Duelling Banjos with MyRouteApp

[Con Hennekens]

@Jem-Cotton, This is not where it went wrong for you but I am taking this as an example:

You have a distance of 25km between wp1 and 2. The difference in distance and/or time between taking the D76 and the D618 to the red circle marked crossing is marginal. That leaves interpretation to the route calculation engine to take either. Based on trafic info for example. I would have placed an extra WP at the green arrow, to force that part of the route.

Taking the D618 up North from Camors looks like multiple waypoints are being skipped, but that is actually not true. Only skipping WP2 already leads to taking the long way up north, probably because of the very slow interesting route you made, but with not enough waypoints

The green arrow shows where you deviated. The red arrow shows the location of WP2 being skipped. The route engine says it is faster to go up North to (originally) WP3 instead of South like you intended.

Why WP2 got skipped before it was reached, I don't know. Could be by accident, pressing on the upper right tile. But there are also a few posts about premature skipping of waypoints. But I have not experienced that myself yet.

It is not uncommon to add shaping points at every 2 to 10 km. But more important is it to check your route for possible alternative calculations, like depicted in my first picture.

[Rob Verhoeff]

@Con-Hennekens @Jem-Cotton And that brings me exactly to my point of placing a waypoint after every important intersection or road split, at the very least. You can easily skip a 40km stretch without a waypoint, especially when the route winds through the mountains with no side roads.

[Con Hennekens]

@Rob-Verhoeff said in Duelling Banjos with MyRouteApp:

You can easily skip a 40km stretch without a waypoint, especially when the route winds through the mountains with no side roads.

Yes you can indeed. There are not much alternatives if there are no side roads . But the further the waypoints are apart, the more impact skipping a waypoint can have. That's what we are seeing here.

[Jem Cotton]

@Con-Hennekens

Hi all,

I understand about the placement of waypoints, but that doesn't address the main point of my issue which is ..

Why would 2 MRA apps with the same version and same downloaded maps, and sharing exactly the same route ... make different route choices?

Cheers, Jem

[Jack van Tilburg]

@Jem-Cotton said in Duelling Banjos with MyRouteApp:

the same functional settings

Did you look at the setting that are shown in the first screen after opening a route for navigation too?

[Con Hennekens]

@Jem-Cotton said in Duelling Banjos with MyRouteApp:

I understand about the placement of waypoints, but that doesn't address the main point

I think it does... Obviously your pal Mike skipped WP2 somehow. Be it by an unintended manual skip, or by a premature skipping by the app itself. Long-pressing WP2 would have put you in the same direction again. My pictures above illustrate that skipping only WP2 has the effect you experienced.

[Con Hennekens]

@Jack-van-Tilburg, Those settings are deemed to be equal for them both, since they are inherited from the online route nowadays. Unless they were altered manually before starting the route of course.

[Jack van Tilburg]

@Con-Hennekens
So is a difference ruled out?

[Con Hennekens]

@Jack-van-Tilburg, if not altered manually at the location you show, I think yes.
If the impact of the routing options was that big, it would already be visible in the route overview window where you press Start too.

Doesn't my explanation above sound more plausible, you think?

[Jack van Tilburg]

@Con-Hennekens said in Duelling Banjos with MyRouteApp:

Doesn't my explanation above sound more plausible, you think?

Yes it does. More then mine i should say.
But even your option doesn't exclude un unintended action of the user.

[Con Hennekens]

@Jack-van-Tilburg, certainly not indeed.

[richtea999]

All your points are plain 'waypoints' / shaping points, which means they're not mandatory and can be skipped, should the routing engine dynamically decide it knows better.

Change one (or more) of the waypoints - say point 3 - to a 'via' point, i.e. a point that you must pass through. Then the routing engine should behave as you expect.

You can do that by tapping on the hand symbol (possibly teaching Grandma to suck eggs, here - sorry!):

I think the only downside to via points is if there's a road closure, serious traffic problem, etc, it will still attempt to get you to go through that 'via' point, which could cause some interesting routing.
For example if the road was closed a mile after your point 2 then the routing engine would do some complex re-routing to make sure you still got to point 3, whereas in real life, you might just think - 'forget it, let's go another route today'.

All that fluff above doesn't explain why both instances of the app didn't behave in a similar manner, but it might help get them better aligned next time.

[Con Hennekens]

@richtea999, It seems I keep repeating myself, but my pictures above show that even if WP3 was a viapoint, by skipping WP2 the navigation would take the long way up north to WP3 because it is quicker than the winding roads down south.

Via points are used to indicate mandatory waypoints, nothing more. The ultimate reason why the deviation after skipping WP2 is so big, is that there are not enough shaping points in the route to force it down south.

[richtea999]

@Con-Hennekens You're right, Con - apologies. I have had similar oddities that seem to have been solved by using 'via' points. Maybe that was just luck.

Maybe the route planner needs an extra option:

• calculate shortest route

[Con Hennekens]

@richtea999, if WP2 was a via point, then that one would not have been auto-skipped. But the same thing could happen for all other shaping points. A "shortest route" option would most likely have prevented TS his problem, but would also have introduced the same problem here:

It would have chosen the northern route instead of the southern one). The essence (still) being: not enough shaping points... There is no substitute for shaping points! Only driving a track maybe, but for that you'll have to give up waypoints altogether.

[Jem Cotton]

@Con-Hennekens

Hiya. I could understand Mike maybe missing one waypoint (Wp2) by accident (though highly unlikely in my opinion), but not the others. Mike's route would have to skip past wp 3 - 4 - 5 .... in order for his route to be valid, and wind up taking us to wp6.

... and no, he didn't long press a further waypoint. We're both experienced users of MRA and know how to both read and manipulate the nav on the move.

It's easier to blame a user i guess than look into a potential error in the software ...

ChJem

[Jack van Tilburg]

@Jem-Cotton

It's easier to blame a user i guess than look into a potential error in the software

To be able to explain a deviation/cause, you will have to rule out all possibilities.
Given that you you self indicate that all technical settings are basically the same, it makes sense to investigate whether an unintentionally human act can be the cause.
It's not an accusation. In fact, we are all curious about the cause, you can tell by the number of messages and possibilities in this topic. All based on help and interest.

[Con Hennekens]

@Jem-Cotton, I am not blaming anyone. I am trying to find a plausible explanation to an event no one else has been reporting to this extend. I guess it is easier to blame the software, than to look for potential human error... (easy saying, isn't it?)

Now that is out of of the way : What I am trying to show (and seems to be difficult to grasp by many, proven by the replies I got) is that it is quite plausible that ONLY wp2 was skipped. The route goes up North but still towards WP3 quickest way. To reach WP3 you follow the route in reverse order along 5, 4, 3 so it looks like you are directed to 6.

I took quite some effort in looking into your route and making the screenshots. Please tell me if you don't want me to help you, I'll stop, since I have better things to do than to help someone who does not appreciate it.

[Rob Verhoeff]

@Jem-Cotton said in Duelling Banjos with MyRouteApp:

It's easier to blame a user i guess than look into a potential error in the software ...

Of course, there could be an error in the software. I believe that all software contains errors to some extent. However, no one here has said that it's your fault! Considering the many responses to guide you in the right direction, I don't think anyone holds it against you. Instead, I would suggest taking the recommendations given to heart when compiling your next route.

[Jem Cotton]

@Rob-Verhoeff

Thanks everyone for your interest and replies.

I'm not offended or anything, but wanted to point out that as fairly experienced users, it was highly unlikely that a waypoint was skipped by accident.

Mike and I use that functionality frequently, and with gloves on, it takes some purpose to achieve, especially as you have to confirm the choice.

For that reason, I ruled it out as a realistic explanation.

That leaves an unexplained difference between the two instances of the app, which for me is a little worrying.

I'll make sure to feature viapoints a little more liberally to try to prevent it in future.

Happy travels all.