Uploaded POI subfolders not loading in alphabetical order

I see the same issue on my 1390T, 2495LMT and my new Drivesmart 55. It's kind of stupid that they don't show up in alphabetical order.

When you load your POI’s, do you do it manually or use the auto function?

Hi, do it auto mode. I tried manually but could not figure out how to do it. Maybe you can help. What do you do with the screen you get when you select "Manual" ? Thanks Terry

When I go to the Manual screen I get a message "Please choose the settings for the file "%1$@". I have tried all option and a blue continue box comes up but when I select it, nothing happens.

It has always annoyed me that, when I look at my poi files on the computer they organize alphabetically but, when I look at them on the GPS, they don't organize that way. Very weird.

POIs on the unit are listed in order by distance from your location.

..you have POI loader installed on your computer. Upon clicking on POI loader, a box should pop-up asking if you want to allow changes to be made to your device. It should have 7z Setup in the box. Click yes. This will open up the POI loader. Click accept the agreement and then click done. The next box will say "Welcome to the POI loader". Click next. The next pop-up will ask if you want to save to your Garmin device or your computer. Click device and then next. The next pop-up will be "Find your device". It will show either your device or (if you have a memory card installed) it will show the memory card. Click where ever you want to save the file. (Either to the device or the memory card.) Click next. It will then ask you to select where the data files are found. If they are not displayed in the box, click browse and find the POI file. If the POI file doesn't have a name, put the file name in the box. At the next box use the drop-down file and choose the "form of measurement" that you want to use. In the next box, choose "manual". Click next. You will get a pop-up telling you that the POI file already exists and will ask if you want to "overwrite the file". Click Yes. The next box will bring up your first POI file. It will ask if you want to ignore the file or if it contains proximity points. Choose "proximity points". Under alert settings click "Alert whenever you get close to a point". Put a distance in feet in the box and click next. Do this for all of your remaining POI's. If you want to ignore one, just click ignore. All of your POI folders should now be installed on your GPS in alphabetical order. Each file within the folder should be installed in alpha order. The only exception to this would be if say, you installed the National Parks POI. All of the parks are listed closest to you so they will not be in alpha order.

POI's will load according to distance. For instance, Shell gas stations will all show Shell on the GPS but they will be according to distance from the current location of the GPS. However, if you are looking at the Auto Repair Shops POI, they are listed in alphabetical order but by distance. For example, when I look at auto repair shops around me, I see the following:
R & M Auto Repair-6.0 mi. W,
Thamann's Service-16.3 mi. SW,
Mader Trans.-44.8 mi. N,
Tiltons-Grandview-75.2 mi. NE,
Tiltons-Worthington-80.8 mi. NE
Tiltons-Northland-82.2 mi. NE
Tiltons-Gahanna-83.9 mi. NE
So, as you can see; some of the POI's will show in alphabetical order, while others won't.

Phranc, the OP is talking about his folders not in alphabetical order, not the individual POI's in the folders.

Phil

Hi, Some of you have the issue of POIs in alpha order and sub folders in alpha order. Most of the agents at Garmin did the same thing. Obviouly POIs cannot and should not be in Alpha order.

I got this explanation from a higher agent at Garmin. The answer makes sence but the reason the sub folders are not in Alpha order does not. Bottom line is that the Garmin software will not put the subfolders in alphs order.

We need to contact Garmin and ask them to go back to the older software that allowed this feature.

Answer from Garmin Tech support:

Hello Terry,

With changes in our devices and POI software, the POI categories assigned will no longer appear in alphabetical order. There is no way to dictate the order the individual categories or lists will appear in.

I can take feedback of your desire for our products to be returned to the older state where they displayed in alphabetical order. I have also submitted a request to get our FAQ updated to reflect the correct information.

Thank you for choosing Garmin,
Alex
Product Support
Garmin International

I pulled up the present FAQ just to see what information it provided. Never had a need to search for it before. https://support.garmin.com/en-US/?faq=qoNRGEzCxb5MqQvgRtTaF8...

Not sure about what Garmin is now saying.Just updated my POIS today and just like always they are in alphabetical order.

I must have fake Garmins, because all my Nuvis display CATEGORIES in alpha order.

Nuvi 1490 == When I go to CUSTOM POIs, my list is alpha, with the exception of the alerts = Redlight Cameras, Rest areas, & Speed Cameras. Those are all on top and in that order. If I click ALL CATEGORIES (Nuvi's 1st selection), those are all random categories.

When I load POIs, I have 2 folders, ALERTS and ALL, These are separate so that I load the alerts manually and set the alert distance for each one individually.

The ALERTS folder contains CSV, BMP, & WAV files for the 3 categories. The ALL folder has subfolders, one for each Category. Each of those folders contain the CSV, BMP, & WAV files for each store in the category.

On my Nuvi 3597, the ALL CATEGORIES goes immediately to listing destinations which are listed by distance.

I would assume that if I included the Alerts in the ALL folder and made ONE pass (one GPI file) instead of 2, they might all be in alpha order.

My POI folder on the Nuvis has 2 GPI files, ALERTS.GPI and ALL.GPI

SO, now that I have detailed it, my assumption is that you are loading your POIs, one category at a time and have a GPI file on the Nuvi for each category. If you place your category folders in one folder (the same as my ALL folder) and load the whole folder in one operation (select the folder and not individual files), they will probably come out like mine in alpha. Let me know if I am correct in my assumption and if the change works.

So much for HIGHER Garmin technical support.

I believe ruggb is correct. That is the way my Nuvi 265 works. Like him I have two GPI files one with the red light and speed camera files and another with sub-folders for each category of POIs. My categories all show up in alpha order.

Are you using the renaming method? http://www.poi-factory.com/node/16639 .That may be causing your problem. Remember in past posts, members had the problem when they replaced the the gpi files with the updated ones.Resulting in the other gpi files not being in alphabetical order.If I remember correctly, they went back and reinstalled the renamed files again to regain the correct order.

Subdirectories sort in the order that you created the Subdirectories. Read my post in the following node.

http://www.poi-factory.com/node/47910

7th reply in the node. I went into detail.

In a nutshell. Subdirectories show in the order that you created the subdirectory. A subdirectory created Nov 28, will show ahead of a subdirectory created today. A subdirectory created 2 minutes before the one you just created will show up before.

The individual POI File, in a specific subdirectory, will sort alphabetic order within that subdirectory. GM.gpx will show ahead of Toyota.gpx.

Specific POIs within a file will show in order of the distance to that POI. A Crackerbox 10 miles away, will show ahead of a Bob Evans that's 12 miles away, even though Bob Evans is alphbetically ahead of Crackerbarrel.

I use this unique sorting to have the files, that I want to see at the top of the POI screen, to show closest to the top.

For instance, Red Light Cameras and Rest Areas are used almost exclusively as proximity alerts. You never actually look for the location. As a result, I create these files last, so that the are at the bottom of the screen. Gas Stations, Restaurants,Customers (if you're a salesman or service person) are files that you use all the time, so you want them at the top. Create those files first.

Hope this helps. The reply that I referred above has better detail, so you might want to read it.

After much testing, this is my conclusion:
The Nuvi does "sort", sort of.

It "sorts" according to WHEN the file is transferred to the Nuvi.
I create my GPI files and save them to the computer. The only thing a name change does is to reposition the file in the transfer. Transfers are done in alpha order. When I loaded BOTH files at the same time, the one that was 1st alpha displayed first because it was the first one transferred to the Nuvi. If I transfer ALL then transferred ALERTS, ALL appeared first. It does not depend on the date/time or name of the file.

Anything IN the folder is alpha because POILoader reads them that way creating the GPI.

The only thing I can figure is that different Garmins sort differently.

My NUVI 2555LMT sorts as I have described above. Others seem totally different.

Go figure.

So are you talking a MAC machine or a WINDOWS machine?

I have been loading POI on my units since 2005 and use a Windows PC.

I have a folder called MY POI and within that folder are folders like Speed Camera, Redlight Camera, Hotels, Rest Areas, etc.
All loaded with POILoader. They ALWAYS show up on the Nuvi, Drive, and DriveSmart units in alpabetical order.

It DOES NOT matter what the folder timestamp is. However I have NEVER sorted the My POI folder by the sub-folder's Date Modified field and then run POILoader. Can't think of any reason I would want to do that, and can't think of any reason I would want to view them in that order.

I'm using Windows and I discovered the sorting by accident. Nothing that I did changed the sort order.

I've used this anomaly to prioritize the viewing order on my NUVI2555LMT.

If mine sorted alphabetically, I would simply prioritize with a number in front, such as "1 Restaurants" "5 Red Light"

l load Poi's manually as I use custom alerts..... For example, I use 12000 feet for Rest Areas because I prefer the extra time before the sign to be able to discuss stopping and change lanes, etc.

I use 10000 feet for Cracker Barrel for the same reason.... And on Cracker Barrel I use it as a tour guide too, as many are off the road a bit....

All my POI's are CSV format and they pretty much load according to the folders they were stored in on PC. 660 with Lifetime Maps and 2689LMT