TourGuide tornado sirens.wav
TourGuide tornado sirens.bmp

You can also do this .
tornado sirens TourGuide.csv
tornado sirens TourGuide.wav
tornado sirens TourGuide.bmp

Stay with the csv files and poiloader in the manual mode while you play around with sevearl settings to get best radius distance you want.It may take several tries.Then you may want to go to the gpx files and build your distance into the file.See http://www.poi-factory.com/node/28521

The biggest problems with the alerts and icons not working are the files not being named the same except for extensions and having double extensions. Double-check each of them. The best way to prevent double extensions is to go to your folder options in the control panel and click view then find hide extensions for known file types and remove the check mark. Click ok.This is for XP.

It is simpler to see an example! Thanks charlesd45 (and MotorcycleMamma who gave the original on the site? )

I guess what I was trying to say was what charlesd45 said with some additional about gpx, and can be 'shown' like this:
.

tornado sirens TourGuide.bmp <--optional
tornado sirens TourGuide.mp3
tornado sirens TourGuide.csv
{ where "lon,lat,Siren1"
.............."lon,lat,Siren2" }

**compile in POILoader Manual mode, enter proximity distance **
**proximity and alert sound will be the same for all poi records **
.
.

tornado sirens TourGuide.bmp <--optional
tornado sirens TourGuide.mp3
tornado sirens TourGuide.gpx
{ where name= Siren1
..............name= Siren2 }

**compile in POILoader Manual mode, enter proximity distance **
**compile in POILoader Express mode, all proximity will be .2? mi**
**proximity and alert sound will be the same for all poi records **
.
.

tornado sirens TourGuide.bmp <--optional
tornado sirens TourGuide.mp3
tornado sirens TourGuide.gpx
{ where name= Siren1
..............prox= .5 mi

..............name= Siren2
..............prox= .25 mi }

**compile in POILoader Express mode **
**proximity will be different but alert sound will be the same **
.
.

tornado sirens.bmp <--optional
tornado sirens.gpx
{ where name= Siren1
..............prox= .5 mi
..............link= TourGuide sound name1.mp3

..............name= Siren2
..............prox= .25 mi
..............link= TourGuide sound name2.mp3 }

**compile in POILoader Express mode **
**proximity and alert sound can be different in each poi record **
.
.

I've found all of those scenarios to give a TourGuide type (off of road) alert. 'TourGuide' in the sound file name is the critical bit for POILoader to make it an 'off of road' alert rather than a regular proximity alert.

But.. if you don't link the sound file inside a gpx poi record and are relying on POILoader to use the filenames only, then the gpx, csv, and bitmap names need 'TourGuide' (yes, cAse SensiTive) in them as well in order for all of them to 'match' & associate:

TourGuide filename.ext
filename TourGuide.ext
TourGuide File Name.ext
File Name TourGuide.ext
TourGuide_Filename.ext
Filename_TourGuide.ext
File Name_TourGuide.ext
TourGuide_File Name.ext
filename_TourGuide.ext
... etc. will all work

.
(This looked much better in notepad where the dots were spaces - sorry. Hope you get the idea and it doesn't confuse anyone.)

Thanks for this post. It probably should become a FAQ.

In order to make sure it is really understandable, I have a few comments.

In this case the OP needed .wav files based on his GPS unit. If this were a FAQ, then you would use .wav in the examples but add a TIP that .mp3 files could be used on GPS units with a media player.

Correct a typing error:

.25 not .2?

Question:
when you say

should this not add “unless you are using the .gpx file technique” or something like that?

You're probably correct, but I haven't actually tried some of these combinations with .wav files, so I didn't want to take a chance. I'm confidant that .wavs work in the first 3 scenarios, but haven't tried the last one with a .wav.

Not totally sure about the second decimal place either. As an example, one of my nuvi's shows a default speed alert as just .2 mi after it's compiled. So, I'm not sure if another one would show .25 or if it's actually .2. In these examples, I verified them with a nuvi that won't show the details about a TourGuide poi, only a 'regular' poi. When 'driving' the route it also seemed like it was closer to .2 than .25 as well, but I could be wrong.

No. It must be there in all of the cases I've shown. That might not be the case if TourGuide goes in the gpx file's individual poi name, but I can't swear to that right now.
Meaning, in each file type above I've shown the minimum data needed in each file type, csv or gpx. Of course, gpx has other data in it that's usually not shown, like the time stamp, etc. (OK, I also left out lat & lon in the gpx examples just for clarity)

(Too many combinations, too little time & mental stability! )

I've not read anywhere before this thread that POI names with TourGuide in them are converted to TourGuide POIs.

There is no magical TourGuide designation in a GPX file. You need to have an mp3 with TourGuide in the name. The advantage in using GPX files in this case is that a proximity alert distance can be built into each POI so POILoader can be run in express mode. This is helpful if you are loading multiple Custom POI files.

POILoader says:
To create TourGuide points use the File/URL field to attach the appropriate .mp3 files to the points. The .mp3s must contain the word “TourGuide” in the file name to activate the TourGuide feature. For example, “TourGuide.mp3”, “TourGuide USA.mp3”, or “TourGuide 12.mp3” are all valid TourGuide file names.

Anything else is someone's guess and needs to be tested.

Thanks. That's my understanding as well.
My above examples work for me, nothing more, nothing less.. for now until other combos are tested.

I just ran a test on my 765T. Here is what I did

Created a folder named "@test gpx v tguide"

Next, I got a file of restaurants and from that file saved one POI record which was near me into a gpx file which had the "TourGuide Info Proximity" field set at 1000 feet and was linked to a "Lowes.wav" file in an entirely different folder.

Then, I loaded that one POI record to my 775T from the "@test gpx v tguide" folder.

Then, I safely disconnected the 765T and put myself in Simulation mode (Tools > Settings > system > GPS Simulator > On > OK and Back).

Then I selected a Recently Found I have set up about 1.5 miles away from my home, touched Map and then Set Loc. I backed out till I could selcct Go Home.

I was asked "Do you want to simulate driving this route" and I answered Yes.

At the right distance I got the "Auto Play" alert (set under TourGuide)for "lowes store ahead" with the black oval showing the address of the restaurant. As it turned out the oval went away for a few seconds because I got outside of the "radius" distance I had set. Then, I came back in range and I got the alert again as well as the tourguide oval. After a while the oval went away again once I got out of range.

No TourGuide in the wav file.

All done by the GPX file entries.

A normal POI will play an audio file if you are traveling on the road on which the POI is located.

To test a Tourguide POI alert, you must be traveling on a road that does not come within 50 ft of that POI, but within the alert distance radius.

I had read in POI Loader Help something that seemed to imply that a tourGuide had to be a gpx file.

It said:
"TourGuide is a feature available on compatible Garmin devices. TourGuide files include Custom POIs with descriptive .mp3 audio files. When you approach a TourGuide point, the .mp3 file plays and provides you with information about that point, much like a guided tour. TourGuide files must be saved as .gpx files."

I did not think that was correct so I used the same restaurant file as in my previous test - except that it was only the one .csv record near me.

I created a folder called "@Test csv tguide" and into this folder placed a Walgreen .wav file which I renamed to be "food test TourGuide w walgreen.wav". I named the one entry POI file "food test TourGuide w walgreen.csv".

I ran POI Loader in manual mode and set the alert distance at 1000 feet - same as I put into the gpx file.

In simulation mode this did not work. I ran POI Loader again and set a distance of 2000 feet and tried again. This time it did work but only barely at one place on the route.

I was at a loss to explain the difference in the distance for the alert. So, I tried again using 3100 feet in manual mode (after much trial and error) to make the alerts sound at the approximaely the same two places.

I reran the test several posts above again and verified that EPE was using 1000 feet.

Based on my feeling of the distances involved, I think that EPE must be using yards rather than feet.

I am at a loss.

I'm going to admit right at the top that I haven't totally digested what you wrote in your second post, but I thought I should mention that I posted a few messages about EPE and how it can handle gpx number values incorrectly. It gets a bit complicated and it looks like I need to follow the thread closer, but look here http://www.poi-factory.com/node/28107?page=3 and on the last page.

It's basically a metric/imperial thing. GPX files need to save/read in metric, but EPE can allow you to save in Imperial, which none of the other gpx-compliant software is expecting.

I think post http://www.poi-factory.com/node/13958 is still one of the best posts about TourGuides.

I agree, it's excellent.

I'm a big gpx fan and it neglects to mention the extra functionality in the gpx format or give similar gpx examples. A lot of people seem to try to avoid gpx files for some reason, but as shown above they can be as easy to use as the csv.

I use the GPX format for all my files with the alerts so I can build the distance into the file and use express mode for poiloader.Plus I get a better format on the gps screen without the more button and numbers to dial for Bluetooth.

Your EPE preferences may be set incorrectly. Set the Options>Preferences Units to Editor:Imperial, File Read:Metric and File Save:Metric.

I just came off a long trip cross country 7500 miles and now a 700 mile trip.I have rest stops as a gpx file set at 8000 ft .Comparing my settings to the road signs showing distance to rest stop.Can say for sure EPE not in yards.Preferences set as you outlined.If you click on one of the pois it will show on screen Alert Information Distance= x miles.That will tell real quick if you have settings correct.

I found one of my problems was that my 450 doesn't do MP3, it uses WAV files. I'll have to go back and try with that. WOW, I've learned a lot from this one.

It seems that GPX is the preferred format, but I haven't found a way to do GPX with multiple POIs. I've got 121 sirens all in one file and 275 rain gauges in another. Individual "threats" can be done one at a time, but then I start doing schools or multiple points along a railroad track and I'm dealing with a lot of files. I'll need to load them up before my outings (it would sure be nice if you could turn them off and on from the Nuvi).

I've done conversions of CSV to GPX and I get invalid file errors.

Are there certain things that need to be or can't be in a CSV to convert them?

The 38 poi FILES I have on my Garmin are all in .csv format. Of these, 6 are set up as TourGuide files - and I have plain distance alerts on another 8 files. No problems with any of them. The rest I just use as informational when I'm looking for closest location, and of course, to take me there.

dave817 - thanks for that info. It works but I had to make changes to get my match.

After making the changes to Imperial/Metric/Metric, I had to change the Proximity value from 1000 feet to 3200 feet to get a match on two instances of the tourguide alert. Interestingly, when I enter "3200" in the field and say "Ok" - and then go back an edit again, the value is "3200.1".

When using a csv file and running POI Loader in manual mode, I was using 3100 feet yesterday as the distance that would alert and then cause the route to travel outside that radius in feet and alert again as it came back into the radius. Today I have to use 3200 feet to match the EPE gpx file with the revised settings.

The gpx file has this line
975.4

One question must be whether or not POI Loader actually is programmed to work in metric and converts what I enter from feet to meters.

Just to make sure others are reading this correctly, I was talking of POI File names containing "TourGuide" - not a POI entry with "TourGuide" in its individual name.

My tests indicate that one can produce "radius" alerts whose pop-up oval starts with "Tourguide" with only a .gpx file that has a value in the "Proximity" field in the "TourGuide Info" section at bottom of the right panel in EPE and which also points to a .wav file (in my case) that does not have "TourGuide" in its name.

Your quote from POI Loader:

was what prompted me to run the test using an EPE generated .gpx file that had "TourGuide" nowhere.

However, note that the POI Loader was referencing MapSource and saying it had to be a .gpx file. This confused me so -----

As you suggested

that is why I ran these tests.

Why your suggestion of Imperial/Metric/Metric worked is still a mystery to me. I think I need to ask TurboCC to comment.

I hope you will have time to run some tests and see if you get the same results I did. Simulation provides one with the ability to test many things without having to actually drive somewhere. I think the trick is to set up a "Recently Found" location near your "Go Home" location (wherever that is because some do not have that set at their "house") I do this because "Go Home" involves no setting of addresses - only one touch gets you started. Of course, a "Favorite" location properly set means only a couple more "touches".

Make sure to put the sox.exe in the right location.In my case for XP I click My Computer,Local Disk (c),Garmin Folder and paste the sox.exe on any blank space.You will see Poiloader,Mapsource etc in the Garmin folder. See http://www.poi-factory.com/node/25730

The way I do this is to use Extra POI Editor which was written by one of our members and is an awesome piece of software!!!!!

Get EPE from here:
http://turboccc.wikispaces.com/Extra_POI_Editor#toc5

Put it in a sub-folder (something like "EPE") to your Garmin folder - assuming you have one named that way. Recall that charlesd45 wanted you to put sox.exe into the C:\Garmin folder and he was assuming that is where you had placed the software for POI Loader. If it was not, then sox.exe MUST go in the folder where PoiLoader.exe resides.

It would seem that you have 121 sirens in a file and I will assume that is a .csv file. I will call it "sirens.csv" for this example.

Start EPE and have EPE open "sirens.csv". Simply do a File > Save As and EPE defaults to .gpx (I think). If not, click the down arrow to get to .gpx format and then save it. You are done.

If you do not have a .csv file, let us know what you are using.

Yes, it is & it does. With two exceptions. That's the gist of my messages to turbo about EPE.

The gpx file standard specifies all values be metric, hence the Garmin products expect that.

The speed numbers (@xx in a poi name) and the numbers in the file name however are NOT part of the gpx specification, or Garmin's extensions to it.

POILoader takes any numbers in a gpx file, assumes them to be metric but converts the ones following @xx in a poi name AND the ones in the file name according to which system you select at run-time.

As an aside to this topic, the bigger problem is that currently EPE also converts the @xx numbers in a poi name. When you type in a speed in it's speed box, it converts it from your editor system to your write system preferences, and adds it as @xx in the gpx file when it writes. So, if you also have speed numbers you need to set POILoader as well to Meters & Kph when using a EPE generated gpx. I hope turbo fixes that.

I just tested, and all 4 of my gpx examples work wth wav files as well if you follow charlesd45's note about sox.exe.

foghorn.legghorn- If you're using EPE to do your csv to gpx, make sure you have EPE's GPX Output, Encoding preference set to "UTF-8" or you can get invalid file errors from POILoader, MapSource, and probably BaseCamp.

I believe in the KISS principle - Keep It Simple Stupid! If .csv files work, why complicate things with .gpx files?

dobs108

There is no more complexity in GPX's than CSV's, the truth be known. Just more info available.

Ok. I think I had two problems.

I got rid of the MP3 and put in a wav file containing 1 second of silence. My 450 doesn't do MP3, despite what the "manual" says.

Second, I had an @0 in the filename to make it a proximity alert. Apparently the TourGuide keyword conflicts with the @0 keyword and the result was neither worked.

I'm good now with the sirens. They're the easiest for me to verify. Now I'll move on to some of the harder ones. Thanks all!

I believe you will find that the 450 does play mp3's.Most likely the problem is double extensions are file name and associate files not named the same.

The biggest problems with the alerts and icons not working are the files not being named the same except for extensions and having double extensions. Double-check each of them. The best way to prevent double extensions is to go to your folder options in the control panel and click view then find hide extensions for known file types and remove the check mark. Click ok. For Windows XP.

If you are typing in the extensions and you have not changed computer to show extensions you will not see the double extensions.If you want to keep the settings not to show extension.Just type in the name of the files and not the extensions they will taken care of by defult.

We are glad to see you were able to make the TourGuides work!

dobs108

Glad you got what you were looking for.

Btw, the @xx in a poi name isn't purely for proximity, it's actually for a speed value.. which does affect the proximity as well. As are any numbers in a filename.

Which of my two first examples in the 9th post from the top are more complex?

Number two because you might need editing software that understands gpx if you modify the pois? Seriously.. I'm curious.

(and there really is another reason I'm asking - something I'm currently working on)

It's probably the same thinking that goes "I don't use GPX because the file is 5 times larger and I don't want to run out of memory in my unit?

Foghorn just got the TourGuides working for the sirens. Did he use .csv or .gpx files?

dobs108

As well as yours. But I'll take that as #2 because gpx files are a complex "black hole" unless you tell me otherwise.

When the gpx file is converted to the gpi file it is much smaller then what it is showing on the computer.Take one gpx file and check size on computer.Load only that one gpx file to the gps.Hook gps up to computer and now compare the size for the one on gps drive(poi.gpi) to the one on the computer and you will see what I mean.

GPX files make excellent input to tour guides. I like them as it is easy to set different proximity alerts for different entries. I heavily modify the Wal-Mart file and set a greater distance for stores that have fuel over those that don't. You just have to remember you are working in meters rather than feet. (That's partially why I'm critical about format changes in the file Donald!)

Just to have some perspective, I just ran a test with Walmart csv and gpx files.

The csv file has 4619 locations and takes 510kb an my computer. The gpi file was 609kb.

The gpx file has 4649 lacations and takes 2,558kb on my computer. The gpi file was 928kb.

So, on the unit 609 versus 928.

In my opinion this is an acceptable increase in size for the value that you get by being able to use express mode in POI Loader and still have proximity alerts.

I think it is also possible to tailor the sound alert for each POI differently with a gpx file - although you would likely not want each to be different but only vary by something like "has restrooms" and "does not have restrooms" if you were doing your own rest area file.

Thanks Box Car. I'm already a 99% gpx user also. And, I've used other forms of XML enough that I don't have a problem with it myself.

But, I've always used 'csv' for doing heavy editing and speed number conversions, and that's why I was most curious about why some have a real aversion to gpx and avoid it.

I'm working on the latest revision to an Excel spreadsheet add-in that opens gpx files, has built-in poi specific functions, and saves as 'M-column' csv for rebuilding into gpx with EPE or GeePeeEx, etc.

I'm just curious why people use csv to the exclusion of the better functionality of gpx.

(I'm not sure who Donald is, but a file that stores numeric data (except speed) in anything but metric isn't adhering to the schema, and isn't 'gpx'.)

The only csv file I use is 'Zip Codes'. No other data is required for that file i.e. phone numbers etc. The rest are gpx.

I have a 260W and it does impact performance. Other user also reported the same. I only added 45000 POIs, but they have custom icons and alerts. Before the custom icons and alerts I didn't notice any slow downs. Now the unit "lags" about a second behind my actual position in the map. I take it it is the slow CPU. People with 700 series or higher appear to be unaffected.

On a side note, I can't help to read your messages with the "voice" of your avatar

I took over maintaining the Target Store file (csv) in July 2009. I wish I had noted the download count at that time, but I didn't. As best I can remember it was around 20,000.

The csv version download count is now at 27,870. That's about 7,000 downloads in a little over a year. I completely re-wrote and updated the file in the fall of 2009, so that accounted for a lot of the downloads.

In Feb. 2010, I added the gpx version of this file to the Factory. In 8 months, it has been downloaded 260 times. That's about 33 downloads a month, way behind the csv version.

My point is that the csv version is more popular by far, than its gpx counterpart.

Gary, I would attribute that to the lack of knowledge about the extra features gpx files offer.

Donaldb530 - He's the Wal-Mart file maintainer.

As to editing my source files, I use Excel and save them as .xls. That way when I format the column for zip codes as text, the leading zero stays. When you save the file as CSV all the formatting info is lost so zips get converted to numeric and the leading zero is dropped.

Working with XLS files lets me put any field in any column so the first two don't have to be lat/lon. They can, and in my files often are the POI Name field followed by address, city, state, zip, phone, lat, lon, description then comments. EPE allows concatenation, so say you have "Target - City" in the first column and the store number as a comment field, you can tell EPE both columns are POIName and it will concatenate the store number as it reads from the M Column order you specify. If you do a function to find say all the superstores, you can set a proximity value in a field that is one value and another value for those that are just Target stores.

It's pretty much what I do with Wal-Mart, I strip off the Sam's and the Canadian locations, find those with fuel and set a large proximity distance and those without fuel get a much smaller value. His GPX file, if it is complete is easier to begin with as I load it and then decompress it when saving as an M-Column XLS. I then have to go in and do a lot more editing, do a couple of sorts and then write my version back out as a new GPX which I load.

I have been using Excel to create POI CSV files. I also clean up the files, using the Excel functionality, before the final save as a CSV file (sticking to the four column format). I then open the POI CSV file in EPE and verify the longitude and latitude coordinates.

Your explanation, of the M-Column XLS to EPE interface, will greatly simplify/improve/expedite my future POI file creation. I will now be able to do all of my heavy file editing in Excel, and not have to deal with the CSV or GPX formats until the final file save in EPE.

First thing that I did, after learning about the M-Column XLS EPE functionality, was to go into EPE and define my M-Column CSV fields. Second thing was to create a placeholder POI (longitude, latitude, name) and save it as a M-Column XLS file, creating a template (with associated M-Column CSV field column headings) that I will use in the future for POI file creation.

Another lesson learned was how the Proximity field value varied between the EPE GPX file and the M-Column XLS file. Typically in EPE, I set my GPX file Proximity value in non-metric units (feet). I noticed that the XLS file had changed the Proximity value to meters (1 mile = 5280 feet in EPE = approximately 1600 meters in XLS). To simplify things (XLS value = EPE value) and minimize units confusion (feet or meters ?), I updated all of my EPE Units preferences to metric. I can still work in fractions of miles as 1600 m is divisible by 2, 4, 5, and 10 (0.5 mile = 800 m, 0.25 mile = 400 m, 0.2 mile = 320 m, 0.1 mile = 160 m).