Recommendations for CSV layout

 

Hi, all. I've assumed responsibility for some existing POI files and I'm looking for some advice on formatting the CSV files.

In the third column I'm planning to put the POI name, address and phone, like this:

Harveys: 401 Bayfield St, Barrie, ON >705-737-3911

The ">" is the phone number delimiter for TomTom devices.

I see lots of CSV files with a fourth column which, as far as I know, most TomTom devices effectively ignore (mine does). However, if there is something I can put in there that would be helpful to users of other brands what would it be?

as the majority

As the majority of this site's members own Garmins, I have no problem with you creating POI tailored for Tom-Tom however, existing formats shouldn't be changed. If you want to produce 2 versions of a file, that is fine. Leave the 4 column as is and identify the Tom-Tom version as being a 3 column. This would be similar to those of us producing both CSV and GPX versions of a file. Perhaps Turbo would be willing to modify (again) the output options of EPE to support your proposed format.

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Illiterate? Write for free help.

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Box Car wrote:

If you want to produce 2 versions of a file, that is fine. Leave the 4 column as is

But that's the thing... If possible, I'd like to find a CSV format that can work reasonably well for both Garmin and TomTom owners.

I have already seen that the use of the fourth CSV column is rather inconsistent. Sometimes it simply repeats the third column, and sometimes it has additional address information in it. When it has additional information, sometimes it has hard line-breaks in it and other times is has <br> tags. Perhaps the latter are interchangeable – I don't know – that's why I'm asking for advice.

The format for Garmin

The format for a Garmin CSV file requires only 3 columns. Longitude, Latitude and POI Name. The 4th column is optional and there is the rub. There are no requirements for the fourth column or position. As different models of Garmin use different characters for line breaks, you have many different line breaks.

Generally, and that's with a big brush, the Garmin format is fairly fixed by the majority of maintainers so that Column C (or field 3) is the name for the location. This often is just an entry like Red Lobster - Andover or can be the name of a shopping center or anything to identify the location. Mahoney has the POI Name include the city and state and sometimes other information such as Diesel for fuel stops. The fourth position then contains the street address, city, zip or post code and telephone number. Garmin doesn't recognize a phone number in a CSV, only with the GPX format.

The major difference between the units is how the 3rd field is treated. TT doesn't have a "name" field but more a "description" field which is what the 4th position is for with Garmin.

The problem for you is adopting an existing POI file written in one format and proposing to go from 4 fields to 3 with the 3rd field containing what most Garmin owners would expect in the 4th field. The other problem is Garmin limits the number of characters that will display from the information in the 3rd field to about 20. There's just no easy way around the issue. Either way, in order to get the functionality in both lines, it either involves a lot of editing of a file using an editor or learning to live with whatever format the original file uses. It's not an easy chore, either way you're between the dog and the hydrant. The file will work in one manufacturer's units perfectly and be somewhat less friendly in anothers.

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Illiterate? Write for free help.

@Versatileguy

Displaying my ignorance here. How do .csv files get converted to the .ov2 files I see on POIs you maintain?

I notice your POI files have .csv, .gpx and .ov2 versions (although not all for every of you POIs).

The 4th column is just a

The 4th column is just a mess even with Garmins. One displays them the other does not. I run a tool to merge the 3rd and 4th columns and remove all end of line / return characters. There really should be standard strictly enforced.

--
eTrex Touch 35, Nuvi 1350LMT, Nuvi 350, Nuvi 260, Garmin GPS III, Basecamp

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thetick wrote:

There really should be standard strictly enforced.

LOL. Oh no, here we go again!!!

How many times has this been discussed?

You can't enforce a standard when there is no standard for csv files. grin

GadgetGuy2008 wrote:
thetick wrote:

There really should be standard strictly enforced.

LOL. Oh no, here we go again!!!

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Nuvi 2460LMT.

Déjà vu

Oh no... not again. shock

If someone can find that old topic on here (I couldn't find any good search terms) we need to paste the link here so everyone can see what we went through before.

*Gary runs screaming from the room* wink laugh out loud laugh out loud laugh out loud laugh out loud

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Tampa, FL - Garmin nüvi 660 (Software Ver 4.90), 2021.20 CN NA NT maps | Magellan Meridian Gold

Previous "Standards" Discussion

Gary A wrote:

If someone can find that old topic on here (I couldn't find any good search terms) we need to paste the link here so everyone can see what we went through before.

The previous "standards" thread is here:

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/18592

I had actually skimmed that discussion a while back, and it was not my intention to re-open that particular topic. I wasn't looking for a "standard" to impose on anybody else; I was just looking for any advice that non-TomTom users could offer that might my CSV files more useful to them. redface

selfish?

This is my standard, I create the files to work in my units then I share, if it doesn't work in yours then you fix it to your liking, there are programs to strip what you don't need.

Both my Garmins have no problem displaying 4 column CSV files.

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Garmin 38 - Magellan Gold - Garmin Yellow eTrex - Nuvi 260 - Nuvi 2460LMT - Google Nexus 7 - Toyota Entune NAV

@jgermann

jgermann wrote:

How do .csv files get converted to the .ov2 files I see on POIs you maintain?

They are stored as CSV. They get converted to OV2 "on the fly" from columns 1 through 3 of the CSV file when you click the "TomTom OV2" download button.

jgermann wrote:

I notice your POI files have .csv, .gpx and .ov2 versions (although not all for every of you POIs).

Several of the POI files I recently "adopted" were uploaded in both CSV and GPX formats. One of the reasons I asked for advice is that I don't have any practical experience with Garmin devices and I didn't want to make any uninformed "TomTom-centric" changes that would needlessly inconvenience others.

Since ov2 files are created

Since ov2 files are created when you click the ov2 button you need to create the file in csv or gpx.

csv is generally 4 columns as you have found out.
gpx is more than 4 columns because it can contain other data and also store a phone number that you can dial with a bluetooth enabled phone.

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Nuvi 2460LMT.

@VersitleGuy

Ok, a csv file gets converted on the fly to an OV2 file but the conversion only involves columns 1 to 3.

The only way to read this is that any additional columns get ignored?

Aside from OV2, are there any other formats that whatever loads POI files to a TomTom will accept? (for instance, POILoader will take both .csv and .gpx)?

The FAQ "How do I convert POI files to TomTom OV2 format?" (see http://www.poi-factory.com/node/6675) seems to imply that .gpx files can be converted to OV2 (perhaps by POIEdit). Is that true?

@jgermann

jgermann wrote:

Ok, a csv file gets converted on the fly to an OV2 file but the conversion only involves columns 1 to 3.

The only way to read this is that any additional columns get ignored?

Aside from OV2, are there any other formats that whatever loads POI files to a TomTom will accept? (for instance, POILoader will take both .csv and .gpx)?

The FAQ "How do I convert POI files to TomTom OV2 format?" (see http://www.poi-factory.com/node/6675) seems to imply that .gpx files can be converted to OV2 (perhaps by POIEdit). Is that true?

Did you consider investigating this by looking at PoiEdit and seeing what it's capable of before you asked the question?

--
Illiterate? Write for free help.

I did

Box Car wrote:

Did you consider investigating this by looking at PoiEdit and seeing what it's capable of before you asked the question?

but, thought that, since VersatileGuy has obvious experience, I could get a answer from him.

Since I found references to POIEdit, POI Edit, and POI Editor, and have no experience with any of them (assuming they are different), the quick question seemed best.

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jgermann wrote:

The FAQ "How do I convert POI files to TomTom OV2 format?" (see http://www.poi-factory.com/node/6675) seems to imply that .gpx files can be converted to OV2 (perhaps by POIEdit). Is that true?

Yes. I don't know about POIEdit, but with Extra POI Editor you can open a GPX file and then save it as an OV2 file.

It not a selfish issue.

It not a selfish issue. It's a compatibility issue. Garmin itself can not even be consistent with supporting a 4 column. I wrote custom scripts to fix all the different scenarios I hit with my different Garmin units. Some use 3 some use 4, others don't and show the return EOL characters.

There is no excuse not have a standard and Garmin really is to blame.

A text file is text file regardless of what is in it. A standard is what everyone should use so we don't have these compatibility issues.

In another 5 years I'll probably bring it up again if Garmin is still making GPSRs.

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eTrex Touch 35, Nuvi 1350LMT, Nuvi 350, Nuvi 260, Garmin GPS III, Basecamp

I'm a fan of overkill

I want my files to have way too much information. The files I created are all in .gpx format. If you don't want it in your particular unit, you chop it out. As the Home Depot guy once eloquently told me, "It's better to look AT it, than to look FOR it".

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Striving to make the NYC Metro area project the best.

I would never use the 4th

I would never use the 4th column, but merge as stated above on getting the info into a single value.

My Garmin doesn't like the 4th data spot being there.

Forbidden knowledge

When I joined this forum just over 3 years ago I saw the same problems being discussed here of how to gather and keep good data, and to properly format it for Garmin, Tomtom and perhaps other devices. I made my living for years developing software, including process control software, satellite communication systems, and database applications. The task seemed a perfect match for a rather simple database. Once in a database the information could be output in any form that any GPS needs and and the user wants (recognizing that not all users have the same desires for POI content).

I know that not all users could be expected to be database users. But it would be very easy to import data into a database if it was cleanly organized. Spreadsheets, CSV files and simple text files can all serve as input and be cleanly imported to a database.

I joined the previously mentioned discussion. There seemed to be a lot of interest, 5 pages of posts in about two months. Sure, there were some people who wanted to call people Nazis because they were trying to organize something rather than keep the chaos that has now prompted this discussion, but in general some good discussion seemed to be happening.

But the thread was shut down. Supposedly because this site was going to make some changes and (apparently) adopt some sort of system. We were told "I am locking this thread for now because we already know what we will be doing." Apparently we were no longer even to discuss the issue because some big change was coming. The people who called others Nazis got what they wanted. I'm not sure what the big change was, it never happened.

I built a couple of POIs this way, using a very simple script file that went straight from a text file to a .csv file (no point in fooling with a database if no one else wants to use one). I could easily write other scripts to use the same input but output xml files or TomTom ov2 files, or whatever else was needed. But I really don't want to spend much more time on it if we are just going to be told to "shut up" again.

GPX to other formats

For myself, I would keep the complete data in a GPX file because this allows me to have access to all the field data separately. It is my basic "database".

Using the 4-Column CSV profiles in EPE (which can be 3-Column CSV as well), I can remap the data in any way I want and save each profile for later use when saving. Once your profile is made, it becomes as simple as saving a file in 3 formats (for example 3-column CSV, 4-Column CSV and OV2).

Same here

I would rather look AT it, than to look FOR it... More information is "mo better!". .gpx is my format of choice. It can always be 'dumbed down' later.

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Striving to make the NYC Metro area project the best.