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SAT NAV Destinations on your SD Card

19K views 14 replies 8 participants last post by  saywell  
#1 ·
Does anybody know if the facility to load destinations onto your SD card for use in your RNS 500 will be made available again. I used to use this service provided by VWLabs and found it very useful. Now I have to use the SAT NAV interface which is a right pain.

If anyone knows how to create or edit existing Vcard files that would be great. I have tired using outlook and there is no-where to put the GPS co-ordinates in, which is really fundamental in finding your location.
 
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#2 ·
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to the forum Barry.shepherd and thanks for joining. Since I don't have the RNS I'll have to let one of our RNS members answer this for you.

Given that this is an international forum it would be a good idea, if I may suggest, putting where you are from and a brief description of your Tig in your signature for future posts. This way people will be able to see what you have and then reply with quick and accurate responses to any questions you may have down the road. Give a look at other members' signatures to get an idea of what people have. Instructions to add a signature and other useful tips are included in the "Say Hello" thread in the New Member Introductions Forum. Here is the link to it: http://www.mytiguan.com/index.php?/topic/3700-say-hello/

Now, why not take a minute to help populate the Tiggy World Map. Here is a link to it: http://www.zeemaps.com/map?group=338335&x=-70.3125&y=-1.4061&z=15 . To add a marker just click on the "Additions" tab and select either 'Add Marker - Simple' or 'Add Marker - Detailed'. The detailed marker lets you put in a pic or video, and a description of your Tig, or other comments. FYI, you can see a list of who is on the map by clicking on the View tab and then select Show List. You can also zoom in/out using the slide bar or the mouse wheel.

Cheers
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#3 ·
#4 ·
Just picked my new Tiguan at the weekend and still playing with the toys. Noticed this thread so thought I'd do some research. The Owner's Manual implies that you can use a VW internet site (Volkswagen NAV Companion) to find locations, place them on an SD card andload them up in the RNS510, but it's not very specific about the site to use.

I did find the German version of the site at http://www.volkswagen.de/de/navigation/adressnavigation.html (I searched in vain for an English version - let me know if you find one). It appears that you can create vCards (a small file with location information in it) from this site and place them on an SD card for uploading into the RNS510. It's dead easy and quite useful. Don't be put off by the fact that the site is in German as it's really easy to use...

- Go to the url as above
- In the 'Interesse' box enter an address such as '123 Green Lane'
- In the 'Ort' box enter a town such as 'Littleborough'
- Click on the 'Suche Starten' button and the map will show a point corresponding to the address
- Click on the 'Fur Adress-Navigation speichern' button on the map or the listing on the left
- This will create a file on your PC called '123 Green Lane....vcf' (might be in your Downloads folder)
- Insert your SD card into your PC and create a folder called 'Destinations' at the root of the card (i.e. not in any other folder)
- Copy this file to your SD card into the 'Destinations' folder and eject it from your PC
- Place the SD card in your RNS510 and choose Navigation/New destination
- You may have to wait for the SD card to become available as the unit may take time to recognise it.
- If all has gone well you should be able to select the destination or you can import it as a stored location.

I've tried a variety of destinations on the web-site as follows (some details of what I was trying obscured for internet use)...

Interesse = 123 Green Lane, Ort = Littleborough (Example of address)
Interesse = D12 3EF, Ort = Deetown (Example of postcode)
Interesse = Currys, Ort = Wednesbury (Example of business)
Interesse = Port, Ort = Dover (Example of UK POI)
Interesse = Port, Ort = Calais (Example of Euro POI)

I'm sure there are other combinations that would yield interesting results. It seems to work really well. There is also a POI (Points Of Interest) loader function but my German isn't good enough! Feel free to try it though.

So, Volkswagen UK, how about asking your German counterparts to provide an English translation on the site, or hosting a version of it on the UK site?
 
#5 ·
I don't have the VW satnav but if it creates vCards, you should be able to knock them up using other software too.
It would be an interesting challenge.

Could you open a vcard thus created in notepad or other plain text editor, and post the contents here, along with the data you entered into the website.

I might be able to put a little program together...

William
 
#6 ·
OK - this looks quite easily do-able.

I've created a vCard for my place of work, which I've attached as a text file as the forum won't allow uploading of .vcf files.
Rename it to Yeovil District Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.vcf and ignore the warning about changing file extensions.

CAdd that to an SD card and open it in the SatNav. Then tell me [or upload an image of] what details you see on the screen.

I should be able to write a little program to create these based on google maps data, which I'd be happy to share here.

William

View attachment Yeovil District Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.txt
 

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#7 ·
Looks like the right format. Agree that vCards are very simple text files in a published format so something should be possible. Only just picked this up so will test in the car tomorrow but it looks ok. As long as the app can use location data like the German site and give the ability to select from a number of relevant choices then this would be really useful (never worked with the Google maps api but it looks like it does use this data in some form). I'm a software developer myself but never seem to have the time spare to pursue my own projects nowadays! Interested to see how you get on.

The original reason for my post though was to tip members off about the German site as it is quite good, available now and easy to use for those who are not quite as tech savvy but want to give it a go. Hopefully others can feed back on what they think.
 
#8 ·
I've has a look at doing this automagically using google API, but I've found it's not very accurate - at leas around here.
My address is in the format 'housename, villagename, post town, postcode' and it can't find it - just gives an averaged point within the village.
Even when searching for numbered street addresses in the main town, it gets quite a lot wrong.
So I'm going to work in semi-automagic mode, where the user has to identify the exact location on the map, and my app will use the coordinates from that point. So it will be as accurate as the user can make it, to 6 dec points each way!

When I've got something to test, I'll start a new, dedicated thread for this.

William
 
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#9 ·
I stumbled across this page when searching how to import destinations into a Skoda sat nav unit.

I couldn't find any follow-up on the program saywell was working on, so thought I'd have a go myself. My IT skills aren't great, but my attempt can be found here:

http://www.schaffer.talktalk.net/SDNav

It uses the Google Maps API too, but allows the user to move the search result for more accurate positioning.

It's a bit clunky - the web site generates text that you have to copy and paste into a text editor (such as Notepad) before saving to your SD card. But it seems to work for me - although I've not tested it much yet.

Given that my Skoda sat nav unit will read the destination files generated by the German-language VW web site mentioned several posts up, I thought there was a chance my web site would work with VW (and probably Audi / Seat) sat navs too. Hopefully it might be of use to somebody....
 
#11 ·
Does the VW satnav allow the import of POI [Point of Interest] files?

If so, I've been experimenting with creating my own - in my case for TomTom, but others are do-able too.

William
 
#12 ·
Does the VW satnav allow the import of POI [Point of Interest] files?

If so, I've been experimenting with creating my own - in my case for TomTom, but others are do-able too.

William
An RNS510 with software 3800 or above allows for you to easily import POI files via SD, I have done it with my speed camera database, though it still doesn't allow audible warnings for cameras.
 
#13 ·
An RNS510 with software 3800 or above allows for you to easily import POI files via SD, I have done it with my speed camera database, though it still doesn't allow audible warnings for cameras.
That's interesting - thanks.

What formats of POI file will it accept?

William
 
#15 ·
That's very similar to the TomTom OV2 format, though the VW one can hold more data items.

William