TT3 - solutions not problems

[spile]

This forum has documented in detail, the location problems in TT3.
Apart from giving up with it, I wonder how users have managed to work with the software?

For my part, I'm wondering if it best to ignore the postcodes completely as entering a postcode in the City field produces nothing of use anyway?

Instead of "City" , I call this field "Location". Ignore large towns like Redditch (many of which aren't present anyway) and enter the second line of the address, eg Headless Cross.

The street search seems to work from this point on.

The only problem is that if attempt to search using the potentially useful search from your list of Contacts it won't work if you have a location as a large town. I suppose you could replace the town with the 2nd line of the address but then this makes your address book rather strange.

Another way of finding a locaton is to use the map to zoom to an area around the desired locaiton, add this to the search field and see how TT3 records the location for reference. Make a note of this for the detailed search which you can put into "City".

I realise that non of these things will make up for the current shortcomings but at least they mean I can use the software. As a new user I don't have the option of gouing back to a previous version and I'm not THAT unhappy with the current system.

Any other user tips for TT3 others would care to share?

Brett

[Oldie]

In the PocketPC Contacts it is possible to enter more than one address. To overcome the address search problem in TTN2 I set up Other address to use the style that TTN2 preferred.

If you use Tap-and-hold on the contact, then you will be given the chance to select the address to be used, ie Home address, Business address, Other address. This choice will only appear if more than one address has been defined.

I realise that we should not have to resort to such ploys, but it is one way round the problem.

[spile]

The Other address tip is excellent.

This may be old hat to some of you but the ukpostcode plugin which I've just installed is suprb and solves most of the problems I was having.

It works fine with TT3 and I would say is an essential download.

http://www.digitools.co.uk/ukpostcode.php#instr

Brett

[Conor]

[DavidW]

The "Open Letter" describes the behaviour of Navigator 3.01 GB exactly:

"certainly in England, it offers streets in the entire county of the city entered, so it returns streets from a much larger area."

I had earlier placed the word city in inverted commas, quite deliberately.


No matter what you enter - whether it's the name of a town, a district, a partial postcode or a county then, at least in England (I haven't characterised behaviour in Scotland and Wales, but I expect it to be the same), you get street names returned for the entire county.


Most addresses, at least in Post Office Preferred format, have no 'town district' or similar in them.

Post Office Preferred, these days, tends to be

<number> <street name>
<town>
<postcode>

or

<number> <street name>
<town>
<post town>
<postcode>

If there is a post town, then it's normally a nearby large town. For example, for Ampthill, which is near where I live, has a post town of Bedford. Counties are not normally used in addresses these days.

There are odd exceptions, but usually if you have more information in an address, it's the format that people have grown used to use rather than Post Office Preferred format (which, for example, you will find if you look up the postcode at royalmail.com).



With the current behaviour of Navigator 3 GB, none of this makes no difference. If you want streets in Filey, which isn't in the database, you should find them if you enter any of "North Yorkshire", another town that is in the database that is in North Yorkshire, or a partial postcode that's anywhere in North Yorkshire.


Let's choose a street in Filey at random (it helps that I know this area of the country - Navigator doesn't exactly help as there's quite a few places in the database around here missing). To help, we'll choose a street that has a less common name - "Belle Vue Street".

If you search for "North Yorkshire", then "Belle Vue Street", you'll be offered a choice of two. YO12 7 is in Scarborough. YO14 9 is in Filey.

If you search on "Easingwold", which is a town in North Yorkshire some way inland (a little way north of York), you'll get the same two Belle Vue Streets. "Harrogate" is even further inland - but it makes no difference - you'll still get the same two streets, as Navigator 3.01 GB returns all matching streets in the entire county.

Partial postcodes behave no differently. If you search for "YO12 7", which we know is Scarborough, you'll get the same two Belle Vue Streets, as you will if you search on "YO14 9", which is Filey (in this case Navigator does not move the better match to the top, which is part of the problem). Even if we pick a partial postcode that's miles away, like one from the Harrogate HG series rather than the YO York series, say "HG1 2" (Harrogate / Boroughbridge area, but still North Yorkshire), we'll still get the same two Belle Vue Streets.


Navigator 3.01 GB returns all matches for the county of whatever "City" you enter - as I characterised in full in the "Open Letter".



David

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