how easy is it to navigate to user saved places

[Devo]

Hi all, let me start by saying I dont own a tomtom yet, but am looking at getting a go730, im in New Zealand.

what i want to do is.......

save a local place (point of interest i guess it's called) and navigate there in say 6mths time, now i will have maybe 1000 or more local POI's over time, and want to know are they searchable via say keyword? surely they must be, i should explain that i currently have a navman MY55 and you can search the inbuilt POI's that come preloaded using say a keyword search, BUT there is no easy way of searching for the ones i have added, dumb aye! they can be sorted alphabetically or by date saved, not a lot of use, also there is only a limited number of POI's you can save as i have just found out :-( is the go730 limited in any way? hope that all makes sense, i am a utility faultman working in a new area and have saved the sites i will need to visit in the future but with the navman being limited in storage and search of these places it's useless for what i need.

 

[mikealder]

There are loads of different ways to navigate to a POI although the device will only list the nearest 24 or 48 depending upon device and software version, the center point for the search can be via a point on the map, in a city or near to your known location etc. A custom POI file can contain thousands of individual locations and they can each be stored with a phone number where applicable - Mike

 

[Arno]

Sounds wonderful being able to search by name. Unfortunately that is not available with TomTom.
POIs are sorted by distance from current locationn which means that the alphabetical order changes constantly.
As Mike already said, there is a virtual limitless number of POIs that can be held in a personal category.
Have look here for some ways I use it.

I make POIs for a trip. family, etc.on the computer using the HOME programme. TYRE is an add on programme, which attaches itself to the HOME software. Tyre has the advantage of keeping the address in a different register from the coordinates which define that address.
Opening the POI with TYRE I type a meaningful name to the left of the address line and leave five blank spaces and save it.
When I now open a personal POI category all the listings are still sorted by distance from current location and not alphabetically but, as the meaningful words (Arthur's Pass, Marula Springs, Rewanui Incline, etc.) are at the left margin of the screen, I can quickly pick my next destination.
I would like to presume that you will have a look at a map before those trips. It would be good to keep one with you for a general over look.
I didn't carry a map last year during my 3000 miles trip to the UK and Ireland and only once missed one.
The rest of the time I was driving to locations for which I had made a custom POI.
I made that trip one week after I got my 930 (my first GPS) and hadn't known about TYRE or that TomTom sorts from present location and was a little bewildered that the POIs where never in the same place as the last time I looked.

 

[mvl]

You can search POIs by name.

Navigate to -> POI near you (or POI in city) -> search

Then type in some text and all POIs that have that text substring will appear, sorted by distance. There's a limit to how far this substring search looks, maybe about 25 miles or so for your specified location.

So if you were able to be unique in naming the POIs and had a general vicinity, the Tomtom should find them.

 

[lec510]

@Devo
Using TomTom you have to master the concept of 'cursor' (the center point of your interest).

Let me explain by using the following example: You plan a trip driving from Christchurch to Queenstown. You want to enter all the Hotels, Places to visit into your GPS.
1- Create a POI Category named to your liking (My_Trip or something like that)
2- Create the POI's by entering them using their addresses into that Category (My_Trip). If you don't find that in the GPS you can summon the help of Google Map. There is a program named Tyre that helps, but I'd rather just get the coordinates from Google Map then enter them manually.
3- Now assuming you are at Christchurch you want to drive to Fox Glaciers, visit places around it before driving to Queenstown do:

- Browse map/Addresses/City ==> enter Fox Glaciers
- Hit the 'cursor' (*) / Browse Map / Find POI using My_Trip Category
- the GPS now presents all POI near Fox Glaciers sorted by distance - from the center of Fox Glaciers - you choose the one you are interested in (by scrolling or by FIND again) . after selecting that POI hit the Cursor again , NAVIGATE to .
Of course you can bypass all these steps, but the GPS will search for POI's around Christchuch, it may or may not find the ones near Fox Glaciers.
You can do that to TomTom POI's or your own.
Is it clear as mud ?
It sounds complicate but you will get used to it quickly.

* Cursor is the blue Cross at the bottom right of the Map screen.

 

[Arno]

Using TomTom you have to master the concept of 'cursor' (the center point of your interest).
-- snip --
- Browse map/Addresses/City ==> enter Fox Glaciers
- Hit the 'cursor' (*) / Browse Map / Find POI using My_Trip Category
- the GPS now presents all POI near Fox Glaciers sorted by distance - from the center of Fox Glaciers - you choose the one you are interested in (by scrolling or by FIND again) . after selecting that POI hit the Cursor again , NAVIGATE to .

I never used that because I plan major trips with Google maps, mostly for time/distance orientation.
Per day, I usually only have one POI, maybe a second for the motel.

I just tried your suggestion and, as you said, it is very simple and fast and would be of benefit to me when having multiple near POIs but limited time to visit just a few of them.

One item to mention for Devo and others new to custom POI categories is that one can choose any of the offered icons as the POI is made or one can make ones own. That would be a BMP with max. 22 x 22 pixel (for a 4.3" device IIRC) and it must, except for the extension, have the same name as that custom category.

One question, I used Google earth when wanting to apply coordinates. Is there a better way to get them from "maps" short of clicking on Link and excerpting them from there?

 

[lec510]

Get coordinates from Google Earth is even easier. Just hover the cursor over your POI, the coordinates are shown at the bottom.

 

[Arno]

Get coordinates from Google Earth is even easier. Just hover the cursor over your POI, the coordinates are shown at the bottom.

Clicking the Link in maps, copy-and-paste into the Address bar, deleting the text before and after the coordinates is faster for me as I seem to be moving the cursor in Earth by the time I type them.
I have to toggle between the pages as I do not remember all those digits at one glance.

I have tried a few times to Send to TomTom (HOME already open or not) but have never been able to get past this screen:

View attachment 2730

Any help how to go on from there is highly appreciated.

 

[Arno]

Not applicable.

 

[mvl]

I have tried a few times to Send to TomTom (HOME already open or not) but have never been able to get past this screen:

View attachment 2730

Any help how to go on from there is highly appreciated.

What browser are you using? Have you set it to trust that web page? It looks like the page is attempting to open the HOME app. Opening of apps is usually blocked by default for anti-spyware purposes.

 

[Arno]

What browser are you using? Have you set it to trust that web page? It looks like the page is attempting to open the HOME app. Opening of apps is usually blocked by default for anti-spyware purposes.

It does open HOME if not already open and then just sits there as in the picture.
(For the record, I use Firefox.)

I have posted the same about a year ago. Since no one reacts to this in a positive manner stating that they have no problems I tend to believe that nobody with a TomTom has gotten this to work so far.

 

[mvl]

I just tried it for the first time, and Tomtom HOME pops up right when that screen does. (I also use firefox 3.5.5).

Do you get HOME opening when you click "add map update service" on the link below?

http://www.tomtom.com/page/mapupdateservice

 

[Arno]

Yes, I get HOME opening when I click on your Link.
HOME popping up is not the problem, having the map data transferred to the device is.
I could not think of another location to look than Favorite and Recent destinations.

What happens in HOME or on your device after HOME pops up?

 

[mvl]

I get this screen in HOME. Clicking on any of the buttons does the labeled action under "operate my go".

You may want to try IE first, as I have so much cookie and addin security on my Firefox setup that this wasn't able to work for me until I went to IE.

 

[Arno]

You may want to try IE first, as I have so much cookie and addin security on my Firefox setup that this wasn't able to work for me until I went to IE.

Last time I tried with Firefox it wouldn't even keep TomTom as the default when choosing GPS.
To night with a few tries it accepted TomTom as the default but always hanging up after it opens HOME (a shudder on the screen if it was open already).

I then opened Chrome > Google maps and put in an address. After Send I got the request to start an external application. Giving permission the Open address screen as shown by you and I can use any of the three options.

View attachment 2737

Thanks, Mike, for pointing me in the right direction.
Getting locations into custom POIs for future trips will become quite a bit faster as I am using Google maps anyway to plan the trip.
Cheers,
Arno

After posting the above I tried MSIE and it opened the Show on map/Navigate to it/Add to favourites immediately. (Guess I won't be able ignore MSIE any longer.)