When the build phase completes, it produces a number of files in the same directory as the reference shapeset. These are:
The first two files (__db.*) are used by Berkeley DB to maintain its environment. These files may not be produced by Windows versions of PAGC. The next file (REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.err) is a file that notes errors experienced during the build phase. These errors may range from serious to innocuous. The next five files (REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.ix*) are files in the Berkeley DB format that index the main data file, REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.pgx. The file REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.pgc is a short text file that contains certain data PAGC will need to carry over from the build phase to the match phase. The last file (REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.sts) is the statistic file, a text file, which is produced if the optional -z flag is used ( See the Statistics file).
The standardized data is stored in the pgx file. The data corresponding to each attribute detected is placed in a field terminated by a comma. The record starts with a pipe (|) and ends with a pipe. The record is stored in a Berkeley DB b-tree using the unstandardized reference table's row/shape number as a key. The file is named REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.pgx and may be viewed when the build is complete by using the -dREFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME -i-1 option. Missing or blank civic numbers are denoted by a -1. Otherwise blank or missing values will be represented only by the terminating comma. Since the standardization may include attributes not present in the unstandardized schema, fields are reserved for them.
The standardized data is also put into four indices. The indices associate a key with the unstandardized row number. The only MACRO ( See MICRO/MACRO) value used in the keys is the POSTAL attribute, if present. The HOUSE attribute is also not included in the indexing. The full feature index (REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.ix0) includes all the other MICRO attributes plus the POSTAL. The streetname index (REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.ix1) takes the STREET attribute only as a key, and then STREET plus POSTAL, if POSTAL is present. The soundex index (REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.ix2) concatenates the soundex value of each word in the streetname to make a key - but does not include the POSTAL attribute. The three foregoing indices are Berkeley b-tree files.
The fourth index is the edit distance index. It is a Berkeley memory pool file, denoted REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.ix3, and is a pointerless trie. Each STREET value and each STREET value plus POSTAL value is inserted into the trie. It is basically a recognition device, and no record numbers are associated with its insertions. When searched with a candidate key, it produces all keys within an edit distance of 2.
These files are used in the match phase to produce candidate reference records to match against a user address. They are searched in the following order:
A fifth file, denoted REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.ix4, is also created and populated during the build phase. For each reference arc, regardless of whether or not its attributes are standardized and included in the pgx file, two index records are created. Each will index one of the endpoints of the arc. This index is used in the matching phase to find blocks that made correspond to missing address ranges.
When the build is complete, certain information is saved in the REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME.pgc file to be transferred from the build phase to the match phase. If a file with the same path name already exists, it will be overwritten.
The first line of the file will be a signature, PGC. The second line will be LITTLE if the architecture is little endian and BIG if not. The next line will be a series of integers, the first giving the size, in machine-dependent size_t units, of the size of an integer. The next integer will be the number of attributes to be used in the matching. There then follow a series of records, one for each of the enumerated attributes, giving the output symbol (postal attribute), the comparison type ( See Comparison Types), the two matching weights, and the field numbers for the associated fields in the standardized records and an unstandardized records, to the maximum of four fields and with a -1 denoting no field.
The following is the contents of a pgc file using a Statscan schema with the default matching weights, on a little endian computer with a 4-byte integer. There are 7 attributes, the first being HOUSE (1) with a comparison type of 8 (an internal representation of the NUMBER_INTERVAL_LEFT_RIGHT comparison type), an m of .9999 and a u of .05, and 4 pairs of fields for its data. The standardized field numbers are numbered 0 , 1, 2, and 3, and the unstandardized fields are numbered 14, 15, 16 and 17. The other six attributes are then represented in a similar fashion.
PGC
LITTLE
4 7
1 8 0.999000 0.050000 0 14 1 15 2 16 3 17
2 1 0.800000 0.100000 4 13 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1
3 0 0.700000 0.100000 5 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1
4 0 0.700000 0.100000 6 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1
5 1 0.900000 0.010000 7 11 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1
6 1 0.850000 0.100000 8 12 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1
7 0 0.850000 0.100000 9 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1 -1
All of the build-created files ( See Build Phase Products) should be deleted if the reference data needs to be rebuilt. Because BerkeleyDB's environment files must also be deleted for rebuilding and because more than one reference may use the same environment, it is recommended that there be only one reference shapeset per directory - unless you are relatively certain that you will not need to rebuild.
To clean a directory of build-created files:
rm -f __db.* *.ix* *.err *.pg*
The build phase error file takes the same name as the reference attribute table and is placed in the same directory as the reference shapeset. It takes the extension ".err". These errors are those logged during the build showing standardization errors. These are logged to assist in the revision (if required) of either the reference attribute table or the standardization files ( See Standardization Files).
The bypassing of records that are not considered geocodable (ie they don't have an address range on either blockface) is not recorded in the error log.
No standardization of ADDRESS for row N: skipping!. ADDRESS is the unstandardized MICRO portion of the address in record N of the REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME xbase table.
Unsupported rural route address: ADDRESS. The string ADDRESS is the MICRO portion of a standardization candidate for a standardized reference record. It contains an RR route, which PAGC can't handle. This error will be logged in the build error log. The appearance of this error does not necessarily mean that the program failed to standardize the address.
No standardization of ADDRESS for row N: skipping!. ADDRESS is the MICRO portion of the unstandardized address data in row N of the REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME reference attribute table.
No schema-conforming stz for row M: Using stz N: ADDRESS. The program was unable to find a standardization of the MICRO portion of the unstandardized address data in row N of the REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME reference attribute table.
SIDE house addresses but no SIDE macro for row N. SIDE is either "left" or "right", and N is the row of the REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME reference attribute table. It indicates that the MACRO fields for the left/right blockface were missing, even though there was an address range for that blockface.
Skip row N: No stz for SIDE macro ADDRESS. N is the row of the REFERENCE_SHAPESET_NAME reference attribute table. SIDE is either "left" or "right". The blockface MACRO data could not be standardized.
In addition to these errors, more general errors are also recorded if they occur after the log has been opened.
As an example, consider the contents of the file Whatcom.err, produced by a build of a Tigerline format shapeset of Whatcom county. It consists of three errors:
Right house addresses but no right macro for row 3051
No schema-conforming stz for row 14089:
E,19 Crst
Using stz 0:
Prefix Direction: EAST
Street Name: 19
Suffix Type: CRESCENT
Left house addresses but no left macro for row 15532
These errors may be interpreted as follows:
This indicates another error in the reference. The commas indicate field divisions - and note the lack of one between the 19 and the Crst. The Crst has been incorrectly included by the reference in the FENAME field rather than the FTYPE field. The standardizer can't find a correct standardization that corresponds to the reference and substitutes its own, which in this case is the correct one.
If the -z is specified with -b flag, a file is produced giving the hit frequency for each build rule applied to a standardization candidate, and the frequency for which it was chosen as the best standardization. These statistics may prove useful in creating or reweighting rules for the reference locale. The format of the statistics report is similar to that given for the standardization test ( See Standardization Test).
The following are two examples of the statistics from the build of whatcom.dbf:
Rule 4 is of type 2 (ARC)
: Input : |1 (WORD)||2 (TYPE)|
Output: |5 (STREET)||6 (SUFTYP)|
rank 13 ( 0.825000): hit frequency: 0.118579, best frequency: 0.811918
9075 hits out of 76531, best 9061 out of 11160
This entry is interpreted as follows:
The first line gives the rule number (4) and number (2) and name (ARC_C) of the rule type ( Rule Types),
The second line gives the rank (13) - a number between 0 and 17 - and then the value at which this rule is applied in this context (0.825000). The hit frequency (0.118579) is the percentage of times that this rule was tested against the input against the total tests against input, and the best frequency (0.811918) is the percentage of times this rule was selected as best for a reference record.
The third line gives the numbers from which the hit and best frequency in line 2 were calculated.
This rule, then, is the one used to standardize 81% of Whatcom's reference records. A second rule is responsible for another 11%:
Rule 694 is of type 2 (ARC)
: Input : |22 (DIRECT)||1 (WORD)||2 (TYPE)|
Output: |2 (PREDIR)||5 (STREET)||6 (SUFTYP)|
rank 12 ( 0.800000): hit frequency: 0.018581, best frequency: 0.111828
1422 hits out of 76531, best 1248 out of 11160