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Tim Hortons Location Project (THLP)


mrcpu

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Thanks in part to This Thread I have decided to go ahead with the similar idea I had a few months back to waypoint all the Tim's I can find.

 

I need your help! Email me .gpx files with all the Tim Horton's YOU find!!! Send them to mrcpu@myrealbox.com

 

In exchange for sharing your data with me, you will get access the the waypoints myself and others collect. I have already made a trade with Olar and have combined our waypoints and put them up on my webpage.

 

IF you decide to send me your waypoints, please use .gpx or if you have to, .loc format. Here are some suggestions for information:

 

Description: General street location, If they have a drive through or not, special notes.

Comment: Your name goes here so you can get credit. I'm using Geocaching ID's for this but it is up to you.

Waypoint: Restaurant (please set the waypoint type to Restaurant and save in .gpx format)

 

That's it. Whenever I get a new set of additions I'll put them in to the "master" file and put it on my site. I'll then email everyone to let them know it's available. Once this gets going I'm going to spend some time and build a pretty web page for it and possibly do some database stuff with it for fun.

 

Cheers,

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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I am a little clueless, so here goes. What program to you recommend to send info(MS Word, Works...) and how do you save in .gpx. Should I have Easy GPS. We have a total of 5 Timmies here in Brockville(4 stores and 1 at Esso).

 

Binrat

 

"Blood is thicker than water.......Unless the water is frozen!"

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You are asking a lot ya know. Sudbury (pop 160,000) has 14 locations listed in the phone book. I pass three on my way to work and the drive is only 12 minutes. I'll see what I can get for you.

 

I would like to have documented proof to the rumor that Sudbury has the highest density of Tim's. Or maybe it is per-capita... I'm not sure.

 

Please post the link when you get Rev 1 available. I suggest "TH..." as the waypoint.

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So things are moving along. I've now got a number of people finding TH's but there was a couple of questions:

 

1. What should I use as a waypoint name?

 

I don't care! I'm going to rename your waypoints to THxxx anyways :-)

 

2. When should I send you may waypoints?

 

Send them whenever you want. I'm up to 27 now and that's between me and one other guy who sends them to me (Olar!). If you send them to me a few at a time then it's easier for me to manage. Besides, if you want me to send you mine, you have to send me yours first!!! :-)

 

3. How do I get credit?

 

In the Comment field put your name or handle. I leave this for other people to see and give you credit. I may suggest email addresses if everyone wants to do that too.

 

I am planning on doing some database work with this to make it easier and eventually I may try to make it all automated!

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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mrcpu,

 

If one was to try to provide you with the information you require, is there any other way of creating the position information in the format that you can accept?

 

We are a Mac/Unix shop and cannot run the common PC based waypoint applications.

 

If there was half a dozen or so, I could manually enter the data into a text file. If you could provide a sample entry, it may be helpful to others that are also PC impaired.

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Pardon an American for posting in the Canada forum, but I was wondering if you're only collecting Canadian stores. There are about as many THs as McDs in my area.

 

It was a sad day when we no longer had to travel to Canada for Tim Horton's. When the first one at the University of Michigan was being built, some folks I knew talked about bringing over some Canadian soil to place at the site. I don't know whether they fulfilled their mission.

 

migo_sig_logo.jpg

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quote:
Originally posted by dinoprophet:

Pardon an American for posting in the Canada forum, but I was wondering if you're only collecting Canadian stores. There are about as many THs as McDs in my area.

 

It was a sad day when we no longer had to travel to Canada for Tim Horton's. When the first one at the University of Michigan was being built, some folks I knew talked about bringing over some Canadian soil to place at the site. I don't know whether they fulfilled their mission.


It appears that when it comes to Timaholics there are no borders. Having U.S. waypoints would be great and I'm sure mrcpu would agree.

Cheers, Olar

 

wavey.gif

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Yep, send me your US tims. I've got a new email address for the project:

 

thlp@myrealbox.com

 

The ironic part of this is that it all started when I got pissed at streets and trips because they have tim's in the us of a but not in Tim's home country of Canada!!!

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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quote:
Originally posted by MrGigabyte:

mrcpu,

 

If one was to try to provide you with the information you require, is there any other way of creating the position information in the format that you can accept?

 

We are a Mac/Unix shop and cannot run the common PC based waypoint applications.

 

If there was half a dozen or so, I could manually enter the data into a text file. If you could provide a sample entry, it may be helpful to others that are also PC impaired.


 

Since the GPX format is just XML, it would be feasible for someone to write a PERL mod that abstracts the data into an object class.

 

Anyways, the GPX format is on the topografix website. If you email thlp@myrealbox.com I'll send you a sample.

 

Cheers,

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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quote:
Originally posted by mrcpu:

quote:
Originally posted by MrGigabyte:

mrcpu,

 

If one was to try to provide you with the information you require, is there any other way of creating the position information in the format that you can accept?

 

We are a Mac/Unix shop and cannot run the common PC based waypoint applications.

 

If there was half a dozen or so, I could manually enter the data into a text file. If you could provide a sample entry, it may be helpful to others that are also PC impaired.


 

Since the GPX format is just XML, it would be feasible for someone to write a PERL mod that abstracts the data into an object class.

 

Anyways, the GPX format is on the topografix website. If you email thlp@myrealbox.com I'll send you a sample.

 

Cheers,

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command


 

Rob: something you might try for folks who want to enter data is to set up a template file that structures the data in a way that corresponds to your schema. Or build a web-based form, then use a simple SQL statement to write the results directly into a backend... PostgreSQL maybe.

 

Have you contacted Tim's HQ and told them what you are doing... they might cough up some sort of sponsorship.

 

Later

 

Decodoppler

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I've actually got a sample that I email to anyone who is looking. The GPX file format is fully detailed at http://www.topografix.com/gpx/ anyways...

 

Actually, my wife is the Manager of a Tims. I'm working through her but it's more of a grass roots thing right now and besides, if I just got a list from them then it wouldn't be as much fun! :-)

 

Cheers,

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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A study (Stats Canada I believe) released 2 years ago had the coffee shops per capita @

 

1:8,500 in Canada

1:35,000 in USA

 

No wonder the world finds us so friendly when we're abroad, we're just sedate from lack of a caffine fix.

 

But then again how else but with coffee are you supposed to stay awake icon_eek.gif on the drive between the Soo and Wawa!

 

GPS's...A step in the right direction!

 

[This message was edited by MedicP1 on September 08, 2002 at 10:10 AM.]coffee.gif

 

[This message was edited by MedicP1 on September 08, 2002 at 10:14 AM.]

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A study (Stats Canada I believe) released 2 years ago had the coffee shops per capita @

 

1:8,500 in Canada

1:35,000 in USA

 

No wonder the world finds us so friendly when we're abroad, we're just sedate from lack of a caffine fix.

 

But then again how else but with coffee are you supposed to stay awake icon_eek.gif on the drive between the Soo and Wawa!

 

GPS's...A step in the right direction!

 

[This message was edited by MedicP1 on September 08, 2002 at 10:10 AM.]coffee.gif

 

[This message was edited by MedicP1 on September 08, 2002 at 10:14 AM.]

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quote:
Originally posted by MedicP1:

 

But then again how else but with coffee are you supposed to stay awake on the drive between the Soo and Wawa!


I've done that trip a few times. It wasn't too bad. Now Winnipeg to Calgary is a different story. A real snoozer.

Olar

 

wavey.gif

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I tried your link and went down to the tightest zoom but couldn't get it to give me Lat. & Long. or any other coordinates. Am I doing something wrong or not looking in the right area. I couldn't find anything to toggle to get it to give coordinates other than the street address & phone number.

 

GPSr's...A step in the right direction!

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Don't worry, you aren't ruining our fun!!! :-)

 

I'm aware that the yellow pages and canada411.com have the street addresses. In fact, I'm planning to try and get street addresses from head office to add to my database.

 

The "fun" is in the finding, just like geocaching. Does it spoil anyones fun that the Benchmark database that our American cousins are using has lat/long and descriptions? Nope! Not at all! :-)

 

The first objective of this project is to have fun finding Timmies. The second is to create a database of waypoints that people can upload to their GPS to help them find a Timmies when the need arises.

 

I played with the Yellowpages.ca site at the start of the project. I also looked at the fact that a lot of tims show up in MS Streets and Trips south of the border too.

 

The problem with Yellowpages et al. is that they haven't figured out that people have GPS units and would like to "click and download" the coordinates for that chinese restaurant or that fancy hairstylist!

 

(Well, at least I'd like too! :-))

 

Cheers,

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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quote:
Originally posted by MedicP1:

I tried your link and went down to the tightest zoom but couldn't get it to give me Lat. & Long. or any other coordinates.


 

Look at the URL displayed on the resulting map page. You will see the coordinates appended as name/value pairs in the post request.

 

For example...

 

LONGITUDE=-1195928&LATITUDE=494999

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quote:
Originally posted by TooNewfs:

You can pull a lot of the coordinates out of the MAP link from the results of a "Tim Hortons" search at Yellowpages.ca.


I think that Rob's intentions were to have the list compiled from waypoints grabbed during actual visits or at least drive-by's during your routine day-to-day travels. There is no deadline for completing this project so slaving away at the computer to get the coords isn't necessary. Besides I much prefer to download all the info from my GPSR to EasyGPS then to manually input each one individually. However if you live in a "One-Timmies town" like PDOP's, manual entry would work for me.

Cheers, Olar (make mine a double-double)

 

wavey.gif

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quote:
Originally posted by PDOP's:

Hey there's only one Tim's in my town. Can I just e-mail you the coordinates in plain text?

 

PDOP's

 

A toasted bagel and coffee start my day.


 

If you are going to manually enter the waypoint, would you mind using EasyGPS to do it.. please!!! I don't have enought time in the day to take what you give me in an email and retype it into EasyGPS. Since you would have to type in anyways, I figure it's the same amount of work for you and less work for me [:rolleyes:]

 

Cheers,

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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quote:
Originally posted by PDOP's:

Hey there's only one Tim's in my town. Can I just e-mail you the coordinates in plain text?

 

PDOP's

 

A toasted bagel and coffee start my day.


 

If you are going to manually enter the waypoint, would you mind using EasyGPS to do it.. please!!! I don't have enought time in the day to take what you give me in an email and retype it into EasyGPS. Since you would have to type in anyways, I figure it's the same amount of work for you and less work for me [icon_smile.gif]

 

Cheers,

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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I sent you 11 TH waypoints the other day. Can't tell if you ever got them.

 

I did a quick drive around Northeast London, banged out waypoints in the parking lots in front of each one, then tried EasyGPS to download and select out the THs and document them. A lot of learning in one evening!! BUt, with apologies to your wife, I disn't get out of the truck once. Restraint, my man, solid willpower.

 

Good luck with the projcet, and I hope to see your mega-file when it's done.

 

EOA, London, Ontario

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Got em... kind of busy... new baby!!!

 

My wife gave birth on Sunday to girl...Patricia. 7lbs, 8oz. I've been busy for the last month getting ready and now I'm busy again with the baby!

 

I plan to merge them in to the database and send out an update this week. I've decided to go with an LDAP solution on the back end and I've spent a bit of time while at work getting it setup.

 

Hopefully, when I'm done, I'll have a model that will allow lots of other POI too.

 

Cheers,

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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Congrats on the new addition to the caching team. So now that youare so busy you have to improvise. Have your wife go around the house and waypoint key baby items, write up a description of the various caches, but to make the hunt more challenging have her pick a datum at random to waypoint them then you have to find them with a different datum. Sounds cool eh!

 

This should provide you with hours of fun, while you try and get a sat lock inside the house.

 

Just remeber that baby monitors transmit to more than just your reciever...it's like an open mike for any scanner owner or other monitor owner to tune into. I've heard some private moments over mine. icon_eek.gificon_eek.gificon_wink.gificon_biggrin.gif

 

GPSr's...A step in the right direction!

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Congrats on the new addition to the caching team. So now that youare so busy you have to improvise. Have your wife go around the house and waypoint key baby items, write up a description of the various caches, but to make the hunt more challenging have her pick a datum at random to waypoint them then you have to find them with a different datum. Sounds cool eh!

 

This should provide you with hours of fun, while you try and get a sat lock inside the house.

 

Just remeber that baby monitors transmit to more than just your reciever...it's like an open mike for any scanner owner or other monitor owner to tune into. I've heard some private moments over mine. icon_eek.gificon_eek.gificon_wink.gificon_biggrin.gif

 

GPSr's...A step in the right direction!

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quote:
Originally posted by mrcpu:

Don't worry, you aren't ruining our fun!!! :-)

 

The problem with Yellowpages et al. is that they haven't figured out that people have GPS units and would like to "click and download" the coordinates for that chinese restaurant or that fancy hairstylist!

 

(Well, at least I'd like too! :-))


 

So would I.

On one of the map sites it says it can't provide lat long due to contractual obligations or some other crud to that effect. After sending an e-mail do a diferant one I got mostly the same response. So my conclusion is that someone DOES Do that and somehow is keeping others from doing it. icon_redface.gif(

 

On a sorta related note if there is any bussines owners on here maybe they could provide that info in all their advertizing. With luck it will catch on. If your the enterprenurial

 

Pat Patterson

VP Herd of Turtles 4X4 Club

VP 4Wheel Drive ***. BC

 

Pat Patterson

Garmin 12XL

82CJ7 & 79F250

Herd of Turtles 4x4 club

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quote:
Originally posted by mrcpu:

Don't worry, you aren't ruining our fun!!! :-)

 

The problem with Yellowpages et al. is that they haven't figured out that people have GPS units and would like to "click and download" the coordinates for that chinese restaurant or that fancy hairstylist!

 

(Well, at least I'd like too! :-))


 

So would I.

On one of the map sites it says it can't provide lat long due to contractual obligations or some other crud to that effect. After sending an e-mail do a diferant one I got mostly the same response. So my conclusion is that someone DOES Do that and somehow is keeping others from doing it. icon_redface.gif(

 

On a sorta related note if there is any bussines owners on here maybe they could provide that info in all their advertizing. With luck it will catch on. If your the enterprenurial

 

Pat Patterson

VP Herd of Turtles 4X4 Club

VP 4Wheel Drive ***. BC

 

Pat Patterson

Garmin 12XL

82CJ7 & 79F250

Herd of Turtles 4x4 club

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I was starting to think that maybe I had sent my file to the wrong e-mail address.... icon_eek.gif

 

Thanks for the honouable mention, although I don't know where to go to pickup the latest version of the listing. icon_rolleyes.gif

 

Would it be somewhere on the website that have setup and I'm just not looking hard enough??

 

http://thlp.kenetic.com/

 

I have not lost my mind...........

I left it in a Geo-Cache somewhere..........

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I was emailing the updates to people but that was a stop-gap thing. I've now got a live link on the site right near the top that lets you download the data live out of the database. When you click the link a perl program queries the database and returns all the entries.

 

Rob

Mobile Cache Command

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