Along these lines, we were looking to find a more effective way to organize Fast Offering routes for our Deacons. A few tries at mapping applications and visual assignment had yielded routes that were difficult to navigate in a car. I also extracted all of the address information into a CSV file, but imported it as stops in Microsoft Street, picked one arbitrarily as the start point, then had the program calculate the optimal route. It provided an optimized driving route throughout the entire ward membership, and has been considered as the basis for segmenting the ward for geographic needs (Fast Offering and emergency response groups).
Regards, Steve Farnsworth -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Pratt, Dave Sent: Friday, September 02, 2005 4:38 PM To: LDS Open Source Software Subject: RE: [Ldsoss] a new application There should be careful thought, prayer, and inspiration involved in deciding where to live. This is a major decision that affects you and your posterity. I sincerely hope you don't believe there is a lack of revelation in these important matters. It was no mistake that Joseph Smith's family moved to up-state New York. It is no mistake that you live where you live, and have the neighbors you have. There was a young man who grew up in Whittier, California. After he graduated from high school, his family moved back east. He put his mission papers in, and was called on a mission to California. His first area was in his home ward, the Whittier 7th ward. The ward members called him Dave, not Elder Pope. He could even give his own referrals, because he already knew everyone in the area. He called the mission president, who affirmed that regardless of his growing up in that ward, the Lord wanted him to be there. The President told him to pray about it. If you question your home teaching assignment, pray about it. Now, as for ward maps & database stuff, my old bishop created a database using Microsoft access that contains all known information about every household within the boundaries, member or non-member. I downloaded the free shape files from Salt Lake County Recorder's website, opened them in Arc view, exported them as windows meta-files, and imported them into excel. Then by using a csv file from the access database I can create formulas so that by selecting a house you can read everything known about that house. I suppose most people would not appreciate being in a database, and this is a very private database that is not known of, or shared with anyone except the ward mission leader, bishop, and myself. One of the main problems with a database is that people move quite often. Updating it is a major task. From: Dave Pratt -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Paul Penrod Sent: Friday, September 02, 2005 9:31 AM To: LDS Open Source Software Subject: Re: [Ldsoss] a new application I will agree in principle with the HT by location comment; however, every EQ I have ever been in has used location as a factor in their decision making before taking the matter before the Lord. Sometimes, things change so that people on the opposite ends of the ward are paired together as a companionship or as a HT family. That's the inspiration part coming into play. As to no inspiration as to where you buy your house? That's total hogwash. If you want it, it's there - but God will not do the legwork for you. There is a use for an application like this as part of the initial sorting out process for families and companionships. The rest of it lies with the EQ Presidency and the Lord. ...Paul Steven Peterson wrote: >Isn't the idea of home / visiting teaching assignments by location >sorta missing the point, there isn't inspiration to where you buy your house? > >:Steve > > >-----Original Message----- >From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Bryan Murdock >Sent: Thursday, September 01, 2005 11:13 PM >To: LDS Open Source Software >Subject: Re: [Ldsoss] a new application > >That's a pretty cool idea. Without thinking about if for more than 5 >seconds, I'll hazard that it'd probably be fairly easy to whip this up >using google maps: > >http://www.google.com/apis/maps/ > >Bryan > >On 9/1/05, Arthur Westover <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > >>I was thinking it would be nice to develop an application that would >>allow someone to quickly tell who lives close to whom in a ward. >> >>This would be useful for hometeaching and visiting teaching >>assignments, esp. with the rising costs of transportation. While this >>might not be a big deal in areas with high Mormon population >>densities, it does play a role in other areas where members of a ward >>can be spread out over many miles. >> >>So the way I would envision it is that the program first creates a >>database with all families. Then using a utility (example --> >>http://www.gpsvisualizer.com/convert?form=address ) is able to assign >>a GPS location to each house based on the address. Then when the user >>calls upon a name, you could see how many families lived within a >>specified radius. >> >>I have zero programming experience, so I'm afraid I can do no more >>than suggest this idea and participate in testing. I take that back. >>I did a semester of fortran some 15 years ago, but I don't think that >>counts. :) >> >>Arthur >>_______________________________________________ >>Ldsoss mailing list >>Ldsoss@lists.ldsoss.org >>http://lists.ldsoss.org/mailman/listinfo/ldsoss >> >> >> >_______________________________________________ >Ldsoss mailing list >Ldsoss@lists.ldsoss.org >http://lists.ldsoss.org/mailman/listinfo/ldsoss >_______________________________________________ >Ldsoss mailing list >Ldsoss@lists.ldsoss.org >http://lists.ldsoss.org/mailman/listinfo/ldsoss > > > > -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. 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