flying_mole

Using archaeic analogies of printers and pages, the previewing the results of the query vs. creating the whole GPX is similar to the processor either "printing a table of contents" or "printing the whole book". Well, more like printing the index, as you have to calculate the relative distance between each cache and the centroid of the search area. If the search are contains more than the requested number of caches, you also have to rank the caches by distance. From a database point of view, it would be interesting to see what information is indexed vs. just stored. I would imagine that the search criteria is indexed. Packaging up the .gpx files, zipping them, and then emailing will take longer though, I'll give you that.

One thing that get me when running the PQ's and Groundspeak's claim that the PQ's take a lot of resources to run... then how come I can preview a PQ on Google Maps immediatly, make a small change, and re-run the PQ. Shouldn't take that much more resources to run a regular PQ than a preview, right? If the problem is that there is a greater load on the servers on weekends, they should look into some sort of cloud computing sharing resources with other organizations that have less load on the weekends. Works better that keeping all the resources on during slack times and then not having enough during busy times. I scheduled a PQ that I had run on Sunday to re-run on Monday with a couple of parameters changed (forgot to update the dates). Didn't run at all on Monday, still waiting for it today. Meanwhile a PQ that I last ran a couple of months ago ran immediatly.

I'll admit to being a bit biased towards Delorme as I have used their maps for years for hiking and cyling (and for that matter driving). They are customer-focused and if you are ever near their hq in Maine it's worth a visit to see Eartha (a huge globe). I started out with a Garmin Etrex Legend which worked well as long as I stuck to printing out the cache descriptions and stayed away from leaf cover. I bought it last fall and it worked well until Spring came with those leaves! I just got the PN-20 refurb (a little hard to spring for the -40 just now) and love it. I downloaded a bunch of gc's with descriptions using pocket queries, and then went out and found two today without any paper, and under leaf cover. I'll have a hard time going back to the Etrex (guess what my grandkids will get for Christmas... only slightly used!)