Testimonials ... and other tidbitsFollowing are some of the positive, written comments to MicroImages during the last quarter exactly as written except for the [edit] alterations in [brackets] to keep them anonymous. Many more comments are received by MicroImages by voice but cannot be reproduced here verbatim as quotes. Please note that these quotations are not edited from their original form in spelling, grammar, punctuation, etc. extracted from a FAX from an International Dealer on 7 November 1996. "We are dealing with the highest levels within the Forest [an agency] and think we have a better than even chance to help them establish an effective national forest management system. You will be pleased to hear that when the second in charge dropped in on its way to see a major [a city] based consulting firm, he was so impressed with TNTmips that he stayed two extra days and didn't visit the firm in [the city] who were trying to sell a $500,000 package based on ARC/INFO, ERMapper, we-know-better-than-you style consulting and very little training." from a student in Germany on 1 December 1996. "I am studying landscape engineering in Freising near Munich - Germany (University FH Weihenstephan). In our school, we are learning to work with computer aided design. A few months ago I took a course using the ARCINFO program and I think I can speak for most of the course members when say we would appreciate a windows interface, since it is much more user friendly." "A few days ago, I visited [a client] in Munich and he gave me an short overview about your GIS system. I am amazed at the abilities of your system and how easy it seems to be to work with it." " [The client] told me that it is possible to get the TNTlite learning program for free, so it would be great if you could send me your program. (PC 486 Windows for Workgroups)" "Right now, at the end of my study I am doing my final exam work and I want to do it with a computer aided program because it is a typical application of superposition of areas. Until now I thought I will do it with AUTOCAD, because for me the GIS on ARCINFO is too involved. However, working with AUTOCAD would also be a compromise. Being able to use TNTlite would make the project much easier." "Another possibility would be to use your TNTmips program, however, I cannot receive support from the school for the purchase of this software. I don't know if it is possible, but would your company be willing to supply a full, or time-limited version of the TNTmips program for my final exam work? My work is only for my diploma and is not a commercial project. Up until now, the ARCINFO program is very sidely used in Germany. This would be an opportunity to introduce TNT to our department in the FH Weihenstephen." "Even if it isn't possible to supply a copy of the TNTmips program, I would very much appreciate receiving a copy of the TNTlite version. Thank you in advance for your help." on a TNTlite Registration Card from Colorado on 10 December 1996. "Thank you for you prompt response and patience with my anxiousness. Though I am working on making TNTlite working on my machine [a PMac]: your program appears to be of high quality and capabilities." [The organization of this TNTlite client has subsequently purchased a professional version of TNTmips.] from a FAX followup from a demo of TNTmips to a major Australian consulting firm on 9 December 1996. "The TNTmips software was very impressive, especially from the way it is designed and how it operates. Functionally, we see nothing from a CAD/Cartographic mapping point of view that cannot be done in either ArcInfo or Intergraph." "Where it is obviously ahead of its competitors is in its ability to derive knowledge or support decision making from GIS data sets. It very much does what ArcInfo (vector) and ERDAS (raster) do in the one system, but obviously has many advantages over trying to use both these systems. From our preliminary overview, the cost benefit of TNTmips would be well ahead of the configuration." [The nature of the work of this firm and the writer are known to have in depth experience with the use of many other GIS and image analysis products. They are not a MicroImages client but were reviewing TNTmips for possible use in a proposal.] extracted from email from a U.S. student on 5 December 1996. "The response time of the MicroImages technical staff never ceases to amaze me. Kudos to you and the whole staff." from email from a student in California on 8 December 1996. "I am a graduate student at the [a university]. I use ARC/INFO, IDRISI, MultiSpec, and SpaceState (From RRI)." "I recently downloaded TNTlite. I loved the product -- I could do everything on TNT that I now use four packages to do poorly -- but it lacks the capacity to actually work on my research." "Who would I talk to about getting a graduate student type discount on TNTmips?" extracted from email from a mining exploration client on 5 December 1996. "I tried TNT on a Pentium the other day - what a difference - fallen in love with the product all over again. Apparently [another client] use DEC Alphas that literally scream with TNT. Hmm, I understand clones are coming out - keep us posted." [The other mining exploration client referenced is using several of the 64-bit versions of TNTmips on clones of the DEC Alpha, which have been around for about two to three years.] on a TNTlite Registration Card from Chile on 10 December 1996. "I am just now trying to do a photogrammetric restitution of a series of photographys I took of a very rocky piece of ground my parents bought at Los Molles Beach. Wish me luck." email from a TNTmips client in China on 17 December 1996. "Today I have received the packing for release of TNTmips 5.5, and installed to my computer. It is wonderful software and better than that I have ever used, thanks a lot!" extracted from a FAX from a client in Germany on 17 December 1996. "There are a number of new items that will make this fabulous System even more helpful to us. Nevertheless, two items we were longing for since September are still missing. These are:" [One of the two items just happened to be added the day the FAX was received. The second is on the request list.] "Finally we would like to thank you for the ongoing support that you provided during the now ending year." from email from a U.S. Dealer on 14 December 1996. "Good News! I installed Version 5.5 on the PowerMac that I have on my desk at [a location]. This is a Model 7600 with 80 MB of RAM (133 Mhz clock speed). The installation was flawless (no special precautions taken except to close all applications before installing). The speed of the program (TNTlite without key -- of course runs like TNTmips with a key) is about the same as it is on my Pentium 133 Mhz 32 MB RAM machine." [The 7600 PMac uses 132 MHz Motorola PPC 604 chip. RAM Doubler 2 is not needed on this system as this machine has 80 MB of memory. It would have run just as well if the machine had 32 MB of memory. Speed Doubler should still be used, as it will speed up file read/write independent of memory availability. Speed Doubler 2 will be released in January and claims even better file access speed equal to two times what it would be if not used.] email from a U.S. Dealer on 16 December 1996. "Thank you for v.5.5 of TNTmips and outstanding new features. I am busy with my delayed TNTatlas projects, but all of them are still actual and getting their form slowly but surely. Reasons for delays are expanding needs of customers and expanding needs for demonstrations." [Continues on to describe an error.] extracted from an email from a German client on 16 December 1996. "Version 5.50 of TNTmips has arrived on Friday. After 'playing' around for a while (I spent half a weekend) I want to express my compliments to everyone at MicroImages for having done a pretty good job once again." "I want to mention some of my favorites: - ODBC - ROIs (very important for us) [Region-of-Interest] - Surface /Raster Properties (tremendously important for us)" "I also appreciate your efforts towards including metadata with objects, and, in my opinion, clinging to the FGDC standard (or a subset, may be organized in profiles) would not be worst choice." email from a Dealer on 17 December 1996. "Thanks for the (somewhat long awaited) release of TNTmips 5.5 which arrived here, last Friday. Although I know, that we're a bit behind or plans (at least in terms of sales) regarding TNTmips, we still take MicroImages effort and impressive development dynamics as the driving force to broaden our knowledge base of TNTmips. I specifically enjoyed (both being entertained and educated at the same time) reading through the ARC/INFO related Memos and the really valuable MicroImages-periodical 'Grapevine'. I certainly take the chance hereby to ask for some compiled form of the material presented in these memos (as suggested)." "We also have sent numerous TNTlite packages out (exclusively PC-Users under Windows). I don't know actually how many of them registered the package. [Some Dealer comments skipped here.] But it's still our conviction, that TNTlite is the way to make specifically other system's users at least have a look at TNTmips, while providing real newbies with a complete system to learn what GIS is all about. The latter will be the people then who stop throwing money in the 'dinosaur's throat'." [Additional Dealer questions skipped.] "Finally, just for the case that I won't be able to get back to you prior to the Christmas Holidays, I'd like to thank you and your colleagues at MI for your cooperation, but mainly for throwing real expertise rather than marketing tricks into the future development of TNTmips. To all at MicroImages happy holidays season and our best wishes for a good 1997." extracted from an email from an Angolan client on 17 December 1996. "As for the rest of TNTmips 5.50 I can only say that it's been worth the wait. I'll need about a month to try out all the new features. Thanks." extracted from an email from a non-U.S. student on 20 December 1996. [This student did not download TNTlite. He only obtained the MI/X Server. He contacted MicroImages' software support as follows requesting help.] [First email] "I have downloaded a copy of MI/X, X server from the internet. It was installed properly, I guess, as it didn't give any error message." [He would have used install routine downloaded as part of MI/X.] "I am using dial up modem connection to go online. It's a university dial up line. Now I try to connect to a different unix system using telnet. I change the display variable as rqd [required] but still I am not able to get display on my computer. Gives error message 'Can't open display on...'" [This message is coming from the remote UNIX machines, which at this point do not know who this is, as he is not on their Domain Name Server.] "HOW CAN I SET UP MI/X so that I can use my system as X emulator and run unix applications to the remote machine.. and display comes up on my machine." "Please help me out.." "Using Windows NT 4.0 Pentium Pro 200 MHz. Connecting to the University of [a name] thru a dialup connection. Telneting to another unix machine." "How can I get display on my machine???" [Software support responded. He then came back saying it now worked but slowly. Software support then asked him how well since a slow modem connection was used.] [Last email] "As such I am trying to run programs like ARC/Info & ArcView, Matlab, IDEAS." "I guess these programs send back and forth lot of graphics data so they are slow over modem connection." "I tried EXCEED from Hummingbird corporation too, its same performance wise except few things here and there." [EXCEED is the top ranked commercial X Server for Windows platforms--cost $300 per seat.] "Kevin, as such I am interested in GIS. Is it possible for me to get a hard copy manual for TNT and a paper or something which tells how things are being implemented internally. Also, if u need anybody for review/testing of software, I'll like to do that. I am pretty good at GIS softwares like ARC/Info (all modules), Map/Info." "Also is there any programming module for TNT." "Thanks, for ur reply and support. I really appreciate that." [He was referred back to microimages.com to TNTlite!] extracted from a FAX from an International Dealer on 19 December 1996. "Just received version 5.50 and I am busy wading through the memos and other documents. Looks like some great new features and improvements have been added. Worth waiting the extra month or two for these." a letter from a professional United States user of TNTlite dated 31 December 1997. "On October 14, 1996, you responded to my posting about GIS software on the Internet. Subsequently, you sent a copy of TNTlite on version 5.4 along with other information to me. I would like to order the latest version (December/Jan release). Enclosed is a check for $25.00 to cover the costs of the new CD." "I understand from our telephone discussion this morning that this is not necessary [i.e. could have one free upgrade], however, I would like to support your company's approach to introducing products to people that want to learn about the capabilities of the software without a major outlay of capital in a small way. [?] I have also passed the information along to several other interested parties." extracted from an email from a German client on 2 January 1997. "Congratulations to all members of the MicroImages team for the new features. Especially concerning the new filters and the 3-D-applications." extracted from an email from a German TNTlite user on 3 January 1997. "PS: TNTlite is great - forget ARCVIEW." extracted from an email from a United States TNTlite user on 11 January 1997. "Congrats to all at MicroImages on the good looking HomePage!!" "I enjoyed bopping around it tonight. Inspirational." "Major upgrade from what I saw last month." extracted from an email from a United States client on 7 January 1997. "p.s. congratulations on TNTmips 5.5, the product is really coming along well." email from a Hungarian university on 16 January 1997. "I have a lot of leaflets about the TNTmips, TNTview, TNTatlas and TNTlite. Some of my colleagues got those when they were at the University of Debrecen, Hungary. they use the TNTlite under Win95 there but this is unuseful for us because we don't use this platform." "We would like to try the TNTlite program but we use SUNs with Solaris 2.3 and Solaris 2.5 operating system so we need the sparsol2.tar file from your ftp-server." "I was able to reach the server yesterday night and downloaded only a part of the 41,691,523 bytes during 6 hours. (Exactly: 41,116,672 bytes) Then the connection was interrupted. So..." "Thank you for your help again, I am going to try it in the future again." [Since the UNIX versions are compressed, he was 500,000 bytes short and interrupted! He gets a free CD kit for effort.] extracted from an email from a Canadian client on 17 January 1997. "I have received the last documentation [MEMOs, etc.] on version 4.5 [He means 5.5]. Congratulation for all your efforts in improving database functionalities and much more on the overall interface." email from a Congo site on 19 January 1997. "Last week arrived the version 5.5. Every quarter it is getting better and better!!!!" from an email exchange with an International Dealer starting 22 January 1997. [Dealer Statement] "Things here are as hectic as ever, we're in the final stages of [a] research project. For project reasons we had a demo of PC ERDAS Imagine 8.2 the other day, and 'frightening' is the only word I can use, it does a small fraction of what TNT can do, it cannot create or edit vectors! All the database capabilities are flat file! 8.3 is due out second quarter which may add some vector capabilities (They are getting the arcview DLLs from ESRI apparently). On the plus side the interface is very very fast and the modeller (which is functionally the same as SML) uses drag and drop flowcharting to define the algorithm and you then click on each box to populate it with a process or some data, very slick. We hit a slight vocabulary problem during the demo, what they call geo-referenced, I/we'd call geo-rectified or simply 'resampled to fit the projection'. Of resampling on the fly there is virtually none in any meaningful sense. The client for this job has specified Imagine, we're going to try to talk them into TNT of course. This may be old news to you folks but its nice to have a decision reinforced once in a while. Bear in mind this is all after a 2 hour demo and then an hour of unsupervised playing (1 App error) while the salesman was at lunch with someone else." [My observations on the speed of the ERDAS user interface (without first-hand experimental results) are as follows: 1) It is likely the salesman brought in the fastest PC available with a lot of memory in comparison to the working TNTmips systems in this shop. 2) As is noted, ERDAS requires common cell size and projections for images combined in a single display. Automatic resampling, map projection reconciliation, differential zooming, and other power features in TNTmips do place time tax on the execution of its interface and displays.] [MicroImages' Response] "One question does arise on the Imagine demo, was the software installed on your machine or was a computer brought by the ERDAS dealer specifically for this purpose? What were the characteristics of the PC involved (RAM, hard drive space, etc.)? Could the software be run from CD?" [Dealer Response] "To answer your question, Imagine was demo'd on one of our own *standard* TNT PC's, 166Mhz Pentium triton II motherboard, 32mb EDO ram, 2MB diamond stealth graphics, Fast Ethernet and 2x2GB disks, running Windows 95. As is typical with almost all image processing demos no image was bigger than 512x512 [demoed by every TNTlite], but they do have tiling and pyramiding so i'd expect display times to be rapid." [MicroImages' Response] "Regarding your email of 24 January. Thanks for the information on the ERDAS Imagine demo. It was interesting to note your comment on the raster size being only 512x512 and the overall speed of the display. As you are aware, using this small of imagery will always be pretty fast. TNTlite will display rasters that are this size quite fast as well as it's free. It was mentioned that while the person was away to lunch that you had the opportunity to 'play' with the software even more. Did you have the chance to bring in some of the large [a name] imagery that is always around [your shop]? If so, how were the display times then?" [Dealer Response] "We didn't get to import any large imagery to Imagine during the demo or playtime, although I assume we now have, since a [name] here is evaluating it on a 12 day demo (this seems to be the standard evaluation time). I'm afraid I've been concentrating on other areas recently, but it's on my list to catch up with the Imagine trial." "On the 512 raster thing, bear in mind, this was their standard demo dataset, equivalent to Crow Butte. Since they have raster tiling/pyramiding I assume display times should be comparable, if I get some time, I'll try and do some comparative timings. The thing that really sped up their display for interactive work, was that when you pan or zoom a window, only the bit that needs updating is redrawn, so you issue say a pan command (or slide the slider bars on the window), the whole display window then instantaneously jumps by the appropriate amount (I assume they're just copying a portion of the display bitmap), the software then fills in the required areas/layers from disk. I guess they've done some research into optimizing the display process further, by redrawing the necessary bits." "BTW another question you asked, during the demo, they didn't run directly from the CD, but installed to the hard disk. Interestingly it is standard practice here at [a name] to set windows temporary directory to be the root of the C disk on a machine (so people notice a buildup of the unneeded temporary files) The TEMP and TMP environments both point to this location. The Imagine install ignored these variables, put some files into the \windows\temp directory and then couldn't find them again!" extracted from a FAX from a client in Lao on 21 January 1997. "I am pleased to inform you that we had received TNTmips from version 5.2 to 5.5 and until 5.9 [i.e. a subscription through V5.90]. These products had ordered from UNDDSMS New York [a United Nations agency]. TNTmips was running quite well and last month we sent our staff to train at [a Dealer site]." extracted from an email from a professor in the USA on 23 January 1997. [The course discussed below is a required freshman/sophomore course in environmental science. This particular full semester course was being given for the first time during the month break between regular sessions. During the three weeks noted, the full 15 week semester's work was covered by working only on this course all day.] "The course went very well. Students were able to complete very complex GIS projects in a week of work [third week was devoted to a project]. Just 3 weeks ago, they did not know what GIS meant. We needed another week to get more into analysis and styling of vector elements and into turning 3-D point data into rasters, etc. They all feel empowered. We are thinking of addition of TNTlite to our Tech Tools II class soon (prepatory to the first GIS class so we can make more progress in the [this] introductory GIS class). TNTlite would be taught aside of stat Tools and advanced spreadsheet tools. Tech Tools I (pre-req for Tech Tools II) covers basic computer, word processing, introduction to spreadsheets, presentation software, photo processing software, and Web building and use." [Conclusion: geospatial analysis concepts can be appropriately taught at the freshman/sophomore university level using TNTlite.] extracted from an email from a South African university on 24 January 1997. "I am currently the manager of the GIS Lab at the Department of Geography at [a university]. We recently received a CD copy of TNTlite. I must admit that it is a wonderful product with many possibilities. To this point I have been able to perform some actions in TNTlite with great success. Unfortunately I have a problem in understanding some of the terminology used for some actions. The on-line help is not always available." [The party was made aware of the on-line documentation.] extracted from an email from a client in Ecuador on 24 January 1997. "ps. the Remote Sensing with TNT-Lite course went great--I have orders for 8 copies of the CD and haven't talked to the department head yet about their copies--we'll deal with this later!" an email exchange with a Hungarian university using only TNTlite on 28 January 1997. [This is not a TNT professional user, but one who downloaded the TNTlite product. He could not install it, so he came into technical support by email. It was turned over to the MicroImages software engineer who manages our installation processes including those used for network downloaded products. He pursued this with vigor since he had gotten similar feedback in prior months from three or four sites while hundred of others were downloaded and installed okay. He could not duplicate the problem here, primarily because the previous reports did not have sufficient detail, and we simply sent them a CD. Finally, someone in Hungary was willing to go back and forth as frequently as was necessary by email to be given the interrogation needed to find out what he was actually doing. The final exchange of email succinctly summarizes it all. And, how many software companies do you know that would stick to solving this kind of problem for a free product, especially when it turns out to be a problem in somebody else's software? As a problem solving company, MicroImages does not like unsolved problems. So we will stay on them with willing clients until they are eventually solved--days, weeks, or years!] [from MicroImages] "My first idea of what went wrong isn't the cause of this problem. I figured out today that your use of 'D\Install\Microimages' for your source directory causes PKUNZIP to fail. 'Microimages' has more than 8 characters." [from Hungary] "Oh my God, I have thought that the problem will be a triviality, but such a triviality ... I have the highest regard for you, because when somebody has a problem in his brain profoundly, it is very difficult to realize a triviality. While I am writing this mail, TNTlite has installed, so you tip was right. Thanks." email from an international client on 28 January 1997. "Thanks alot for your immediate action and help in this matter [a problem in customs]. What happened is that we quite frankly have a crazy president. I'm not sure how much [the nation's] news you get in Nebraska, but let me just get you oriented. National and international policies change every day.. The first week he was in office, President [a name] (after recording a CD) announced that long hair, rock and roll, and leather jackets (a national product) were against the [nation's] way of life or something.. Anyway the next day the police were going around arresting young men at a rock concert that had ponytails! So what I'm getting at here is that all of a sudden they have decided to be extremely strict with incoming items in terms of fines etc. The president also has just put his 20 year old son in charge of customs, and no of course he has no experience in these matters! But at least it keeps things interesting around here, I mean he's not really dangerous per se, but quite loony. So I have no idea if the second copy will make it through, maybe they will forget about their upped protection on imports tomorrow! I'll let you know what happens." [Just part of the fun of shipping and servicing products to some nations.] extracted from an email from a client in Italy on 30 January 1997. "This time MicroImages is not busy with a meeting in a polar temperature and I have taken the occasion to fly in Thailand to dive. It was not so interesting as a MicroImage's meeting but hotter." [Fine, but we are still here in Lincoln, and it's still polar for us. During the approximate period the Advanced Users' Workshop would have been held in the past, the temperature in Lincoln reached -15F degrees and -60F degrees wind-chill. Yes, spring is a better time in Lincoln. January is a good time to get down and do work.] email from a client in California on 3 February 1997. "Lee had asked me to try out the MI/X [MicroImages' X Server] for Arc/Info. I am pleased to report that I am able to run TNT products on workstations from my home computer running W95. We have PPP accounts through [a location] and as long as I start MI/X and TWM, I can start TNT products from the [a location] workstations." "I am a bit disappointed in Arc/Info version 7.0. It does not like the xterm window I am using, and bombs out with a fatal error. I will try a few other approaches." "The rewarding achievement is being able to run TNT from home. This means that many students could avoid the parking problems and computer sign up sheets." extracted from an archaeological conference paper on 3 February 1997. [The stereo video imagery used in this study was collected by swimming over components of a wrecked ship. The images were then framegrabbed into TNTmips. Geographic control points were "staked out" in the area of the components. We have airvideo, so should this be seavideo or scubavideo?] [from the Methods section] "The SIS [Spatial Information System] package used for this project - TNTmips versions 4.5-5.5 [4.5 through 5.5], written and distributed by MicroImages, Inc. (Lincoln, NE) - has the capability of grabbing video signal frames (primary and secondary fields) and creating rasters from them; registering the rasters to an arbitrary, user-defined coordinates; rectifying the registered rasters by applying various models of distortion; prospective projection of raster image pairs, and from these left-right pairs, generate elevation models, which may either be traditional Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) or the more efficient data structures called Triangulated Irregular Networks (TINs). No other software was required, and in fact the routines used in this project only comprise about 5 percent of all the routines available in the package." [from the Summary section] "Commercial off-the-shelf hardware and software have been used to generate elevation models of parts of a wreck site in the Florida keys. The final product will be a 32-bit TIN model of the wreck that is the 'base image' for generating many other types of raster, vector, and CAD objects representing the same area. The technique presented here does not require a metric camera, nor custom software, nor a workstation. In 1993, all hardware and software used in this project was purchased for under $10,000. No modifications have been made to either the hardware or the software in order to generate stereovideo models from the captures video imagery." email from a U.S. client on 4 February 1997. "digitizer works just fine now, thanks for the help!" [Getting digitizers to work is a pain in the neck for all GIS software vendors.] extracted from email from an International Dealer on 11 February 1997. "Please pass on my congratulations to all the staff at MicroImages for their impressive effort on v5.5. We have used it consistently since its release and have found it extremely reliable and full of useful new features. It seems to me that TNTmips draws further ahead of its competition each quarter." extracted from email from a client in the Congo on 11 February 1997. "I hope you can help me solve a problem. I am installing a database with the locations and camps as part of our infosystem. Basis: locations (Lat/Long) as vector points. Primary [field] attached is a unique code for every village. I link now a database table to this object and set the relation to the attribute, the code of the village. In this linked table are stored the activities of the people, like elephant hunting, fishing, etc. ...and so on..." email from the U.S. from a prospective client on 20 February 1997. "I am currently evaluating GIS and image processing packages. I think highly of TNTmips, in fact, since it does offer everything I am looking for in one integrated package I am 99% sure it will be the software I choose. Please send me the latest pricing. Also, I am considering running it on Intergraph's TDZ-410 (dual Pentium- Windows NT) which has 3-D graphics, similar to Sun or SGI's (Unix RISC) 3-D hardware. Will this affect pricing. Thanks in advance for your prompt reply." [It is a pleasure to find that Intergraph has been put at least once in the position of providing fast hardware to run TNTmips! More! More!] emergency email from a client visiting Botswana on 20 February 1997. "The DLL files seems to have cured all that was ailing us - we did indeed have version 'b' of windows 95. I want to thank you and [a staff name] for coming to the rescue so fast - the folks here in Dilbete [Botswana] (synonym for a place far away from the backbones of the Internet) were really quite impressed that a problem of this magnitude could or would be so quickly solved by a corporation in the States - you really need to congratulate yourself and take a pat on the back. Once again technical support at MicroImages not only were able to quickly source the problem from my confused and cryptic fax - but you handed me the solution from my confused and cryptic fax - but you handed me the solution in a way that I could help myself out quickly (posting the DLL on the server). My first attempt at downloading was successful for only about 5 minutes as 19b of the 64b file made it through before the rural Botswanan telephone lines thwarted us. However one quick call to Gaborone got someone to go by Info-Botswana (the local server) and they followed instructions I had faxed to them on where to look and how to download the file. By 3:00 PM today (20 February) we were up and running and back in business. Thanks for the great job on your end!" "Happy TNTmipssing in the Botswana bush veld." extracted from email from a client in Ecuador on 21 February 1997. "Thanks for replying about the drives and the dates for the workshop. I have forwarded a copy to both [names], who started working on TNTmips in our Chile office late last year and has since got all the geologists in the office onto TNTlite. She keeps in close contact with [a MicroImages Dealer]." email from India on 21 February 1997. "In the Geotimes' October, 1996 issue I came across the news item about your TNTlite cross platform mapping/image processing/GIS software. We are planning to take up a pilot project on groundwater prospecting in hard rock areas using satellite imageries and field geophysical, geological and hydrogeological data. In this connection we are also trying for federal government funding for remote sensing applications in geophysics, coastal engineering and other areas. At our research station we only have IDRISSI GIS software, which also is not the latest version [as it is no longer free]. We have an image processing software which has been developed in house and as such is not very versatile and robust. We are however, planning to acquire image planning and GIS software for our remote sensing applications in the near future." "I would appreciate if you could send me the details of how to obtain your TNTlite software free of cost for the time being for use in our pilot study. We are not hooked on to Internet as yet and as such are not able to down load your software from MicroImages. I would be thankful if you could answer my query through e-mail." extracted from a FAX from an International Dealer on 23 February 1997. "ESRI. What really annoys me [me too] is that every one thinks that the A/I methods and topology are, by definition perfect. However, we are sick of getting geology maps in A/I format that have been 'Cleaned' (i.e. Filtered and Validated in a largely uncontrollable process) such that the map borders do not match up. This happens because instead of moving nodes to make a new intersection, it also bend the line down to meet the node. Thus the borders are no longer straight and when the maps are joined, slivers have to be manually removed. Also, ARC/INFO can not have points and polygons in the same data set. PAT stands for Polygon Attribute Table or Point Attribute Table depending on which type of data is in the coverage." [*.PAT is the extension of one to the many files making up a coverage.] "The real advantage that A/I has, and the only reason consultants like us need it, is that the e00 format is an industry standard and therefore any serious GIS packages should be able to produce e00 files. We have a MapInfo to ArcInfo translator called AIMI but it converts polygon attributes to point attributes so the polygons have to be built using ArcInfo. Unfortunately neither AIMI nor PC ArcInfo can handle some of the larger data sets we produce." "LINUX. I once installed LINUX on a PC and was very impressed with it. I often see requests on GIS-L for information on GIS/IPS for LINUX. It appears that GRASS is the only system available. It might be worth us running TNTmips under LINUX just to keep up [a name's] UNIX skills, so we can provide support. We can wait until v5.7." extracted from email from a client in Ecuador on 24 February 1997. "I have interrupted my work to send you guys a huge THANK YOU ! for some great foresight." "Because my disk space is limited without access to my ?)!@#$! EO drive. I have imported two TM scenes by linking to the data on the CDs and selected the create pyramids option. I am now looking at a Full View of the two of them simultaneously because although the raw tmdata can't be accessed for on of them (separate CDs) the pyramids are on my hard disk. I took a chance that this would work and am so happy to see is does THANKSSSSSSS! Please pass on my exuberance to the software developer responsible." extracted from a FAX from an International Dealer on 24 February 1997. [Discussing training given at a large university.] "This [training] went particularly well with all of the lecturers planning on how they are going to package TNTlite and external training documentation for distribution to students externally. [This university does a lot of courses by correspondence.] They are talking about anything from 60 to 100 students per year which will be excellent. They have plenty of ideas on what they want to do as far as teaching materials are concerned. They will probably communicate directly with you with how they manage all of this. They had a range of questions and concerns they wanted to address and I gave them the option of either communicating directly with you or via me to you. Most of their questions and concerns were on how they might distribute TNTlite. For example they were thinking that they might create their own CDrom's for distribution containing TNTlite, documentation, training data sets. They want to be able to customize TNTlite so that when a student first loads it up they are only presented with the relevant menu or toolboxes [i.e. toolbars] instead of the complete menu." [...continues on regarding details.] An Internet exchange on comp.infosystems.gis on 21 February 1997. [Question from someone who subsequently ordered TNTlite] "Hi there. What to think about TNTlite software. Sounds interesting for a beginner in GIS, but what experienced users think about it. Thank you for answering me." [Response from university professor in the U.S.] "We are full blown users of TNTmips. As far as TNTlite is concerned it is just as good but with all the limitations described on the CD. It does have just about everything you could ever want for any application. CAD, raster, vector and TIN. Converts easily between all these applications and in the full version can convert to just about everything. It is very easy to use and has a nice interface. We run it on NT here at work and I have TNTlite at home on my 68LC40 Mac. We have almost stopped using Arc/Info since we purchased our second copy. Since TNTlite is free I would suggest getting a copy." [A very clear review of the situation.] extracted from a FAX from an International Dealer on 24 February 1997. "Amazing how often you can tell people that having one or two expert ARC/info/ERDAS literate users in the company is putting your whole GIS/RS operation at risk of instantaneous collapse, and they won't listen till it happens, then help!" extracted from a letter to software support from a client on 24 February 1997. [From a group of clients who visited MicroImages for a week of training.] "I'm not sure I can find proper words to say thank you for everything. So, 'thank you for everything' will have to do the job. It was a long week, but very enjoyable, educational, and well worth the time and money. I have the feeling that you may have thought you didn't cover enough, but believe me, you did... and then some. I fully understand that TNTmips is a good package and I intend to begin using it much more that I have been able to in the past, and I want to continue to 'dig deeper' into some of the areas you covered. I'm going to work on a map/poster layout and may send it down to you for printing once [the boss] approves what I come up with." [A personal paragraph here contained information that two of this party became engaged during a break in the training. Now who said TNTmips wasn't dynamite and can't do everything!] "I felt very welcome in your offices and really enjoyed talking with the different people in your company. [MicroImages] have created a wonderful environment for you to work in and it really shows that [MicroImages] care about their people. This is something [the boss] and I have discussed at length, and seeing some of our ideas work in reality is exciting to me." "After I catch up on everything back here, I plan to spend some solid time working with the data we created. Again, thank you so much for all your help and good information. I look forward to working more with TNTmips and to the possibility of future training." email from a MicroImages International Dealer on 27 February 1997. "It's a long time since I don't contact you." "My new life as a husband is wonderful. I will try to send you a picture of my wedding." "Things have been a little bit busy here." "Among the last interesting projects we were involved in on the 'Maps of Environmental Study of Gasandes' was an interesting one. This implied to made 47 copies of 37 different maps (more than 1000 maps). This was done in November and December of the past year. The client was very happy with the quality of the maps." "I hope somebody may go to the new version of AUW." [Wow, two wedding deals in a row! Makes for happy users.] extracted from a FAX from an International Dealer on 1 March 1997. "I visited some potential client site (forestry) for an explanation of TNTmips, [they] having two [ERDAS] Imagine and two Arc/Info used for making forestry maps based on classification of Landsat or others. They complained about Arc/Info and ERDAS, etc. Arc/Info's 'programmers' aspect and the buggy, and non-reproducible nature of several processes of Imagine, management problem of UNIX, not so fast compared with current PC, and high prices of the system." [Several feature questions followed with regard to TNTmips' features.] extracted from email on 6 March 1997 from a party recently at MicroImages for training. "I'd like to say thanks to all of you at MicroImages for the excellent visit I had to your place. It was well worth while." "Well I would like to give a tentative big YEE HAAA. It looks like we'll get the contract from [a company]. So I'd like to repeat my thanks, because our ability to do quality soil mapping from your software played a big part in us getting it." email to a MicroImages Dealer on 7 March 1997. "I have been able to use TNTmips as well as the old dos mips for longer than I used ArcInfo. For managing graphic data and translating several formats as well as outputting hardcopy I feel that TNTmips is one of the best packages out there. Unless it has changed since 1995 when I last used TNTmips, it wasn't database linkable or ODBC compliant. Has that changed?" incoming email from a TNTlite user in Estonia on 7 March 1997. "I'm very impressed about your TNT product line. May I have your price list and more detailed information about your software future versions." a posting on the Internet from Canada on 8 March 1997. [This party ordered a TNTlite on 31 January 1997 but has had no other contact with MicroImages.] "I've been looking at TNTmips to use on the Mac Platform." "Are there any list members that are using this software or does anyone know someone that is using TNTmips on the Mac?" "As far as I can tell it is the most powerful and comprehensive software available for the Mac Platform. Does anyone disagree with that?" [No one disagreed! Dimple and PCI responded with an attempt to promote their image analysis products on the Mac. But the poster does not ask for alternatives or mention image processing.] extracted from email from an International Dealer on 10 March 1997. "During [dates in] March we were on an exhibition about software in environmental protection field and we made an exiting [exciting] experience: All persons who visited our place are really surprised about TNTmips, especially about the price and possibilities of TNTmips. So we hope to get some new clients in the near future. A very great input of potential customers we get from [another client firm]. They also use TNTmips in landscape planning and had a really well prepared exhibition. (I don't know if they will tell you about it). Very impressive was a plot of an ortho-mosaik overlaid with some vector elements on high quality paper printed with HP Designjet 750 C. The plots looked like really photopositives and were about 3.5 to 2.5 meter in extension (very large!!!)." note printed on edge of order form from a U.S. professor ordering a second set of ten copies of TNTlite 5.5 on 13 March 1997. "Had ordered previously. Really a great program. Have a French version?" [He was referred to a Dealer in France.] Sample TNTlite Demo INVITATION This was broadcast 3 March 1997 via email to the faculty and graduate students of the University of Wisconsin at Madison by a very experienced, long time Ph.D. student user of TNTmips (and TNTlite)--not suggested, solicited, or arranged by MicroImages. AN INVITATION TO A HANDS ON DEMO OF TNTlite CONTENTS: THE PITCH, THE CATCH, THE BOTTOM LINE, and THE INVITATION THE PITCH: I am inviting you to a hands-on demonstration of TNTlite, a FREE version of the professional product TNTmips. (Reference http://www/microimages.com/tntlite/english.htm) TNTmips is a "hybrid" GIS developed by MicroImages, a software company based in Lincoln, Nebraska. TNTmips is a "hybrid" GIS because it provides for Raster, Vector, CAD, TIN, and Database processing in a single package. TNTmips provides the usual suite of processes but more interestingly, it offers some advanced geospatial analysis capabilities: Spatial Statistics (Trend, Residuals, Autocovariance, and Semivariogram profiles, surface (e.g. kriging) and polygon fitting (e.g. tesselation) ground truth sample planning and reporting, etc.) A to B conversions (where A and B equal Raster, Vector, CAD, or TIN) Raster to vector map conversion (color raster binarization, automatic line thinning and following) Vector combinations (AND, OR, XOR, Add, Subtract Extract Completely Inside/Partially Inside/Outside and Clip, etc.) Vector properties (Fuzzy properties, directional analysis, etc.) On the fly Region of Interest calculations (Dynamic "cookie cutter" analysis) Thematic statistics and display (Partition and color database field values by quartiles, etc.) Directional Analysis (Line segment rose plots for "fracture" analysis, etc.) Digital Photogrammetry (Epipolar image creation, DEM Extraction, Restitution, Stereoscopic viewing, anaglyph display) Image processing (Unusual filters and classifiers, morphology, mosaicking) 3-D Visualization (Rapid mesh display, anaglyph display, raster drapes, multiple raster offsets) Civil Engineering tools (Route tracing, COGO, map projection tool and dynamic display and subobject functional datum, ellipsoid, and projection transformations) Cartography (Dynamic abstraction by display scale, robust layout control, many different plotter and printer drivers) Database Management (Attach by attribute, attach by coordinate, field population via field combination, report creation, Open DataBase Connectivity) Data Management (Folder, object and subobject data file methodology, locked file edit protection, generous metadata capability) Platform Compatibility (Interface, functionality, and data file access are independent of computer platform and operating system) In short, this package tries to do it all. A reference you might like to look at is the September 1996 issue of GIS World, in which the image processing components of TNTmips were recently compared to EASI/PACE, ENVI, ERDAS Imagine, ER Mapper, and MBI/MAI. THE CATCH What I gain - by offering this demo is the possibility of creating increased use of this software on campus (as far as I know, I am the only one making use of it). I empathize with the frustrations of my colleagues and classmates when grappling with the syntax and analysis limitations of various "standard" software packages. I believe this software enables one to more freely explore the semantics of geospatial analysis. I have seen, and have personally experienced, the frustrations of ESRI's Arc/Info and ERDAS' Imagine. However, I do not view TNTmips as a replacement rather as a complement to them. A toolbox has many tools, not just one. Another catch is that TNTlite is not fully enabled. There are limits to the size of the objects which can be manipulated and the export capability has been turned off; HOWEVER, the FUNCTIONALITY of TNTlite is the same as the professional package. Therefore, TNTlite is best for pedagogical purposes; the purpose of this demo. (Reference TNTmips. http://www/microimages.com/tntlite/english.htm). THE BOTTOM LINE: It is the number of options that I find intriguing and wish to share in the spirit of "constant sifting and winnowing". THE INVITATION: If you are interested in attending this demo, I will be offering it every evening of the week March 31 to April 4 from 5 till 6 PM at the Environmental Remote Sensing Center's Instructional Laboratory, Room 1253, 12th floor, AOSS Building. Please tell me: 1. What day(s) of the week March 31 to April 4 is (are) most convenient for you to attend? 2. What single geospatial analysis would you like to try in a demo? (I can't be an expert on every aspect of this software, but I will try to address your particular interest in a demo you can try.) If you are not interested or cannot attend, would you please consider forwarding this invitation to a faculty member or graduate student you think would be interested? Thank you for your time. Abbreviations. For simplicity, the following abbreviations were used in this MEMO: W31 = Microsoft Windows 3.1 or 3.11. NT or NT4 = Microsoft NT 3.1, 3.5, or 4.0 (3.1 is error prone, and thus the TNT products require the use of 3.5 and its subsequent patches). W95 = Microsoft Windows 95. Mac = Apple Macintosh using the 68xxx Motorola processor and MacOS 6.x or 7.x. PMac or Power Mac = Apple Macintosh using the 60x Motorola PowerPC processor and MacOS 7.x. MI/X
= MicroImages' X server for Mac and PC microcomputer platform
and operating system. 
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