Testimonials and other Tidbits (V6.00)

A cross-platform GIS/Image Processing/mapping educational program, TNTlite, version 5.7, is now available from MicroImages, Inc. As in previous versions, the software is completely free and may be downloaded from their web site or ordered in a more complete CD kit ($35). This incredible software, based on a X/motif front end runs on Mac, Window, and UNIX platforms, just continues to improve. The latest version seems to have made dramatic increases in speed in the X-window server front end, and is noticeably snappier on our 9500/132 and 9600/200. On a G3 Mac, TNTlite should be very fast.

TNTlite is a fully functional, free version of their professional TNTmips software, with limits imposed on the size of the files that can be handled. TNTlite can be installed on a local hard drive—it needs about 100 MB of space, including program and data modules—or can be run from the CD-ROM. One of the most useful educational features of TNTlite is the set of 20 tutorial booklets that comes with the CD kit. This set of small booklets covers the main functionality features of TNTmips (lite), with a variety of exercises keyed to the example data. TNTmips (lite) is a remarkably complete GIS program that recently received top marks in a comparison of GIS systems in the magazine, GIS World.

To order, contact MicroImages, Inc., 201 North 8th St., Lincoln, Neb. 68508. Phone: (402)477-9554. Fax: (402)477-9559. E-mail: <info@microimages.com>. WWW: <http://www.microimages.com>.
 
 

Extracted from page 4 of the Newsletter of the Research & Development Division, Zimbabwe Forestry Commission, March 1998, Vol. 10, No. 1.

The following information occurred in a color sidebar.

Equipment Used

The VegRIS project started on three PCs 486/66MHz, 8Mb RAM, 1.4GB HDD. Satellite images were processed on PC ERDAS 7.5, the maps were digitized and produced on PC ArcInfo 3.4D.

Meanwhile [currently] VegRIS runs on four Pentium PCs ranging from 133MHz to 300MHz and from 16Mb to 128Mb RAM. The combined disk space amounts to 18Gb. For convenience, performance, economical, and service aspects, the software was swapped to TNTmips which includes both GIS and Image Processing capabilities.

The display comprise of high resolution 21" monitors through 4MB SCGA boards. Data are captured through A0 and A1-format digitizing tables and an A0-format black and white scanner. For map output VegRIS uses an A0-format full colour plotter. Data are stored and backed-up onto 650Mb CD-Recordables or 2.3Gb 8mm exabyte tapes.

VegRIS (Vegetation Resources Information System) is a program whose objective in part is to publish vegetation maps of Zimbabwe and is sponsored by the German Development Co-operation (GTZ).

"I am currently using TNTmips for a mapping project. Before I used other GIS software, but now decided to switch to TNTmips because of its many capabilities. But I know that I have to be acquainted with all the commands and techniques of this software to be able to work efficiently." [continues on to ask a "how to do"]

"Congratulations for the program (previously we used IDRISI in our projects) and for the Brazilian dealer (GEOSAT) which is doing an excellent after-sale work!"

"Just returned today from the [European alpine forest ecology] meeting."

"I am proud to tell you that our TNTmips demonstration was a big success. Like you suggested we borough [borrowed] from [a name] a Pentium II 400 MHz to speed up our demonstration. We showed and manipulated a 3D draped perspective view of our extracted DEM from the top platform of Sierra da Estrela (highest mountain of Portugal). The DEM was obtained from a low elevation real-colour air-photo cover (1:8000) using TNTmips Stereoscopic Modeling Process. The potential value of the extracted interpretation rasters in our ecological research—mainly to provide geo-spatial explanation variables for our vegetation and related pollen influx distribution patterns—was the crucial point to explain to all participants. With the new features of the 5.9 version, you kindly sent us [a V5.90 beta was provided], we made 3 MPEG movies ‘ortho-photogrammetric flying over the top of the mountain’ which were permanently running on the screen. These MPEG movies made a strong impression—Before our explanation, people first thought these were real recorded movie taken with a helicopter."

"So, thank you again."

[In response to a question posted about using ENVI on raster/vector based problem]

"There will be a lot of software such as ERDAS by ERDAS Co. or TNTmips by MicroImages Inc. in USA. I think IDL/ENVI is a good software package. But GIS is weak point of the software, I think."

"I have met with a GTZ official you directed to me. It was interesting to hear from him in terms of what TNTmips can do. He was full of praise of TNTmips (and so I am). It was very interesting because he was with a GTZ official who commissioned vegetation mapping in one of the national parks of Uganda, and where I used TNTmips."

"I would like to have TNTmips updated to version 5.9 [currently using V5.80] because ..."

"By the way: Thanks for TNTmips V. 5.9. The software keeps getting better and better. Also, a very good idea to integrate creation of training areas into the classification process!"

"By the way: I did a demo of v5.9 for [a name]. He works with [a name] who has an older version of TNTlite. They decided to buy SSToolbox some time ago and [he] seems sorry they did. He was pretty impressed with what TNT can do out of the box."

"NOTE also for ARC users: We recently tried to import some DLG3 optional format data from national wetlands inventory into ARC and eventually found out that ARC versions since 7.0.4 have a software bug importing the data. However, TNTmips handles the dataset just fine."

"We received the TNTmips version 5.9 package yesterday. It has been a very nice surprise checking the changes accomplished from Version 5.6 to 5.9."

"First, I’d like to thank you all for being so helpful and responsive to my previous requests. We’ve been quite satisfied thus far with the performance of the system."

"All I can say is ‘wow’!"

"I requested this feature this week didn’t I?"

"I’ve got to think of a better word than ‘kudos’ to use when complimenting the MI team."

"How about, ‘first round’s on me?’!"

"Thank you very much for the information. This is a USAID project to help the Ministry of Health in Malawi on surveillance and control of malaria. There is a parallel project in Mozambique where a friend of mine from Brazil is doing the same thing."

"The paper on using TNTmips for malaria research in Central America is very accurate. [A draft copy of a paper which has not yet been published.] I am familiar with those papers and I had a two-month training at AMES last year. I made a similar study with malaria in Venezuela using remote sensing and GIS and the conclusions are remarkably similar."

"The information you provided me is going to be very helpful to my mission in Malawi. As you said much more information needs to be gathered there before any plan can be drawn."

"Whatever the software they end up using it will require a lot of training (more than one week), perhaps one full month in site training, and reinforcement a few months later. A problem I foresee is that one a person is a GIS specialist he/she can find a better job elsewhere than in the government. But that is something I still have to determine in Malawi; that is true here in Venezuela. Indeed that is my main problem keeping a trained person long enough with the low salaries they pay at the University, much less in the Ministry of Health. That is why software with very steep learning curves end up being not very convenient in the long run, what do you think?"

"I believe remote sensing is going to be an essential part of any GIS in developing countries. I am using a TM image to digitize (with TNTmips) the roads in western Venezuela because recent maps are from 1972. The maps also turned out to be very inaccurate. Since vegetation is a major indicator of mosquito preadult aquatic habitat and adult resting places we would need to develop vector layers derived from imagery. Of course, it all depends on the spatial scale, but in my understanding you cannot fight malaria unless you map its element on an adequate large scale. From that perspective TNTmips is clearly more convenient than buying GIS and RS software separately. A shortcoming for TNTmips at this time is that fewer people are familiar with it than with the others (ARCinfo, etc.). Indeed I was asked if was using ARCinfo right from the beginning, which I am not and probably will not. We will see."

"I am back to working on my stereo-to-DEM project. Once I set perhaps 1500 tie points on a right and left pairs (about 3600 lines by 2000 columns) and ran it for the DEM under 5.8 with a update of GEOREF.EXE of 10/30/97 (old). I was surprised by new procedures (I have not run the program for a long time) and even more by the speed. What used to take 8 to 14 hours to process took slightly over 2 hours this time. I am eager to run it under 5.9 next on my NT system."

"Kudos yet again to the MI team!"

"Both of these text import functionality enhancements will help me greatly with my work I am performing right now."

"Oh yes, and congratulations on the PERS review. I’ve brought it to my classmate’s attention and talked about it at the SML and GPS demo today."

"I have been working on TNTmips 5.9 for some time now. All the improvements to this version have been very useful to the accomplishment of both Image Processing and GIS tasks."

"Hyperspectral data analysis is to be very useful to us in the near future. I shall be involved in a project where the analysis of DIAS airborne data is to be carried out. I hope we will not have any problems reading the data as they are written in ENVI format. I was pleased to see that you have included the ENVI format in V6.0."

"The ‘new’ training set Editor has been very easy to use and it facilitates the classification process."

"The newly introduced Geoformula module is very useful for the integrating of several tasks into one sequence. However, I need to invest quite some time before to be able to use it effectively."

"Generally, I think that TNTmips should have been the most appropriate S/W to be used as a basis for the accomplishment of the [a name] project."

[Describing a TNTmips training program put on for their clients]

"The training concept included introductions to the theoretical background of the methods, using textbook references (e.g. Jensen 96, Sabins 97, ERDAS Field Guide, Lillesand & Kiefer 94, but of course also the TNTmips Getting Started Tutorials and Manual which contain a lot of theoretical information), practical handling of the software and methods using TNTmips training data and tutorials; the main time was spent for on-the-job training, using [the client’s] project data from [their government] (Landsat TM quarter scene, IRSpan scene, set of scanned orthophotos)."

"For image analysis training, I have tried to arrange a realistic flow of work, e.g. similar to the diagram of Jensen 96 (p. 198), starting with the problem and aims, acquiring imagery data, importing, display, contrast, image statistics, enhancement, combinations, radiometric correction, geometric correction/georeferencing, selecting useful bands for classification, creating training datasets, unsupervised and supervised classification, extract and convert the classes to vector."

"For integration of raster and vector data, some other topics were trained, like onscreen-digitizing using high resolution imagery, methods for combination of vector and raster data, hybrid display; methods for elevation models, creation of heights and contour lines, vector combinations, thematic map layout, pin-mapping, grids, scale-bars, legends etc. Emphasis was on precision checks (e.g. of georeferencing, classification), as quality control is a flaw in the GIS work of the [a name] authority until now."

"This was quite a broad spectrum of technology and also of TNTmips functions. The trainees used about 15 of the Getting Started tutorials during the six weeks. Considerable time had to be spent for a general idea of raster data information, its handling and potentials."

"After approximately three weeks the trainees were able to handle the basic routines independently. The trainees loved the feature mapping process as it is a straightforward and fast introduction to the concept of multispectral image classification. After six weeks they certainly had a quite good and most of all realistic idea about image analysis and its integration into GIS."

[Regarding the progress of the hyperspectral features in TNTmips 6.0]

"... So yes, you are probably correct—it’s currently ENVI or TNTmips."

"I’ve had a quick look through your hyperspectral tutorial booklet and I’m impressed how far you’ve come in a short time. I’ll reserve detailed comment until I’ve had a play. But one observation is that ENVI rely quite a bit on the Minimum Noise Fraction transformation as a alternative to PCA, as a means of assessing data dimensionality. The view is that it is more effective at separating signal from noise. For example, the 40 SWIR channels from AVIRIS might show tonal structure in the first 14 MNF bands, but noise in MNF 15-40. The implication would then be that there are only 14 endmembers present in the data. The first 14 MNF bands would then be used to establish the most extreme pixels through a series of successive scatter plots (something they call the pixel purity index, a cell-based count of how many times a pixel rated as extreme in n-dimensional space, following the full permutation of scatter plots)."

[This Minimum Noise Fraction (MNF) transform was added to TNTmips 6.0 after this client provided this response.]

"Unfortunately, the most laborious and difficult step remains the identification and extraction of endmembers. This has yet to achieve automation, though it is the step that most people struggle with. Even with these interactive methods, there is no guarantee that all endmembers will be pure spectra—there is no mathematical reason why a mixture can’t also be an endmember. Logic suggests that in reality, there may not be pure pixels of anything, that the entire scene consists of various mixtures of various endmembers. So how do we know they are there and how can they be extracted (or synthesized)?"

"I must apologise profusely for wasting your time with my bug report re. importing multi-part shapefiles in ArcView—they are incorrectly stored—I’ve written a small Avenue script that solves the problem and the result imports perfectly into TNT. If you’re interested in getting a sample of the dodgy data, I’d be happy to oblige."

[Using a nearly final beta of V6.00]

"The version of mips for the Mac from the TNTpatch site is great. I like the new help file systems you have implemented. [refers to the Getting Started Booklet windows] Although I haven’t used them, having them there so prominently makes me feel better. I installed on a new G3 Mac (OS 8.5, 300Mhz, 9 Gb UWSCSI HD, 128 Mb RAM, STD display card, DVD). I haven’t had mips on that machine before so I don’t know if the blazing speed was due to the OS, the machine or the new caching scheme MicroImages came up with. But, it was the fastest implementation I have tried yet."

"It was really fast. In short it has made my decision to stay with mips on the Macs."

"I’ll send in some testimonial benchmarks with the three macines I have access to. Do you have a favorite file/setting to run timing with."

"I have installed 5.9 beta version on my PC. The menu looks compact and the combining of interpret and prepare into a single menu seemed impressive. Specially your turnkey product is very good and made things easier for demonstration of some product features. The network analysis is really very great. Really, all these are truly reflecting the power of TNTmips. I will be back to you after I have a closer look at the additional features. Anyway I am thankful to you for the immediate delivery of the product. By the way the mpeg movies menu item is also nice."

on 1 September 1998

"I made an agreement today with [a professor] of GIS dept. of [a university] to teach a semester long course. The students are 3rd year students, so it is not just a basic course, but introduction to geographic data management. The material of the course will be TNTlite and Getting Started booklets with demo data found from TNTlite CD-ROM. [The professor] assumes, that there will be even 100 (a hundred) participants. Well, it will be a challenge for me, for there are only 20 PC’s (200 MHz Pentium II) in the computer class. If there are over 40 entered, the course must split into two courses. The course comprises of 12 lectures, 2 hours each, one lecture in a week. We’ll go through about 20 Getting Started booklets. Perhaps later on we’ll arrange an advance course including spatial annualizing etc. So, I like to order two 100 units of TNTlite CDs (200 pcs, $3/CD). Please charge [dealer’s company]. The course will start on Thursday, 17th of September."

[Response: With 200 CDs, it sounds like you will be promoting TNTlite to a large group of potential users this quarter including your 2 class sections. I assume you are using the GS booklets for the CDs as reference in your courses in some way. For example, it should be easy for interested students to print their own GS booklets as needed on their own color printers if you explain this to them. Several new booklets are about to be posted on microimages.com in PDF format. They include 3 installation manuals, Network Analysis, Sharing TNT Results with other Products (EXCEL, Illustrator, Access, ...), and Hyperspectral Analysis.]

on 21 September 1998

"The classes started last week and this really loaded me because of there are now indeed two classes, on Wednesdays and on Thursdays, 2 hours each during next ten weeks time 69 students in all. I am doing this on my own time and you can guess that this is not very easy task to give personal guidance for all of them. Well, 69 was the starting number and there use to be falling off the number during the autumn. I am using the GS booklets and the students are advised to print out the booklets before attending the class."

on 24 September 1998

" [The university] decided to add TNTlite into their permanent list of programs. Earlier they did not have any GIS programs in their common use, but now the have TNTlite. There are over 100 pcs 200 MHz Pentium II machines, which are in common use for students. Students not allowed to install any programs of their own and in general the use of these computers is under heavy control. My lessons continues with two groups every week."

on 21 October 1998

"Teaching is improving from time to time [as time passes]. I have two classes with average 34 in each. The first hours were exhausted to show separately for each person where to press buttons and toggles etc. but now they are navigating smoothly around TNTlite menus. We manage to go through one Getting Started booklet per hour at this stage of the course and I’m expecting to raise the speed to two booklets."

[Response: Yes, taking time with each student to show which buttons to press, etc. would be very tiresome. Something that we have done for large groups of people is to use a projector which is connected to the computer. All of the graphics from the computer are then shot onto a projection screen so that an entire room of people can see what is happening all at once.]

on 22 October 1998

"There is a LCD projector in the classroom, which I am intensively using. We have a pretty new XGA projector at our offices, too. The projections are, indeed ideal when used in remote demos, but how handy they are taking their weight into consideration, reminds me of old Kaypro times of portables..."

[Response: Managing 70 students in TNTlite should be quite a task. Hope you are getting paid for it. I am surprised at how fast you say you can go through each Getting Started booklet. Are you using the PDF versions and going through the tutorials via the video projector or do the students simply redo the exercise? How are the students taking to TNTlite as contrasted to some other GIS/IPS system(s) they may have been exposed to?]

on 26 November 1998

" [The] course is now approaching its end. The Getting Started manuals are very suitable for this kind of training and teaching. It is true, as you notcied, that it is not possible to go thoroughly, step by step, through the amount of booklets, that we listed for the program of this course. However, this has been an introductory course and all the listed booklets have been gone through more or less. One problem we have, not too big to overcome, is with TNTlite itself, or more precisely said, with operating systems which is WIN NT4. The administration of the computers in a [university] like this is a very dauntling task. For that reason the use is very restricted in the means of writing rights on the hard disk of the users. An ordinary user is not allowed to write any other place but C:\temp drive and directory. Not even any software is allowed to write but C:\temp. For this reason we have to copy TNTlite every time at the beginning of the lessons to C:\temp. What are the temporary files TNTlite wants write or to keep open during session and is it possible to define these files into \temp directory to allow permanent installation of TNTlite?"

"Before the release of V6.0, we should say that V5.9 was a very stable and bug-few version ever we had. Good job." [This dealer was questioned as to which V5.90 was referred to herein—the official release or a patched version. The response was that this comment applied to the official V5.90 release before patches.]

"We are in the final stages of setting up certificates courses through [a university], one on GIS and the other on Remote Sensing (each a two week course). [We] will run the course for the University, and, of course, TNTlite will be the teaching software used. We always sought this kind of collaboration effort with a University, and now this University has realized the urgent need for courses in these fields in [the nation] and the potential for earning extra revenue for the University by running courses that will be available for working adults. This formerly conservative [a name] University was recently described in the local press as one of the most progressive, dynamic and forward thinking universities in [the nation], and praised for its management policies and maintenance of high educational standards in a scene where the better-known institutions are sinking to new lows. I have taught a one-week course to their [a discipline] students for three years now, which has been very well received, and students have rated my course as more useful than their [a different discipline] department’s month long ArcView-based program. Hence the invitation to us [as a private company] to partner them on this new program. An exciting development for us, and one which will lead to even more exposure for your products."

" [Another university’s name] have a world-renowned [a name] Department. This department [has a TNTmips key]. Their fourth-year students all completed their projects this year on TNTmips, in subjects including using GIS to define suitable sites for marine aquaculture (mariculture) off [the nation’s] coastline, using infrared imagery to estimate surface-kelp off the [a place], and examination of fish catch sizes for certain species off our coastline. With limited experience in the software and our assistance, these students produced excellent projects, which they presented to staff at [the university] during a day of oral presentations. This seems to have caused a shake-up in thinking, because we’ve suddenly been approached by heads of other departments to get closer co-operation."

" [The university] has recently established a chair of [a discipline] Science. ... he has now approached us to run a GIS and Remote Sensing course as part of this program in 2000. So that’s 2 Universities where [we] and TNTmips will be able to set the trend in GIS/IP."

"In addition, the [a discipline] invited me to attend a seminar discussion on their GIS setup, past, present and future. After 10 years they have achieved very little and here’s their [reasons]."

"They cannot afford to equip a lab with the required number of software seats. Quote ‘although the lite version of TNTmips will help us solve this one.’"

"I have subsequently mailed them a reply to their ‘problems’, with recommended solutions, plus info on TNTedit, which I feel will go a long way to putting some life into their GIS laboratory. I have prepared some colourful promo-material on TNTedit that I’m getting our to ArcInfo/ArcView users with a ‘boost your GIS productivity by adding TNTedit to your existing GIS setup’ message. Perhaps this Department (under new, more enlightened headship) will now have a more open-minded look beyond the ESRI world, and work with us to improve their setup."

"We have a steady stream of queries concerning TNTmips coming in now from various agencies using ESRI products, who are ‘in a jam’ producing the goods. I’ve got a set of materials together that we’re sending off to these people and hope to turn them into sales. Examples are:"

" [Company A] A supplier of scanners and printers in [a town] whose clients use Arc products and are complaining to him about various problems they’re having (mostly printing—not surprising from what I’ve read in the Grapevine). He thinks TNTmips is just great (he supplies [some company names] and has seen their output and that they have no comebacks on printing problems). So he’s putting me in touch with all his GIS clients to help sort this out."

" [Company B] They have taken over the [company name] contract (the company wanted a consultant closer to them and apologized to me for making the move—nothing to do with our support, just they needed someone there). The [new] consultant in charge at this company took their [TNTmips] dongle to evaluate whether they should change to ArcView. He phoned last week asking for my help and further into on TNTmips because he ‘is enjoying using TNTmips so much and could not possibly recommend that they downgrade to ArcView.’ Rather he is going to recommend they upgrade their license and will work with us in sorting [the company’s] data out using TNTmips. He is also keen for me to run a course on TNTmips for himself and other [of his] clients in January next year to expose them to the fine product. He mentioned that, while his company used to represent [a software product]. They have now moved away from selling software and have no alliance to any vendor. Their business is now purely data supply/translation etc., and he wants TNTmips as part of their setup because of its huge array of data translation formats. Another client for, at very least, TNTedit."

" [Company C] A [city] based company contacted be Friday last, saying they were working on a huge government contract and were having problems cleaning the vector data they were supplied with. They’d heard that TNTmips would solve their problems and requested urgent information. Another TNTmips to fill the breach!"

[Using an early beta V6.00]

"I loaded the version from the 17th. Hatch is ok."

"Yesterday I worked whole day with TNTEDIT (Version 11/17/98), correcting a large object: EXCELLENT!!!!! - creat new lines and polygons, - change vertices, delete, ... - snap - delete lines - change attributes (implied one-to-one). The speed of the process is very good (even on a slow PC!)"

"May be there is a minor problem with the attaching of attributes after splitting two polygons. Today I will continue and verify this problem."

"GEOREFERENCE of RGB-Raster with overlay of raster topo maps: OK! Very good!"
 
 

"Kevin, I read your paper on management zones and had a hard time following it, so I down loaded TNTlite. After looking at the program I have to work through some of my management zones to fully appreciate the power of the program. However, I agree this is the general thought going around the precision ag circles these days. Truly layered management is beyond the scope of the majority of farmers and most consultants. People knowledgeable in computing agriculture and GIS applications are rare, and with the farm economy the way it is, it will be difficult to obtain the needed talent. Farmers will be willing to pay someone to produce maps they can make themselves with no consideration for the possible agronomic input of the consultant. A format and professional approach to zone management is required with very specific input layers predefined, both layers that help him see what is going on in the field and that help him make a decision on how to manage the field. The successful consultant will produce information far reaching from what a farmer can get from his ‘dumbed down’ (I dislike that term) software. I am presently in a third year of a three year grant looking at the application of precision farming in agriculture. I’m to the point where I have to start looking at what is next, is there a future in precision ag or is it a passing fad. The consulting business is one of the prospects for my future. I’m still in the process of trying to define what a precision farming consultant is."

"Thank you for taking your time to find me. Yes, my primary area of scientific and consultancy work is directly related with GIS and other modeling of marine ecosystems. It took me lots of time to search for complete but inexpensive software solutions, as well as affordable and stable operating systems. This is why I responded when Linux GIS software was discussed. I have once downloaded and tried TNTlite from your site, later I received a pack with brochures, etc. My sincere compliments! First—TNT doesn’t at all have that boring Windows-style interface, second—it seems to be really complete and powerful solution (as far as Lite version could show it)."

"Unfortunately, nowadays IT market is at least by 95% based on monopolist’s products: in our case—Microsoft and ESRI. Therefore, even though I found TNT a surprisingly (!!!) powerful, complete and (with no doubt) cost effective GIS environment, all major projects, which would allow out Institute a purchase of GIS software license are initially pre-conditioned that we must use ESRI or MapInfo software and even (image this!) OS must be Windows. nothing to do about that (yet I always try my best to suggest alternatives). To be honest, for me Linux is a kind of underground protest against expensive and poor quality monopolist’s products."

"Exactly the same probably is the situation with you software. If you see another way,—go ahead, but I would sincerely suggest you this: why not trying to put Linux version of your software for free (or reasonably cheap) on the web? Look, even WordPerfect for Linux will soon appear free for personal use. TNT would then become #1 GIS software for Linux immediately. Alternative would be only GRASS which is powerful as well, but far less user friendly. I am sure, it would add you thousands of new users, especially in the academic and university environment."

"Once again, my very best regards. I hope that one day sophisticated foundations will allow me to purchase TNTmips for $4000 (I would love it!)."

"Many thanks for the CD containing TNTlite. I have been having fun getting to know the package. It looks comprehensive."

"I send you this paper to thank you very much. I received your kit of TNTlite and I am very happy to begin learning <geospatial data analysis> with it. It is a powerful software and I think that is also a very good introduction to GIS for me and for my students in geography."

"I am a geography teacher at the [name of institution] of [name of city] (Tunisia) and I begin learning GIS for my own needs and, may be, to teach it."

"All my thanks for you and for the staff of MicroImages Inc."

"I totally agree with you Bill [Bill Thoen], But after reading articles I wonder why MapInfo didn’t invest in ‘re’porting MapInfo to linux or *nix. Its sound that ArcInfo(s), TNTmips(c), GRASS(c) make a good move by developing stuff under linux. I will be pleased to make a format C;\ when Mapinfo will be convinced that porting stuff on linux isn’t a bad idea. It *my opinion."

"I know for sure that TNTmips (free training version is called TNTlite) is made for UNIX (also probably, ported to Linux). They say, it is a complete package starting with image analysis and ending with GIS. Costs about 4000 US$. Reference http://www.microimages.com."

"After browsing this newsgroup for awhile, I wonder if anyone uses TNT-Mips/TNTLite? I’ve been using TNTLite for about a month and a half on my Linux machine, just to check it out. It has some really cool features that just smoke ArcView and are much easier than Arc/Info."

"Haven’t used all of the features/aspects... I’ve been doing a little change detection studies with NALC data, and was pleased to find several variant formulas built in (though algebraically they’re pretty simple..). I couldn’t figure out how to do something similar with ArcView without writing Avenue code (blech!), Arc/Info’s easy enough in Grid but you still have to look up all those commands and parameters and then write AMLs...."

"Anyway, I really dig the fact they (MicroImages) have a system that can run on Multiple Platforms *easily* and the files can be shared between Macs,Windoze,Unix’s without conversion. Also they don’t spread so many damn files all over the place, instead using a single RasterVectorCad file system. Their GUI needs an update, but hell it’s the ease of use and the output that matters. Anyway, I’m just looking for other peoples opinions on their product (not salespeople!)."

"I have been trying out TNTlite for about the last month or so. It is a very comprehensive system (image processing, vector topological, CAD (non-topological), surface modelling), and it seems like they usually give you several algorithms to pick from for each process you want to run."

"I’m still trying to get to grips with their database system though. Instead of providing functions for things like computing centroids of polygon features (like ArcView), they include them in an internal table (like Arc/Info), however I haven’t figured out how to get them from here into other tables (I’m not sure how they attach attributes to spatial features)."

[From email addressed to a dealer concerning the new hyperspectral analysis procedure]

"Thanks for your email with all of your news. I am very impressed that you guys don’t mess around and get on with developing product to meet new technology quickly. I have heard from others in the past that your programmers were very fast with bug fixes. I hope that you have successful dealings with [a name]."

"NetMAX is ready for market! Beta 1.0 release received substantial trials from testers around the world and was very well received. It is clear from their responses that NetMAX, a full-featured network server that can be administered through your web browser, will fill a very real need. (Learn more about NetMAX at http://www.net-max.com, and more about Cybernet at http://www/cybernt.com.)"

"As with Beta 1.0 test release, the final commercial product will contain a section, ‘NetMAX Client-Side Applications’, with the following beginning paragraph: ‘This document contains a list of applications that enhance the NetMAX Server. All of these applications are provided without any implied support by Cybernet Systems. This license agreements for each included product apply exclusively to that product.’ We are including both Windows and Macintosh software."

"We would like your permission to include MI/X and MI/X (PPC) on the NetMAX CD with the following introductory information."

"Software Name: MI/X"

"File Name: mix/zip"

"License: Freeware"

"Home Page: http://www.microimages.com/downloads/mix/download.htm"

"Description: The X Window Systems provides multitasking, remote execution, and the display of graphics on one X terminal that were generated somewhere else in a network. The free X Servers included upon this CD-ROM for the Macintosh 68K and PPC as well as the Windows NT/95 platforms by MicroImages Geospatial Analysis Products: TNTmips, TNTview, TNTedit, TNTatlas and TNTlite. For information on the TNT products, please contact MicroImages at http://www.microimages.com."

"Thank you very much for the permission to put the MI/X-servers on CD of out book ‘Windows NT and Unix integrieren’. I decided to stick to the Win32 one as the book does not deal with Macintoshes at all. However, in the CD text I left a not on its availability."

"The text on the CD reads as follows:"

"Bei dem freien X-server fuer Windows 95/NT, den Siein diesem Verzeichnis finden, handelt es sich um ein Produkt von MicroImages, Inc. Er—und seing Zwillinge fuer PowerPCs und die Macintosh-68k-Platfomr, die Sie unter http://www.microim-ages.com/downloads/mix/ downloaden koennen—wurden im Zusammenhang mit MicroImages’ Produten zur Analyze geospatialer Datem, TNTmips(R), TNTview(R), TNTatlas(TM), TNTedit(TM) und TNTlite (TM), entwickelt."

"Wenn Sie mehr ueber die TNT-Produktfamilie wissen wollen, wenden Sie sich bitte an MicroImages: [address follows]."

"I downloaded and installed your free X server for Windows. It’s an excellent piece of software and I greatly appreciate your providing it for free."

"Thank you for making the wonderful free X Server for win95. I am using it right now running xterm over a 56l modem connection and it works great! I love free software that works this well."

"The thing works great. In fact, it works better than I think you planned."

"I have a legal copy of Solstice Network Client (from Sun Microsystems), which has an X-server (and NSF server/client). However, it is set up so that when you reach the limit of number of allowed sessions (i.e. simultaneous X-servers using ‘license tokens’ form a license server—usually the same machine as the X-client) it refuses to manage the display."

"However, if I am already using the MI/X server, and I try to run an X-session using the Solstice software, it goes ahead and runs the rexex command on the X-client anyways! Thus I can find in my log files on the PC a message to the effect ‘All license in use’, but I get the x-windows under the MI/X screen, complete with all the options (colour, size, environment variables, etc.) I originally specified when I set up the session shortcut with the Solaris software. Thus I don’t need to log on to the Unix system first via telnet, set $DISPLAY, and do ‘xterm&’ as described in your FAQ."

"(And if I set my automounter time-out for the NSF client to a few seconds instead of the default few minutes I don’t need to worry about running out of licenses tokens to use NSF from my PC.)"

"Hi. I just set up MI/X, and it is absolutely incredible. Wonderful product."

"I was able to use Japanese character font on MI/X by your suggestion and some information from WWW in Japan. You product MI/X is wonderful. I was surprised that it is free. I wish for prosperity of your company."

"I respect the fact the MicroImages has provided this app for the community at no cost and constant updating may be a pain. It is an extremely useful tool for my work. You should have seen the look on the MS guy’s face after I showed him your app. He had earlier told me that I could not even so that on a Mac. He was a little steamed after I told him that not only could I do it but I did it with a _free_ solution."

"First of all, thank you *very* much for providing freeware for X-Windows emulator for MS Windows. I’ve wanted it for a long time. I tried it on WinNT at school and liked it very much. And now I am trying to install it to my comp running Win95."

From a member of the general faculty to the SIVA Center

"I want to share with you a positive experience and reiterate the importance of having competent staff and resources on campus. I had the pleasure last week of working briefly with Bob Woodruff of the SIVA center. And as a harried PI I want to emphasize ‘brief.’ I needed a data subset selected and converted from one format to another and the consultants I was working with were unable to do this. Bob use his experience, judgement and expertise to accomplish exactly what I needed with only vague and uninformed input from me. He did it right the first time and very quickly. WHAT A DIFFERENCE FROM MY USUAL EXPERIENCE!"

"This is a plug for Bob and others like him who make our lives considerably easier."

Response from the Director of the SIVA Center

"Thanks, [a name], for your positive comments about Bob Woodruff. I am adding to your comments by stating that one reason that Bob was able to do this for you so quickly and correctly is the vast capabilities of TNTmips. Bob used a TNTmips import process to get the bathymetric data (digital elevation model, DEM) into TNTmips. Then he used the vector line surface modleing and contouring part of TNTmips to generate the depth contours as vector GIS lines from the imported DEM. Then, he used the export capabilities of TNTmips to export these vector GIS contour lines to the AutoCAD format (.DXF). Of course, it helps to have 10 years of professional geospatial experience." [Clearly not just a simple format change.]

"I might add that Bob does this kind of service for all the researchers at CSUMB and for students (enrolled as well as past students doing Capstone work) on a daily 40-hour-a-week basis (which being paid for only 4 WTUs each semester). Bob often sits in on the ESSP 332 and ESP 436 lectures—even when he is not paid at all to do so."

"It is nice to know that I am not the only person here at CSUMB that fully appreciates Bob’s capabilities."