HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: craven@cg.emr.ca (Jim Craven)
Subject: Re: WDB files - what compression is used?
Reply-To: craven@cg.emr.ca
Organization: Dept. of Energy, Mines & Resources, Canada
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 13:30:28 GMT

In article 371@almaden.ibm.com, isw@vnet.ibm.com (Ian S Worthington) writes:
>I have obtained the wdb2-README written by Lars Aronsson from
>lysator.liu.se which describes the format of the wdb bdy, riv, and
>cil data (.dat) files as '20 byte ASCII records'.
>
>But when I ftp the files from gatekeeper.dec.com they have an extension
>of '.cbd' and are binary in nature.
>
>Anybody know what's been used to compress them? Or where I can get the
>plain text files from?
>
>In hope...
>
>Ian S Worthington
>ALCS Development

The data were compressed as binary short (16 bit) integers by Brian
Reid at Decwrl and most likely cannot be uncompressed with any generic
data decompression program.  The docs state:

	The "*.Map/*.cbd" files encode features from the "CIA World Data Bank II
	map database".
	
	The CIA World Bank II master information is a series of COBOL records, 
	specifying 5,719,617 individual vectors, which occupies about 130
	megabytes of disk space. The "cbd" files here are compressed binary
	encodings of it, collectively occupying about 15 megabytes of disk space.
	These "cbd" files were produced from the original ASCII database by
	Brian Reid at Decwrl.

Now, do you *really* want 130 Megabytes of data?  If you would prefer to use
the cbd files I can make available a program to read them.   Drop
me a line and its yours.  (I wrote it on a Sun by the by but it could
be easily modified for any machine with different integer byte
ordering).  If you would prefer ascii flat files I cannot help you.

I believe someone wrote a program called mfil to read the cbd
files as well; it is in the public domain and in an archive near you.

Jim 
---
We shall not cease from exploration and |Jim Craven (craven@cg.emr.ca)
the end of all our exploring will be to |Seismology & Electromagnetism
arrive where we started and know the    |Geological Survey of Canada
place for the first time.  T.S. Eliot   |Ottawa Canada K1A 0Y3

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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Wed, 22 Jul 1992 13:33:30 PDT
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         good@GOODRS.GEOG.UCSB.EDU
Subject:      Re: Object-Oriented DBMS and GIS
X-To:         "Geographic Information Systems Discussion List"
              <GIS-L@ubvm.cc.buffalo.EDU>
              16 Jul 1992 01:51:27 GMT ."
              <9207160816.aa19596@pollux.GEOG.UCSB.EDU>

Curt Kolovson <kolovson@HPLABSZ.HPL.HP.COM>





Kurt:

I just saw the note you posted on GIS-L about OODBMS and Unit 25
of the Core Curriculum on Trends in GIS:

     In the NCGIA Core Curriculum on GIS, there is a unit
     entitled "Trends in GIS" in which there is a comment that
     some object-oriented database management systems (OODBMS)
     may not be well-suited to GIS applications.  In
     particular, some OODBMS are:

     1. not well adapted to storing natural feature information,
     2. not well suited to complex spatial analysis, and
     3. often have embedded proprietary data structures

     I understand the 2nd and 3rd points, but I'm not quite sure
     about the first.  Is this referring to the problem of
     representing continuous surfaces or large objects such as
     raster images in an OODBMS, or something else perhaps?

Since I (and Karen Kemp) did the final editing, here's my response.
In brief, yes, I would argue that OODBMS are not well adapted to
processing digital representations of fields.  When a TIN, raster,
polygon network etc is used to represent a field, the objects which
populate the database (triangles, pixels, polygons respectively)
are artifacts of the representation and scale dependent.  Of course
one can regard the entire representation as an object, and while
that is useful for extracting windows from archives, it doesn't
help much in modeling or analysis.  That's what I assumed Jack
Dangermond to mean in his original version of that unit, and that's
why I left the statement in as editor.

There are further aspects of the context which are perhaps
important.  This is a "Trends in GIS" unit intended to reflect the
current state of the industry and where it might be going, rather
than abstract ideals.  Hence while points 2 and 3 are true of many
products currently marketed as "object oriented GIS", the unit does
not attempt to deal with whether they are true of the abstract
properties of OODBMS.  For example, it is true that in an abstract
sense an OODBMS is extensible, but in practice current systems such
as Postgres have embedded certain predefined extensions of SQL,
such as search polygons.  Similarly, I'm open to correction here but my
understanding is that while TIGRIS is marketed as an
object oriented GIS, it is not extensible in the abstract sense.
Unit 22 tries to explain the GIS interpretation of "object
orientation" at greater length.  I think there's a good case for
a new unit defining the abstract ideal of OOPS and OODBMS, and
its significance for GIS.

I hope these comments are useful.

Mike Goodchild
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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Wed, 22 Jul 1992 16:24:40 GMT
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Steve Smyth <stevesmy@MICROSOFT.COM>
Subject:      Weiler Data Model

Howdy Netters,

Here's a question I got recently:

>Just dropping you an email to see if you have ever heard of a
>spatial data model developed by a guy or gal named "Weiler".
>Someone asked me about it, but I don't recognize it.  It is
>apparently of interest at POSC?  I think it has its background
>in the CAD/CAM industry, so I thought you might know of it.

Can anyone provide more information?

...steve smyth (ss4370@u.washington.edu)
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From: gthaker@fergie.atl.ge.com (Gautam H Thaker)
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Subject: Looking for info on VPF (vector product format)
Keywords: VPF
Date: 28 Jul 92 14:03:12 GMT
Organization: GE Aerospace, Advanced Technology Labs

I am new to this newsgroup; please forgive me if this is an FAQ.
Any and all hints are welcome.

I am looking for information (including possible code) that deals
with the Vector Product Format. This is, as far as I can tell, a
Military standard storing all types of geographical information,
including map, cultural data, etc. etc. I have the official standard 
but this is not completely useful to a new comer. Would anyone recommend
any articles, books, products etc. that can help explain this format?
My eventual goal is to write (possibly Ada based) programs that 
read and write VPF data.

Thanks in advance.

Gautam H. Thaker 
Internet: gthaker@atl.ge.com    ("reply" often works, but may not).
GE DECNET:  atl::gthaker     Dialcom 8*777-6412 
GE Adv. Tech. Lab.           609-866-6412 (office)
Route 38, Bldg 145-2         609-866-6397 (fax)
Moorestown, NJ 08057	     609-767-4396 (home)



-- 
Gautam H. Thaker 
Xref: sparky comp.infosystems.gis:2286 bit.listserv.ingrafx:131
From: rorem@bert.eecs.uic.edu (Doug Rorem)
Subject: Re: ARCEDIT, or anything, under X Windows
Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Sun, 26 Jul 1992 03:45:57 GMT


>while the mouse pointer was in the graphics screen were redirected (I don't
>know by whom) to the text panel.  If you wanted to type in another window,
>such as your mail tool, no problem - just move your mouse pointer over there
>and type.

Sorry if I'm joining this thread late, but you can change your defaults
in openwindows so you CAN type in a window by just moving the mouse
pointer there.  It's modified under the 'Properties...' selection on
the main menu when the mouse pointer is on the desktop.  You first get a
'Color' property selection, but by clicking the right mouse on the
selection icon to the left of 'Color', you'll find 6 additional properties
one of which is miscellaneous.  Under the miscellaneous category there
is a property called 'Set Input Area', click on 'Move Pointer' and 'Apply'
and that's it.

Doug Rorem
University of Illinois at Chicago

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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Fri, 24 Jul 1992 10:41:45 PDT
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Eric Weitzman <esri!sync!eric@UUNET.UU.NET>
Subject:      Re: Arc/Info AML question:
X-To:         uunet!UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu!GIS-L@uunet.UU.NET

> Does anyone know how to verify that an item exists when it is
> used as an argument in an AML?

Use the [ITEMINFO <specifier> <type> <item> -EXISTS] function.  This returns
.TRUE. if the item exists, .FALSE. if it doesn't.

-Eric

eweitzman@esri.com
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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Thu, 30 Jul 1992 05:56:49 EDT
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Feibing Zhan <zhan@GEOG.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Postscript
X-To:         GIS-L@ubvm.cc.buffalo.edu

Please would you forward a copy of the responses on the Postscript file
generation in ARC/INFO to me. Thanks.

Feibing Zhan
zhan@geog.buffalo.edu
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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Thu, 23 Jul 1992 13:08:16 MET
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Sincak <KUKO@CSPUNI12.BITNET>
Subject:      last call for EC - partners
X-To:         imagrs-l@csearn.BITNET, GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET

Dear networkers

I am making the last atempt for contact with partner from Europian
Community for utilizing the present possibilities for asking grant
from EC comminsion for cooperation with the Eastern Europe. The dead-
line for asking the grant is 7-th of August 1992 in Brusel.
There are some of the projects :
1. GO WEST & GO EAST mobility project
2. join project grants
3. networking between various institutions

   My personal interest is the area of image processing considering
remotelly sensed images.
Any furher disc. in this problem would be appreciated - but must be
promt because of the date of the deadline.

Sincerely
Peter Sincak


******************************************************************
  I    I     I
  I----I     I    ----- it is    A H O J     in Slovak language
  I    I     I               &  Slovakia is a part of
                         Czecho-Slovakia in Central Europe
        Peter Sincak, Ph.D.
                 Kosice, Technical University of Kosice, E-Fac.
  Department of technical Cybernetic & Artificial Inteligence
  Czecho-Slovakia,     E-mail  - KUKO@CSPUNI12.BITNET
                                 KUKO@ACI.CVUT.CS
                       FAX     - 0042 95 343 92
                       Voice   - 0042 95 578 64
                  CITY AIR-plane connection = YES
*****************************************************************
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL11]
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Tue, 28 Jul 1992 16:05:50 WST
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Tim Telcik <tim@CS.CURTIN.EDU.AU>
Subject:      Re: TIN Survey
X-cc:         U_GHAZ@UTMJB.BITNET
              at Jul 27, 92 5:00 am

Mohamad,
	thanks for the reply.

Tim Telcik.

--
Department of Geographic Information Systems
School of Computing
Curtin University
GPO Box U 1987
Perth  W.A.  6001
Email: tim@marsh.cs.curtin.edu.au
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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Wed, 29 Jul 1992 20:39:59 PDT
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Tom Poiker <poiker@SFU.CA>
Subject:      GIS Master Bibliography Project (fwd)
X-To:         gis-l@ubvm.cc.buffalo.edu

Forwarded message:
From poiker@sfu.ca Tue Jul 28 22:52:44 1992
From: poiker@sfu.ca (Tom Poiker)
Message-Id: <9207290552.AA15926@fraser.sfu.ca>
Subject: GIS Master Bibliography Project
To: gis-l@ubvms.bitnet
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 92 22:52:40 PDT
Cc: poiker@sfu.ca (Tom Poiker)
X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL11]

Until about 1977. I have collected GIS annotation. In 1972, I
published those that I had so far in a discussion paper of the
Geography Department of the University of Toronto. In about
1975, I gave a copy of the file to John O'Callaghan and he
put it on microfilm.

Do you want this stuff? It is well over 1000 entries. I don't
have a machine readable file of it anymore, just a micro film
and some printouts. But John O'Callaghan still might have it.
Tom Poiker
poiker@sfu.ca
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Wed, 22 Jul 1992 14:41:43 -0230
Reply-To:     sfreundsch@kean.ucs.mun.ca
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         sfreundsch@KEAN.UCS.MUN.CA
Subject:      RE: Whither AC? Yes.
X-To:         GIS-L@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu

>Whither Auto Carto? Yes.
>                    ---
>That opinion is based on my understanding of the roles of the major
>GIS conferences, or at least how each has evolved.
>
>Auto Carto: Technical issues of automated cartography (originally),
>            but has slowly become dominated by general, technical

Bunch of stuff deleted...

>If Auto Carto ceases to draw interest on the topic of automated cartography,
>and if the residual (technical GIS topics) conflicts with SDH, then let
>AC die.  Don Cooke said at a recent conference that all good lists (especially
>on overhead graphics) have 10 items!  Let's allow Auto Carto's 10 meetings
>to be listed historically as a major contribution to the GIS field.
>
>Mike Gould
>NCGIA-Buffalo (en el sabatico mas corto del mundo)

I agree with the arguement that Mike has posted, all except the
characterization that people interested in GIS attend the "AAG if they
insist on being/remaining a geographer while playing with GIS".
                                             ^^^^^^^
Come on Mike, you really don't mean that do you? ;)

I vote to let Auto Carto "die", so to speak (though it seems that it
already has.....).

Scott Freundschuh
Memorial University of Newfoundland
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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Wed, 22 Jul 1992 16:10:01 PDT
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Tom Poiker <poiker@SFU.CA>
Subject:      Wither Auto Carto?

I would vote for a. keep A-C going in odd-numbered years and
SDH in even-numbered years.

Can the GIS Specialty Group of the AAG take over A-C and have
different geography departments in North America organize it?
Or surveying and other departments for that matter?
Tom Poiker
poiker@sfu.ca
From: mzajac@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Michael Stephen Zajac)
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Subject: Is there a PD SIF=>GRASS or SIF=>DLG program
Date: 27 Jul 92 21:02:05 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada

Does such a beast exist?

Michael Zajac
Dept of Landscape Architecture
University of Manitoba                             voice:  (204) 474 6449
Winnipeg, MB R3T 2N2                   internet:  mzajac@ccu.umanitoba.ca
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
From: dmarble@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Duane F Marble)
Subject: Re:      The GIS Master Bibliography Project
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1992 15:56:19 GMT

REFER is standard on nearly every UNIX system. It is not great but it
is very widely available. The ASCII format of the input files also
allows them to be prepared using a simple text editor or a word
processor.
-- 
Duane F. Marble			       E-mail: dmarble@magnus.acs.osu.edu
Department of Geography                Telephone: (614) 292-2250
The Ohio State University
Columbus, Ohio 43210                   Fax: (614) 292-6213
From: mccauley@ecn.purdue.edu (Darrell McCauley)
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Subject: Re:      The GIS Master Bibliography Project
Date: 27 Jul 92 18:20:58 GMT
Organization: Ag Engineering Dept, Purdue University

I'm almost positive that I've seen refer2bibtex converters.
-- 
James Darrell McCauley          Department of Ag Engr, Purdue Univ
mccauley@ecn.purdue.edu         West Lafayette, Indiana 47907-1146
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
From: anne@cco.caltech.edu (Anneliese Lilje)
Subject: Re: Arc/Info version 6 and OpenWindows via MacX
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1992 01:12:00 GMT

In article <9207272159.AA02593@mies.MIT.EDU> Rob Smyser <smyser@ATHENA.MIT.EDU> writes:
>Joe Frizado writes: (the entire message is copied below)
>>  Is there something in Arc/Info that will not allow it to run
>> on "generic" X terminals?
>
>We at MIT have just finished encountering and "solving" the new
>difficulties with Mac/PC X servers and Arcinfo 6's "disp 9999" windows.
>The problem is new in Arc 6 and is really annoying.  It takes slightly
>different form on Suns, Decstations, and RS6000s.  We have encountered it in
>using MacX and Hummingbird's Exceed/W, as well as a variatino of it when using
>remote workstation X servers (such as logging in to Suns from Decstations...).

[text deleted]
>
>To connect to the rooted window under MacX use "setenv DISPLAY address:0.3"
>where the ".3" refers to the colro rooted window.  Under Exceed/W you pick
>"Options... Window Mode ... Single" from the Windows menu under the dash thing
>in the upper left corner...
>
>We spent weeks hashing this out.  We thought at first that it might be a server
>problem so we didn't ask ESRI about it.  The problem is definitely with ESRI
>code, though.  It is very annoying  not to be able to use your favorite
>workstation window manager.  And PC and mac users buy their servers *expecting*
>the Mac OS or Windows to manage their X windows and they can't.

Hi Rob,

I will second this. We ran some "tests" using Mac X and ARC/INFO 6.0 and
had repeated the same problems. Our workaround is in a nutshell the
same as yours. It's possible but defeats the whole purpose of having X
in the first place.

anne
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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Wed, 29 Jul 1992 08:42:53 -0700
Reply-To:     Marcus Lester <marcusl@u.washington.edu>
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Marcus Lester <marcusl@U.WASHINGTON.EDU>
Subject:      Map Layers and Overlay
X-To:         GIS-L%UBVM.BITNET@uwavm.u.washington.edu

Several folks have spoken to this, but I think I'll throw in my two cents
worth anyway. These two are intimately connected but separate.  The data
structure and the operation upon the data structure. In this light, the
question of what gets put in a layer is reduced to, "How complicated do
you want your data structure to be?" Conn Copas points out that data may
take many forms and represent widely divergent phenomena.  GISs allow one
to combine or transform data in myriad ways (some less defensible than
others). All of this points to what I believe is the conventional wisdom:
keep your data in its most disaggregate, most detailed form.  It is
generally easier to combine things as one needs than to repeatedly separate
the wheat from the chaff.

Some interesting work has been done on error propagation with map
overlays. The methods applied to GIS continue to be refined and debated. I
think that some of the most important work to be done is in the field of
metadata - data about data.  How much and what do we have to know about our
data sets in order to transform and combine them and still have reasonable
and defensible results?

I will be very interested in anyone's comments about the associations
between metadata and method.

Marcus Lester
Department of Geography  DP-10
University of Washington
Seattle, Washington  98195
marcusl@u.washington.edu
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
From: jschlage@moose.uvm.edu (Joel D. Schlagel)
Subject: U.S. AVHRR Data Companion Disk
Organization: University of Vermont -- Division of EMBA Computer Facility
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1992 18:10:21 GMT


Has anyone worked with the U.S. AVHRR Data Companion Data C.D. ?

I've been having trouble reading the DLG files in the ecologic
directory: ecoregions and land resource areas.  I've been using 
arc/info DLGARC to convert them.  The politcal boundary data on the
CD convert, but these files do not.  Is there a problem with the 
dlg file format on the disc, or with arc/info's dlg file reader?


thanks in advance!

joel

--

______________________________________________________________________


  Joel D. Schlagel                phone: (802) 656-3325
  223 Aiken Center                  fax: broken...
  University of Vermont           email: joel@wildlife.emba.uvm.edu
  Burlington, VT 050405                  jschlage@moose.uvm.edu

______________________________________________________________________
From: brian@jaeger.geog.ubc.ca (Brian Klinkenberg)
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Subject: Re: Postscript
Keywords: Postscript, Arc/Info
Date: 30 Jul 92 05:48:29 GMT
Organization: University of British Columbia, Vancouver, B.C., Canada

I would like to thank all of the people who responded to 
my earlier request for help in solving our postscript
problems.  We now are able to produce maps galore.

Reordering the map layers may have provided some of the
relief.  Now, when we want to produce a postscript map
we
   1) in arcplot use DISPLAY 1040 to create an 
        esri graphics file;
   2) in arc, use the postscript command.

Using DISPLAY 1040 2 (which creates a postscript
file directly) does not appear to work as
reliably as the method outlined above.

Again, many thanks--the system (GIS-L) works!

klink

(aka brian@geog.ubc.ca)
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X-VMS-To: IN%"GIS-L@UBVM"
Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Wed, 29 Jul 1992 20:26:00 CST
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         "JOHN K. WILDGEN" <JKWPO@CANAL.CRC.UNO.EDU>
Subject:      Re: U.S. AVHRR Data Companion Disk

I have been working with this disk, but on other subdirectories so far.
I will look into your problem.  I am working in a raster environment
(IDRISI) which is supposed to interpret DLG data.  I will let you
know if I have any success.

John K. Wildgen
College of Urban and Public Affairs
Univ. of New Orleans

"Laissez les bons temps roulez!"
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Newsgroups: comp.infosystems.gis
Date:         Fri, 24 Jul 1992 11:24:38 PDT
              <GIS-L@UBVM.BITNET>
From:         Rusty Dodson <dodson@TOAST.NCGIA.UCSB.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Arc/Info AML question
X-To:         "Geographic Information Systems Discussion List"
              <GIS-L@ubvm.cc.buffalo.EDU>
              23 Jul 92 22:43:31 PST."
              <9207241055.aa24169@pollux.GEOG.UCSB.EDU>

Thanks to all who answered my question.  The [iteminfo] function
is exactly what I was looking for (and didn't find as I was using
a version 4.0 manual.  Whoa!).

Rusty Dodson
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