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Joined: 22/11/2002 13:33:48 Posts: 992 Location: Surrey, UK
Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2007 7:48 am Post subject: Submission Guidelines - POI database
Please follow these guidelines when submitting updates to the POI database.
1. The contents of the Title box.
Enter the Town/City/District in which the POI is located or near followed by a name/additional text. Separate the the two items with a comma. For example, a pub and an historic house
Farnham, Star & Garter
Basingstoke, The Vyne
Please capitalise the text, i.e. not farnham, star & garter, but Farnham, Star & Garter.
Another example, a Sainsbury's store on a retail park
Farnham, Water Lane
For some POI it may not be appropriate to use both a town/city/district and a name/additional text but you should provide one of them. As the Subcategory name is used for the POI file name there is no need to include it in the Title box.
2. The contents of the Details box.
Optionally, enter a more detailed street address using commas between the elements of the address. This box can also be used for information on opening hours etc.
The text in the Details box is output in a separate field named Details in Garmin CSV files so do not make it too long. The text in the Details box is no longer appended to the Title text for TomTom OV2 files because if it is too long it can corrupt the telephone number when the OV2 file is used.
3. How to position a POI.
The POI latitude and longitude co-ordinates will be used by your SatNav to get you to the location of the POI so do not position the POI on the actual building in a large retail park. Position the POI on a road within the retail park close to the store or at the entrance to the car parking area. The Google Map Satellite view quite often shows a detailed image which can be used to select the best position. Please use the Comments box to say how the POI has been positioned.
Remember that sliproads to motorway service areas can be some way from the actual position of a POI in the service area. So if you are using your SatNav to issue a warning when approaching a POI it is better to place the POI on the sliproad rather than on the actual building. Basically you need to know which POI are present in the service area not their exact positions. Again, please use the Comments box to say how the POI has been positioned.
NB. From now on POIs that have been positioned at access points will have "Access Rd." at the beginning of the Details text when the file is released. Please do not submit Change requests that will reposition these POI to the actual building.
4. The contents of the Comments box.
Please use the Comments box as it is very reassuring to see "repositioned using local knowledge" when the Action selected is "Confirm existing POI" but the co-ordinates are different to those of the original. It really does help the reviewer if you state in the Comments box what you are changing when submitting a "Change existing POI" request.
For instance you may be just updating a phone number so please say so.
5. Phone numbers
Enter phone numbers in the international dialling format without spaces or hyphens. For example the UK number 01234 123456 should be entered as +441234123456
6. The Action drop-down list
Double check that you have selected the correct action. Many submissions that are repositioning a POI are being sent in as "Confirm existing POI" and with a Comment.
7. Dining Pub Subcategory
The Dining Pub subcategory is special as it has been created from the lists on the Dining Pubs website, see http://www.diningpubs.co.uk
As this is a special category of pubs, ie not just ones that serve food as well as drinks, new entries will only be added to it if you also submit the webpage reference from the Dining Pubs list. Corrections to positions will of course be accepted but please identify the car park access in keeping with the present style.
The Dining Pubs website states "Please mention diningpubs.co.uk when you visit one of the pubs, inns or hotels in our guide and use our voting system to ensure that information on the site is as up to date as possible". So please help keep their list up-to-date after you visit a pub.
Edited 28/5/2008
Changes in 1: and 2:, Paragraph 7 added
Edited 20/02/09
Changes in 1: Capitalisation advice _________________ Various TomToms, Garmin eTrex Legend, GPSMAP 60CSx, Oregon 550t, Forerunner 405
Last edited by Oldie on Wed May 28, 2008 9:12 am; edited 1 time in total
Another example, a Sainsbury's store on a retail park
Water Lane, Farnham
Can I suggest that the town/city name is put first and the street/area name second.
The reason I say this is because where I live (Cardiff) if I search for a POI on my TomTom it lists the distances as "as the crows fly" which results in the ones in Bristol as being closer than the ones in Swansea whereas in reality they are twice as far away.
If the street name is quite long then you don't see the town/city part and you only realise it is in Bristol once you have planned a route. _________________ Gareth
Can you give me a specific example so that I can try it on my TomTom. I will then see what the alternatives are
Richard
If you try and plan a route from Cardiff to nearest POI for National Trust it it not until the second page (Aberdulais Falls) that the first welsh POI is mentioned. Also all the names on the 1st don't necessary tell you where they are. _________________ Gareth
I must admit it is rather annoying when searching through POIs and finding some only have street name and you havnt a clue what location its in, It would be very helpfull if the town,city or village would be included, beginning or end would probably be open to discussion, but personally find it fairly easy to click on entry raher than not have it at all.
Joined: 22/11/2002 13:33:48 Posts: 992 Location: Surrey, UK
Posted: Sat Jan 06, 2007 4:05 pm Post subject:
Guys,
Please prepare and enter all the data that you can when you first submit a POI. It is very disheartening to have to review an update to a POI shortly after it was submiited for the first time.
Richard _________________ Various TomToms, Garmin eTrex Legend, GPSMAP 60CSx, Oregon 550t, Forerunner 405
Oldie, I am currently working on a list of approx 170 POIs (all same category) on a spreadsheet, what is is the best format to submit i.e. text file or other
Joined: 22/11/2002 13:33:48 Posts: 992 Location: Surrey, UK
Posted: Sun Jan 07, 2007 4:51 pm Post subject:
aj2052 wrote:
Oldie, I am currently working on a list of approx 170 POIs (all same category) on a spreadsheet, what is is the best format to submit i.e. text file or other
Sorry for the slow response, but I have been busy reviewing POI submissions ;)
A text file with the following will be good
longitude,latitude,"Title","Details"
with longitude and latitude in decimal degrees. The Title and Details text should be enclosed in double quotes " " if the text contains commas. Telephone numbers can be included at the end of the Details text, eg " 123 Roman Way +441234123456". Please remove all spaces and hyphens from the phone numbers.
Richard _________________ Various TomToms, Garmin eTrex Legend, GPSMAP 60CSx, Oregon 550t, Forerunner 405
Joined: Jun 04, 2005 Posts: 19991 Location: West and Southwest London
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 4:34 pm Post subject: Re: Submission Guidelines - POI database
Oldie wrote:
Please follow these guidelines when submitting updates to the POI database.
1. The contents of the Title box.
Enter the name of the POI followed by the Town/City/District in which the POI is located or near. Separate the the two items with a comma. For example, a pub and an historic house
Star & Garter, Farnham
The Vyne, Basingstoke
I'm glad you've "decreed" this format, but the existing sets don't all do it this way, they are inconsistent...
For example, I downloaded a combined set of DIY stores, by selecting the B+Q, Homebase and Wickes lists.
The Homebase POIs show up as:
"Homebase - Hayes, Homebase"
"Homebase - Isleworth, Homebase"
etc.
But the Wickes and B+Q show as:
"Hayes, Wickes" or
"Yeading, B+Q (Glencoe Road, Yeading Hayes etc.)"
Thinking about it... I suppose you can't win! If we just want to download the B+Qs as a single type, then we'd be annoyed if every entry started with "B+Q...", but when we combine several companies together, that's exactly what we DO want!
On balance I think 'Name, then Town' is better... Is that something you can do easily, I started trying to do it in POI Edit, but it is really laborious.
So, to confirm... you want 'Name, Town' for all new submissions?
Joined: 22/11/2002 13:33:48 Posts: 992 Location: Surrey, UK
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 6:59 pm Post subject:
All I can say is that you would not have over 100,000 POI to download if I spent more time than I presently do reformatting the submitted files before uploading them I have tried to remove the duplication of the subcategory name in the Title field of the POI but I know that I have missed some, for example the one that you have pointed out, "Homebase" and another is "Asda". This will be corrected when we have the chance.
Richard _________________ Various TomToms, Garmin eTrex Legend, GPSMAP 60CSx, Oregon 550t, Forerunner 405
Joined: Jun 04, 2005 Posts: 19991 Location: West and Southwest London
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:33 pm Post subject:
Sorry Richard, it wasn't meant to be a "nag"!
What I meant by:
Quote:
Is that something you can do easily, I started trying to do it in POI Edit, but it is really laborious.
So, to confirm... you want 'Name, Town' for all new submissions?
...is that I've started to do it for you, but just wondered if a. you knew a better way than POI Edit to do it and b. that I was doing the right thing?
Joined: 22/11/2002 13:33:48 Posts: 992 Location: Surrey, UK
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 9:44 pm Post subject:
Andy_P2002 wrote:
Sorry Richard, it wasn't meant to be a "nag"!
What I meant by:
Quote:
Is that something you can do easily, I started trying to do it in POI Edit, but it is really laborious.
So, to confirm... you want 'Name, Town' for all new submissions?
...is that I've started to do it for you, but just wondered if a. you knew a better way than POI Edit to do it and b. that I was doing the right thing?
Please don't waste your time editing the files by hand as we (Lutz that is) can remove text like "Homebase - " from the Title field using database commands. At this stage of the game it is much better to concentrate on getting the positions correct; of course you can when submitting a position update correct the text at the same time.
When subcategories are combined for download the subcategory name is included in the POI name so there is no need to include it in the Title. It was just an oversight on my part that some of them got through I can only plead old age ;)
Also remember that every submitted update has to be reviewed so please do not, at the present time, send in a lot of submissions that are just changes to text. Even if these are sent in as files they will still have to be reviewed individually.
Richard _________________ Various TomToms, Garmin eTrex Legend, GPSMAP 60CSx, Oregon 550t, Forerunner 405
Richard am sure everbody apreciates the effort that yourself and lutz put into buildng the database, I for one certanly do, seeing from the time being submitted to showing in the database certainly shows this, but i think the op raises a valid point, would it be helpfull to raise a sticky of standardised formats for submission updated as neccesary, judging by the various questions around the site I feel that this would save a lot of searching and also help yourselves by being submitted in a proper format. also may I suggest a prelist of catagories even if empty although this may not be feasible because everbody may have different ideas,
Just a thought
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I have tried to remove the duplication of the subcategory name in the Title field of the POI but I know that I have missed some, for example the one that you have pointed out, "Homebase" and another is "Asda". This will be corrected when we have the chance.
