MapGuide best practices-Managed or Unmanaged Resources

When we introduced MapGuide Studio to Load Data, we talked about two Data loading methods: Load Procedure and Data Connection. What are the differences between the two methods? Does this have anything to do with managed or unmanaged resources? In this article, we will describe this concept.

 

Managed resources are the file resources that have been uploaded to the MapGuide server. That is to say, these resources are generally file-type data, such as SDF files and SHP files. They can upload data to the MapGuide Server resource library by using Load Procedure in MapGuide Studio.

For example, we upload a shp file through Load Procedure,

Take a look at the resource storage in MapGuide Server as follows. You can find the resource file you uploaded in the C: \ Program Files \ Autodesk \ MapGuideEnterprise2010 \ Server \ Repositories \ Library \ DataFiles directory, however, the SHP format has been converted to the SDF format.

The resources that reside in the MapGuide server are Managed resources. You can create a Package (*. Mgp) to package resources and pass them to others or to other MapGuide servers. For more information about packaging, see MapGuide data packet management.

 

What about unmanaged resources? Unmanaged resources reside in common file systems, and MapGuide references these resources through file names. We can connect to unmanaged resources through Data Connection in MapGuide Studio. To connect to an unmanaged resource, you must first create an Alias name in Site Administrator to point to the directory where the SHP files are actually stored. Network shared directory is supported here.

Then, use Data Connection in MapGuide Studio and select the appropriate Provider to connect to the unmanaged resources.

Note that the shp Provider can be connected to a file or a directory.

When the corresponding unmanaged resources are packaged, these resources will not be transferred into the data packet. You also need to send the necessary data files to others so that they can establish the alias name.

 

The following describes how to select managed and unmanaged resources. Basically, managed and unmanaged resources are used, which has little impact on performance. If your data is rarely updated, you can choose to host resources. When deploying the data to the customer, you can directly load the mpg file.

If your data needs to be updated frequently, it may be in a format other than SDF, such as SHP. In this case, you can use unmanaged resources. If you need to update resource data, you only need to overwrite the file. MapGuide automatically detects resource updates without re-uploading. In actual project applications, this method undoubtedly has great advantages. When using Unmanaged resources, pay attention to the following points to improve performance:

1. When using SHP Provider, use the directory method, and preferably link to a specific file one by one. If you use the directory method, when there are many files in the directory, the performance will be low.

2. Try not to use shared directories over the network, especially in poor network conditions. Although MapGuide Alias Name supports shared directories, if the network condition is poor, it will still cause performance problems.

 

In addition, many projects need to edit the data in Map 3D and release the data through MapGuide. How can we easily maintain data updates? An unmanaged resource is an option. In Map 3D and MapGuide, we can use FDO Provider to connect to the same resource file, so that the changes made to data in Map3D can be reflected in MapGuide in a timely manner. Isn't that cool?

 

Now, we have discussed the concepts of managed and unmanaged resources and their application scenarios. We hope you can apply this feature in future project practices to achieve better application results. If you have any questions, please comment below or go to the MGDN forum to discuss them.

Daniel Du)