Basic ArcIMS tutorial (3)

Chapter 3 use author (Part 2)

Chapter overview

This chapter describes how to use other options when creating an Axl file. The use of these tools and functions will increase the beauty of the website.

 

In this chapter, we will learn how to use the display ratio range to resolve conflicts between elements during display and increase the processing time of the website. We will also learn how to set up Geographic Encoding, how to use a composite topic diagram. You can also create a storage query to query specific information during the exercise.

 

General labels

You can set many important parameters for an active layer in a tag.

First, you can change the name of the layer in the list and legend that the user can see in the General tab. The layer name does not affect the actual data file name actually stored. It can use more descriptive names for your understanding;

You can also set the scale range of the layer. In other words, you can set a certain scale range so that the layer is only displayed within a certain scale range, but not within this range;

In addition, the General tab lists the basic information of the active layer, such as the name, type, location, and file size of the source data.

 

 

Display data according to the proportion range

By setting the proportional range displayed by the layer, you can make the map have an appropriate degree of detail at a certain scale. For example, you may want a very detailed layer to appear only when it is zoomed in to a certain extent, or you may want to zoom out the map so that it is fully displayed without displaying the layers of city streets, you can set the display ratio range.

To set the scale range interactively, first enlarge the area of a more detailed layer, right-click the activity layer, and select set maximum scale factor. In this way, the element layer is not displayed when the scale-out of the map exceeds this range. Similarly, you can use the set minimum scale factor to make the layer not displayed when it is enlarged to a certain extent.

To change the minimum or maximum scale, repeat the preceding operation. Alternatively, right-click the activity layer and choose remove scale pactor to remove the proportional range. Alternatively, you can directly set it using the general label in the layer attribute. The final results of these settings are saved in the minscale and maxscale attributes of the <layer> label.

 

 

Labels label

Some text information can be added to the map to describe the layer elements, which are from a field in the layer Attribute Table. The labels label in the layer attribute is used to create such a note.

To create a note, you must first specify the field to be labeled. For example, you may want to use a street name to mark a street layer. Secondly, you can specify the font (any font provided by Windows), size, color, bold, and italic based on your requirements.

ArcIMS provides many annotation methods for point elements or line elements. For example, for line elements, you can directly place a note on the top, bottom, or online of the online element. For point elements, you can rotate the note at any angle, in addition, you can select the relative position of text and vertex elements. For example, you may want to place a note in the center of a certain element or in a certain direction of a point.

ArcIMS provides a specialAlgorithm. This algorithm can also solve the note conflict problem so that the notes do not overlap. Note that the notes in ArcIMS cannot be scaled. Therefore, no matter how large the map is displayed, the text is displayed in the same size and style. If you want to scale a note, you can use the note layer in ArcSDE.

 

 

Special notes

You can set special notes to enhance map aesthetics. By clicking the effects button under the labels tab, you can add special effects such as shadow, glow, or background to the note.

Adding a shadow will make the text Look 1.3-dimensional, while shining will make a background color appear around the font. Of course, you can also add a background, that is, to make the text surrounded by a colored rectangle.

Allow duplicate allows you to set multiple tags for certain elements with the same property value. If this item is not selected, ArcIMS displays only one annotation, regardless of whether several elements have this attribute value. For example, a street has several parts, but only one annotation is used to annotate it.

The use highest text quality option enables all the notes on this layer to be displayed with the best effect, which may slow down the running speed of large data volumes, so if you want to generate a map at a faster speed, it is best not to select this option.

 

 

Layers label

You can add additional topic graphs to the layers to create complex symbols to make the map more attractive and readable. A common usage is to draw a road element twice, with a rough line at a time, and a thin line of different colors at a time. In this way, the expressway can be visually displayed.

You can use the layers label to add new topic diagrams. Here, you can add, delete, or modify a topic diagram. You can apply the dot, line, and surface styles used by a layer to other layers. In addition, you may want to place a coarse-line topic symbol under the fine-line topic symbol. In this case, you can adjust the display sequence by moving the topic layer up and down.

You can use the set scale dependant tool to set the display of the same topic layer at different scales. For example, you may want a highway to appear on a small scale in the form of a single line, but in a large scale in the form of a broken line. When this tool is used, the <scaledependantrenderer> identifier is written into the Axl file.

 

 

Map prompt

Sometimes you can use a certain field to set map prompts to quickly access certain element information. The map prompt specified in author is not written into the Axl file, so it is set for the convenience of website creation. The client user cannot see this map prompt. The next chapter describes how to set a map prompt for the client.

To set parameters for the map prompt, click the map tips tool on the toolbar. In the pop-up dialog box, you can set fields used as map prompts. Repeat the operation to set a map prompt for each layer. To delete some or all MAP prompt settings, use the clear all maptips fields or clear selected maptips fiesd buttons.

 

 

Identify Tool

The identify tool allows you to use the mouse to view all the attributes of a layer. Select the identity tool and click the elements on the activity layer to view the attributes of the elements. When you click a point, the attribute information of all elements within the range of the tolerance is displayed. Therefore, if many elements are very close to each other, identify will display all the element attributes near the click according to a certain degree of tolerance. When multiple elements are selected, click the elements in the list on the left to highlight them to obtain their attribute values.

Note: The attribute information opened through the identify tool cannot be edited.

 

 

 

Find Tool

You can use the find tool to quickly find certain elements based on string attributes. It searches for the string of the attribute field and can enter a part of the string. Find returns the result to return the records that meet the condition. The input string is enclosed in quotation marks shortly after it is input, but it must be case sensitive. For example, you only need to input afgh to find Afghanistan.

When the find tool returns more than 100 qualified elements, the system will ask if you want to view the first 100 records first or all the records.

If more than one element is found, you can click a selected element in a record, and then click pan to move to the selected element without changing the scale, or click zoom to display the selected Element range.

Click the clear all selection tool on the toolbar to clear the selection of Selected elements.

 

 

Set a pre-defined query (stored query)

Predefine query is a simple and flexible method provided by ArcIMS to allow client users to query spatial databases. It reduces the pressure on client users to use SQL statements, allows website developers to define a simple or complex single parameter statement for customers, and allows client users to call statements by name.

ArcIMS pre-defined query must have only one variable and the name must be unique to run correctly. To create such a query, define a logical expression in author and click execute. If the execution is normal, replace the variable with a specific value and save the query with a unique name. In this way, after the website is established, the client users can use their own values to replace the variable to call this query.

 

Set geographical encoding attributes

The geographic code of the addresses in ArcIMS is a process that allows the client users to locate their actual locations by entering the addresses based on a street layer. ArcIMS uses the same Geographic Encoding engine as ArcView and supports many common address encoding standards, such as the American Street postal code standard.

In fact, author does not support address matching, which is performed on the client. In the geographical encoding Properties window, you must select an address format and select the corresponding fields for each required parameter from the Attribute Table.

In author, the final output result of geocoding is embedded in the tag of the Axl file and saved in the new index file (. GCI file) stored together with the shapefile.