Guided Tour of RouteWriter: Handling Duplicate Pushpin Names
RouteWriter matches waypoints with the pushpins used to create them. Waypoint data is then written with the corresponding pushpin data fields. Here we look at how the pushpins are matched and how RouteWriter handles duplicate names.
Duplicate Names
A route will often have pushpins (and hence waypoints) with duplicate names. This often occurs if pushpins represent business locations and the names are the business names. A company with multiple locations will have multiple pushpins with identical names.
The spreadsheet on the right lists some sample data which demonstrates this. Each company has multiple business locations with identical names.
The map on the right shows the same data loaded into MapPoint. A route has been constructed that visits multiple customers - many from the same company. This results in pushpins (and waypoints) with duplicate names.
RouteWriter has two methods for matching waypoints with their parent pushpins. These are controlled with the Resolve duplicate matching pushpins check box on the main RouteWriter panel (see image to the right).
The fastest option is to clear this check box. This will cause RouteWriter to match pushpins according to their names only. This will not work correctly if the map contains pushpins with duplicate names.
Set the Resolve duplicate matching pushpins check box if the map contains duplicate pushpins. This will cause RouteWriter to match pushpins according to both their names and the distances. Although this option is more reliable, it can be much slower if the map contains large numbers of pushpins.
Here is an example. This spreadsheet (see right) was created using the above data but with the Resolve duplicate matching pushpins check box cleared.
Note that the names, distances, and travel times look correct; but with closer inspection, the other data fields are interchanged. This is because the waypoints were mis-matched with their parent pushpins.
Here are the correct results with the Resolve duplicate matching pushpins check box set. Note that the waypoint data is now correct, and has not been mixed up.
Next, we look at the RouteReader component of RouteWriter. RouteReader is used to create a MapPoint route from pushpins in a pre-determined order.
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