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Questions about PQ's


Oysterr51

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I managed to make a couple of pocket queries, and now have some questions.

 

First, I put in one for my local area, and it went out and located 500 of them. Now if I want the next set, out further in a direction.. hmmm Should I break up the area into blocks and then make them smaller than the limit of 1000 in order to keep an orderly set of data, or how do the pros do it so as not to miss any over a wider geographical area?

 

Next, if I choose a route from here to there, and ask for 1000 that are within say 3 miles, and the PQ generates 1000, what are the parameters for the missed ones? Does it start with the closest to the route? Or does it pick up the first 1000 that were cached... or?

 

thanks, Mike

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Keep in mind, if your PQ's have some overlap, that's ok. Your GPS will recognize this and only display one listing. I don't think that overlapping caches count toward your device's limit.

 

There are some other alternative strategies if you wish to include a larger area, but keep your home location at the center. First, increase the search radius and take advantage of the 1000 cache maximum.

 

Second, you can split the searches by cache type, size, and/or difficulty rather than by location. You can set up one PQ and copy it. In each of the copies, you can change the search requirements, but leave the location and radius the same. I have two PQ's for my home with a 40-mile radius: one for traditional caches, and one for all others (multi, puzzle, earth, virtual, etc.), but if you live in a densely cached city, you could have a PQ for micros, one for small, one for regular, one for large.... or separate by difficulty, etc.

 

With this strategy, you could potentially cover every cache in a 50-100 mile radius, depending on your location.

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Any comments on the route question. We are about to go travelling and picking up caches along the way needs to be done in advance. Coming from Canada to the USA we can't bring a smart phone or anything more than occasional wifi and so getting good results from a PQ is important

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I managed to make a couple of pocket queries, and now have some questions.

 

First, I put in one for my local area, and it went out and located 500 of them. Now if I want the next set, out further in a direction.. hmmm Should I break up the area into blocks and then make them smaller than the limit of 1000 in order to keep an orderly set of data, or how do the pros do it so as not to miss any over a wider geographical area?

 

Next, if I choose a route from here to there, and ask for 1000 that are within say 3 miles, and the PQ generates 1000, what are the parameters for the missed ones? Does it start with the closest to the route? Or does it pick up the first 1000 that were cached... or?

 

thanks, Mike

 

I also am very interested in an answer to the OP's 2nd question. Anyone know ??

.

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I managed to make a couple of pocket queries, and now have some questions.

 

First, I put in one for my local area, and it went out and located 500 of them. Now if I want the next set, out further in a direction.. hmmm Should I break up the area into blocks and then make them smaller than the limit of 1000 in order to keep an orderly set of data, or how do the pros do it so as not to miss any over a wider geographical area?

 

Next, if I choose a route from here to there, and ask for 1000 that are within say 3 miles, and the PQ generates 1000, what are the parameters for the missed ones? Does it start with the closest to the route? Or does it pick up the first 1000 that were cached... or?

 

thanks, Mike

 

I also am very interested in an answer to the OP's 2nd question. Anyone know ??

.

 

There are two possible answers:

1. It's by distance from the route.

2. It's by distance along the route.

 

You can test these hypotheses by creating a fairly long route through a cache-dense area, say Salt Lake City area, but keep the maximum results somewhat low as to max out the search results. Then preview your PQ on the map. Do the results run the entire length of the route? If no, then we know that it counts from mile 0 forward until it maxes out. If yes, then look at the maximum distance from the route (this may take more work as I'm not sure, off the top of my head, if you can get this data from the list view). Do any come close to the distance setting you chose? If no, then it starts with the closest and moves out until it maxes out. If yes, then there is some other criteria.

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Next, if I choose a route from here to there, and ask for 1000 that are within say 3 miles, and the PQ generates 1000, what are the parameters for the missed ones? Does it start with the closest to the route? Or does it pick up the first 1000 that were cached... or?

 

thanks, Mike

 

I also am very interested in an answer to the OP's 2nd question. Anyone know ??

.

 

There are two possible answers:

1. It's by distance from the route.

2. It's by distance along the route.

 

You can test these hypotheses by creating a fairly long route through a cache-dense area, say Salt Lake City area, but keep the maximum results somewhat low as to max out the search results. Then preview your PQ on the map. Do the results run the entire length of the route? If no, then we know that it counts from mile 0 forward until it maxes out. If yes, then look at the maximum distance from the route (this may take more work as I'm not sure, off the top of my head, if you can get this data from the list view). Do any come close to the distance setting you chose? If no, then it starts with the closest and moves out until it maxes out. If yes, then there is some other criteria.

 

There was another thread about this a little while ago and IIRC no one ever came up with a definitive answer, ie no one was able to show that it was anything but random. If my recollection is not correct, I'd like to be corrected as well.

 

In any case, you might be better off breaking the trip into several smaller routes and working with PQs for each segment.

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Next, if I choose a route from here to there, and ask for 1000 that are within say 3 miles, and the PQ generates 1000, what are the parameters for the missed ones? Does it start with the closest to the route? Or does it pick up the first 1000 that were cached... or?

 

thanks, Mike

 

I also am very interested in an answer to the OP's 2nd question. Anyone know ??

.

 

There are two possible answers:

1. It's by distance from the route.

2. It's by distance along the route.

 

You can test these hypotheses by creating a fairly long route through a cache-dense area, say Salt Lake City area, but keep the maximum results somewhat low as to max out the search results. Then preview your PQ on the map. Do the results run the entire length of the route? If no, then we know that it counts from mile 0 forward until it maxes out. If yes, then look at the maximum distance from the route (this may take more work as I'm not sure, off the top of my head, if you can get this data from the list view). Do any come close to the distance setting you chose? If no, then it starts with the closest and moves out until it maxes out. If yes, then there is some other criteria.

 

There was another thread about this a little while ago and IIRC no one ever came up with a definitive answer, ie no one was able to show that it was anything but random. If my recollection is not correct, I'd like to be corrected as well.

 

In any case, you might be better off breaking the trip into several smaller routes and working with PQs for each segment.

 

I have 180 miles split into 3 PQs - 2.5km wide and they all return 1000 caches. I will have to play around with this some more and find out which way it cuts off - length or width.

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It can't be completely random, or it would return different results every time it was run.

 

I didn't say it was random, I just said "no one was able to show that it was anything but random." If anyone can show that it is age/GC code, that would be something--if so, is it oldest or newest that get cut, I wonder.

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I didn't say it was random, I just said "no one was able to show that it was anything but random." If anyone can show that it is age/GC code, that would be something--if so, is it oldest or newest that get cut, I wonder.

Well put. A better way to say this is that it isn't logical rather than using the term "random".

 

It's by sequence in the database, almost.

Ah, a classic problem: it is logical, but only to the implementer, not to the user, the person it needs to make sense to.

 

This result is scary to me since I always assumed it would be logical and never really gave it a second thought. The bottom line is that to have a valid PQ based on a route, you must cut your width or your length down until you get fewer that 1000 caches. If you don't, you'll loose the newer (or older?) caches. In either case, those are the ones I'd least like to miss.

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The bottom line is that to have a valid PQ based on a route, you must cut your width or your length down until you get fewer that 1000 caches. If you don't, you'll loose the newer (or older?) caches. In either case, those are the ones I'd least like to miss.

Or you could cut out certain sizes or types of caches.

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