Extra_POI_Editor v5.0 beta (.gpi file creation only in this thread)

Issue #1: POI icons in Where-To

This is the POI icons that will appear in the Where-To menu. Do not confuse it with the POI symbols that appears on the map. We'll get to that one later.

First news: there are 2 icons. The first icon is the one that you see when you go in the menu. The second one is the one that appears when the icon is selected (finger pressed). In the newer models, this is the same icon as the first one, but it is slightly smaller and it has a light blue highlight around it.

What's my problem with this? How to integrate the icons selection in EPE.

Option 1: When saving to .gpi, I could use the .gpi filename and try to find the 2 .bmp corresponding to the file being saved. For example, you create rest_area.gpi and EPE could look for rest_area1.bmp and rest_area2.bmp.

Pros: no need to define new Preferences in EPE. Yeah!

Cons: the .bmp files need to be in the folder where you save the .gpi or in a special folder in EPE's folder. If you change the file name, you have to rename the .bmp files as well. I do not think that you would rename your poi files that often.

Option 2: A new dialog can appear in EPE every time you save to a .gpi file and it asks you where are the 2 bmp file. The dialog could remember the last ones you used to make it easier.

Pro: not sure

Con: If you work on more than one POI files, you would need to browse to different bmp paths each time. EPE could remember the last 10 paths you used, but it is more work (for me).

My vote? I add a path in the Preferences where you will save all your POI icons. We'll define a naming convention (like xxxx1.bmp and xxxx2.bmp) and everytime you will save to xxxx.gpi, EPE will look for the icons in that specific folder. If EPE does not find it, there will be simply no icon in the Where-To menu. Just text. What do you think?

Hi Turboccc:

Is there any download for your new beta version? Where / when might one see it or screen shots of the new gui?

Congratulations on the latest award. Great work.
Thanks

No download until I solve some of the issues. I will post some more today. I also have to go back to work and this will slow things down during the week. Maybe a beta next weekend.

Turbo:

Thanks for the reply. I guess I jumped the gun again. Have a great week.

It is possible to have more than one level for a single file or multiple files. Here's one example with File A and File B. Let's call the POI icon in Where-To "My_POI". In each file, there are categories of POI, let's say Cat1 & Cat2 for file A and Cat3 in file B. The tree will look like this:

My_POI
.. File A
.... Cat1
.... Cat2
.. File B
.... Cat3

Under each category, you will find their respective POIs. Garmin did this very well. While under My_POI, you will see FileA and FileB. Clicking on FileA, you will see a new menu with only Cat1 & Cat2. Clicking on Cat1, you will see the POIs fron Cat1. Back to My_POI, clicking on the "All Categories" button will show Cat1, Cat2 & Cat3. Clicking again on "All Categories" will show all POIs from all categories.

Let's make an example with Car_Dealers.gpi. We will have car delers as the first level and the 3 States in which they are located as the second level.

Car_dealers
.. Hyundai
.... CA
.... NY
.... FL
.. Ford
.... NJ
.... CA
.... GA

2 levels are not always required. If you have only one category and put all Friendlys in one file, it will look like this:

Friendlys
.. all POI listed

If you have multiple files with restaurants and no sub-category, it may look like this:

Restaurants
.. McDonald
.. Chili's
.. Olive Garden
.. Outback

and each first level will have the list of their respective restaurants.

How do we manage this with EPE?

EPE can read mode than one file (using the Merge Open menu. Normally, this is intended to merge the files into one, but I keep track of where each file is coming from. I could make an export by filename and when you save as .gpi, the first level will be the name of each file.

Q1- How should we manage the second level? Most of you deal with CSV files with no category whatsoever. In this case, things will be easy and what I propose above will work. If export by Categories or by State, it will also use the Category or the State as the first level.

Q1 again: How do we manage the second level and keep this simple?

No answer comes easy for now. I think I will stick to one level for now and see how it goes. I am still interested in your feedback, though.

For one level, this is what I propose:

Option 1: I can create a new window where you drag & drop all the files that you want to include.

Option 2: I do the same as POI Loader and you will specify the root folder of all your POI files. The first level will be the name of each sub-folder.

I do not think POI Loader supports more than one level of folders. With EPE, it you put 2 gpx files in the sub-folder, I could use the POI filename to create the second category name.

Pros: simple interface

Cons: if there are multiple csv files, how would EPE knows which column assignment to use for each of them? There are chances that you will have all csvs with 4 columns, but sometimes 3 or maybe more. Bug!

My vote? I would go with option 2 for now. This is not as cool as creating categories out of a single file, but it is a start. I still need to figure out the .csv column assignment.

What do you think?

What do you think POILoader is doing (or assuming) with all of the .csv files it might get during a single run?

I agree, however, that option 2 would be a good starting point UNLESS doing so precludes switching to Option 1 later with analysis of each "drop" as it occurs ( and perhaps a reject if not recognized).

POI Loader just looks at the first 4 columns. EPE could do the same, but for some reasons I thought that loading all the columns could be more useful. Some people like the "viewing" capability of Excel for reviewing all their POIs.

One could argue that if you want all the information, you should save your 4+ column CSV into a .GPX.

I could also prompt the user for each file asking which M-Column Profile to use for each CSV. To avoid doing this all the time, EPE could save the information "somewhere" to be re-used later.

Have a fixed folder where icon files may appear using your xxxx1.bmp & xxx2.bmp suffix (location either fixed or in preferences). Have EPE check the folder where the .gpx or .csf file is, then the fixed folder, and lastly use no icon if not there. This way you could place the icon files in one place if desired.

Great work and congratulations, by the way.

At this point in the development I don't think you should assume anything more than what is required by POI Loader. This may be a case where you want 2 programs, one a POI Loader replacement in which you can view and modify the input and as a second the enhancement to EPE allowing the current file to be output as a GPI.

There are a number of users that rename GPI files to decrease the time they spend updating - as in if a file doesn't change that often, why keep reloading it. I think that option would be more useful for that level of user.

Having a POI Loader replacement allowing a person to view and modify the input file or stream would be a BIG improvement. POI Loader is famous for its lack of diagnostics in that with a CSV file it reports "Error in file zzzz, all data before line X will be loaded" or "ZZZZ.GPX has an error, skip this file?" It sure would be nice to have EPE open the file with an error at the point of the bad record and allow it to be fixed.

As to handling differences in CSV content, CSV only requires 3 fields, Lon, Lat, POI Name. The 4th field is the optional description and this is where we have the most problem in decoding. There is no agreed upon rules as to what content (and in what order) will be present.

If an input spreadsheet has more than 4 columns, I see 2 options, ignore anything after column D or open the editor and ask the user to define the file layout as an M-Column mask.

Thank you guys, this is very good feedback.

Looking in the source folder for the Where-To icons is ok when there is only one folder. That would work very well. If there are multiple folders, this would be confusing. I just need one pair of icons to put in the Where-To menu. One could argue to put them in the root folder, but this requires 2 folder levels. Or, you put the logo in the first folder, but then it becomes harder for me and you to determine which folder will be the first to be read by EPE. It may be a pain, but I think I will stick to the folder specified in the Preferences for now, but I do not exclude to look in the first level folder. Ièl;l think about this.

When working in POI Loader mode, EPE could load all POI files specified in the file path. This way, if it finds a CSV with more than 4 columns, it can prompt you for the right profile. I like that, but this will require a partial file preview to see what is inside and determine the right profile to use. If I was really fency, I could also count the number of columns and try to find automatically the right profile to use. Maybe this is a bit too crazy to start with.

Obviously, ignoring anything after column D is much simpler. Maybe we can stick to that in the first phase. I'll think a bit more about this.

Assuming EPE loads all the POIs, that could mean 10 or 100 thousands POIs (or more) in the editor. That will work for sure, but any other processing like sorting, find duplicates or other (view POIs on map is out of the question) may become relatively slow depending on your computer.

Alternatively, I could load one file at a time and write sequencially to the GPI file. This way, there is no more than one file loaded at a time. I think this makes more sense. Like I wrote before, I could still create a second level if there are more than one file per folder without having to load all files at the same time.

Currently I use both csv and gpx. If all I need is a name and/or description I'll keep the file as a csv to feed into POILoader. But I usually take a csv with more than a description (like address (or other) details) in col D and parse it in a spreadsheet to M columns then run it through EPE to re-create it as gpx to run through POILoader. So from my point of view:

I'd like to see categories based on root folder & sub folder names and the files in those folders. With an option to use/not use gpx categories if the folder contains gpx files. Icons with the same name & in the same folders as the files (.. ala POILoader).

Regardless, categories more than two levels deep would be highly desirable, and a much needed improvement over POILoader.

Note- My POV is slightly different than most since I convert to and use more gpx files than csv, and I typically edit gpx files using a spreadsheet rather than EPE.

I can't wait to give it a try. Thanks

For some of the files I regularly convert I created M-Column templates in EPE. I then open the csv in EPE and save it as an M-Column XLS. Saves a lot of work in Excel.

Yeah, I find spreadsheet editing more relaxing.

But I 'cut corners' with these spreadsheet utils I created:
http://gpspois.wikispaces.com/

In the current implementation (which may or may not be released with any changes), I load a file in EPE and do a File-Export-Category. The first level becomes the category name as specified in the GPX file.

With multiple files, I am not sure if I need to sort everything before making categories. I need to test more.

Also, each POI has a special index number which so far seems to indicate the category number in the first level. It allows to see only the POI belonging to that category. I am not sur eI am explaining this correctly, but it seems to sugges only 2 levels are possible.

So far, I am doing this by hand. It is a real pain. Once I can generate them with EPE, I'll try to add more than 2 levels.

..deleted. Some day I'll start reading everything before I post!

You could "standardize" all CSV files by creating header column titles using a recognized title as you have in EPE. That way, EPE could "read" the first line of data to determine what data is in which column.

For the CSV files that don't include the column titles could easily be changed by inserting the title line in the file.

One other thought for CSV files, is to make one column the path for the BMP file in the title lines

Yes, the "standardize" CSV header exists in GeePeeEx. I would rather create a local .ini file or elsewhere to remember the profile name this specific file used to load. Things "standardized" always cause issues. But, yes, this is a possibility.

As for the bmp file, it is ok for me to look in the poi file folder the same way as POI Loader by checking the same filename, but with the extension .bmp. As for the Where-To icons, it can't be embedded in the CSV fiel because it applies to all POI files. It is a global icon.

I have not check this yet. I think an external program is needed to load MP3 files (SOX.exe I think). I wonder what it does. Does it convert MP3 files back to WAV?

This could be a feature I will keep for last. Any info on this would be appreciated. Otherwise, I'll just load an MP3 file using POI Loader and I'll see how it ends up.

Sox is used to enable audio files to be heard on unit without an MP3 player. Exactly what it does, I haven't a clue. Sox requires a WAV file for use.

And it looks like that's all it does, to ENABLE sound. I tried to load .wav files of a smaller sample rate and bit rate (to save memory) but they didn't work. It certainly doesn't convert mp3 to wav; I tried that also. How it interfaces with POI loader other than to enable sound... no idea.

The information here might offer a clue:

http://sox.sourceforge.net/

Any way when using the program.A user who has not set up their computer to show hidden extensions.The program will alert the user of the problem of double extensions so the change can be made.

Interesting little program. It is capable of doing conversions, so POI loader is not passing those parameters to sox.exe, as the sounds didn't work in my unit. POI loader doesn't pass parameters to convert MP3 to wav either. I wonder what type of conversion POI loader is requesting from sox.exe, which is what ultimately goes into the gpsr.

I have been working on the Where-To icon transparency issues for the past few days. No result. It should work, but it does not. I am missing something. Anyways, it still works at 95% so I guess I'll jump to something else for now.

I worked a bit on the proximity/speed too. Still a bit more work.

POI writing seems to be working well with all the fields.

There is a crisis in my wife's family and I need to take care of her so I may be delayed in releasing the new EPE beta. Sorry for this, but I really need to spend time with her. Thanks.

As always take all the time you need with your family, you and your family have our (The Factory) support and are in our thoughts and prayers.

We'll wait for whenever you are ready. Family is always first! No need to apologize.

Ok! Let's have some fun. Well, you are going to have the fun and I'm going to have the bugs. LOL! Let's be clear: I am not done yet. I am just posting this beta version so you can help me testing and have some fun with this in the meantime.

The first thing you need is the beta: The current download link is here:

http://turboccc.wikispaces.com/file/detail/Extra_POI_Editor+...

Second, we need to establish some rules, otherwise I am going to be flood with unknown bugs.

1- If you have a bug, you need to tell me how to reproduce it.

2- If you need to send me a POI file, it must have only one POI in it. This will reduce the amount of time I need to spend on each file trying to find what went wrong. If there are only one POI, you should also be able to find out what caused the problem.

Here's one example of bug report:

I used the character "@" in the POI name and my GPS was not able to display it, or a weird character appeared, or ... I removed the "@" and the problem was gone.

This way, I know exactly what caused the problem and what to look for.

Note: I have not tested all the funny characters. So start slowly and let me know if some are not working correctly.

Here's how to make your own POI icon in the Where-To. You need to make 2 icons: one by default and one when the icon is pressed. They must have the same name as your .gpi file with the suffix 1 and 2. For example, if you want a poi file sonata.gpi, you need to make 2 bitmaps sonata1.bmp and sonata2.bmp. You must also set the path to find those 2 files in the Preferences. If the files cannot be found, EPE will use its default logo for you. It's ugly, but it does the job. Try to make logos smaller than 150 pixels by 150 pixels. Logos can be regular 24-bit logo, or even better, 32-bit logos with transparency.

For now, you can only save the POIs currently loaded in EPE. You can use "Save As" and select the filetype .GPI. You can also export by Category or export by State. I have not tested if you put 2 of those .gpi files what will happen in the Where-To. I mahe have to change the internal part number for each POI file.

Notes:

1- proximity and speed are not working for now. The other regular fields are working. Even fax and Phone2.

2- Do not try to load audio files or bitmaps. It does not work. I set a default icon to appear on the map. It is garbage for now. I will put something better by default and add the possibility to load your own like POI Loader does.

Remember this is for fun. If it works for you, then Great! If not, do not be too disappointed. Just let me know and I'll fix it. The end result will be very cool!

Turbo

Great job! On my first test (one POI) everything went without a hitch. Used the default icon.

Second test with two .GPI files (just because), and only the first .GPI file name appears in the menu. Its contents are duplicated. There is not sign of the second .GPI file.

Third test - remove original file (renamed) and second .GPI file (with a half-dozen POIs) appears in the menu.

In all tests, the POIs appeared in a category named TurboCCC 000. With the two .GPI files, this category appeared twice.

FYI, I did not remove my other pre-existing .GPI files. They were merged into the POIs created by EPE in the new .GPI file. They also appeared when I pressed the normal Extras icon. The new EPE POIs did not appear there under Extras.

This is very cool, and a lot of fun!!

I have an expanded version of my Breweries poi, which includes a small jpeg image for each poi. Up until last Aug. I was able to save as a .gpx with EPE then load using Poi-Loader. Since then Poi-loader says the .gpx file contains no data even though it looks fine.
The last working gpi was 29megs. I saved the current version of my poi, as a gpi, but it only shows the first few columns (I'm using the m-column layout).
Also, Command23 shows in the preview window.
I put the two bmp images in the same folder as EPE and my poi file, Do I need to use command23 to associate them to the gpi?

LOL! I completely forgot to remove the Command23 button. It was for testing purposes. Just forget it for now.

For you r 2 BMP images, you can put them wherever you want as long as you specify the folder path in the Preferences.

@WAASup,

Yes, merging of the Extra and Where-To POIs are done by the GPS. This is normal.

When you put 2 .gpi files made with EPE, something strange happens. Internally, there are a partnumber, some poi categories and the poi file title. Since all those 3 are generated by EPE, they are all the same. This may explain what you say. I need a way to generate unique part numbers and poi file title. In the later case, it should simply be the file name.

Edit: ok. I found a way to make sure the 2 .gpi files will not be merged together and appear correctly in the Where-To menu. Try v5.01 here:

http://turboccc.wikispaces.com/file/detail/Extra_POI_Editor+...

Note: do not rename files outside EPE. The file name is used inside the poi file. Instead, save twice in EPE with a different name.

I have a Nuvi 765T.

When I create and install a 1 entry poi file with EPE and install it to the poi directory on my SD card (which is where I install my custom .gpi files created in PoiLoader) I get an icon on my "where to?" screen named cabelas (the name of the created gpi file is cabelas.gpi). I have never seen my 765 do this before (place an icon on the where to screen).

When I select it, it displays the single location in the file. It is not being included in the "Where To" -> "Extras" -> Custom POI screen where my other custom poi's are normally listed.

When I create the same cabelas.gpi with POILoader and place the file on my SD card in place of the EPE created version the icon is no longer on the "where to" screen but rather is listed under the "Where To" -> "Extras" screen as they normally have been.

I used the same cabelas.csv file for both creations. The file contains 4 columns (lat, lon, name, address) and was created using excel

Edit, I posted this while you made another post of a similar issue, sorry if it is a duplicate problem. Will delete post if needed

@Gastx,

Yes, EPE puts the icon in the Where-To menu. You know, I worked very hard to do this... LOL! To my knowledge, I am the only one who succeeded in doing this, except Garmin. In a future version, I will let you select if you want the POIs to appear in Where-To or Extra-Custom POI. I just thought this would be more spectacular in the Where-To.

BTW, if you use capital letters in the poi file name, you will have a poi icon with capital letters as well in the Where-To menu.

Just another note: If the icon in the Where-To menu looks weird, just check or uncheck the Alternate Icon format in the Preferences. On my 760, I need to use a different format than on my 3750. In the future, I may ask the GPS to be connected so I can determine the right icon format automatically. Do not think this is an EPE bug. I have other .gpi files made by Garmin that do the exact same thing.

No problem with the icon being in the "Where To" menu, it just caught me off guard and assumed (you know what they say about assumptions ) it was a bug as I have never seen this happen before.

I normally have 4 separate .gpi files loaded on my SD card. 1 each for Ark, Tex, and Lou geocache locations and them a main.gpi which includes all of my poi files I download from POI Factory which display as separate categories under the extra-custom POI menu.

I am all for reducing the number of menu levels I have to traverse to get to my geocache files. Carry on the great work and look forward to more testing.

Thanks

Hi Turbo,
I tried your gpi mods for the first time. I was surprised by the saved gpi file appearing on the main menu rather than under Extras>Custom POIs like POI Loader does even if you make a separate POI Loader created gpi file. I'd like control over that, as most times the main menus are crowded enough without adding a bunch of other buttons.

The Garmin extended address fields are not present in the EPE gpi file. I assume that's because this is just a Beta. Those fields are very important. I did see the Phone# field,but the rest of them are missing.

About POI levels in the menu, POI Loader makes the structure Extras>Custom POIs>Alpha POI filenames. I'd prefer yours generate Extras>Alpha POI filenames, dropping the Custom POIs useless level.

Another possible EPE mod would be to take geocoded photos and make MapSource gpx files of Waypoints that include file pointers to the photos in the same folder. That would round out TourGuide creation. You'd have to examine EXIF and IPTC tag info from the photos to see what fields would be useful. IRFANVIEW does a good job of displaying photo fields and there is a photo organization that defines the structure of the image tags.

When you finish these EPE mods, are you going to rewrite MapSource ? Maybe just a map database display program where all the data can be observed, from a standard map layout without the Garmin cartoon display of MapSource to speed limit definitions, road types, one way indicators, etc., though I don't know where you'd start to get the database structures.

If I had access to a Harley branded Toad Tech Garmin, I'd want to experiment with your main menu buttons to see if I could replace the one that Harley puts there with my POI data gpi file. Many Road Tech owners have asked for that one.
Dave

In the long run, the goal is to add only one button in the Where-To and up to 2 other level layers. That should be enough to add only one icon in the Where-To menu. As for dropping the Custom-POI level, that is another story. I do not know how to do that yet.

You are right. They are gone. I know I tested that, so I did something wrong to lose them. I'll check. Thanks.

If you open a .jpg file with EPE, it will use the geotagged information to create your POI. That has been there for some time. Not perfect, but working. Please post question about this in the other thread. Thx.

Agreed. I like the POIs on the main menu as well but of course would like control over where they end up on the unit...great job on this work-in-progress, TurboCCC!

DorkusNimrod (AKA: SergZak)

Extended address info is fixed. I had a typo. It would have worked if you did not use the email field. Now, all is good in v5.02.

http://turboccc.wikispaces.com/file/detail/Extra_POI_Editor+...

Hi DorkusNimrod! I didn't know it was you. That explains why you are as bright as SergZak!

BTW, I am TurboCCC (aka turboccc), but I am sure you recognized me already! LOL! My wife says I have a bad sense of humour. At least I make myself laugh! ROTFL!

Yes, Turbo, "It's a Small World"...hmmm, that makes me think of Disneyland where I'll be with my son on Friday since we have annual passes & live only a few miles away...but, we'll be at Space Mountain or something *other than* "It's a Small World".

sorry, back to the topic at hand...

First congrats. Well deserved. Second, this is a really great adjunct to EPE and long overdue - glad someone is finally taking a real stab at it.

Ok a question and a suggestion. Q: Before I start playing with it, will it work with my old Nuvi 360? S: it would be really neat to put some of my specialized POIs immediately under an existing category button (I.e. my favorite restaurants under the food category).

I really appreciate the approach you are taking in letting us minions out here really beta test! TY

It should work with any Garmin GPS model, but you seriously have to try it. Make a quick try. Start EPE and create one POI. Just set a couple fields. Save as .gpi and copy that file in the POI filder on your GPS. Reboot. EPE will put a default icon. So no need to bother with that for a quick test.

Your POI will not appear in existing categories. I am pretty sure of that. I wish it was possible. I have been dreaming of that for a long time, but I can foresee the problems this would generate for Garmin.

EPE beta v5.03 fixes an issue with the City field and negative latitude coordinate.

http://turboccc.wikispaces.com/file/detail/Extra_POI_Editor+...

Now supports custom icons for the POI file. If you open a POI file called Rest_Area.gpx (or .csv) and you have also the corresponding bitmap Rest_Area.bmp (only bitmaps supported for now), this bitmap will also be read and integrated to the .gpi, and this icon will be displayed on the map at the POI location.

I also fixed the min/max lon/lat area.

Still no speed/proximity, no wav/mp3.

New d/l link:
http://turboccc.wikispaces.com/file/detail/Extra_POI_Editor+...

Thanks turboccc, great work as always. I see Garmin is copying some of your work with POI Loader v 2.6.0

Do you mean, the bugs? LOL!

No the naming POI part, beside theirs is a finished product with bugs

And, coyrighted bugs, I might add...

I made a quick check at POI Loader and sox.exe. Here's what I found:

When you have a POI file and a .wav which is not exactly the format POI Loader wants, it calls sox.exe to convert it to the right format. For example, POI Loader wants a 16-bit mono wav at 44100 Hz. If you have a wav file at 22050 Hz, it will need to be converted.

This means EPE will need sox.exe as well to convert some wav files with bad format.

I tested as well with an MP3 file. The MP3 file was simply inserted in the .gpi file without any conversion. I do not think sox.exe was used either.

Other subject:

If you have a .bmp with the same file name as your POI, it will be embedded in the .gpi file. Does this work as well with .jpg symbol file? I tried a .jpg today and POI Loader ignored it. Did I miss something?

I tried to use Extra_POI_Editor V504 (and any of other the 50X versions) to create POI files directly in the Where-To menu with the default turboccc icon.

There is no new turboccc icon added in the "Where-To" menu (or anywhere else), but the same .gpi file does add the turboccc icon with my nuvi 775T and 255W.

I did not try with custom icons and/or .wav files as of yet.

Thanks for your work and the added features of .gpi support.