Manifold Community Site Area: General

Report from Nvision 08

Dimitri — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 21:43:25 GMT

Hi everyone,

I've been lucky to attend NVIDIA's Nvision 08 event in California the last couple of days and wanted to report what I saw to the community. Nvision 08 is NVIDIA's first worldwide conference bringing together the many dynamic uses of their technology under the theme "visual computing."

It was organized in meeting rooms, theaters and three large halls: one hall for company exhibits for vendors involved in motherboards, graphics, automotive uses (huge!) and high performance (CUDA) computing; a very large hall for many hundreds of computers supplied by vendors and brought by participants involved in gaming of various kinds plus a Guiness world record attempt for the largest LAN party; and last, but not least, a huge hall for competitive gaming leagues with blow-by-blow commentary and reportage on screens 40 feet high. In addition to all that a variety of adjacent meeting rooms hosted professional conferences on CUDA/High Performance Computing, Automotive, Professional and Enterprise computing tracks. Ah, yes, and there were a variety of performance centers, HD theaters and other venues showing the incredible CG uses of NVIDIA that now power the film industry, many in 3D no less.

Gaming uses for NVIDIA are huge. We all know that, but to internalize how huge they have become so rapidly is not easy to internalize. One indicator is that the gaming industry is now tens of billions of dollars bigger than the world film industry. If anything, the world film industry, from Hollywood to Bollywood is seeming more and more destined to become an appendage of gaming given the extensive use of CG. Of the top ten revenue-grossing movies in the past year, nine could not have been created without CG. Actors speaking at events discussed how it has become routine for their synthetic doubles to be inserted into scenes and it is clear that fully synthetic actors will soon be used as non-gimmick replacements for live actors. But for all the 3D displays and expected evolution of striking graphics, the really amazing stuff seemed to be coming out of the massively parallel computing use of GPUs.

What surprised me and I think what surprised many of the attendees, a sort of collective realization that came upon us, was on the one hand the incredible surge in massively parallel architectures and on the other hand what they have now made possible. Many of us have been working on our own projects this past year and while it was obvious that many other things were going on it was still a big impact to see it come together in one place. Parallel computing is already huge. There are now tens of thousands of developers working with CUDA and many hundreds of truly significant applications. The amazing thing is how much of what is being done is truly transformative.

Cars are employing CUDA calculations within embedded NVIDIA GPUs to do real-time, highly sophisticated computer vision so that multiple cameras within the car can "see" other cars, obstacles, the road and terrain and make decisions about safety. It is not just simple as the car driving itself through traffic. It is things like the car knowing when a crash is unavoidable and being able to make physics decisions to minimize the damage of that crash. This can range from things like deploying air bags moments before impact to allow a softer, less dangerous deployment, to the car knowing that a pedestrian is going to be hit and the car making subtle changes in variable, electromotive bumper and hood component positions to dramatically lessen the harm to the pedestrian.

In consumer applications, simple cameras, like the digital cameras already routinely connected to computers, can provide imagery that can be analyzed using the speed of CUDA in real time to detect objects, including people and the motions of those people in view, to enable control of computers using gestures. Like the gestures and interfaces in the iphone? You can have that on your monitor as well if you like to enable new GUIs or to simply enable Wii-like games without any need to hold hardware.

It turns out we are getting remarkably close to simulating natural brain function by simulating the operation of many neurons in real time. We are many years away from doing humans, but simpler organisms are no longer a problem using relatively inexpensive (four GPUs, like four 280GTX cards... a little over a 1000 stream processors) hardware. Even if we are not talking "intelligence" or self-awareness or other sentience, a remarkable degree of autonomous function is now possible. There will only be more in the (near) future.

Anyway, while simulating the very largest systems is still a challenge requiring racks of NVIDIA GPU cards (albeit room sized racks and no longer football stadium sized racks), for an extraordinary range of applications requiring machine vision, machine reasoning, 3D everything, computation that used to be prohibitively expensive, can be accomplished with a single GPGPU card or chip and all that at such absurdly low costs that even the most trivial application, like an automobile back-up camera, can use it.

The backup camera is a good example of a nearly free CUDA application. People don't like the "fish-eye" distortion usually seen in backup camera displays. No problem. CUDA GPUs of the simplest sort can instantaneously recompute the warping to, in effect, re-project the fisheye distortion into a flat display.

Other examples include the new field of (I'm not making this up) apparel cloth physics. It turns out that while it is fairly simple in 3D packages to show some cloth draped over an object it is remarkably difficult to compute exactly how a real piece of cloth made up of given material of given thickness and wear will in fact appear in real life when cut into panels, stitched together to make clothing and worn by a human. It's a task that requires a substantial supercomputer, or a handful of NVIDIA CUDA-enabled GPU cards, to compute in real time. It is a critical task that now is done with CUDA and is spawning a new generation of computer-assisted garment industries, from designing and laying out and prepping new clothing designs for semi-automated manufacturing, to rendering those clothes in printed and online advertising or even virtual garment shopping.

On the high end there are many big applications that merit deploying rooms full of GPUs to do computations in seconds that formerly took days on supercomputers. These will increase the rate at which we are able to discover fundamental knowledge about biology, how our vision and thought work, how proteins fold, how the most complex processes of life proceed. Progress can now be made in minutes and days, with tens of thousands of simulations per day when just a year ago it would be just a simulation per week in some cases for a scientist to analyze.

I attended sessions on use of CUDA in biology, astrophysics, medicine, manufacturing, gaming and many other disciplines. What stood out in the reports and interactive discussions with folks who have been using CUDA the longest is the awareness among us all that this is just the very beginning. Looking at the inexorable advances in performance and lowered cost that we all know are coming, it is dawning on us all how incredibly transformative the emergence of truly free, literally zero cost, computation at effectively limitless rates will be on our society.

As David Kirk, NVIDIA's chief scientist, remarked in a very insightful talk, "faster is not just faster" meaning that up to some level, say 2 or 3 times faster, nothing changes, but when you get to 10 or 20 times faster things start changing as people become willing to adapt what they are doing and at 100 times faster new things become possible and people completely transform how they go about what they are doing. We can see how it will be 500 or 1000 times faster very soon now with prices for such computation going to near zero in the not too distant future.

I'm not a futurist and won't pretend to know where this is going. But that the technology is accelerating at a rate that is outstripping the imaginations of even those who had taken supercomputers (and I mean the really big iron of the last couple of years) for granted. That such power soon could be so cheap it could be inside every coffee pot, that I feel, as I have rarely felt anything so certainly before, will be true. It will be transformative in dazzling and unexpected ways and will change our world society in fundamental ways.

Anyway, in our very small part of this very big future it is clear the Manifold choice to take advantage of this new technology was the right one. Lucky for us, we got on the right track over a year ago and have built up a lot of expertise that we can utilize in new versions of Manifold. Like everyone else working with this technology, the more you do it the more you realize you are just scratching the surface and you have a wealth of ideas with which to go further.

By the way, on a personal note it was a wonderfully bizarre mix to have rooms full of maximum mathematics astrophysicists and the world's massively parallel supercomputing elite getting together just across the hall from a stadium full of gaming enthusiasts with hotrodded machines howling away at blood sport shootouts on screens two stories high. It was just wild and astonishing and perfect. All the gray beards and CUDA guys were thrilled and totally happy that the wildness and entertainment of gaming helps power getting 100 million CUDA-enabled GPUs out there so we can enjoy killer economy of scale to put a supercomputing BFG on our desktop. Cool! Now stand back as we frag that convolution matrix!

NVIDIA hopes to have full content for Nvision 08 online in the next few weeks.

Regards to all!

IMS - need help!

andrej — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 03:47:36 GMT

HI,

We have IMS server run Manifold 6.5. Todaj I uninstall MF 6.5 and install 7.x - everything OK. But now when I try to run IMS I get an error:

Active Server Pages error 'ASP 0241'

CreateObject Exception

/osnovniVO/Default.asp

The CreateObject of '(null)' caused exception C0000005.

Server object error 'ASP 0177 : c0000005'

Server.CreateObject Failed

/osnovniVO/Default.asp, line 124

c0000005

I also try ro open existing project, save It and one again export web pages, permision,... When I try to run this new pages I got the same error.

Please help - thanks in advance.

Best regards,

Andrej from sLOVEnia

ISI driver / linking to MS's virtual earth

nir — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 06:41:25 GMT

Hi,

I'm trying to link an image from virtual earth.

In Manifold's documentation it is said that "ISI drivers by 3rd party" are required for that operations.

I'm searching the internet but couldn't find any.

For example:

I've googled the following: "isi driver" -manifold +gis

But received only <10 results (which were non-relevant)

Advice?

printing layout in 24 by 36

cjensen — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 11:10:27 GMT

I am trying to print my layout in 24 by 36. Each time I change printers, the image resizes showing information that is beyond my original layout that i created. Can anyone point me in the right direction?

SQL to calculate slope along a line snapped to 2 GPS points

Mike Pelletier — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 19:21:18 GMT

Here's another SQL puzzeler. The goal is to calculate the % slope along a line that has been snapped to 2 GPS points (in the same drawing) that contain a height value. Attached is a map file with such a drawing. Slope is the rise in height over [lenght (I)] of the line. Is it possible to write an SQL statement that calculates the rise or the slope along the line? Thanks for any help.

Attachments:
slope calc.map

Editing polyline: cutting branches and closing line

dplass — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 02:20:19 GMT

I have a closed contour line and want to edit it by removing some branches (valleys). Deleting single coordinates is easy. For larger branches with many coordinates I haven't found a method to delete many coordinates at once (to keep the closed line).

With the other method of cutting of branches (Delete Coordinate - Split Branch) on both sides of the branch I have the problem that I cannot manage to close the line again: I snap both end coordinates of the line with Snap to Lines, apply Join Lines, but when I go back into Edit mode and move one of the coordinates that are on top of each other they are still not connected. It seems I need more than one line for Join Lines. How to close the line? (And I don't want to create areas from the polygon!)

PostGIS and IMS - how to see PostGIS drawings

artlembo — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 10:44:13 GMT

I have a linked drawing from PostGIS, and want to use it in IMS. However, it does not show up in IMS even though it shows up in my .MAP.

I know it has something to do with permissions, but I'm not sure what needs to be changed.

Lets assume my PostGIS database is called "PostGIS", and it has a table called "Parcels". What file does the IUSR account get access to? With a .MDB, it make sense, as you can point directly to the Access database, but how do you do it with PostGIS since it is running as a service?

asp.net vb.net ajax IMS sample

mdsumner — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 16:15:08 GMT

Okay, it's not the best IMS I have ever done and I designed it about a year ago but it gives you a rough idea of how to interact with the Manifold Object Model in .net

It's meant to look like this:-

http://map-analysis.sequence.co.uk/health/

Attachments:
Health.zip

[C#] HowTo create some Geom with specific unit requirement

lloyd — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 16:12:26 GMT

I'm trying to generate rows for paddock for a farmer GIS application.

I manage to reach the point where I have the following variables:

====

Drawing allpadocks = ....;

Drawing allbaserow = ....;

Geom paddock = ....;

Geom baserow = ....;

====

Now, to make it simple, I need to produce a geometry which will cover the paddock with line parralel to the baserow, 1 meter apart.

Where I'm stuck now is, while the paddock could be approximate to an euclidan geometry (i.e. in a plane), I don't know how much of a given unit is one meter, I'm not sure that the X and Y coordinate system is cartesian (i.e. the X and Y line are perpendicular).

Any clue how should I go from there?

Upgrade to V8.x : too late ?

geoguy — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 12:37:00 GMT

Hello, i have missed the upgrade offer to v8.x of manifold system.

Is it to late ?

How to reset the LinkArea of linked drawing

Kenneth — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 10:04:10 GMT

When I checked the Drawing object, I fould LinkArea property but it is readonly. There is no method the reset the LinkArea?

NAD 83 vs VE Mercator

patrickdwong — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 18:21:28 GMT

Hello,

This is a follow up from an old thread.

http://69.17.46.171/forum/t37681.2

I have a map of a site with MS VE imagery linked. I also have parcel and other site data (buildings, infrastructure, etc.). I have separate maps created with layouts for each. One for the aerial imagery and site data and the other for just the site data.

The aerial imagery has a Mercator (meter) projection. I didn't change or alter the projection and made maps based on this project. I made maps to fit a specific scale (1"=50'. I made a view with 1:600 and used that in the layout).

The site data map has a NAD 83 (foot) projection. This data was imported with the projection and hence was retained throughout the map making process. I used the same process as described above to make the layouts.

I discovered that there are differences in both maps. When scaled the same, the aerial map is stretched. I have a building that measures 500' in the site data map (which is correct) and that same building is stretched to 600'. I tried re-assigning the project of the aerial imagery, but then it moved way out in space.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what is going on and how to resolve the differences?

Patrick

programmatically linking to datasources based on an SQL Query

artlembo — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:29:23 GMT

Using the Database Console, you can link a drawing through an SQL clause:

SELECT * FROM "public"."Locations" WHERE "City" = 'El Paso'

then, link the resulting table to a drawing.

in PostGIS, this is lightning fast. However, I will want the City to change frequently, and would like to pass the SQL query as part of the DataSource.ConnectionString. It doesn't appear to me that Manifold will allow this.

UI scripting will not work because I would eventually like to have this run as an IMS or ActiveX application. Does anyone know of a way to include the SQL string into a connection to a DataSource?

Projection trouble though I have datum and spatial extent

Kris Austral — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 18:39:07 GMT

Hi, another annoying newbie question (I do read and re-read the manual, but it's obviously not sinking in!)

I have a .shp file showing areas across a whole state. It's from a government department (who generally use AGD 94 as the datum), and has a little blurb saying: SPATIAL EXTENT N Lat -28.0, W Long: 141.0, S Lat: -37.5, E Long: 154.0.

In Edit - Assign Projection, AGD 94 is automatically accepted. If I just press OK, the image has latitude and longitude displayed onscreen as within the bounds provided for the Spatial Extent. However, when I opened the image in Google Earth (.kml) to see how that function worked, the areas failed to correspond to the city features they were meant to be centred on (being about 200 km north).

So, I started again, tried Edit-Assign Projection, kept AGD 94, and also checked Orthographic and "Suggest", getting Centre Latitude: -32 and Centre Longitude: 147, which seem right. But the latitude/longitude displayed onscreen is then about 3 degrees out of the Spatial Extent provided, and opens in Google Earth as a teeny tiny area about 8m wide in the middle of the state.

I'm probably trying to do too much too fast but need australian examples to show my boss. Any help would be really appreciated.

Cheers

How to get the coordinates of the four corners of map in screen?

Kenneth — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 14:53:30 GMT

I need to create a polygon base on the map in screen (IMS) to extract data from database.

How to get the coordinates of the four corners?

Thank you.

SQL 2008 and Manifold 8.0.7 - Not importing geometry from table

jenerdba — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 08:06:12 GMT

I've ran into an issue while testing SQL Server 2008 with Manifold.

It seems that if I import geometry data based on a query into Manifold, the geometry column becomes a binary column.

Here are the steps I took:

1 - Open the Database Console (menu Tools | Database Console)

2 - Connect to a SQL Server 2008 data source

3 - Type a query in the bottom textbox: SELECT * FROM any table that has a geometry field.

4 - Click on the Import Query icon and close the Database console.

Now if you double click on the imported query in the project pane, you will see that the geometry column is now a binary column.

When I tried the same steps with Oracle11g, the geometry column was imported as a geometry.

Is this a bug?

Creating point objects from a line attribute

anajera — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 09:53:30 GMT

Hello all

I hope someone can help me get a solution to the challenge described below. I have not ben able yet to figure out a way to solve it using the available Manifold tools. The file ExternalNumbers.map has been uploaded for reference.

I have a drawing representing blocks in a city. One of the attributes on the drawing table are the house numbers. There is a column named NumExt which has all the external numbers belonging to that part of the block, separated by commas as follows:

3,5,7,9,11,13,15,17,19,21,23,25,29,31,33,3,5.7,9,17

Obviously, different blocks have different sets of numbers as can be seen in the attached file.

I need to create a point feature for each of the house numbers contained in this column evenly aligned along the line representing the block where the numbers belong to. So there shall be one point feature for house number 3, another for house number 5 and so forth.

Does anyone have an idea on how this could be done other than manually?

I would very much appreciate any help.

Alberto

Attachments:
ExternalNumbers.map

Bearing/greater circle lines

Galain — Tue, 06 May 2008 15:04:52 GMT

Hi,

I am considering purchasing Manifold, but I have one important question to ask first: is it possible to get Manifold to accurately draw greater circle lines? Ideally id like to be able to programatically specify a bearing and distance from a point and have a line drawn that takes the shortest path along the surface of the earth. Is this sort of thing possible without having to resort to manually calculating polylines?

Thanks.

Manifold and Windows Installer Error

gloriadangerfield — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 06:31:11 GMT

I was attempting to upgrade to Manifold 8.0.9 on one of our end-user computers which run Windows XP Pro.. When I went to add remove programs to remove 8.0.8 I got a Windows Installer Error Saying that "A program run as part of the setup did not finish as expected. Contact your support personnel or package vendor". After this 8.0.8 will not open ("Authentication Error") and I cannot install 8.0.9 (I get the same installer error as above). I tried running the 8.0.8 install and selecting repair but this does not change anything.

I installed an unrelated program to see if this was a windows issue and it let me install and uninstall no problem.

Any thought on a solution to this problem?

problems printing pdf format map with contour lines

rbfree — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 15:56:13 GMT

I've exported a map layout to pdf format, as usual, and it looks fine on screen.

However, when I print the image, the resulting print has several angles overlaying the more dense areas of contour lines. The contour drawing is an area drawing. These angles are the same weight and color as the contour drawing.

Can anyone tell me what is causing this problem?

If it's a printer problem and too off-topic for this forum, can anyone suggest a better venue?

Thanks again -- rbfree

Need a consultant to design GIS tomanage large FTTH Network (country wide)

hbaaqeil — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 11:48:23 GMT

Would like consultants experienced in GIS systems to design and provide quote for Software and Development monitor a large FTTH for new operator in Saudi Arabia

Please send your comments to hbaaqeil@ebttikar.com

Urgent

Exporting Manifold to SQL Server 2008, MapDotNet

andrewsbj — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 11:43:16 GMT

I recently began moving my Manifold data to native spatial support provided in SQL Server 2008. I'm building an application using MapDotNet toolset and none of the newly exported data is being returned in the MapDotNet mapfile. I grabbed the query being executed in SQL Profiler and it looks ok. The data I'm working with is unprojected lat/long. Prior to using native sql support I had exported the manifold data to a shp file and used the sql server extension provided by SpatialDB that integrated with MapDotnet and this did work.

If anyone else is using these tools and has a suggestion that would be great.

Thanks,

Ben

Manifold Website is Down?

hydrokiwi — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 09:28:20 GMT

Looks to me that Manifold.net is offline.

What`s new in ER Mapper 7.2

volker — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 13:10:15 GMT

From the ERDAS newsletter:

You will be interested to know that we are holding a free online seminar announcing the new version of ERDAS ER Mapper 7.2. The seminar is held on Wednesday 27 August.

Some of the new features added to this version include:

A new, powerful projections engine

A 64-bit compressor, equipped to handle images more than 5 TB in size.

To learn more, please register for the webinar sessions listed below

Simplify Your Image Processing and Compression with ERDAS ER Mapper

27 August, 2008

Crash on importing large TAB file

mlinth — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 06:12:46 GMT

Hi all,

I'm trying to load a large TAB file (2GB all together) and Manifold imports for about 25 minutes, then dies - Vista tells me there's a problem with the app and shuts it down :-(.

Does anyone out there have experience of importing such large TAB files? Or any suggestions on what to do?

Thanks in advance.

Martin

wanted: russian centered world projection

nikowilkesmann — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 03:17:33 GMT

hi there,

i'm looking for a world projection to display a world map with russia in the center (focus). i know that for example south americans use a projection in which south america is in the center an wondered if there is soemthing like that for russia?

thanks & greetings, niko

concern about operating system update, need help verifying

lrockwood — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 07:10:29 GMT

Hello all,

I am running Windows XP Professional, SP2 and can no longer get the geocoder to return lat/long values. Could a few of you running some other operating system run my script and tell me if you get actual lat/long values or you get 0,0? Please use the default Manifold Geocoding Database, you don't need any data layers in your project.

Please let me know what operating system and 32 or 64 bit version.

Thanks,

Linda

Attachments:
AddressLookup.txt

Virtual Earth and Manifold

artlembo — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 18:35:00 GMT

Hi everyone. Just wanted to give everyone a heads-up. I have been doing some work with a client who wants to use VE. So, I was talking to the MS folks to get a somewhat authoritative answer to the use of Manifold and Virtual Earth.

So, there is the general problem: direct tile access to VE is forbidden by MS licensing agreements. Hence, the only way an individual could license VE is through the use of the VE application itself, imbedded in your application.

VE has granted folks like ESRI, IDV Solutions, IS Consulting (MapDotNet) and a few others, direct tile access. However, I'm not sure that Manifold has that agreement.

Therefore, even though we have talked on this forum about the fact that Microsoft is "looser" than Google regarding licensing, it really isn't necessarily true. So, using VE within Manifold is actually a violation of the VE license agreement.

From what I understand, ESRI licenses the access to VE, and then passes the license cost off to MS.

I also heard a rumor that VE is going to surface a direct tile access API (and license) this fall and this would presumably solve the issue. However, you would have to pay for the API.

Manifold x64 & odbc drivers

Gustavo Palminha — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 19:56:43 GMT

Hello to all.

I was trying to use manifold v8.09 x64 but i havent found drivers that let me link some mdb access tables.

Since Jet 4.0 is apparently not supported by windows xp 64 what drivers could be used to link to mdb access tables?

Regards

[HowTo] Create a Table wth C# code?

lloyd — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 20:42:43 GMT

I am developing a WinForm app with a ManifoldControl for user interaction.

I need to create Table and Drawing with code in my application.

For temporary work in a temporary layer.

Unforunately there is no way for me to create both a Table and a linked Drawing (to the table in code).

For exemple:

1. to create a Table you use

Document.NewTable(string name, ColumnSet cs, bool exact) but there is no way to create a ColumnSet (furthermore there is no way to create proper Column object)

2. to create a Drawing you use

Document.NewDrawing(string name, CoordinateSystem cs, bool exact)

how do I create a link drawing then? I'm thinking of trying to use the same nam as the table, but it is a moot point as I can't create a table in the frst place.

Any tip?!?!

Layout Size vs Symbology

jkessler — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:28:38 GMT

Just getting back to GISing and seem to have forgotten something basic in Manifold. A frequent demand is to make several different sized versions of the same map or layout. For example, one to fit on letter size paper and one to fit on poster size paper. General arrangement of components is identical. However, the symbology that works for one layout page size doesn't work at all for a different page size. A line representing a road formatted to 0.5 point thickness works on a small layout but is nearly invisible on a large layout. No surprise there but with dozens of drawings in a single map and thus single layout, it is extremely time consuming to change the formatting and create new themes for all of those drawings. My question is, besides creating multiple themes for each drawing, is there a way to create one layout and then alter "something" to make the symbology scale up or down depending on the page size or the size of the object on the layout?

Thanks for any help.

Plotting great circles

woneil — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 14:32:33 GMT

Is there a convenient and direct way to plot a great circle segment between two given points in Manifold? I recognize that I could calculate waypoints exterally and enter them as a table from which to plot a drawing line, or make a great circle drawing in a mapping program such as Versamap and import it, but I wonder whether Manifold offers a less cumbersome approach.

Will O'Neil

Bugs and Workarounds for Importing MapInfo Tables and Access DB with and without scripts.

robertc — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 23:14:01 GMT

After spending a few days on trying to automate an importing routine for a large set of MapInfo tables, I need to highlight some issues and workarounds on this subject so others don't waste as much time.

This is a summary of two other related posts.

BUG 1. - manifold does not import non spatial tables from MapInfo. These do not have a .map file and result in a file not found error.

Workarounds:

1. If you rename the .DAT file, to a .DBF file, you can import these as dbf files OK. However, if you have any fields that are longer than 8 characters, these fields are going to be renamed.

2. If you save your MapInfo tables to be stored in an Access DB, you can import these from the Access DB OK. However, you have to do this in Mapinfo. You could probably also do this by exporting them to mid/mif.

BUG 2. - If you run a script to import the table data from an Access DB in a script, you need to create a new ImportMDB object for each import. If you create one, and simply reuse this object for different tables, it will simply reimport the same initial table each time. This can be avoided if you create a new object for each import.

....Loop for each datatable

Application.StatusText = "Importing " & fso.GetBaseName(f) & "..."

Set importMI= Application.NewImport("MDB")

importMI.ConvertPolicy = ConvertAll

importMI.ConnectionString = AccessDB

importMI.Import datatablename, False

Will work

But

Set importMI= Application.NewImport("MDB")

importMI.ConvertPolicy = ConvertAll

importMI.ConnectionString = AccessDB

... Loop for each data table

importMI.Import datatablename, False

Will not.

Below are two scripts that work for importing mapinfo tables, the first only imports spatial tables, the second imports the non spatial tables that are stored in an access DB. THe tab files are used to identify the tables that are in the MDB.

' Import all spatial mappinfo tables from a given folder

' to a new folder in the root level of the project

Option Explicit

Sub Main

Dim wshell ' object accessing Windows shell

Dim fso ' FileSystemObject

Dim importMI ' Import

Dim s ' input box string

Dim cf ' Component folder

Dim f ' File

Dim c0, c1, c2 ' counters

Set wshell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")

' Get the source folder

s = Application.InputBox("Import from folder:", "Import tab files", _

wshell.CurrentDirectory)

If s = "" Then Exit Sub

Set fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")

If Not fso.FolderExists(s) Then

Application.MessageBox "The folder " & Chr(34) & s & Chr(34) _

& " does not exist."

Exit Sub

End If

' Return to the root level in the Project pane

ReturnToRoot

' Create a new component folder to hold the imports

Set cf = Document.NewFolder("Imported Maps", False)

' Put the focus in the Project pane on the new folder

Application.UserInterface.Panes("Project").ControlSet("TreeViewComponents").Text = cf.Name

' New importer

Set importMI= Application.NewImport("TAB")

importMI.ConvertPolicy = ConvertAll

' Initialize counters

c0 = Document.ComponentSet.Count

c1 = c0

c2 = c0

' Import the shapefiles

For Each f in fso.GetFolder(s).Files

If UCase(fso.GetExtensionName(f)) = "TAB" Then

If fso.FileExists(fso.GetParentFolderName (f) & "\" & fso.GetBaseName(f) & ".map") Then

'Application.MessageBox "base Name: " & fso.GetBaseName(f)

'Application.MessageBox "File Name: " & fso.GetFileName(f)

'Application.MessageBox "Folder Parent Name: " & fso.GetParentFolderName (f)

Application.StatusText = "Importing " & fso.GetAbsolutePathName(f) & "..."

importMI.Import fso.GetAbsolutePathName(f), False

c2 = Document.ComponentSet.Count

If c2 = c1 + 2 Then

' Import was successful (drawing plus owned table)

Application.StatusText = "Imported " & f.Name & "..."

c1 = c2

ElseIf c2 = c1 + 1 Then

' Import was successful (just table)

Application.StatusText = "Imported " & f.Name & "..."

c1 = c2

Else

' Import failed

Application.MessageBox "The import of " & fso.GetFileName(f) _

& " was unsuccessful. Batch terminated."

Exit Sub

End If

Application.StatusText = CStr((c2 - c0) / 2) & " tab imported into " & cf.Name

End Sub

Sub ReturnToRoot

' Return to the root level in the project pane

Dim cs, tree, f, c, continue

Set cs = Document.ComponentSet

Set tree = Application.UserInterface.Panes("Project").ControlSet("TreeViewComponents")

f = tree.Text

If Not IsEmpty(cs(f).Owner) Then

' If the selected component is a dependent component (such as a drawing's table)

' then select the owner instead

' Note that the Folder property is always empty for a dependent component,

' being set (if at all) only on the owner

tree.Text = cs(f).Owner.Name

f = tree.Text

End If

If cs(f).Type = ComponentFolder Or Not IsEmpty(cs(f).Folder) Then

' If the selected component is either a folder, or within a folder,

' search for the first component which is neither

c = 0

continue = True

While continue And c < cs.Count

Select Case True

Case Not IsEmpty(cs(c).Owner)

' Skip it: the Folder property is set only on the Owner object

c = c + 1

Case cs(c).Type = ComponentFolder

' Continue: this component is a folder

c = c + 1

Case Not IsEmpty(cs(c).Folder)

' Continue: this component is within a folder

c = c + 1

Case Else

' Stop: this component is neither a folder nor within a folder

continue = False

f = cs(c).Name

End Select

Wend

tree.Text = f

End If

End Sub

Script 2 import tabs from Access DB

' Import all tabs in an access DB from a given folder that the mapinfo tables are stored as an access db

' to a new folder in the root level of the project

Option Explicit

Sub Main

Dim wshell ' object accessing Windows shell

Dim fso ' FileSystemObject

Dim importMI ' Import

Dim s ' input box string

Dim AccessDB

Dim cf ' Component folder

Dim f ' File

Dim c0, c1, c2 ' counters

Set wshell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")

' Get the source folder

s = Application.InputBox("Import from folder:", "Import tab files", _

wshell.CurrentDirectory)

If s = "" Then Exit Sub

Set fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")

If Not fso.FolderExists(s) Then

Application.MessageBox "The folder " & Chr(34) & s & Chr(34) _

& " does not exist."

Exit Sub

End If

' Return to the root level in the Project pane

'ReturnToRoot

' Create a new component folder to hold the imports

Set cf = Document.NewFolder("Imported Tables", False)

' Put the focus in the Project pane on the new folder

Application.UserInterface.Panes("Project").ControlSet("TreeViewComponents").Text = cf.Name

' New importer

AccessDB = "D:\Data\Jobs\AgDat\Migration\Manifold_Staging\Access\FarmMapNonSpatialTables.mdb"

Set importMI= Application.NewImport("MDB")

importMI.ConvertPolicy = ConvertAll

importMI.ConnectionString = AccessDB

' Initialize counters

c0 = Document.ComponentSet.Count

c1 = c0

c2 = c0

' Import the shapefiles

For Each f in fso.GetFolder(s).Files

If UCase(fso.GetExtensionName(f)) = "TAB" Then

Application.StatusText = "Importing " & fso.GetBaseName(f) & "..."

Application.MessageBox "Importing " & fso.GetBaseName(f) & "..."

Set importMI= Application.NewImport("MDB")

importMI.ConvertPolicy = ConvertAll

importMI.ConnectionString = AccessDB

importMI.Import fso.GetBaseName(f), False

c2 = Document.ComponentSet.Count

If c2 = c1 + 2 Then

' Import was successful (drawing plus owned table)

Application.StatusText = "Imported " & f.Name & "..."

c1 = c2

ElseIf c2 = c1 + 1 Then

' Import was successful (just table)

Application.StatusText = "Imported " & f.Name & "..."

c1 = c2

Else

' Import failed

Application.MessageBox "The import of " & fso.GetFileName(f) _

& " was unsuccessful. Batch terminated."

Exit Sub

End If

' Application.StatusText = CStr((c2 - c0) / 2) & " tab imported into " & cf.Name

End Sub

Sub ReturnToRoot

' Return to the root level in the project pane

Dim cs, tree, f, c, continue

Set cs = Document.ComponentSet

Set tree = Application.UserInterface.Panes("Project").ControlSet("TreeViewComponents")

f = tree.Text

If Not IsEmpty(cs(f).Owner) Then

' If the selected component is a dependent component (such as a drawing's table)

' then select the owner instead

' Note that the Folder property is always empty for a dependent component,

' being set (if at all) only on the owner

tree.Text = cs(f).Owner.Name

f = tree.Text

End If

If cs(f).Type = ComponentFolder Or Not IsEmpty(cs(f).Folder) Then

' If the selected component is either a folder, or within a folder,

' search for the first component which is neither

c = 0

continue = True

While continue And c < cs.Count

Select Case True

Case Not IsEmpty(cs(c).Owner)

' Skip it: the Folder property is set only on the Owner object

c = c + 1

Case cs(c).Type = ComponentFolder

' Continue: this component is a folder

c = c + 1

Case Not IsEmpty(cs(c).Folder)

' Continue: this component is within a folder

c = c + 1

Case Else

' Stop: this component is neither a folder nor within a folder

continue = False

f = cs(c).Name

End Select

Wend

tree.Text = f

End If

End Sub

Splitting a line with a point

danb — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 13:00:42 GMT

I'm sure Tim (tjhb) posted something specifically about this recently, but I can't find it just now. If I have a drawing containing both linework and a series of points exactly on the lines, can someone point me towards the SQL to split the lines using the point objects.

Many thanks Dan

IMS: why different behaviour with ZoomBox depending on browser?

vincent — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 08:38:51 GMT

If I use the ZoomBox tool with IE and Firefox, I get same behaviour when I drag the rubber band from left to right.

But if I drag the rubber band from right to left, I often get a false result with IE and always good result with Firefox or Safari.

This error is included in default exported web page.

Does someone has already fix that error and can share code? Or does someone is willing to fix this error ?

Thank you !

Manifold & ACCESS

volker — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 06:56:43 GMT

It`s not only possible to export Drawings (like i wrote in this thread: http://forum.manifold.net/forum/t69139.8)

to an mdb-Access database, it`s possible to export images, too. And with projection. See the attachement.

Who need this ? Maybe this one, who don`t want to install a real database. But it`s funny to do this, it`s undocumented... And the image in an mdb you can link the images, too.

Attachments:
Raster&mdb.png

Point on Point overlay

kcg5 — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 06:32:56 GMT

Hey all

I'm trying to do what seems like the simplest operation but am starting to get frustrated. I have two point layers...one with data on distance travelled at each point and another with the table and points of all other data I want it to add it to. I have tried to do a spatial overlay using point on coinciding point (are the same points just two different layers) but even though the operation appears to work i.e. no error messages, the results are not showing in my table. I tried to do it through the layers on the map and then again using selections in my drawing layers but no luck. I have tried to play with the transfer rules (using copy) and made sure that both columns had exactly the same name and same type. Does anybody know why I can't get the data from one point layer to overlay and copy into the column for the other? Cheers:-)

Simplifying lines

Sloots — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 02:32:31 GMT

Dear Manifolders,

I have a map of a roadnetwork. I want to use it for road distance calculations in another application. In order to increase the performance I'd like to simplify the original roadnetwork. My goal is to remove redundant lines/nodes while keeping to topology intact, and keep track of the original distance. The attached image hopefully will clearify my question.

The network on the left is (part) of the original one. The numbers next to the lines at the bottom describe the length of each line (it's just an example, so the numbers are far from correct!). The right part show a manually drawn example of how the drawing should look like after the correct transformations. The single line at the bottom replaced the 6 lines in the original network, but an attribute now contains the sum of the original length. Also note that the red line are actually 2 lines, each with a different length in the attribute that hold the length of the original two paths.

I can solve this problem by scripting, but hopefully someone comes up with a more elegant solution.

Thanks,

Chris

Attachments:
simplify.png

Importing MapInfo Tables that do not have spatial data

robertc — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 06:24:35 GMT

I am getting to the root of the import script issue (another post), and it turns out it is a general manifold issue. If you try to import a standard Mapinfo table that does not have spatial data, you get a "can't open file" error in manifold. Hence a script that tried to do that also failed.

I was able to make the script run by checking if a .map is present, but this means that I only get the MapInfo tables with spatial data. I would still like to import the non-spatial tables into manifold.

I am sure that I have done this in the past in a previous version as I have got those tables in other map files. Has something changed?

I am trying to import a drawing, which doesn't quite fit, but I can't see any other suitable options. Trying to import a table doesn't work at all as it treats the .tab file as a csv.

Any suggestions?

Attachments:
T_app_alloc_table_id.DAT
T_app_alloc_table_id.TAB

MapServing in the news

Dimitri — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 13:02:55 GMT

FYI all...

http://www.princetoninfo.com/index.php?option=com_us1more&Itemid=6

Congrats MapServing!

Manifold + WPF

ghelobytes — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:29:20 GMT

hi guys!

just wondering if i can use Manifold with WPF?

if not, is there any plan on making this possible in the future?

TIA!

Making Transparent Images

AR_Rick — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 14:13:15 GMT

I've turned off the background layer in my Map component. There is now a checkered area representing where "nothing" exists. Now, is there a ANY way to extract a raster image from it with an alpha channel that represents the "checkered" area? Manual list of todos, scripts, SQL, green-screen compositing, etc are all on the table.

Rebuttal to "Three Takeaways" Column

Dimitri — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 09:36:57 GMT

Adena Shultzberg, a highly respected GIS journalist whom I've had the pleasure of corresponding with over the years recently posted a column about "Three Takeaways" from a recent ESRI meeting at

http://www.directionsmag.com/article.php?article_id=2842&trv=1

I've written a rebuttal, as despite my great respect for Adena I think in this particular case she got all three points exactly backwards.

These are big trends that reveal some of the key differences between Manifold and ESRI philosophy so I'm publishing them here as a thread in case anyone would like to comment, point out logical errors, voice support for the meek approach to prose, etc. [Also, Adena has a 1000 word limit on her comments page so this way I can just reply and link to this thread. :-) ]

-----

Adena,

That must have been a truly depressing meeting for the three takeaways to be such retrograde notions. It is as if you went to a meeting about high performance race cars and came back with the three takeaways that steam engines are returning, the right choice of buggy whips is important and new vendor relations in the provision of straw will reshape the horse supplies industry.

Time-sharing was killed off by distributed computing in the 1980's for a very good reason: Many people sharing one processor will always endure terrible performance compared to what you can get by having many processors serve one user.

"Web applications" are simply a return to timesharing, where many people share the function of a single server. It is an expertise test of sorts to see if people are fooled by changing the words, using "web application" instead of "time sharing" or "thin client" instead of "dumb terminal" - whatever you call it, it's the same old time sharing gig of an overloaded central processor trying to serve many users.

That is one reason why web GIS has such poor performance and such barren user interfaces compared to distributed GIS. For a complete dissection of the technical reasons why well-written distributed applications run better than centralized time sharing ones, see http://www.manifold.net/doc/gis_and_networking.htm

Note that the extent to which "web applications" are tolerable is only that they are really local applications. That's the AJAX thing, which is not about the web at all but is all about how to deliver local applications while cloaking yourself in the stylish cover of saying you are doing web stuff. See http://www.manifold.net/doc/what_about_ajax_.htm for insight.

You mention "the cloud," but that is just double-talk trying to convince people you are not really cursing them with a time-shared architecture. Web guys are usually perfectly aware of the disadvantages of time sharing, so to sell a stale idea they have to make it appear to be something else. The spin behind "clouds" is they say that many users are not time sharing one processor, they say it is a case where there is a cloud of processors waiting to serve you, the single user. That is a bald lie, actually two lies in one.

The first lie is that the presentation of "clouds" falsely implies some degree of parallelism. But clouds are not parallel architectures, which are much more difficult to accomplish. A parallel architecture takes an individual task, such as a reprojection, and chops it up into smaller pieces for simultaneous execution on many processors, reassembling a result at the end. It is as if in a copy shop with ten copy machines when you walk in with a book to copy all ten machines are put to work on your job simultaneously, each copying one tenth of the pages and then the result collated. That's not what clouds do.

Instead, clouds simply take your task and assign it to one of the servers within the cloud and your task runs there. It is as if you come to a copy shop with ten copy machines and you get assigned to one machine to copy your book while the other nine machines work on something else. There's no parallelism there and to suggest parallelism is to tell a lie.

The second lie in clouds is to imply that the cloud will be built out so that there is never more than one user per machine to which you are assigned in the cloud. That's simply not true, as the economics of time sharing and clouds do not allow build outs so that every user has their own machine. It is like that copy shop example again, where you stand in line to use the "cloud" of ten copy machines and then when it is your turn you get assigned to one of the machines and you find there are ten other guys also assigned that machine. That's when you realize the bitter truth that clouds are time sharing.

No wonder, therefore, that clouds suffer the same performance problems that any time sharing environment does as compared to distributed processing.

I will grant you that there can be parallelism in the form of fetching tiles from storage and other data access. Such parallelism across machines for data access has long been a feature of DBMS. But that's as far as it goes and there is absolutely zero parallelism in the processing of that data that GIS people want to do. When you want to do spatial overlays to find which parts of which tax parcels occur within different tax districts you do real processing, not just viewing of static data fetched from storage. Clouds are not a lie if all you want to do is fetch views from storage, but they are very much a lie when actual processing is involved, as is the case for GIS people who actually want to do GIS.

Which brings me to your "Round and Round" comment. If what you say is true, that the most popular question asked at GIS shows these days is "Can you show me my house?" then that explains why as matter of unit volume no one goes to GIS shows anymore. If that's what they are asking first they don't really know what GIS is. They are spectators, not players.

People who use GIS software for actual work care about a lot of things but the front line issues are not about seeing your house. That's just viewing of satellite imagery, and professionals doing GIS know perfectly well that the rather poor accuracy and mangled projections typical of consumer image servers like Google Earth don't help them much in their real work, which tends to be about data. It is this lack of awareness of what GIS people actually do from 9 to 5 that drives some clueless folks into thinking that Google Earth is a GIS, for instance.

The idea of using image servers within GIS is a very old idea, years old, and around seemingly forever ever since TerraServer, Virtual Earth, NASA WorldWind and Google Earth first appeared as automatic layers in software such as Manifold, what? five years ago? Image server layers are of course pretty and especially appealing to beginners, but they are fundamentally a side show compared to the real business of GIS, such as running enterprise access to spatial DBMS from a mixed environment of desktop clients (for expert work) and customer-facing IMS (for consumer-friendly publication of that work).

Likewise, the notion that it makes sense for GIS users to put a leash around their necks for access to data and to hand it to their GIS software vendor is also totally old, a throwback to the nasty 80's and 90's.

In the old days of lumbering minicomputers the vendor would try to sell you the computer, lock you into their operating system, lock you into their applications and then force you to buy the data from them as well. ESRI took that model into GIS by trying to force users into buying data from ESRI. They'd even take free government data and try to resell it to their users. That's not the modern way.

The modern notion is that your GIS package should be able to read a wealth of formats, including all the government formats in which free data in the US originates, so that you can get to the data, either free or paid, without having to pay off some middleman in the form of your GIS company.

In answer to your "three takeaways" I'd venture the exact opposites to each:

1. The attempted return of time sharing is failing, as the low performance and barren interfaces of server-based applications turn people off. It is soon brutally evident that sharing one processor among many people is far slower than dedicating many processors to serve a single person.

2. Clouds are going nowhere because people soon realize they are fake, and that it is just time sharing in a different form. Instead, people are using multicore processors and inexpensive, massively parallel plug in cards to put hundreds of processors into their desktop. Such a swarm of processors devoted to a single person can do in seconds what takes hours in a cloud.

3. The round and round bit is that companies who have lost track of what GIS people really do have lost their shirts as well. Dumb talk about Google Earth being a GIS plays well with the Where 2.0 crowd, but it doesn't pay the bills in terms of delivering products that folks who do GIS from 9 to 5 really need. Exit AutoDesk, good-bye MapInfo. The second point about data access got it exactly backwards: the big trend today is that public access to public data, as originally started in the US, is expanding to the rest of the world as well. GIS users around the world are rapidly evolving processes to cut out the middleman, and they start by choosing GIS software that does not require them to chain themselves within some GIS vendor's silo.

Regards,

Dimitri Rotow

Manifold';s use of CUDA in the news

Nick Verge — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 11:14:13 GMT

http://www.emediaworld.com/press_release/release_detail.php?id=132492

connecting to OGC WMS data layers

dthideman — Thu, 01 May 2008 14:25:47 GMT

Hello I am looking to see if anyone can assist

I am trying to connect to http://openmaps.gov.bc.ca

I can get the OGC WMS server link, can see the layers in selection but cannot display anything

I am assuming something to do with resolutions and tile size

Any advice would be appreciated

thank you

Dennis

Linking drawings to oracle tables

chu_man_fu — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 08:09:06 GMT

Dear All,

I have the latest version of Manifold (8.0.9.0) and I am having great trouble when linking drawings to my oracle database.

I have an Oracle 9i database and I am running Manifold on Windows XP (sp3). I link drawings into manifold by File -> Link -> Drawing. From the Data Source dialog I create a data source using "ADO.NET Oracle Data Source" and fill in all my database details. I then select the newly created data source and press "OK" on the "Data Source" dialog. Now Manifold hangs for 5 - 15 minutes before displaying the dialog box with where I am able to select the Oracle table I wish to create my linked drawing with. Once I have selected the table the actual import takes no time at all, and any refreshing the drawing is done within a resonable time.

If I do the same steps but link a table instead of a drawing it is more or less instant.

Does any one have the same issue, know why it is so slow or know of a fix please?

Also, why is it that once I have my drawing linked into Manifold it is split up into:

A seperate drawing for the points
A seperate table for the point drawing
A seperate drawing for the lines
A seperate table for the the lines drawing
2 seperate queries for the point and the lines (which I am guessing the drawings are based on)
And a seperate table

I found it easier to work with just a drawing and a table.

Best Regards

Chris

Area of interest add-in

James — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 02:30:08 GMT

Having just upgraded to 8.0.9.0 the area of interest add-in that someone produced a while back now does not appear in a tool bar at all. I though that 8.0.9.0 fixed a problem whereby add-in tool bars were never docked correctly when the software opens, but now, to activate the add-in I've got to get to it through the tools/add-in menu. Is there a straight forward way to get this tool bar to reappear?

Scroll wheel zoom?

paddleman — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 08:01:02 GMT

Hello.

I have just upgraded to the 64-bit version of Manifold and have noticed a peculiar behaviour, not present in the 32-bit.

The zoom feature using the scroll wheel on the mouse works, unless the INFO pane is open, then the scroll feature is transfered to scrolling the info pane. Close the Info Pane and the zoom works as before.

...anyone?

Manifold and SAP

Donmap — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 07:57:42 GMT

The electricity and water company where I work is looking into implementing a GIS system, however, one of the main prerequisites is that the GIS system must be able to integrate and meet SAP (SAP Enterprise resource planner) approval.

I know ESRI and Geomedia have SAP integrations, just was wondering how manifold fit in all of this and is there any talk on this matter as well?

Manifold has proven in the past to work with or have their software support third party software, such as, Nvidia, Microsoft SQLSever 2008, Oracle (those that I know of), so there might be others.

Any help will be appreciated!

postgres administration

artlembo — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 10:59:31 GMT

Has anyone done the following in PostGRES?

1. created a new user

2. set permissions for the new user to only have read access to certain tables

I want to put together an exercise for my students, and want to use PGAdmin since I think the GUI will be easier. So, if you have had success with this, please let me know.

(btw, it was so easy to do this in SQLServer Management Studio - didn't even require reading the directions)