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Release of V5.30 TNT products| PC using W31 | 114 |
| PC using W95 | 114 |
| PC using NT (Intel) | 114 |
| DEC using NT (Alpha) | 117 |
| Mac using MacOS 7.1 (680xx) | 64 |
| Power Mac using MacOS 7.5 (PPC 60x) | 74 |
| Hewlett Packard workstation using HPUX | 95 |
| SGI workstation using IRIX | 120 |
| Sun workstation using Solaris 1.x | 86 |
| Sun workstation using Solaris 2.x | 79 |
| IBM RS/6000 using AIX 3.x | 152 |
V5.30 of the TNT products for
the DEC Ultrix, DEC workstation
using OSF/1, and the Data General Aviion platforms are
available upon special request for which a special CD
will be produced.
Upgrading
If you did not order an upgrade of your TNT
professional product, and wish to do so now, please contact MicroImages by FAX,
phone, or email to arrange to purchase your quarterly upgrade to V5.30.
Upon receipt of your order and processing, MicroImages will supply
you with an authorization code by return FAX only.
Entering this code when running the installation process allows you to complete
the installation and immediately start to use TNTmips 5.3 and the other TNT
professional products.
If you do not have an annual subscription to TNTmips,
you can purchase V5.30 under the elective upgrade plan
at the cost in the tables below. Please remember that new features have been
added to TNTmips each quarter. Thus, the more quarters
you are behind V5.30, the higher your upgrade cost, up
to a fixed limit. Upgrades from all previous versions of MIPS
and TNTmips 4.8 or earlier are the same, fixed cost
shown below. As usual, there is no additional charge for the upgrade of your
special peripheral support features, TNTlink, or TNTsdk
which you may have added to your basic TNTmips system.
Within the NAFTA reselling area (Canada, U.S., and Mexico):
| TNTmips Product Code | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price upgrade from TNTmips: | ||||||
| V5.20 | V5.10 | V5.00 | V4.90 | V4.80 | V4.70 (or earlier) | |
| D30 to D60 (CDs) | $250 | 450 | 600 | 700 | 750 | 750 |
| D80 | $375 | 675 | 900 | 1050 | 1125 | 1125 |
| M50 | $250 | 450 | 600 | 700 | 750 | 750 |
| U100 | $450 | 800 | 1000 | 1200 | 1300 | NA |
| U200 | $780 | 1400 | 1875 | 2200 | 2350 | NA |
| U300 | $1030 | 1850 | 2475 | 2900 | 3100 | NA |
For all other nations:
| TNTmips Product Code | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price upgrade from TNTmips: | ||||||
| V5.20 | V5.10 | V5.00 | V4.90 | V4.80 | V4.70 (or earlier) | |
| D30 to D60 (CDs) | $300 | 560 | 750 | 875 | 940 | 940 |
| D80 | $425 | 800 | 1050 | 1225 | 1300 | 1300 |
| M50 | $300 | 560 | 750 | 875 | 940 | 940 |
| U100 | $500 | 850 | 1050 | 1250 | 1350 | NA |
| U200 | $830 | 1450 | 1925 | 2250 | 2400 | NA |
| U300 | $1080 | 1900 | 2525 | 2950 | 3150 | NA |
TNTview TM5.3
As usual the new features available in TNTview mirror the new features described below for the TNTmips display processes (e.g. scale controls, theme mapping, improved element selection, graphical fields, ...).
Import and Hot Linking
Import and Hot Linking were promised for V5.30 but did not make it simply due to lack of time. These features are being added now, so if their use is important to you prior to V5.40, check their status via software support.
Color Printing
The same limited direct snapshot color printing capability is now available in all TNT professional products: TNTmips, TNTview, TNTatlas, and the TNTlite products. This capability is explained in more detail below in the section on new features in TNTmips. Also attached is a sample of a color print which can now be prepared by TNTview.
SML support
It has not been MicroImages' policy to create optionalized incomplete analysis software. However, TNTview is a visualization process. CAD sketching, theme mapping, color printing, import and linking (pending), and the power of SML are all migrating from TNTmips into TNTview. Rather than increase the price of TNTview to cover all these features, the use of SML will be an add-on $1000 option. Thus, only those who want to conduct special analysis, and expand and extend the functions of TNTview will need to concern themselves with an extra cost. Special arrangements can be made to obtain this SML option for use in TNTview in V5.30. With V5.40, this feature can be added to an existing TNTview at any time by the purchase of the appropriate authorization code.
Upgrading
Within the NAFTA reselling area (Canada, U.S., and Mexico):
| TNTview Product | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price upgrade from TNTview: | ||||||
| V5.20 | V5.10 | V5.00 | V4.90 | V4.80 | V4.70 (or earlier) | |
| W31, W95, and NT | $95 | 170 | 225 | 265 | 280 | 280 |
| Mac and PMac | $95 | 170 | 225 | 265 | 280 | 280 |
| DEC/Alpha via NT | $125 | 225 | 300 | 350 | 375 | 375 |
| Unix single user | $155 | 280 | 375 | 440 | 470 | 470 |
| TNTview Product | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price upgrade from TNTview: | ||||||
| V5.20 | V5.10 | V5.00 | V4.90 | V4.80 | V4.70 (or earlier) | |
| W31, W95, and NT | $115 | 205 | 270 | 320 | 335 | 335 |
| Mac and PMac | $115 | 205 | 270 | 320 | 335 | 335 |
| DEC/Alpha via NT | $150 | 270 | 360 | 420 | 450 | 450 |
| Unix single user | $185 | 335 | 450 | 530 | 565 | 565 |
TNTatlasTM5.3
Color Printing
The same limited direct snapshot color printing capability is now available in the TNT professional products (TNTmips, TNTview, TNTatlas) and the TNTlite products. This capability is explained in more detail below in the section on new features in TNTmips. Also attached is a sample of a color print which can now be prepared by TNTatlas.
Within the NAFTA reselling area (Canada, U.S., and Mexico):
| TNTatlas Product | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price upgrade from TNTatlas: | ||||||
| V5.20 | V5.10 | V5.00 | V4.90 | V4.80 | V4.70 (or earlier) | |
| W31, W95, and NT | $65 | 115 | 150 | 175 | 190 | 190 |
| Mac and PMac | $65 | 115 | 150 | 175 | 190 | 190 |
| DEC/Alpha via NT | $80 | 140 | 190 | 220 | 235 | 235 |
| Unix single user | $95 | 170 | 225 | 265 | 280 | 280 |
For all other nations:
| TNTatlas Product | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price upgrade from TNTatlas: | ||||||
| V5.20 | V5.10 | V5.00 | V4.90 | V4.80 | V4.70 (or earlier) | |
| W31, W95, and NT | $80 | 135 | 180 | 210 | 230 | 230 |
| Mac and PMac | $80 | 135 | 180 | 210 | 230 | 230 |
| DEC/Alpha via NT | $95 | 170 | 225 | 265 | 280 | 280 |
| Unix single user | $115 | 205 | 270 | 320 | 335 | 335 |
TNTatlasTM sampler of San Francisco
The dual formatted "A" CD
for V5.30 and an improved installation process has
eliminated the need for a floppy diskette for installing the TNT Mac
and PMac products. This progress in Mac installation procedures will make it
possible to move ahead in this quarter to produce Prototype3 of this sample
atlas to work on both Windows and Mac platforms.
On-Line Documentation
So many new features were produced this quarter that we
have been unable to thoroughly document them all. The size of the documentation
has expanded slightly this quarter to 2079 pages. A lot of new pages were added,
but the extensive subsections in the Prepare volume on Edit Vector and Edit CAD
were deleted along with the processes. The corresponding subsections on the
object editor have not yet expanded to such a level of detail.
Last minute supplemental pages which do not, or only partially occur in the
on-line documentation were created for new processes. These sections were
completed for V5.30 after the master CDs
were created for the reproduction process. These additional pages are included
in supplemental, printed form as follows.
Watershed
New SML Functions
Interactive Line-Following and Coordinate Geometry (COGO)
Tools
Off-Line Documentation
Many clients may not yet be aware that the TNT
on-line documentation is also made available in Microsoft Word files by chapter
for both Mac and Windows platforms. The installation programs for all these
versions now provide an option to copy these Word files to wherever you
designate on your hard drive. The appropriate version of Microsoft Word will
then let you view, browse, search, and use all its other features. All the
illustrations are embedded directly into these Word files for rapid scrolling
and viewing.
You do not need to own and use Microsoft Word as your normal word processor to
use it with these TNT files. Microsoft now has freeware
Word Viewer products for W95, W31,
and the Macs. These viewers can be downloaded from
http://www.microsoft.com/MSWord/ or Microsoft Network from the Word Forum
(MSWORD) or via CompuServe, Genie, and MSPN from the Microsoft Software Library.
On Internet, the
Word Viewers are located on the Microsoft anonymous ftp server which you can
reach as ftp ftp.microsoft.com.
New TNTmips Application Features
* Paragraphs or main sections preceded by this symbol "*" introduce significant new processes, or features in existing processes, which are released for the first time in TNTmips 5.3.
System
Search tree subobjects used to locate elements (e.g. for
selection) in vector, CAD, and TIN objects are now saved, which prevents the
need to regenerate them in memory. For large objects, this saves a considerable
amount of the time and the space needed to continually regenerate them. They are
now automatically recreated and saved in processes which create and alter these
kinds of objects (e.g. import, edit, ...).
Icons
Thirty-three new, large icons have been added to the collection used in the TNT
products. A color illustration of these new process-oriented icons is attached.
Fifty-three new, small icons have been added and are noted on the attached color
reference sheet.
Profile View
There is a new "stair step" viewing mode in addition to point-to-point
plot passing through the data values. This new mode shows each data point in the
profile as a horizontal line with a vertical riser up/down to the level of the
next point.
* Datums
Over 190 additional new Geodetic Datums have been defined. Datum
conversions are now automatically performed when necessary for all available
projection transformations. There are 186 datums defined using standard
Molodensky Transformation parameters. In addition, 8 multiple regression
solutions are provided for contiguous continental areas. The multiple regression
method has a stated accuracy of +/- 2 meters over the defined areas when
transforming to or from WGS84.
The equations for the many datums and their conversions can be found in a DMA
Technical Report entitled Department of Defense World Geodetic Systems
1984: Its definition and relationships with local geodetic systems. (DMA
TR 8350.2, Second Edition, 1 Sept 1991. DMA Stock No. DMATR83502WGS84).
The cover page for this reference is attached providing further information
should you wish to obtain it.
The following are the names of the 186 datums added to the list using their
Molodensky Transformation parameters.
| World Geodetic System 1984 World Geodetic System 1972 North American 1927 North American 1983 Adindan - Mean Adindan - Burkina Faso Adindan - Cameron Adindan - Ethiopia Adindan - Mali Adindan - Senegal Adindan - Sudan Adindan - Somalia Ain el Abd 1970 - Bahraib Ain el Abd 1970 - Saudi Arabia Anna 1 Astro 1965 Antiqua Island Astro 1943 Arc 1959 - Mean Arc 1950 - Botswana Arc 1950 - Burundi Arc 1950 - Lesotho Arc 1950 - Malawi Arc 1950 - Swaziland Arc 1950 - Zaire Arc 1950 - Zambia Arc 1950 - Zimbabwe Ascension Island 1958 Astro Beacon E 1945 Astro DOS 71/4 Astro Tern Island (FRIG) 1961 Astronomical Station 1952 Australian Geodetic 1966 Australian Geodetic 1966 - MRE Australian Geodetic 1984 Australian Geodetic 1984 - MRE Ayabelle Lighthouse Bellevue (IGN) Bermuda 1957 Bissau Bogota Observatory Bukit Rimpah Camp Area Astro Campo Inchauspe Campo Inchauspe - MRE Canto Astro 1966 Cape Cape Canaveral Carthage Chatham Island Astro 1971 Chua Astro Corrego Alegre Corrego Alegre - MRE Dabola Djakarta (Batavia) DOS 1968 Easter Island 1967 European 1950 - Mean European 1950 - MRE European - Western Europe European 1950 - Middle East European 1950 - Cyprus European 1950 - Egypt European 1950 - UK/Ireland European 1950 - Finland/Norway European 1950 - Greece European 1950 - Iran European 1950 - Sardinia European 1950 - Sicily European 1950 - Malta European 1950 - Portugal/Spain European 1979 Fort Thomas 1955 Gan 1970 Geodetic Datum 1949 |
| Graciosa Base SW 1948 Guam 1963 Gunung Segara GUX 1 Astro Herat North Hjorsey 1955 Hong Kong 1963 Hu-Tzu-Shan Indian Indian 1954 Indian 1975 Ireland 1965 ISTS 061 Astro 1968 ISTS 073 Astro 1969 Johnson Island 1961 Kandawala Kerguelen Island 1949 Kertau 1948 Kusaie Astro 1951 L.C. 5 Astro 1961 Leigon Liberia 1964 Luzon Mahe 1971 Massawa Merchich Midway Astro 1961 Minna - Cameron Minna - Nigeria Montserrat Island Astro 1958 M'Poraloko Nahrwan - Oman Nahrwan - Saudi Arabia Nahrwan - UAE Naparima BWI North American 1927 - Caribbean North American 1927 - Central America North American 1927 - Canada North American 1927 - Canada (MRE) North American 1927 - Alaska North American 1927 - Continental USA North American 1927 - Bahamas North American 1927 - Cont. USA (MRE) North American 1927 - San Salvador North American 1927 - Eastern USA North American 1927 - Yukon North American 1927 - Western USA North American 1927 - Canal Zone North American 1927 - Alberta/BC North American 1927 - Cuba North American 1927 - Manitoba/ON North American 1927 - Greenland North American 1927 - Eastern Canada North American 1927 - Mexico North American 1927 - NWT/SK Old Egyptian 1907 Observatorio Meteorologico 1939 Old Hawaiian - Mean Old Hawaiian - Hawaii Old Hawaiian - Kauai Old Hawaiian - Maui |
| Old Hawaiian - Oahu Oman Ordnance Survey of Great Britain 1936 - Mean Ordnance Survey of Great Britain 1936 - England Ordnance Survey of Great Britain 1936 - England/Wales Ordnance Survey of Great Britain 1936 - Scotland Ordnance Survey of Great Britain 1936 - Wales Pico de las Nieves Pitcairn Astro 1967 Point 58 Pointe Noire 1948 Porto Santo 1936 Puerto Rico Provisional South American 1956 - Mean Provisional South American 1956 - Bolivia Provisional South American 1956 - Chile (Northern) Provisional South American 1956 - Chile (Southern) Provisional South American 1956 - Colombia Provisional South American 1956 - Ecuador Provisional South American 1956 - Guyana Provisional South American 1956 - Peru Provisional South American 1956 - Venezuela Provisional South Chilean 1963 Quartar National Oornoq Reunion Rome 1940 Santo (DOS) 1965 Sao Braz Sapper Hill 1943 Schwarzeck Selvagem Grande Soviet Geodetic System 1985 South American 1969 - Mean South American 1969 - MRE South American 1969 - Argentina South American 1969 - Bolivia South American 1969 - Brazil South American 1969 - Chile South American 1969 - Columbia South American 1969 - Ecuador South American 1969 - Baltra South American 1969 - Guyana South American 1969 - Paraguay South American 1969 - Peru South American 1969 - Venezuela South American 1969 - Trinidad & Tobago South Asia Tanararive Observatory 1925 Timbalai 1948 Tokyo - Mean Tokyo - Japan Tokyo - Korea Tokyo - Okinawa Tristan Astro 1968 Viti Levu 1916 Wake-Eniwetok 1960 Wake Island Astro 1952 Yacare Zanderij |
When selecting a geodetic datum, information regarding the
area for which the datum is used is provided for reference. The parameters
provided by the DMA report for each Molodensky
Transformation are also shown. Additional datums can now be added if the proper
transformation parameters are provided. Only a few parameters are needed for
Molodensky Transformation. Full specifications for new datums require more
complicated equations which you will need to acquire from your national geodetic
or mapping agency, armed forces, or data provider. You will find some of these
special local or national client-supplied datum definitions have already been
added to the on-line list for V5.30.
Project File Maintenance
Histograms
The information for raster histograms now shows cell value, count, and total
area for each cell value.
* Recovering Project Files
How do they get damaged? An object in a Project File can be
damaged in a variety of ways, and this may make the entire Project File
unusable. Probably the most frequently reported source of damage to a specific
object is from some form of power glitch which occurs when an object is being
written into a Project File. This may be a split second interruption which is
not even noticeable, or a complete disruption of the power. While this object is
corrupted, it is unlikely that any other objects in that Project File are
damaged.
Bad sectors and other deterioration can also suddenly develop on a hard drive or
may show up only intermittently. Some other software or even the
operating system can also damage a Project File. These and related kinds of
after-the-fact damages are very likely to show up in a TNT
Project File first, as they often occupy most of your hard drive's capacity.
Finally, an error in a TNT process may damage a Project
File, but this is much less likely to occur than the above conditions. It is
very hard to damage any file by reading it! However, an operation which writes a
damaged or incorrect new object into an existing Project File might create a
problem in accessing the other valid objects in that Project File.
What can now be done about it? At the request of several clients
in countries with unstable power sources and clients using portable computers, a
new "Recover Project File" option now occurs on the menu. It provides
you a new process designed to recover objects from a damaged Project File. It
simply allows each valid object in a damaged Project File to be accessed,
checked, reassembled, and moved into a new Project File. A report on the status
of each object examined, recovered, and moved, or not, is also generated.
Damaged objects which cannot be read and reassembled are left behind so that the
new Project File contains all the recovered objects and all their subobjects.
Please note that the new Project File created in this fashion is compacted and
releases the space of the damaged objects and all other free space that results
from previously erased objects.
In the future, additional effort will be put into making this recovery process
more and more intelligent so that it may be able to automatically patch or
recover at least part or all the data from the corrupted object(s). These
capabilities will be developed and added as you send in damaged Project Files or
objects for MicroImages to analyze and determine the kinds of tests and
corrections which are needed.
* Measurement Tools
A subtle, but widely used feature of old DOS
MIPS is now available in TNTmips with
expanded capabilities. It is now possible to view raster statistics for an area
selected via the various measurement tools. The rasters to be
"measured" do not even need to be showing in the View window! For
example, simply draw a polygon on the view, which may be showing a 256
color-infrared reference image (especially if you only have an 8-bit color
display board). Then select other coincident raster objects such as the three
8-bit rasters used to created it, and review the statistics for each of the
raster objects for the same area as the polygon.
DOS MIPS was primarily a raster based product, and this
approach was used to visualize properties of images. For example, you were
viewing an 8-bit color compressed natural color TM image
and wanted to review the mean and variance of the same polygonal area for all 7 LANDSAT
TM bands from which the image being viewed was created.
Within TNTmips with its much wider management of spatial
data types, the same kinds of measurement tools provide a much more expanded
horizon for their applications. For example, you may be viewing a vector or CAD
display of a vegetation or soil map and want to draw a line (not necessarily
straight) and review a profile of the cell values in rasters of other biological
factors generated from Kriging GPS collected field
samples. Or you may want to carefully examine the histograms of a polygon area
for a series of multispectal, multitemporal, or multisensor raster objects which
do not even have the same cell size, map project, or extents.
Display
General
The relative zoom and current map scale are now displayed in a reference line at
the bottom of each view window. Both the map scale and zoom factor fields can be
selected with the mouse and edited so that accurate numeric values can be
entered to directly control the redraw operation. Cursor map coordinates also
now appear in this same new reference line. By default these coordinates are
displayed in whatever projection each group is viewed in. The coordinate system
and their units may be selected using the Options menu in the View window.
Point, Line, and Polygon style selection has been made much easier. The user interface is now more graphical, and patterns may now be easily selected from the "standard" set of patterns provided in stdstyle.rvc.
It is now possible to override vector or CAD label heights when drawing.
A warning message will now be displayed if a tool is selected that is not usable in the current context. For example, if the route tool is chosen when no vector layers are available.
A status message dialog will now be displayed while raster histograms are being computed. Previously the process appeared to be "hung" if the raster was very large.
Raw Date viewing for vector, CAD,
and TIN objects is integrated into the Element Selection
window.
* Tabular Views
The advanced multi-element selection tools are now available in display for use
with the Tabular View window. These were introduced last quarter in the object
editor and have been expanded and enhanced. Multiple element selection can now
be used on the active vector, CAD, or TIN
layer. Elements of all the types which occur in these layers can be selected and
their attributes viewed and edited. Element selection can be sequential; by area
selection tools such as polygons, circles, squares, ...; and other new methods.
All attribute or database tables for a View can now be listed and managed in the same selection window. For example, when you select a database, the window simply opens up, or expands, to show the tables.
Full support of database editing is available in the Tabular View window.
Multiple elements can now be selected in the active layer in the View window by selecting the corresponding attribute record(s) in the Tabular View window. For example, you can choose to view all available records in the Tabular View window. Then select several records in this window and choose the Select Elements option on the Record menu in the Tabular View window. All the elements in the layer being viewed tied to these records will then be selected.
* Element Selection
A new Element Selection dialog box is now used in display. A color print
entitled "Element
Selection and Attribute Assignment" is attached to illustrate this
significantly altered and more interactive approach. It has not yet been
implemented in other processes such as the object editor, but will be during the
next quarter.
The new button "Selection Parameters" in this dialog box drops down a panel exposing small labeled icons for each group in the active view. Using the mouse to select a group will expand the list to show small named icons for all layers in that group.
Selecting a layer will expand the list to show an array of small icons pertinent to that type of layer (e.g. raster, vector, ...). These icons provide direct access to important selection controls for each element type in the layer. Each row of icons in the array for a layer is for a particular element type (e.g. for a vector layer, rows for points, lines, and polygons will be shown). All icons in a row look like a tool bar and will be gray if the object did not have, or you did not choose to view, any of that type of elements in the current layer (e.g. the icons for line elements will all be gray if only points and polygons were displayed).
The row of small icons for a raster layer can be toggled to:
- show the attribute tables list,
- show the list of internal attribute tables,
- make a new table,
The rows of small icons for a vector layer for points, lines, or polygons can be toggled to by type to:
- select an element type for attribute viewing,
- show the attribute tables list,
- show the list of internal attribute tables,
- make a new table,
- select all elements,
- clear all elements selected, and
- invert the selection of elements.
The row of small icons for a CAD layer lets you:
- show the attribute tables list,
- show the list of internal attribute tables,
- make a new table,
- select all elements,
- clear all elements selected, and
- invert the selection of elements.
The rows of small icons for a TIN
layer provide all the same options as available for vector layers, except the
rows are for nodes, lines, and triangles.
The Show Attribute Tables and Show Internal Attribute Tables icons insert a list
of the names and descriptions of all tables available for the element type
selected directly into this dialog box. A small icon also appears at the
beginning of each row in the list of tables and can be used to open up the
Tabular Attribute window for that table.
A toggle button lets you expose or hide active element information for vector, CAD,
and TIN objects directly in the Element Selection window
(formerly obtained in a separate window using Examine/Raw Data).
All these new interface features are best understood by experimenting directly
with them and
selecting everything with the mouse.
* Scale Controlled Views
Layers may now be selected to draw only within a specified range of map scales.
This allows construction of a layout containing data at various levels of detail
and extent. As you zoom in on the data, the layers that have greater detail can
appear and the layers that have the coarser detail can disappear. This technique
can be used to build an "atlas" where you simply zoom in to where you
want to look through a series of progressively more detailed objects.
Display and other processes that use displays now provide scale controlled views
of vector, CAD, and TIN objects.
Your monitor, and thus all view windows, will need to be calibrated to a known
scale. Support/Setup/Preferences provides a means of entering the current width
and height of your display screen.
This view by scale feature now provides a virtual pyramiding effect in the
display of vector, CAD, and TIN
layers with a decrease in display time. For example, if you currently display
100% of the elements in a full view of a vector object of a TIGER
data set for a county, this individual layer might take a minute to display on a
fast PC or PMac. However, with this scale option, a full
view of this object can be designed to show only major roads, rivers, and
political boundaries. Thus only 5% of the total vector elements might be read
and displayed for this full view.
A properly designed scale controlled view also looks better than displaying 100%
of the elements, which yields mere blobs of color at full view. As you zoom in,
more kinds of elements would be "turned on" but the area viewed and
the elements which need to be read are correspondingly reduced. Vector, CAD,
and TIN objects are already optimized to support
efficient, direct access to a subportion of their elements (by using index
tables, buffering, caching, etc.). Thus you can anticipate further improvements
in viewing vector, CAD, and TIN
layers by scale where the amount of the object being read and rendered at any
scale is consistently reduced by your scale design to be less than 10% of the
total object.
The key to display by scale is using georeferenced line objects (available for
years) and then getting a scale assigned to the element types they contain. Some
of the ways in which you will be able to assign scales to element types are as
follows.
· 1) You will be able to use display to view all the elements in the object and
interactively set or edit the scale for each class. For example, in display,
select an element class or multiple element classes, enter a display scale--the
scale field for these element types is added or altered--then redisplay to see
if the results are as desired at that scale.
· 2) Open a tabular attribute window for all element types, and manually enter
a "scale to show at" value for each element class attribute value.
* Improved Selection of Elements
In V5.20 the element location index table that contained
the pointers to the disk locations of all elements that make up the vector, CAD,
or TIN object were recomputed when the process started a
selection procedure. For example, when you used display to retrieve the
attributes of a single polygon, you saw a status bar. This bar was timing the
computation of this index table which was retained in memory to locate the
element(s) you select.
It is not necessary to recompute this pointer table in a process which does not
actually alter the object. For example, displaying the attributes of selected
elements within a display activity does not alter the index table. Thus, V5.30
now stores the index table in the Project File as an associated subobject for
each vector, CAD, and TIN
object.
This system level modification is transparent to you and is analogous to the
handling of the histogram subobject for rasters. The histogram subobject of a
raster object is computed or recomputed and saved when a raster object is
created or altered (e.g. import, edit, etc.). The histogram subobject is then
automatically read and used by subsequent processes (e.g. display). Processes
which alter a raster object (copy, edit, etc.) automatically recompute and store
the new histogram subobject.
The new element location index table subobject functions similarly. It is
computed or recomputed and stored when the object is created or altered (import,
edit, copy part, validate, etc.). It is no longer necessary for processes or
subprocesses which use, but do not alter, objects to compute this index table as
it will be read from the subobject. Therefore, you will no longer be seeing the
associated "Building Search List" status bar and the time it takes
away from you. Similarly, processes which alter objects, such as the object
editor, can use this stored subobject for their initial display and then
recompute and replace what has actually been altered as part of saving an
altered object. The net result is processes that support selection of elements
from vector, CAD, and TIN
objects will be considerably faster to start up. The most obvious benefit will
be when display is used to select elements and expose their attributes.
How will you get these new subobjects for your existing line objects? They will
automatically be computed and stored the first time you use the object within a V5.30
process. Of course, this will not work with objects stored in project files on CDs.
This read-only media will be detected, and the attempt to store an index table
subobject will be aborted. Thus each time an object is used from an earlier CD,
the index table will be recomputed as in V5.20. Objects
created for CDs made after V5.30
will automatically contain their associated index table subobject which will not
need to be changed since the associated object cannot be altered on this media.
* Theme Displays (a prototype process)
The term "desktop mapping" has recently gained popularity in
conjunction with rising public interest in a class of products initially
designed for isopleth or theme mapping. In the United States this has been one
manifestation of the general public's interest prompted by the wide availability
of the Census Bureau's County TIGER, USGS's
DLG, DMA's Digital Chart of the
World, and other public domain spatial data. As a result, a variety of general
public commercial software has been created to assist in the use of this readily
available spatial data in business geographics, gerrymandering, demographics,
and related applications. This software has gradually expanded into other GIS
applications directly and by extension via other companion or wrap-around
products. The widening popularity of this class of lower cost ($300 to $1000)
products has in turn provided the basis for a market for improved and additional
proprietary data sets on CD and other media.
Complex theme mapping has previously been provided by TNTmips
and TNTview by using a query to control which vector or CAD
elements are displayed and in what styles. Queries give you extensive powerful
control over what is to be selected and how it is to be rendered. However,
creating simple theme maps such as polygons filled with colors denoting
population density takes too much time and requires experience with creating
logical queries. As a result, an interactive theme mapping approach has been
introduced into TNTmips and TNTview.
A sample color theme map entitled "Population
Theme Map for California Counties" is attached. On the reverse of
this print is a list of the steps needed to create it within TNTmips
or TNTview.
Theme mapping is simply another method by which vector, CAD,
or TIN layers can be displayed and styled. Advanced
MicroImages clients can approach theme mapping as a speedy aid to selecting and
overlaying vector and CAD objects without writing a
query. Beginners, especially those using TNTview, can
use theme mapping on a single vector object to get those first maps produced
fast without resorting to learning the database query language.
The new theme mapping feature in the TNT products is
totally interactive. You may apply the theme mapping approach to points, lines,
and polygons separately or in combination. It may not be obvious at this point,
but this theme mapping applied to point data is a direct and easy route to
producing a pin map. However, try it first on polygons by selecting your sample
monochrome SPOT image for Crow Butte (CB_SPOT.RVC) then
select the soil map overlay from the same Crow Butte data (CB_SOILS.RVC) and
theme map the attribute values for the Potential Wheat Yield for each soil type
as color transparent overlays for the image.
To use the theme mapping feature after you select the vector or TIN
layer to display, choose the element type (points, lines, polygons, labels, ...)
you wish to display, and use the style button to select style "By
Theme". To design a new theme (since you have not created any) select the
adjacent button "Specify ..." which opens the Theme Mapping Controls
window. This window is where you design one or more theme map layouts for the
selected layer. Choose the attribute to be mapped, the type of distribution, and
the number and range of the values to be mapped. Then close this window and
proceed on to display the layer as your theme map with default symbolism.
The Theme Mapping Control window provides a wide variety of additional optional
features to use in the design of what your theme map will represent and how it
will appear. The number of classes in the theme map can be spread over any range
of the attribute by equal area, equal count, or user-defined distributions.
Ranges are shown and can be manually edited. A histogram of attribute
distribution can be opened with vertical bars showing the current class
boundaries. The mouse can be used to drag these bars to reposition any and all
classes.
The default colors and symbolism of each class can be interactively created or
selected from your style objects. A style object controlling the symbolism of
each theme map can be created. Point color and symbolism; line color, style, and
width; or polygon solid or transparent colors, color spread, and bit-map fill
can all be selected for each class or assigned from any available style object.
The appropriate point, line, or polygon style object editor can be directly
accessed to select, edit, or create a completely new style. Intermediate classes
can be set to be skipped (i.e. not rendered) such as a range of polygons which
are 100% transparent to the underlying layers. The amount of transparency for
solid color of each polygon class can be specified to allow partial exposure of
an underlying image.
When you have completed the design of what your theme map will contain and how
it will appear, you save the design as the default or named layout for that
layer.
Theme mapping applied to points in a vector object is a fast way to create pin
maps from the points in a vector object. You can easily set style, exclude
ranges, set ranges, etc.
Legends
You can add legends to your theme maps. To do this, you create a normal point,
line, or polygon legend (Layer/Add/Legend). When it asks for a style object to
use, pick the style object that is stored under the theme table, which is a
subobject of the vector object. The descriptions will be generated
automatically, but they can be changed.
Stereoscopic Viewing (a work in progress)
The display process now provides for easy viewing of stereo images which have a
tie point subobject established by Step 1 in the DEM/ortho
process. First use Step 1 to prepare and save a few colocated tie points to
interrelate the geometry of the pair of stereo images. It is not necessary to
complete Step 1 and generate two new raster objects with correct epipolar
geometry. Thus, only a few tie points need to be entered if you are not planning
to complete the epipolar solution. The display process uses these few tie points
to automatically resample one image's geometry sufficiently to reorient and
rescale it to fuse its view in stereo with its mate.
If you plan a lot of stereo viewing of the image pair, then go ahead and
complete Step 1 and produce a corrected pair of images, as their subsequent use
in display requires only a simple geographic locking. Thus moving around in
stereo view mode will be faster since the images will not have to be resampled
every time you choose to change your stereo view position.
During the next quarter, adding stereo measurement and related features to
display and other processes will be undertaken. As part of this activity,
establishing the tie point and epipolar geometry of a stereo pair will be
incorporated into the display process.
Once stereo fusion and relief exaggeration is established in V5.30,
then zoom, pan, scroll, and other relocation operations automatically maintain
the stereo fusion. The area of stereo overlap of the left and right images is
also automatically determined and limits the stereo viewing area for all these
display changes within the stereo mode. If you wish to experiment with stereo
viewing, please remember that the sample TNTatlas of San
Francisco contains a stereo pair of 10 meter panchromatic SPOT
images and three stereo pairs of color-infrared NHAP
airphotos for this purpose.
Anaglyph stereo displays for two-color lens glasses can now be automatically
made from panchromatic stereo images (or corresponding bands for the NHAP
images on the CD). Considering the simplicity of this
viewing device, it provides quite usable stereo but cannot present color. The
very simple cardboard glasses with two color lenses (one red and one blue or
green) require a two color blended image which is automatically displayed. You
can specify a variety of colors for each lens, so simply cut out a cardboard set
of glasses and tape appropriate color foils over each eye opening. A pair of
cardboard anaglyph glasses will be distributed with V5.40
of the TNT products which will contain expanded features
for their use while viewing stereo images.
MicroImages has finally located a low cost color stereo viewing device and
supported it. It has been built for the game industry by a Korean firm and is
called 3DMAX. It is based upon an LCD shuttered lens and
a video sync card which must go into the bus, costs $200, and provides good
color stereo for displays up to 1280 by 1024 pixels. Currently these glasses are
restricted to the Microsoft Windows-based PC platforms,
but the Mac versions are promised in the next couple of months.
MicroImages has supported these glasses in V5.30 and
imported 30 sets directly from Korea for internal development use with very few
left over for those clients who wish to experiment this quarter. With V5.40's
expanded use of stereo, detailed information on these glasses will be provided.
It is likely that these particular glasses will be sold directly by MicroImages
for a while, as it is unlikely that you will be able to readily acquire them in
most nations.
MicroImages has a developer's set of CrystalEyes LCD
shuttered glasses and the related video sync device. Support for this $700 color
stereo viewing device will be added after V5.30 ships. Please note that these
glasses will work with PCs, Macs, and workstations and
do not require that any hardware be added inside your computer.
* Multi-element Selection in Display
V5.10 and V5.20
provided multi-element selection tools in the TNT object
editor with the associated ability to open and edit multi-record or multi-line
Tabular View window(s) for vector, CAD, and TIN
layers. V5.20 supported the use of Tabular View windows
in display, but the element selection tool only allowed you to select elements
one at a time. Now the multi-element selection tools are available in the
display process. Circle, polygon, all, or other multi-element selection
operations will show or hide the associated attribute records in the Tabular
View window.
* Graphical 'Fields'
An innovative concept has been introduced into the TNT
products where the Tabular View windows can now show a "graphical"
field. The graphical field displays a color sample of the point, line, or
polygon style currently assigned in the style table for each record exposed in
the new Tabular View window. Thus, when both the display view and a Tabular View
window are open, the graphical field provides an immediate legend to visually
relate the symbolic display of the selected elements to their attributes
(identities, descriptions, areas, ...). Graphical fields are shown in the
attached color print entitled "Element Selection and Attribute
Assignment."
The graphical field will be optionally exposed in the table whenever requested.
It can be positioned as a vertical column or new field wherever you designate
vertically among the existing numeric and text fields. Usually, it would be
positioned as the first field in the Tabular View window as an interactive
legend showing the style assigned to each record. Selecting any graphical field
with the mouse will allow you to modify the style associated with that record
without going to the Style Assignment window under the appropriate control
panel. The graphical fields contents will also change when other tools and
processes are used to alter the associated style table.
* Styles
Style Management
The unique new display of graphical fields now provides direct access to the
style editor. Also more and more use is being made of TNT
standard style collections (objects); your local custom developed collection(s);
and potential contributed collections. These kinds of changes require continued
gradual modification to the style assignment, design, and management tools in
the TNT products. Styles, like fonts, require a
sophisticated means of creating, managing, accessing, and keeping those assigned
readily available for each principal object and layout. However, unlike fonts,
extensive standard schemes are not in place within the operating systems and
associated software.
Style management has to evolve in the TNT products in
concert with the addition of new features (e.g. TNT
object editor, graphical attribute fields, theme mapping, ...), issue large
collections of standard symbol objects (e.g. the new geological fill patterns),
respond to the need for new and advanced symbolism (e.g. complex combinations of
symbols--point symbols inserted in line patterns), and so on. The following new
features are available to assist in the use of styles.
Style Assignment Editor
A new direct access to the style assignment editor has been incorporated to
support the concept of a graphical field outlined above. It allows the mouse
selection of any graphical field from the Tabular View window using the
graphical field as a "push button". When "pushed" the color
graphical cell will be changed to gray, just like a "pushed" icon
button. This action will also expose the styles available in the current style
object for that element type (e.g. point symbols) in the currently selected
style object. Selecting a new style will substitute it for the one previously
used, and the contents of the graphical field will be changed in the Tabular
View window. When the view is redrawn, the new style will be substituted into
the style table and used in the redraw of the layer. This new approach provides
a much easier, direct, and interactive means of assigning or
changing styles.
Style Object Editor
In previous versions of TNTmips, there were only a few
style objects available to deal with, but now they are proliferating. Several
new standard style objects have been added this quarter (see below). As a
result, improvements are being gradually added to the style object editor. It is
also possible to edit several style objects to accumulate a new style object to
define the appearance of a specific layout or printed map. The style object you
wish to edit can be switched without exiting the editor. You can also switch
between style types (point symbols, line patterns, and fill patterns) within the
editor. The unused styles or styles currently assigned to individual elements
can be deleted from a particular style object. The new standard TNT
bit-mapped fill patterns described below can now be selected and their
individual styles assigned, copied, edited, and so on.
Standard Style Objects
Three standard style objects are now available to provide
you with 215 geologic bit-map fill patterns. Four pages (1 color and 3 in
monochrome) are attached to illustrate the contents of these new sets of
patterns.
GMT Contributed Geological Fill Patterns
The one pattern set illustrated in color was contributed by MicroImages'
Representative for Papua New Guinea (PNG), Geo Mapping
Technologies (GMT), located in Brisbane, Australia.
These represent a collection of patterns that they wish to share with you which
they have developed and find useful for the preparation of geologic maps with TNTmips
for their clients in Australia and PNG. Should you have
a collection of symbols or patterns you wish to share with other clients as a
contributed library, please provide them to MicroImages.
USGS Geologic Fill Patterns
The other two new sets are patterns developed by the
United States Geological Survey (USGS) which have been
very carefully rendered within the TNT bit-map pattern
editor for your use. The source material for the preparation of these patterns
is a DRAFT Open File Report 95-525 entitled Cartographic
and Digital Standard for Geological Map Information issued in 1995 from
the United States Department of Interior's United States Geological Survey (USGS)
in cooperation with the Federal Geographic Data Committee. This thick DRAFT
report contains hundreds of pages of reference materials describing and
illustrating the standard symbolic representation to be used on geologic maps.
It contains extensive point and related composite symbols used to render
geologic maps as well as extensive descriptions for fill patterns and their
complex coloring. Reference information on this important report is attached.
Unfortunately, it is already out-of-print and will be superseded this summer
with the printing of the final, official version.
The USGS symbol fill patterns are printed and attached in black and white to
show the fine details of the symbolic patterns they contain. One set contains
sedimentary patterns, and the other is for igneous and metamorphic materials.
Their correct use requires that the internal symbolism contained in each of
these patterns is rendered in a uniform color of varying intensity, while their
background is in another uniform color of varying intensity. While the color
combinations prescribed are harmonious, both the internal pattern of the symbol
and the background color convey separate information about the geologic material
represented by each geologic polygon.
Over 8000 different color fill pattern/background color combinations are
specified in the USGS document. At this time, to use
these TNT fill patterns in color, it will be necessary
for you to select and separately specify the colors of the internal symbols and
the background. It will be difficult to do this to approximate the official
colors until you can gain access to the completed USGS
final report later this year. However, these patterns should still be useful to
those applying TNTmips in geology. What is needed now is
your assistance in locating reference material from which MicroImages can
continue to construct suitable libraries of bit-map or fill patterns for other
disciplines.
Standard Point Symbols
A large collection of 540 standard TNT point symbols were noted as available on
special request in the MicroImages MEMO shipped with V5.20. This point symbol
file is now included in V5.30.
Any Others in the Future?
Please, please, will any client who knows of similar map symbol reference
materials for the United States of America and all other nations bring it to
MicroImages' attention. As a software manufacturer, MicroImages does not have
ready access to such information and materials, especially for other nations.
This material might be in the form of similar national standards, reference
charts, commercial symbol products and files for use in CAD, and so on. Some
materials on the official Australian geologic symbols and Russian general map
symbolism are already on hand. It is particularly important to identify
reference symbol sets related to topographic, ecological, forest and other
vegetation, and so on. During the next quarter, MicroImages will encode the few
standard line symbols contained in the references we already have as well as
additional points and patterns.
Object Editor
The object editor continues to improve and expand with
incorporation of new, major processes for raster layer editing, COGO
creation and editing of a CAD or vector layer, and the
introduction of advanced interactive color line following to assist in the
creation of, or adding to a vector or CAD object from a
raster object. As previously announced, the older, independent Edit CAD
and Edit Vector processes are no longer available for W31
and UNIX. This releases about 7 megabytes of your hard
drive space.
Each of the new major processes is introduced in detail below. Enhancements and
extended features added to existing processes were also added as follows.
The editor now automatically creates, updates, and maintains the standard
attribute tables for CAD and vector layers (area,
length, etc.) which you create or edit.
A new "Exclusive" selection mode is now available to place the
elements selected into the list of selected elements. It also removes from the
list of selected elements those elements that do not fit the selection criteria.
For example, selecting lines with the circle selection tool will place the lines
inside the circle into the selection list. At the same time, any previously
selected lines not inside the circle are removed from the selection list.
Snapping of line ends in either line creation or the line snapping option in
editing vector layers now has a "Snap back" angle tolerance which can
be set. This prevents any extension of the line which would create an angle with
the original line larger than the tolerance. This forces the line to snap
forward, since an extension of the end of the line backward (such as from the
end of a spur) would create a large angle with the direction of the original
line. This tolerance can be set to prevent many undesirable snaps such as those
from the end of a non-perpendicular spur which creates an undesirable small
triangle between the spur, the snapback line, and the original line.
* Interactive Line Following (a prototype process)
A new and completely rewritten color interactive line following subprocess is
available in the TNT object editor. It provides rapid,
semi-automatic heads-up digitizing with many improvements over the method
available in the old DOS MIPS product. This process can
reduce the number of colors in the input color map or drawing using neural
network color compression (automatic unsupervised image classification). You
then interactively determine from a small color palette which remaining color or
similar colors make up the line type to trace, such as the tan colors of the
contours (known in image processing as the labeling process). A color print
entitled "Interactive Line-Following" is attached to show the user
interface. Consulting it periodically will help clarify the following
introductory comments. A printed supplemental documentation section entitled
"Interactive Line-Following and Coordinate Geometry (COGO)
Tools" is also enclosed.
As in other areas of the TNT object editor, this tracing
process allows you to work on the layer or layers you select from your composite
view. For example, you might be viewing a composite of CAD,
vector, and raster layers, but tracing will be confined to the raster layer(s)
you select. If you have a big map to digitize, and do not need these other
object areas for reference, then hide or do not select them. Use of interactive
line following on a large map may move the view many times, and rendering any
extraneous layers takes time.
Tracing on RGB color images (3 objects of 8-bits each)
requires that you select these multiple component layers from your composite
view. The neural network color compression process then reduces the 16 mil