Manifold Community Site Area: Announcements

Manifold 9.0.180

adamw — Thu, 16 Mar 2023 17:14:22 GMT

Welcome to the new updates for Manifold 9 and SQL for ArcGIS Pro!

9.0.179.last - re-projecting a component copies style data, thematic styles remember method used to compute breaks, view or edit center of view in map or in layout frame as lat/lon / stored coordinates / projected coordinates

9.0.179.4 - 'none' overlap mode to render all labels, autoenter name of table for a new drawing or image in the Transform pane

9.0.179.3 - view or edit scale as an absolute value / pixel size / view size, Position / Scale status bar panes work for layout frames with maps

9.0.179.2 - Save as Image allows specifying render DPI, allows specifying coordinates of rendered view directly

9.0.179.1 - Save as Image tool for rendering maps to images of nearly arbitrary size, including or excluding virtual layers such as grid, rendering functions in queries

The updates are available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold 9.0.179 + 8.0.35

adamw — Tue, 10 Jan 2023 15:46:18 GMT

Welcome to the new updates for Manifold 9, Manifold 8 and SQL for ArcGIS Pro!

Manifold 9 / SQL for ArcGIS Pro

9.0.178.last - legend modes for map layers, separate formatting for legend items of different types

9.0.178.6 - dynamic legends in maps and layouts, labels can be set to move to avoid overlaps

9.0.178.5 - layouts better handle maps with tons of layers, labels in maps can be set to avoid overlaps across layers

9.0.178.4 - shared preview background color for easier tinkering, specify exact scale bar length, Apply buttons in Grid / North Arrow / Scale Bar dialogs, SelectionReplace / SelectionReplaceWindow query functions to alter selection from query, -showserial command line option to show first characters of serial number

9.0.178.3 - control grid step and unit, north arrow / scale bar / grid in layouts

9.0.178.2 - north arrow / scale bar / grid with numerous configurable parameters in maps

9.0.178.1 - command line style for text fields, refreshing table data keeps filters and orders, show total number of records / number of selected records in status bar, copy selected table records as text to paste into Excel / Notepad, copy single field for selected table records as text

Manifold 8

8.0.34.1 - -showserial command line option to show first characters of serial number

The updates are available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold 9.0.178 + 8.0.34

adamw — Wed, 10 Aug 2022 12:34:38 GMT

Welcome to the new updates for Manifold 9, Manifold 8 and SQL for ArcGIS Pro!

Manifold 9 / SQL for ArcGIS Pro

9.0.177.last - easily edit min / max scale for a layer, render scale for drawings / labels, layouts show drawings / labels at true scale, smooth tolerance + prefer positions above / below line for line labels

9.0.177.4 - overlap spacing for labels, repeat mode + straight / straight horizontal / straight perpendicular modes + bend spacing + tighter overlap shapes for line labels, -export command for Commander (MANIFOLDCMD), improvements to MIF

9.0.177.3 - offset for line labels, -runqueryfile / -runquerytext commands for MANIFOLDCMD, support for JSONL / GEOJSONL, improvements to JSON / GEOJSON / TIFF / DBF / SHP

9.0.177.2 - 64-bit only, table window can show up to 2 billion records, show number of displayed records / number of fetched records for table / query / command window, improvements to ECW / JPEG2K / FLT / XYZ / NC, support for ArcGIS 3 (SQL for ArcGIS Pro)

9.0.177.1 - show number of selected records / total number of records for tables, queries and components based on them, MANIFOLDCMD tool for automating common tasks

Manifold 8

8.0.33.1 - 64-bit only

The updates are available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold 9.0.177 / SQL for ArcGIS Pro 9.0.177 + Manifold 8.0.33

adamw — Sat, 02 Jul 2022 13:08:08 GMT

Welcome to the new updates for Manifold 9, Manifold 8 and SQL for ArcGIS Pro!

Manifold 9 / SQL for ArcGIS Pro

9.0.176.last - two new editions: Professional / Server, text field style for files

9.0.176.7 - server can run as a Windows service, Manage Services tool, enter traverse commands into insert coordinate

9.0.176.6 - faster LAZ with additional improvements for COPC, optimizations for overlays / overlay filters / selections on big tables

9.0.176.5 - license can be installed for all users, faster parallel downloads / session-wide cache / instant cancels for image servers / TMS / WMTS / ArcGIS REST, text field style for email addresses, suggest control point locations for registration

9.0.176.4 - read-only database server (MANIFOLDSRV) as a console application, rendering support, any number of simultaneous requests from same client, tunneling of nested data sources

9.0.176.3 - fast switch between selected / all records, print arbitrarily big images, faster batch inserts for PostgreSQL, fixes for OSM / PBF

9.0.176.2 - optimizations for IN / NOT IN, sieve transform, unique / percentile / statistic selects

9.0.176.1 - layer scale limits, better exports to GDB / SHP / DBF / KML / KMZ

Manifold 8

8.0.32.2 - license can be installed for all users

8.0.32.1 - fixes for virtual tables for rasters in queries

The updates are available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.176 + Manifold System 8.0.32 + SQL for ArcGIS Pro 9.0.176

adamw — Thu, 30 Dec 2021 15:43:22 GMT

Welcome to the new updates for Manifold System 9, Manifold System 8 and SQL for ArcGIS Pro!

Manifold System 9

9.0.175.last - customize colors, edit alignment / language / style for multiple fields at once, COPC spatial indexes for LAZ, access spreadsheet data on Google Docs

9.0.175.7 - better support for Windows 11, improvements to SQLITE / WEBP / LAS / DXF / KML / KOBO

9.0.175.6 - language pickers and favorite languages, list of supported languages extended from 200+ to 600+, styles for lat/lon data / URLs / fixed set of choices, support for KOBO servers for data acquisition

9.0.175.5 - specify alignment and style for table fields, filter items in schema dialog by name or type, more query functions for formatting values, query functions for generating random values and computing hashes, improvements to GDB / LAS

9.0.175.4 - query functions for formatting values with international support, query functions for producing UUIDs and timestamps

9.0.175.3 - labels may show values from multiple fields and may show the results of expressions, improvements to GDB

9.0.175.2 - edit traverse coordinates replaying traverse dynamically, end area branch closing the gap according to the compass rule, improvements to GDAL / JPEG2000 / ECW / SID / ArcGIS REST

9.0.175.1 - better error messages for table operations, query functions for tiles, tile masks are numeric instead of boolean, improvements to SQLITE and other databases

Manifold System 8

8.0.31.2 - updates to image servers

8.0.31.1 - support for portable cutting edge builds, fix for Make Image

SQL for ArcGIS Pro

9.0.175.last - support for GDBMOBILE / GPKG / SQLITE layers, refresh tables and table definitions in ArcGIS

The updates are available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.175 + Manifold System 8.0.30 + SQL for ArcGIS Pro 9.0.175

adamw — Mon, 16 Aug 2021 16:36:25 GMT

Manifold System 9.0.175 is a new update to Manifold System 9 that includes numerous additions to labels (line labels follow line segments, both on screen and when printed), coordinate systems (EPSG 10.19, various new system types), dataports (GDAL, GDB, SQLITE / GPKG, ESRI mobile geodatabases, LAS, LAS library), user interface (drag and drop from Windows Explorer into the Project pane, ODBC configuration from About, better copy and paste into GDB and similar data sources), SQL (GeomWithin, GeomOverlayWithin / GeomOverlayWithinFilter, much faster unindexed joins, field properties for SELECT INTO), etc, and includes the new activation system.

Manifold System 8.0.31 is a new update to Manifold System 8 that switches Manifold 8 to the new CRT and .NET, adds some fixes, and includes the new activation system.

SQL for ArcGIS Pro is a new product based on Manifold 9 technology that installs into ArcGIS Pro as an add-in and allows analyzing data in geodatabases opened in ArcGIS using spatial SQL.

SQL queries written in SQL for ArcGIS Pro may select data using spatial or non-spatial criteria, may alter records in geodatabase tables, may create new geodatabase entities or manipulate existing entities, may combine data from different geodatabases, may combine data from data sources other than geodatabases (eg, SHP or CSV files or databases like PostgreSQL or SQL Server or SQLite), may run script functions written in .NET languages, etc. SQL queries written in SQL for ArcGIS Pro also have access to hundreds of built-in functions provided by the Manifold SQL engine, as well as to multiple hardcore features of the engine specifically designed for spatial SQL with emphasis on performance and control: constraints, computed fields, spatial and non-spatial indexes, temporary tables and temporary databases, precisely controlled multi-threaded execution, offloading of advanced raster operations to GPGPU, read-only and transparent read-write caches, and more.

SQL for ArcGIS Pro shares a common code base with Manifold 9 and is being updated on the same schedule. Improvements to SQL for ArcGIS Pro automatically appear in Manifold 9 and vice versa.

For more on SQL for ArcGIS Pro, see sql4arc.com

For details, see threads for cutting edge builds:

Manifold System 9.0.174.1

Manifold System 9.0.174.2

Manifold System 9.0.174.3

Manifold System 9.0.174.4

Manifold System 9.0.174.last + Manifold System 8.0.30.last + SQL for ArcGIS Pro 9.0.174.last

The updates are available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.174

adamw — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 17:11:02 GMT

A new update to Manifold System is now available.

The update contains improvements and fixes in the following areas:

Registration: There is a new Register pane which allows georegistering (georeferencing) raster or vector data using control points. Control points can be entered using the cursor or by typing coordinates directly. Control points can be saved to a component and loaded back. There are multiple registration methods available: numeric methods of varying orders, including methods with restrictions and projective generalization, thin-plate spline, and triangulation. The pane can show registration errors for individual control points, as well as the total registration error. Reported errors are updated dynamically as control points are added, deleted, edited, or turned on and off. The results of the registration can be previewed.

Editing: There are new commands for editing vector data. Clip trims the edited geometry to objects in the specified layer, keeping parts that are either inside or outside of the objects. Erase deletes parts of objects in the specified layer that are either inside or outside of the edited geometry. Merge combines the edited object with other objects in the active layer, merging field values according to user-specified transfer rules. Split cuts objects in the specified layer into parts using the edited geometry as a cutter line, producing new objects and splitting field values according to user-specified transfer rules.

Analysis and queries: Gravity (IDW) interpolation allows specifying interpolation order. There is a new interpolation method for thin-plate spline. There is a new interpolation method for natural neighbors. There is a new Spatial select template which allows selecting geometry using a spatial criteria. There are new query functions for registration and interpolation, including a parallel variant for gravity (IDW) interpolation, and a new function to filter pixel values in a tile. The DROP statement tolerates missing components.

Dataports: Image libraries load faster, and report the number of files matching the mask for diagnostics. LAS / LAZ and LAS libraries expose shifts and scales for coordinate values in metadata. LAS libraries load faster, and can be refreshed with automatic updates to the coordinate system and similar data. Exporting data to LAS / LAZ embeds the coordinate system into the file, always produces LAS 1.4 with the record type determined from the available fields, and does not require any fields apart from geometry. PostgreSQL and Jet databases support boolean fields. Multiple databases support UUID fields either via a native database type or as a fixed-length string. MySQL databases support unsigned integer fields.

Components: CUDA has been updated to 11.2.2, GPGPU modules have been recompiled. ECW has been updated to 5.5.0.2034 for several minor fixes. WEBP has been updated to 1.2.0 for several minor fixes and better compression quality. SQLITE has been updated to 3.35.3 for new query clauses and functions as well as improvements to the query planner. ICU has been reworked to use the built-in Windows 10 implementation, expanding support for non-English languages and reducing install size. V8 Javascript engine has been removed with V8 scripts mapped to JScript.NET, reducing install size.

For detailed lists of changes, see documentation or threads for individual 9.0.173.x builds in the Cutting Edge forum area.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.173

adamw — Mon, 07 Dec 2020 16:52:49 GMT

A new update to Manifold System is now available.

The update contains improvements and fixes in the following areas:

Panes and windows: Individual panes are taken out of the Contents pane and can be shown simultaneously. Windows and panes can be docked, moved between top and bottom rows, moved between left and right sides, undocked or closed using the context menu. Floating windows and panes snap to each other when moved or resized.

Component + Record: The former Component and Record panes are merged into the Info pane. The pane shows various new data for components: dimensions for an image, language for a script, page size for a layout, editable descriptions for all components, etc. Editing a record in a table puts record data into the Info pane, geometry values can be expanded to show coordinates and tile values can be expanded to show pixels in a separate tab. The new Related tab allows searching for records in a secondary table related to the picked record.

Select + Transform: The Select and Transform panes are reworked to use a two-step process: first pick a template, then edit parameter values, better utilizing screen space. Both panes remember their state on a per-window basis. Both panes show last used templates, allow repeating them and allow pinning them for use between sessions. The names of new components created by a transform can be edited directly in the Transform pane. Many transforms that were previously creating new components now allow putting the results into a new field as an option. There is control over the amount of computation resources used by a template. There are numerous new templates and extensions to existing templates. Queries generated for templates are shorter, queries for transforms have a clearly separated repeatable part.

Previews: Previewing the results of a select or transform in a table uses a separate preview field which can be dragged around, resized, or temporarily hidden. Previewing the results of a select or transform in a map uses a separate preview layer, which can be resized to cover the full width of the window or limited to its left or right side, or temporarily hidden. All data for the preview layer is computed at the beginning rather than dynamically on zoom or pan, using multiple threads, ensuring very fast subsequent display. Transforms that didn't previously have previews now have them.

Queries: There are numerous new query functions. Many raster functions have been extended to allow operating on a specific channel of a multi-channel image. Many vector functions for 3d data have been extended to allow specifying the name of a field to take Z values from.

Dataports: Dataports for databases detect disconnects and automatically attempt to reconnect. Dataports for databases optimize batch operations, automatically breaking big transactions into manageable portions to avoid failures. Exporting a GPKG performs faster and produces files conforming to the latest version of the GPKG spec. Reading a TIFF recognizes pyramid data stored within the file. Geocoding servers of different types are merged together with URLs for individual services specified separately. Geocoding servers for Bing / Google / Here / MapBox / MapQuest / Yandex support search services that allow locating features near a lat/lon location with a filter. Linking an ArcGIS REST server allows accessing vector data. Various web dataports have been strengthened to work around server errors.

For detailed lists of changes, see documentation or threads for individual 9.0.172.x builds in the Cutting Edge forum area.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.172

adamw — Thu, 07 May 2020 15:44:32 GMT

A new update to Manifold System is now available.

The update contains improvements and fixes in the following areas:

Projecting images: There is a new option to specify the interpolation type: nearest neighbor / bilinear / bicubic. There is a new projection method: direct sub-pixel, which takes longer than the standard method, but produces a better quality image.

GPGPU: The GPGPU interface is no longer tied to a particular version of CUDA and can use CUDA devices starting with compute capability 2.0 (Fermi). The GPGPU modules are loaded from the GPGPU.DAT file included in the installs of 64-bit versions of Manifold and Manifold Viewer, with the system automatically choosing the best version of the module supported by the actual graphic device.

Join: There is a new Join dialog which transfers data between components in 5 different scenarios: table to table, drawing to drawing, drawing to image, image to drawing, image to image. Each scenario supports transferring data to existing fields or channels or to newly created fields or channels, with a variety of transfer methods available for each transferred item. Each scenario supports transferring data to or from queries or components built on queries. A join operation set up in the Join dialog can be saved to an update query which can then be used to repeat the operation, eg, to capture changes, or customize it.

Queries and transforms: There are about 50 new query functions, 5 of them with GPGPU variants. Multiple functions have been extended to take additional parameters, enabling new behavior. Vector transforms such as Shift, Scale, Rotate and underlying query functions have been extended to support 2d curves (previously, curvilinear arcs were erased and replaced with straight line segments). There is a new transform to reverse the direction of lines. There is a new transform to place sequences of coordinates with the specified step and distance range onto lines.

Dataports: Reading a PBF file performs significantly faster. Reading a KML / KMZ file recognizes more variants of geometry data and more variants of URL links. Reading a LAS / LAZ file or a LAS library exposes scaled XYZ coordinate values as separate fields. Connecting to an SQLite / GPKG file no longer requires an external version of SQLITE3.DLL and can use the internal implementation of SQLite built into Manifold.

For detailed lists of changes, see documentation or threads for individual 9.0.171.x builds in the Cutting Edge forum area.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.171

adamw — Wed, 04 Mar 2020 15:46:53 GMT

A new update to Manifold System is now available.

The update contains improvements and fixes in the following areas:

Raster analysis: Multiple raster operations now use data structures optimized for heavily multi-core systems, for significantly better performance. There are transforms for Euclidean distances, path distances, slope path distances.

Projections: Reprojecting data support NADCON5 transforms, grid files for many standard NADCON5 transforms found in EPSG are included in GRIDS.DAT (a separate download).

Layouts: Layout frames are rendered with anti-aliasing and other advanced features of the Normal graphics engine. The new Insert Legend command creates a legend for one or more components, producing layout frames for legend entries that can be manipulated individually or as a group. Layout frames for legend entries can be further edited in the Record pane. There are new commands to rearrange multiple layout frames simultaneously for quick editing. Moving multiple layout frames with the cursor uses an improved version of snap that is much more intelligent. The New Layout dialog allows choosing paper format and orientation. The new Page Setup dialog allows switching to a different paper format / orientation and allows using a custom page size.

Extended and improved UI: The new Show / Delete / Rename Related commands in the Project pane context menus find components related to a specific component and operate on them together. The New Map dialog lists all potential layers instead of just the context component, and allows including a base layer from Google Maps / Bing Maps / a different image server from favorites. The Layers pane allows right-clicking a layer and making it active. Double-clicking text in an edit control selects the clicked word matching bracket pairs, etc, for easy editing. Clicking the active cell in a grid starts editing its value, similarly to Excel. The Replace dialog for text includes the Replace All button. The application window displays "*" next to the name of the opened MAP file if there are unsaved changes.

LiDAR: Spatial indexes for LAS / LAZ files perform better. A folder of LAS / LAZ files can be linked as a single LAS library data source with a drawing / table showing data from all files put together. The new Index LiDAR Files command in the Tools menu allows building indexes in advance for a folder of LAS files for use in a LAS library. There is an option to build indexes for multiple files in parallel. The LAS library detects LAS / LAZ files without an index, changes its icon in the Project pane and allows quickly building indexes for those files using the Project pane context menu.

Dataports: Exporting a GPKG file publishes coordinate system data in the WKT format for third-party applications. Reading a ECW file supports 16-bit values without reducing them to 8-bit, and supports multi-channel images. Reading a KML file can download referenced data from web resources, recursively with a custom recursion limit. There is a dataport for web KML for linking KML data from a web resource. Reading a NITF file supports reading embedded JPEG2000 data.

Localizations: The new Edit Localization Files command in the Tools menu allows creating or editing localization files. The Options dialog allows specifying the localization to use. There is an option to ignore all localization files and stick to the built-in English strings.

For detailed lists of changes, see documentation or threads for individual 9.0.170.x builds in the Cutting Edge forum area.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.170

adamw — Tue, 26 Nov 2019 12:56:57 GMT

A new update to Manifold System is now available.

The update contains hundreds of improvements and fixes in the following areas:

Layer groups: Layers in the Layers pane can be grouped into folders. Folders can be nested within other folders to arbitrary depth. Layers in a group can be easily manipulated together: they can be selected, reordered, assigned a desired opacity, and so on. Layer tabs in map windows use layer groups as well. Layer tabs for groups report rendering and caching status for an entire group, allow zooming to an entire group, allow reordering entire groups using drag and drop, etc. Groups have their own on / off status. A layer is considered to be visible only if it is turned on and all groups it is in are turned on as well.

Record pane enhancements: Alt-clicking in a map window picks up to 10 objects under the clicked location. The picked objects can then be cycled through in the Record pane. Moving between objects in the Record pane automatically zooms to them. The Record pane can be used to cycle between selected objects. Alt-clicking an image tile picks it for the Record pane. Clicking a pixel in a picked tile scrolls to that pixel to show pixel values, which can be edited.

Vector editing enhancements: Explicit editing modes for inserting, moving and adding coordinates. Snap modes to snap to grid, to a bearing or to a relative bearing, with configurable snap parameters. Snap to coordinates can use either the active layer or an arbitrary subset of visible layers. Snap to coordinates automatically snaps to coordinates in the same object. Dragging coordinates uses snap modes. New commands allow converting line segments to circle, ellipse or spline curves and back. New commands can start, close, re-start, delete or reverse branches. Backspace deletes the last entered coordinate, and can be used repeatedly to delete multiple coordinates. Many editing commands have keyboard shortcuts, all commands with keyboard shortcuts show them in context menus for reference. The entire editing infrastructure is available in the tracker tool, allowing tracker measurements over complex paths.

Traverses: The coordinate list in the Record pane can be loaded or saved to a file, using either Manifold coordinates format or ESRI traverse format. The coordinate list can be switched to show coordinates as traverse commands dynamically, with interactive changes to coordinates immediately reflected in the commands. Clicking a traverse command allows changing it to a compatible command (for example, a direction-distance command that specifies a line segment can be switched to an angle-direction command and back). The Traverse Parameters dialog specifies direction type and direction units used for traverse commands, including support for various ESRI-style options.

Coordinate system enhancements: Built-in coordinate systems include EPSG data up to EPSG 9.8.2, adding about 1000 new systems and transforms. New supported projection: Equal Earth. High precision reprojection with support for NADCON / NTv2 transforms, using grid files loaded from Manifold folders. A GRIDS.DAT file with over 200 MB of compressed definitions of 170+ grids for many countries can be downloaded separately, to avoid bulking up the build for those who do not use grids. Parsing PRJ files supports WKT2. Coordinate systems can be copied and pasted. Reprojection dialogs allow a choice of conversion path between systems if there are multiple alternatives available. Reprojecting an image allows specifying explicit pixel scale, image origin, pixel type and pixel tile size, with automatic choices available. Favorite coordinate systems can be set either to override or to ignore scales and offsets. Favorite systems that override scales and offsets are shown with a trailing '#' in the menus.

Cleaner and smarter UI: Visuals used in grids and various controls have been slightly adjusted for a flatter, more modern look. Grids with toggles switch toggles using the traditional Space key or plain click (not double click). Grids with folders support expanding and collapsing items. Keys on the numeric keypad work for shortcuts. Menus support access keys (eg, Alt-F-O for File - Open). Access keys are localizable for international language support. Menus containing favorites have been streamlined. Clicks have been reorganized both to allow more options and to be simpler to remember. Some UI features can use repeated clicks (Alt-click to pick an object in a map window, click a coordinate to start editing coordinates, click away from the object to stop editing coordinates, etc) for faster operation.

Watersheds: New transforms compute watershed areas, watershed lines (streams), and upstream or downstream watershed objects. Created watersheds include data for linking watersheds into a hierarchy, Shreve / Strahler orders, individual flow through a watershed and total flow through a watershed together with all watersheds that flow into it. Watershed computations are much faster and have more options than in Release 8. Watershed computations can use multiple threads. A new transform allows filling sinks prior to performing watershed analysis.

Viewsheds: New transforms provide viewshed / visibility computations, including computing areas visible from any or all specified observers, computing a visibility index image giving the number of observers visible from each pixel, or computing a visibility index for any or all observers. Viewshed computations are much faster than Release 8. Viewshed computations can use multiple threads.

Faster startup, leaner and smarter installs: Code for ECW / JPEG2000 / Unicode collates / V8 has been moved into separate DLLs that are not loaded until they are needed, reducing startup time. 64-bit installs use the same data for Unicode collates in both 32-bit and 64-bit modes, reducing install size. Viewer installs no longer include components of V8 that were previously part of the core, reducing install size. Install packages use a new, more robust procedure to register the ODBC driver, which allows uninstalling the driver even if Manifold DLLs have been damaged. The ODBC driver can also be installed or uninstalled from within the application, which is useful for portable installs.

Many additions to dataports: A new, specialized, high speed index for point cloud data in LAS / LAZ dramatically improves speed when linking LiDAR data files. Linking a LAS / LAZ file builds a specialized spatial index optimized for fast thinning of point data for rendering, which is stored in a separate file. Images linked from ECW / JPEG2K / SID files allow overriding the coordinate system, performing color adjustments via styles, etc. A new dataport supports NASA PDS files. A new dataport for generic JSON, parses JSON data that is not necessarily GeoJSON into tables. New dataports for web CSV and web JSON allow linking CSV or JSON data from a web URL. Dataports for databases allow extending tables with virtual computed fields, with the values of those fields computed dynamically in a Manifold session and not saved back into the database. Oracle connections are much faster at bulk reads. SQL Server connections can use the newest family of SQL Server drivers available from Microsoft (MSOLEDBSQL). Working with GDB allows editing styles or coordinate systems of existing components and allows creating new components of all types except images, storing all such changes and additions in a specialized table in the geodatabase. Working with GPKG checks whether the SQLite stack includes geometry parsing functions used by spatial indexes, and if not, provides its own implementation of these functions to allow inserting or altering geometry data without SpatiaLite. The GDAL dataport supports GDAL 2.3, 2.4, and 3.0.

Many new query functions: New functions support composing coordinate systems and coordinate converters, Euclidean / geodetic measurements, computing watersheds including specialized functions to compute various subproducts, computing viewsheds, retrieving pixel values covered by geometry, and more.

Numerous performance improvements: in scripts, in GPGPU code, in dataports, in contour transforms, in tracing transforms, etc. The memory cache performs much better under heavy load. The size of the memory cache can be increased from the default values in the Options dialog, which is useful on machines with a lot of RAM.

For detailed lists of changes, see documentation or threads for individual 9.0.169.x builds in the Cutting Edge forum area.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.169

adamw — Wed, 01 May 2019 15:14:46 GMT

A new update to Manifold System is now available.

The update contains hundreds of improvements and fixes in the following areas:

Better controls and dialogs: Transform / Select panes use parameter pickers with easy switches between field / value / expression, units for numeric parameters, etc. Copying and pasting components automatically adjusts references across data sources. New transfer rules for transforms based on new aggregates. Reworked Schema dialog with separate dialogs for fields / indexes / constraints, separate dialog for editing expressions, easy addition of identity data, inline editing of coordinate system info, etc.

Radically improved vector graphics and style UI: Color pickers with a huge selection of standard colors, filtering of colors by name, color picker tool. Style pickers with big lists of built-in styles. Custom styles with many separately controlled options for areas, lines, points, labels. Explicit control over area borders, area inner / outer zones, line left / right sides, line begin / end caps, line dash patterns, halos, shadows, point and label boxes. SVG paths for points. Bitmaps for points and area fills. Rendering optimizations for accelerated graphics. Reduced graphics mode trimmed to basic rendering features in order to be very fast and very robust. All style information streamlined into portable JSON strings that can be safely copied and pasted as well as parsed and synthesized programmatically.

Smoother rendering with less flicker: Rendering of small data finishes faster due to reduced waits. Rendering of large data reduces blinking by scheduling screen updates smarter. Web images are quickly filled with reduced resolution data with the display gradually detailed over time. Re-rendering maps after changes to data (a layer is turned on or off, an object is selected, etc) coordinates with rendering threads to reduce blinking. Rendering maps with multiple layers makes much better use of system resources, producing results faster.

Significantly extended raster transforms, a lot more GPGPU optimizations: Aspect, Slope, linear filters all run on GPGPU. Better versions of all linear filters: Blur, Direction Blur, Gaussian Blur, Edges, etc. Curvature: Gaussian, mean, plan, profile (GPGPU enabled). Median filters (GPGPU enabled). Common numeric aggregates running on pixel vicinity (GPGPU enabled). Fill Missing / Fill Missing Nearest transforms to fill missing pixels. GPGPU is enabled for Viewer.

Many improvements and additions in the query engine: Big optimizations for searches on BTREExxx indexes on remote databases. Radical improvements in GPGPU code generation, better use of device memory and big savings in data transfers. Functions to create read-only or read-write (with writethrough) table caches. Functions to print data (eg, tiles) to JSON and parse them back. Functions to create shapes for linear filters. Faster numeric aggregates. New numeric aggregates: Diversity, DiversityIndex, Major. INLINE Sum(a, b, c) syntax for aggregates. Function to compute bounded areas. Functions to compute raster aggregates for pixels under geoms (same as Transfer Heights in 8, but many times faster). Regression-kriging.

Many improvements for databases: Native reading and writing of SQL Server geometry. Reworked discovery of database objects to better support databases with lots of tables and views. Support for TinyPoint data in GPKG. ADO.NET connections adopt to database and recognize geometry and other data types on SQL Server, Oracle, etc. MySQL connections support geometry features added in MySQL 8. Databases cooperate with the Schema dialog: allow specifying non-NULL field constraints, allow or disallow creating autogenerated fields, ask to specify whether a new geometry field will contain Z data if the database requires that info in advance, highlight indexes used as primary keys, etc.

Extended support for Unicode: New options for built-in collations. Collations specific to databases, available collations listed in the new MFD_COLLATE table. Collations based on UCA (the Unicode standard currently being adopted by many databases). Specialized picker and dialog for collations. Fail-safe loading of collations that depend on external data.

Many improvements in file / web dataports: Can both use and auto-produce during export intermediate levels stored as RRD. Many dataports no longer reorder channels for RGB data and no longer invert values in the alpha channel, putting all necessary adjustments into dynamic style data. Export to ERDAS IMG. CSV better autodetects separators and delimiters. SHP allows working with files bigger than 2 GB, exporting data larger than 2 GB creates multiple SHP files. SHP export automatically resizes text fields to factual length and writes text values as UTF8. TIFF recognizes GDAL metadata, reads mask images, reads Z offset and scale if available. New supported formats: ICO, HEIF. ArcGIS REST dataport extended to support more types of servers.

For detailed lists of changes, see documentation or threads for individual 9.0.168.x builds in the Cutting Edge forum area.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.168

adamw — Mon, 06 Aug 2018 18:37:55 GMT

A new update for Manifold System is now available.

WARNING

The update contains changes incompatible with prior updates:

Queries created in this update might not run on previous updates and vice versa, due to changes to query syntax made in order to accommodate new features.
MAP files created by this update will not load on previous updates, due to extensions to computed fields and constraints, and due to changes to rtree indexes for images.

Changes

The update includes more than a hundred of improvements and fixes, including:

The Transform Options dialog supports additional transfer rules specific to boolean, numeric integer, text and geometry fields.
The map window reports the current cursor location in a specialized status bar pane. Right-clicking the pane allows specifying the type of reported coordinates.
The map window reports the current scale in a 1:xxx or xxx:1 format in a specialized status bar pane. Right-clicking the pane allows setting the scale directly.
The map window supports the tracker tool which allows measuring distances and bearings. All measurements are done over an ellipsoid.
The table window displays tooltips for long or multiline values. Same for all dialogs and panes which display data as a grid.
Right-clicking a value of a selected record in a table window allows quickly copying the cell value to all selected records via the new Copy to Selection command (shortcut: Ctrl-F2).
Text windows support matching brackets (Ctrl-] / Ctrl-Shift-]).
The export and save dialogs confirm overwrites and offer to rename the file.
The Project pane and component windows confirm deleting data.
There is a new component type: locations. Locations store data for a specific geographic location. The map window includes means to capture the current location or to quickly go to an existing location. Locations can be copied and pasted, including between data sources. They can be edited directly, as JSON text. They can also be manipulated from queries and scripts.
Reading MAP files created by Manifold 8 reads views and converts them to locations.
There are query functions and transform templates for interpolating vector data into rasters. Supported interpolation types: gravity, kriging, kriging with median polish, triangulation, triangulation with segments. Kriging interpolation supports multiple models. Triangulation with segments supports removal of flat areas using DEST. All interpolation templates support multiple threads. All interpolation functions are noticeably faster than analogous transforms in Manifold 8, even with a single thread.
Toolbars used by component windows are cleaned up and no longer include rarely used commands like Help - About. Buttons for cursor modes are collapsed into a single button with a drop-down menu, etc.
The query engine allows defining global variables using the new VALUE statement. Global variables frequently make queries simpler and clearer. They also provide fine-grained control over the number of threads used for different parts of the query.
The query engine requires all references to function or query parameters to use @ before the parameter name. This cleanly separates artificial names used by the query from names of the actual tables and fields, and avoids a number of previous ambiguities.
The query engine allows defining an inline script using the new SCRIPT statement. Inline scripts provide a way to use script functions in a single self-contained query component.
Loading a MAP file allows expressions in computed fields and constraints to fail to load. All existing data including data in computed fields with expressions that failed to load is fully and safely accessible. Computed fields and constraints with expressions that failed to load can be safely removed.
Loading a MAP file resolves expressions in computed fields and constraints in a way that allows successfully loading expressions from cross-referencing tables.
Computed fields allow specifying one or more statements to prepare execution context for the expression which computes values. This allows expressions for computed fields to use functions and scripts. Same for constraints.
Loading add-ins ignores DLL files without an accompanying .DLL.ADDIN file. This dramatically reduces the time to initialize the main menu on configurations with lots of DLL modules, such as DLLs for database clients or scripting engines.
The Select and Transform panes specify parameter values which can be set to fields using a new parameter picker control. The control allows switching between fields of the required type, and includes options to use value or expression. Text entered for value is automatically quoted according to the value type (there is no need to type '...' for string values, no need to prefix each backslash with another backslash, etc). Text entered for expression is left intact (can freely combine field names, literals, as before).
The Select and Transform panes generate simpler code for a number of templates (collate parameters, regular expression case switches, etc).
The majority of transforms specify the 'main' transform parameter which gets auto-set to the target field.
The PostgreSQL dataport optimizes bulk inserts, deletes and updates.
The GPKG dataport optimizes bulk inserts.
The DWG dataport recognizes variants of DWG up to R2018 and can read quite a bit more data out of modern variants.
The WMS dataport supports several new types of misbehavior on the part of the servers.
The CSV dataport supports reading multiline text values, controlled via an option.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.167

adamw — Tue, 08 May 2018 16:34:29 GMT

A new update for Manifold System is now available.

The update includes more than a hundred of improvements and fixes, including:

The Help menu includes the Documentation command which opens the documentation web page. The Online Portal command in the same menu is renamed to Web Site.
Pressing F1 in a component window opens a help topic with the keyboard reference for that window. Pressing F1 in a command window chooses between the help topic for the query portion of the window and the help topic for the table portion of the window depending on the current focus.
Opening a MAP file created by Manifold 8 migrates images linked from image servers. Discontinued OSM servers are mapped to OSM base. Yahoo servers are mapped to HERE (the successor). Yandex servers are mapped to Yandex V2. Unrecognized custom servers are mapped to Bing.
Views on PostgreSQL and other databases allow specifying a field to use as identity. Doing this allows records in the view table to be selected, and, if the view supports that, edited or deleted. To specify a field to use as identity, right-click the field header and select 'Use as Identity'. The system will scan all values in the field to make sure there are no duplicates or NULLs and if the values are clean, the table will expose a BTREE index on the field. The information about the field used as identity is saved into the database, so attempting to use the table in future sessions of 9 will automatically expose a BTREE index on that field without further scans. The identity option can be cleared or moved to a different field. The view can have only one identity field specified in this way.
Dataports for PostgreSQL and other databases detect writable views and allow writes to them.
Queries representing database views report their schemas. The Project pane allows viewing the schema of such a query by right-clicking it and selecting the Schema command.
Queries for the Manifold query engine report their schemas as long as the schema of the result table can be discovered without running the query.
The New Drawing and New Image dialogs allow creating a new component based on a query, as long as the query can report its schema.
The DB2 dataport reports schemas for materialized views. The Oracle dataport treats materialized views as queries, not as tables. The PostgreSQL dataport allows accessing materialized views and reports their schemas.
The SQL Server dataport tries to resolve the SRID of geometry values in a table to the system MFD_SRID table (composed based on a SQL Server view). If the SRID cannot be resolved, it is interpreted as an EPSG code, according to the Microsoft guidelines and similar to how these codes are used in practice by Manifold 8 and other products.
Sorting records in a table window requires Ctrl-clicking the field header instead of just clicking. Shift-clicking the field header continues to add the field to the current sort order.
Rendering a label bound to an area tries to places the label into the middle of the visible portion of the area.
The advanced rendering engine supports rendering labels with shadows and halos. The basic rendering engine scales label shadows and halos during printing (were frequently invisible before).
Editing a coordinate system automatically selects the starting system in the lists of known systems and puts the parameters of the system into the controls in the Custom tab. If the starting system is not found in any list, the dialog switches to the Custom tab.
Editing a base coordinate system automatically selects the starting system in the lists of known systems and puts the parameters of the system into the controls in the Custom tab. If the starting system is not found in any list, the dialog switches to the Custom tab.
The local scales, local offsets and units of a coordinate system are separated from other parameters into the new 'Metrics' readout at the bottom of the dialog. The readout reports one value for the local scales if they coincide and two values if they don't, then values for the local offsets unless they are zero. All values are reported in the units of the coordinate system. Clicking a button to the right of the readout shows a context menu with the 'Edit Metrics' command which edits the values using a dialog.
Coordinate system metrics picker supports the new 'Use Default Metrics' command which resets metrics to the default values for the coordinate system. If coordinate system metrics are already set to the default values, the command is displayed with a check icon.
Coordinate system parameter edits support the new 'Unit Converter' command which allows converting the parameter value between units using a dialog.
Right-clicking a layer tab in a map window and selecting the new 'Zoom to Selection' command zooms the window to the selection in the specified layer. If the layer contains no selected data the command does nothing.
Attempting to center or zoom a map layer built on a query automatically computes the extents of the layer and remembers them for future use in zoom commands, until the layer is refreshed or the window is closed.
Ctrl-clicking a layer tab in a map window zooms to the layer. Ctrl-Shift-clicking a layer tab zooms to the selection in the layer.
Comments, query and script windows support the new Edit - Advanced - Make Lower Case / Make Upper Case commands. Both commands operate on the current selection. Shortcuts: Ctrl-U, Ctrl-Shift-U.
Comments, query and script windows support the new Edit - Advanced - Increase Line Indent / Decrease Line Indent commands. If the window contains no selection, the commands are applied to the current line. If the window contains a selection, it is extended to cover complete lines. Shortcuts: Ctrl-T, Ctrl-Shift-T.
Query and script windows support the new Edit - Advanced - Comment Lines / Uncomment Lines commands. If the window contains no selection, the commands are applied to the current line. If the window contains a selection, it is extended to cover complete lines. Shortcuts: Ctrl-K, Ctrl-Shift-K.
The new Edit - Merge - Merge Drawings command allows merging one or more drawings into a single component. The 'Copy all fields' option controls whether to copy fields other than geometry (on by default). Fields of the same name and type from different layers are merged together. Fields of the same name but different type are still merged together as long as field types are compatible, with the type of the resulting field being made big enough to hold all values. The 'Save source component for each record' option allows saving the name of source layer into a separate field (on by default). The 'Skip records with null geometry' option allows skipping records with null geometry values (off by default).
The new Edit - Merge - Merge Labels command allows merging one or more labels into a single component. The options are the same as for drawings, but 'Copy all fields' is off by default and 'Skip records with null geometry' is replaced with 'Skip records with null geometry or text' and is on by default.
The new Edit - Merge - Merge Images command allows merging one or more images into a single component. The new image uses the exact pixel scale specified in the coordinate system (shown in coordinate system metrics readout in the coordinate system dialog). If source images use different pixel types, the new image uses the type big enough to hold all values. In particular, if source images use different number of channels, the new image uses the maximum number of channels.
Merging data from multiple images follows Z order of layers specified in the dialog, with pixels from upper layers overwriting pixels from lower layers.
Merging data from images includes special provisions for cases where the coordinate system of the original image coincides with that of the new image up to pixel scale and only differs in offsets. In such cases, pixels in the original image are not reprojected and keep their exact values.
Merging data from images uses multiple threads if this is beneficial.
GeoJSON dataports (both file and web versions) support TopoJSON.
Reading geometry collection values automatically merges individual values of the same underlying type used in Manifold geometry (area, line or point, differences between subtypes like line and multiline are ignored) and returns the result of the merge, instead of returning the first non-empty individual value. The change applies to all formats which support geometry collection values, including WKB, GeoJSON, native geometry in database-specific formats, etc.
Reading geometry collection values with individual values of mixed underlying types automatically converts areas to lines and lines to points in order to return all coordinates. Example: reading a geometry collection with an area and several points will return a multipoint containing all coordinates of all individual values.
Reading DWG and DXF files creates a field for the block name. If an object belongs to a sequence of nested blocks, the system uses the name of the top-level block. Reading DWG files hides map layers that are marked as turned off.
Exporting a drawing to DXF, GDB, MFD, MIF, SHP or a similar format clears the values of the local offset and local shift values in the exported coordinate system and forces the axis order to XY.
There is native support for INP files (EPANET).
Exporting an image to BMP, ECW, JPEG, JPEG2K, PNG or TGA exports rendered pixel values according to formatting set in the Style pane. Exporting an image to TIFF always exports original pixel values. (Previously, exports were writing original pixel values if the file format supported the pixel type and rendered pixel values otherwise.)
The ODBC driver includes a workaround for a limitation in newer versions of QGIS and a fix for newer versions of Access.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.166

adamw — Mon, 26 Mar 2018 15:16:25 GMT

A new update for Manifold System is now available.

The update includes about a hundred of improvements and fixes, including:

The Select and Transform panes support filtering templates.
The Style pane allows specifying area size. The Record pane shows area size for areas and allows editing it if the drawing is using style overrides.
Migrating a drawing from a MAP file created by Manifold 8 translates formatting data for area sizes. Migrating a labels component bound to a drawing from a MAP file created by Manifold 8 avoids creating extra computed fields to hold label text if the labels component was using a single field with no other text.
Migrating a surface from a MAP file created by Manifold 8 translates shading options.
Migrating components from a MAP file created by Manifold 8 re-creates the folder structure.
Migrating components from a MAP file created by Manifold 8 migrates themes. The theme hierarchy is flattened with each theme converted into a drawing with formatting changes throughout the hierarchy captured.
The Record pane for a label edits label text as a regular field value in the Values tab instead of using a separate text box in the Style tab. The record header for the field displays a distinctive icon. Starting a new label or starting to edit an existing label automatically selects the value of the text field in the Values tab in the Record pane.
Pasting records between tables allows mapping fields using the new Paste dialog. By default, fields are mapped using their names and types. The default mapping for any field can be changed by editing it in the list.
Pasting records into a table avoids displaying the Paste dialog if the system thinks it succeeded at mapping all fields possible. Holding Shift while invoking the paste operation (Ctrl-Shift-V) forces the dialog to appear regardless of how successful the system thinks it has been at mapping fields.
The map window supports copying and pasting data for drawings and labels. Pasting records between drawings and labels automatically maps fields for geometry and / or text to each other.
Pasting records into a table / drawing / labels automatically converts coordinate systems for geometry fields. The conversion is performed only if both the target and source fields have a valid coordinate system (displayed in black instead of red in the coordinate system pickers, eg, in the Component pane).
New templates in the Select pane: Geoms Adjacent, Geoms Contained, Geoms Containing, Geoms Intersecting, Geoms Touching. Each template selects data in a drawing using an overlay drawing and the specified criteria. The templates are parallel. There is a live preview.
New templates in the Transform pane: Geoms Adjacent, Geoms Contained, Geoms Containing, Geoms Intersecting, Geoms Touching. The templates are similar to those in the Select pane and add the objects that would have been selected as a new component, controlling transferred fields.
Web dataports prioritize fetching tiles closer to the center of the requested area whenever possible. This produces a usable picture noticeably faster than fetching tiles in XY or YX order.
New templates in the Transform pane: Contour Lines, Contour Areas. The templates allow specifying minimum height, maximum height, height step, and produce contour lines or areas. The templates are parallel. There is a live preview. Building contours in Manifold 9 is much faster than in Manifold 8.
New template in the Transform pane: Trace Areas. The template allows specifying quantization factor and produces areas covering pixels with different values. The templates are parallel. There is a live preview. Tracing rasters in Manifold 9 is much faster than in Manifold 8.
Contour Areas and Trace Areas templates in the Transform pane include an option to decompose created areas into shapes. Decomposing areas as part of building contours / traces uses a specialized algorithm which performs much faster than the regular algorithm used in the Decompose to Shapes transform.
Creating new data source for CSV allows forcing all fields to text, specifying whether the first line contains field names, specifying characters used for list delimiter, decimal separator and text qualifier. The defaults for all options are to autodetect their values from file content. It is possible to keep some options on autodetect and set other options to explicit values.
Reading a DWG or DXF file better handles block inserts and performs faster.
Exporting a drawing to a DXF file exports areas as hatches instead of exporting area boundaries as lines. Importing a DXF file reads hatches back as areas.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 9.0.165

adamw — Wed, 31 Jan 2018 14:47:45 GMT

A new update for Manifold System is now available.

The update includes about a hundred of improvements and fixes, including:

The new File - Print Preview command creates a virtual layout component for the current component that can be adjusted as needed and printed. The Edit - Save as Layout command allows saving virtual layout as a regular, persistent component for future use.
The map window allows inserting labels using visual tools similar to those used for drawings.
The map window allows selecting labels using visual tools and using Edit - Select All / Inverse / None commands.
Alt-clicking an existing label in a map puts it into the Record pane for editing. The Record pane allows easy access to label text as well as formatting.
The map window allows using the Select and Transform panes with labels and previews the results of their actions. The Transform pane automatically selects the field containing label text.
The table window uses the Layers pane to show, hide, reorder and resize fields. Same for command windows and for windows showing tables produced by queries. Last used field layout for a persistent table component is automatically saved in the table properties.
Right-clicking in the map window no longer commits changes to the currently edited record and instead displays a context menu with the choice between Cancel Changes and Commit Changes.
The Style pane allows formatting images. Formatting images uses faster and more precise statistics. There are protections from downloading too much data when computing statistics for web images. Multi-channel formatting is streamlined with means to set ranges for more than one channel at once, etc. Single-channel formatting is extended to use all classification methods available for vector data (such as 'equal count' or 'natural breaks') on pixel values.
The Style pane includes the new Options tab with controls for per-record styles (style overrides) and image shading.
There is a new dataport for GEOJSON files and a separate dataport for GEOJSON web servers. There is an export to GEOJSON which exports drawings.
There is an export to GDB which exports tables, drawings and maps. (Warning: attempting to export to an existing geodatabase will overwrite it. To add data to an existing geodatabase, link it to the project and then transfer data using copy and paste or using SQL.)
The Contents pane is reworked to use less vertical space for pane captions. Individual panes within the Contents pane are accessed using a drop-down menu or using Ctrl-1/2/3/4/5/6 keyboard shortcuts.
Opening a MAP file created by Manifold 8 translates formatting data for drawings and labels.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Release 9 Licenses Now Available

adamw — Sat, 30 Dec 2017 13:09:13 GMT

Manifold is pleased to announce immediate availability of Release 9 licenses, as well as a transition from Manifold Future to Manifold Release 9 builds.

Previous announcements discussed how the next generation of Manifold GIS products would be introduced using a series of open beta builds called Manifold Future. Any Radian licensee could use Manifold Future with their Radian serial number, at least until Release 9 was issued. During the Manifold Future process, the Manifold community has guided the expansion of a DBMS-centric spatial engineering tool, Radian Studio, into a more GIS-oriented Release 9.

Manifold Future builds have added hundreds of new features and improvements, including numerous GIS features and capabilities not found in the August Radian Studio product. As a much larger superset of Radian Studio, Manifold Future builds have effectively replaced Radian Studio for most Radian users. It is far beyond the very DBMS-centric tool of August, 2017.

The .164 update, therefore, marks the boundary between Manifold Future / Radian Studio and Release 9. All builds from .164 onward are Release 9. Effective immediately, Radian Studio has been replaced by Manifold Release 9 in Manifold's product offerings. Installing Release 9 from an installation .exe will uninstall a prior Radian Studio installation.

During the Future process, Manifold has received numerous requests to offer licenses that would enable Future builds to run and that also would authorize Release 9 when Release 9 is published. Many Radian users have expressed a desire to transition to Release 9 as soon as possible, since they have no intention of stepping back to the August, Radian Studio product when 9 is published.

Large institutional customers also have "use it or lose it" budget issues for calendar 2017 to procure Release 9 licenses this year. Manifold feels it is only fair to make 9 licenses available now to all users, and not just to institutional users for bulk purchases.

Pricing

Effective immediately Release 9 Universal licenses can be procured on the Online Store or through pre-pay bulk purchases at a special offer price of $345 per license, a $250 savings against the regular Universal price of $595.

All Radian Studio licensees can trade in their existing Radian Studio license for a Release 9 Universal license for a total price of only $125, saving $470 off the regular Universal price of $595. All Radian Studio licensees who procured their license within 30 days of the upgrade order will get an additional $50 off for a total price of only $75.

The Release 9 licenses available now are full, Universal edition Release 9 licenses that will activate any Release 9 installation to Universal level from now forever into the future, including all pre-release builds for 9, all Cutting Edge builds for 9 and all official production builds for 9. They are not time limited but are full, Release 9 licenses at Universal edition level.

As the 9 product line evolves into multiple editions we expect Universal Edition to be the highest level except for specialized configurations designed for large organizations that will be operating many computers at once. When Release 9 introduces an IMS, for example, that will be included in the Universal level license available today. As with prior Manifold GIS products, we anticipate introducing editions below Universal level for Release 9 as well.

Questions and Answers

When? - Immediately. As of 30 December, 2017, Release 9 has been published as an official "pre-release" build in .exe installable form and portable installations.

What? - Release 9 will be available in two forms, as an official build in .exe / portable form, and as a series of Release 9 Edge builds published two or three times a week. Release 9 Edge is the name for Cutting Edge builds.

Price? - Special offer price of $345 for Release 9 Universal through 31 January 2018, with a special offer for Radian Studio licensees to acquire Release 9 for $125 up through 31 January 2018.

What happens to Radian Studio? - Radian Studio configurations are no longer offered for sale. For new licenses, buy Release 9 instead, since it is a superset.

What happens to my Radian Studio license? - As was promised in the Transition to Manifold Future Editions announcement, Radian Studio licenses will continue to function with no need to upgrade to Release 9 if not desired. Radian Studio licensees can continue to use the officially published, August 2017, Radian Studio product if they desire with no requirement to upgrade to Release 9. However, all Radian Studio licensees are strongly recommended to upgrade to Release 9 licenses. The August announcement forecast an upgrade fee range of $100 to $300. The upgrade has deliberately been priced at the extreme low end of that range to encourage upgrades.

How long do I have to upgrade my Radian Studio license? - The special offer to upgrade for $125 expires midnight, 31 January 2018. Upgrades may be available after that, but if so they will be priced significantly higher.

What happens to Future? - All existing Manifold Future builds will time out no later than 31 January 2018. The .164 Release 9 build and all Release 9 Edge builds and subsequent 9 builds will require a Release 9 license.

When is the official build of Release 9 expected? - January, 2018.

How about Viewer? - Viewer will continue as before, now tracking Release 9. The official build of Viewer moves to .164 along with Release 9, and the Cutting Edge equivalent, Viewer Edge, will continue to track Release 9 Edge. It will continue to be free.

What is the difference between the "pre-release" 9 build today and the official 9 build? - For experienced Manifold users, the difference is lower price. At the current rate of two or three Edge builds a week, no matter what build was chosen as the "official" build it would be obsolete after a week or two of Release 9 Edge builds.

The main difference between an "official" build and a Release 9 Edge build is that official builds draw a firm line at a given build configuration that can be used as a reference point going forward, especially for large organizations that want to control what configurations are deployed by their personnel. Official builds are fully self-installing .exe configurations while Release 9 Edge builds are all portable installations.

It makes sense to issue an official build just before a series of Edge builds make big additions. The .164 configuration is a perfect time for that given the numerous additions on deck for merger between now and the end of January. Toward the end of January the cumulative, synergistic effect of those new capabilities will mark a clear line between what we consider the first, pre-release 9 product and the first official 9 product.

I want more features. Is development continuing? - Yes. We expect to continue at the current rapid pace well into 2018. Responding to user complaints that two or three Edge builds a week are too much, after January, 2018, we expect to reduce Edge builds to once a week or so, but with no reduction in the number of improvements per month.

What is planned for 9 in the near future? - Numerous expansions in interactive GIS use, cartography and presentation, along with the usual numerous improvements and additions in infrastructure and technical capabilities. See the discussion in the FAQ.

Why should I buy 9 now instead of waiting until January? - There are three reasons:

Better price.
Access to new 9 capabilities. Release 9 pre-release, followed by a rapid pace of Release 9 Edge builds introduce numerous features which require a 9 license. Although Manifold Future at the .163 level will continue to run, that is already seriously obsolete given .164 and subsequent.
Participate in the community driven process. As infrastructure is switched on the form of numerous controls, features and options will be guided in near real-time by the community. Edge builds allow rapid response. A 9 license makes you part of that community driven process.

Are there any special offers for Release 8 licensees who did not participate in Radian? - Not at the present time. The path to early access to 9 (via Future builds) was through Radian Studio, so there are special deals for Radian participants. The best strategy for Release 8 licensees who did not participate in Radian is to take advantage of the special offer on 9 that is available now.

Will Radian Studio return as a DBMS only product? - We have no plans for that.

Transition to Manifold Future Editions

adamw — Wed, 16 Aug 2017 15:21:44 GMT

The .163 update for Radian Studio and Viewer marks the boundary between Radian Studio and the transition to GIS-oriented Cutting Edge builds.

Previous announcements in the forum have discussed how future Manifold GIS products will be based on Radian as a superset of Radian Studio. Using the same Radian platform for new GIS products provides many advantages, such as fast and durable formats, shared localization files, and massively reliable, proven, spatial SQL.

Evolution based on Radian also allows a better transition to the new generation of GIS products, by continuing the same Cutting Edge process that has worked so well with Radian Studio.

Cutting Edge builds from now on will introduce a few GIS-oriented features with each build. Changes at first will seem minor. They will rapidly accumulate to transform the current DBMS-centric tool into the next generation of Manifold GIS.

A public transition using Cutting Edge builds has several advantages:

It becomes a large, open beta program in which anyone can participate, either via a Radian license or by using a free Viewer download. That will provide more feedback from a wider audience than a closed beta program.
Users can immediately put new features and product enhancements to work on the job as soon as they appear. Radian technology is so reliable we believe that the addition of GIS capabilities such as editing tools will not risk data integrity or system reliability.
It allows anyone at any time to see what is going on with no need to qualify for advance disclosure or confidential engineering programs.
It will allow any Radian user to continue with the current Radian Studio product while experiencing the GIS product. Users can decide as they judge best if an upgrade to the GIS is right for them.
Until the new GIS product is officially published, Radian licensees can experience the new product at zero extra cost.

Questions and Answers

When? - On 21 August, the next Cutting Edge build will be the first to include new features beginning the transition to GIS. 21 August is also the date of the great total eclipse of the Sun that will cross the entire United States.

What? - Cutting Edge builds from 21 August will be named "Manifold Future" builds and will continue the build numbering sequence from Radian.

How Long? - Numerous features are ready to be merged into builds, to be issued in sequence rapidly at a steady pace. At some time in the weeks ahead a critical mass of features will accumulate to where suddenly all will agree the product has become a profoundly powerful GIS. Participate in the Cutting Edge process and you will be the first to know when that happens.

Licensing? - Manifold Future builds will require a Radian license to function. Until the final product is published, from an activation perspective the new builds will be just another Cutting Edge build like all previous Radian builds. They can be installed and used side-by-side with existing Radian, Viewer and Release 8.00 installations.

What happens when the next Manifold GIS is published? - Manifold Future builds released through the Cutting Edge process will time out. When the next Manifold GIS product is published for sale, Radian licensees will have an option, for a fee, to upgrade to that next Manifold GIS product. If they choose not to upgrade they can continue using their existing Radian license with Radian Studio as it is today.

What will the upgrade fee be? - We do not know, as that will depend upon what product configurations will be introduced. In the past such upgrades have been in the $100 to $300 range, depending on product options selected.

Will Radian Studio builds continue to be released? - Not while the Manifold Future campaign runs. All bug fixes, enhancements and new features will appear in Manifold Future builds. Any Radian licensee can use those builds with their existing Radian license. During the campaign it is inefficient to maintain two build streams so only the Manifold Future stream will be published. At the end of the process the new product can be trimmed to produce a Radian Studio subset for those who do not want to upgrade to the GIS superset.

Will Manifold continue to offer Radian Studio after the next generation of Manifold GIS is released? - We do not know, as that depends upon future product evolution. It could be that a completely new constellation of products will be introduced as a result of user feedback, changing options for both Radian Studio and the GIS. Participate in the process and you can help guide the outcome.

If I am a DBMS person and I like Radian as is will I be forced to upgrade to the new GIS? - No. Nothing about your current license to use Radian will change. You will be able to continue using Radian and activation servers will continue to support your Radian licenses.

How about Viewer? - Viewer will continue tracking Cutting Edge builds. As Manifold Future builds appear in the Cutting Edge program, Viewer builds will incorporate Manifold Future features. Viewer will provide a way for people who are not Radian licensees to participate in the Manifold Future Cutting Edge process. When the next generation of Manifold GIS is published, Viewer will continue to be available at no charge.

Radian Studio 9.0.163

adamw — Wed, 16 Aug 2017 14:57:43 GMT

A new update for Radian Studio is now available.

The update adds a new rendering engine with support for antialiasing and hardware acceleration, several significant performance improvements to the query engine, new geometry and script functions, and many improvements and fixes in other areas.

Changes

344. There is a new rendering engine that supports advanced rendering features like antialiasing and can offload a lot of rendering tasks to GPU. The options dialog allows switching the rendering engine choosing between:

Basic, software - rendering engine of 9.0.162 and below, uses software rendering, does not support antialiasing and other advanced features;
Advanced, software - new rendering engine, GPU is only used for the most basic tasks like those in 'Basic, software', supports antialiasing;
Advanced, hardware acceleration allowed - new rendering engine, GPU is used whenever it makes sense to use it, supports antialiasing.

The default choice is 'Advanced, hardware acceleration allowed'. The 'Advanded, software' choice is intended to be used to work around a temporary issue with the video driver, or for specialized scenarios like programmatic rendering or use under Terminal Services (Remote Desktop). Switching the rendering engine does not require restarting the application, but current rendering tasks will complete using former settings.

345. The advanced rendering engine optimizes rendering antialiased text.

346. The advanced rendering engine improves quality of joins of antialiased lines.

347. Labels for line objects are automatically rotated.

348. Labels overlapping other labels are automatically skipped.

349. (Fix) Panning or zooming a map with one or more layers referring to an invalid component no longer sometimes leaves rendering artifacts in background.

350. Rendering a map with multiple layers performs faster.

351. Resolving overlaps between many labels uses new algorithms and performs significantly faster.

352. Exporting data to any format displays progress and allows canceling.

353. Data sources for databases like SQL Server or Oracle can be refreshed by right-clicking the data source component in the Project menu and invoking Refresh. Refreshing a data source automatically rebuilds virtual components for drawings and images, virtual tables exposing coordinate system info, etc.

354. Small versions of the query builder in dialogs like Select and Transform hide items for aggregate functions.

355. Applying a filter in a query builder list keeps items below those that match the filter. (Setting filter to 'SELECT' will keep the items below 'SELECT ...'.)

356. Applying a component type filter in the Project pane changes the filter button to indicate that the list of components is filtered.

357. The component type filter in the Project pane allows showing only data sources.

358. The controls in the Project pane are slightly repositioned to avoid putting context menus into a monitor to the right of the Project pane, if there is one.

359. Scrolling a window using a scrollbar moves keyboard focus to the window.

360. The recent file list is limited to 32 items.

361. (Fix) The table window no longer sometimes paints field names in the header in gray.

362. Dragging and dropping components in the Project pane always moves data within the same data source and always copies data across different data sources. The '+' sign in the copy cursor has been made larger.

363. (Fix) The Transform dialog adjusts types of indexes for tables created by union and update topology overlays to allow nulls.

364. (Fix) Deleting records from a btree index in a MAP file no longer sometimes breaks the index. (The failure was found during stress testing. It could only happen under very rare circumstances and should nearly always manifest itself with the 'Can't delete record' error.)

365. Tables in MAP files detect inconsistencies in index data and report broken indexes in the log. In addition, affected indexes are made read-only. Table data can be safely copied to another table. Deleting affected indexes is also safe, although not all space originally used by index data might be reclaimed.

366. New query function: GeomSplitToConvex - takes an area geom and decomposes it into convex parts. The function uses a new algorithm, which is significantly faster than in Manifold 8. The function is also much more robust and can handle geometry that the previous algorithm couldn't. New transform: Decompose to Convex Parts.

367. New query function: GeomSplitToConvexPar - a parallel version of GeomSplitToConvex. The Transform dialog invokes the parallel function if parallel execution is allowed.

368. Joins exposing btree indexes detect more cases where duplicates are made impossible by conditions applied on top of joins, and keep indexes unique instead of converting them into indexes with duplicates.

369. (Fix) Outer joins no longer sometimes misapply conditions in WHERE applying to individual tables.

370. (Fix) Outer joins no longer sometimes misapply constant conditions evaluating to FALSE in the scope of a join.

371. Joins and WHERE filters optimize the IN construct for fields used in btree indexes: <field> IN (<value>, <value>, ...). Any btree index type is allowed. A btree index with multiple fields will optimize IN with the first field.

372. (Fix) The IN construct used to match a NULL value against an empty table correctly returns FALSE instead of NULL.

373. (Fix) The IN construct used to match a non-NULL value against a list of values or a table that contain no matches, but contain NULLs, correctly returns NULL instead of FALSE.

374. The IN construct used with tables can use any type of btree index and can use a btree index for part of matched values. (Previously, only a btree index on a single field with no duplicates or nulls could be used.)

375. The IN construct used to match a value against a list of values fails if the values in the list are of different types.

376. (Fix) The query engine no longer sometimes fails to compile queries with nested joins and complex conditions due to unresolved field names.

377. The query engine optimizes joins with '=' join conditions and indexed fields (btree) on both sides using merge scans. This provides significant performance benefits. Indexes on fields may allow duplicates or nulls, the join criteria may use only a subset of index fields (starting with the first). Comparison options on text fields have to coincide.

378. (Fix) The query engine no longer fails to use spatial indexes for SELECT INTO and some other operations.

379. The query engine is better at optimizing query plans when there are multiple alternatives.

380. The query engine is significantly better at optimizing filter criteria in nested joins.

381. (Fix) WHERE filters and joins on indexed text fields no longer sometimes fail to account for comparison options such as NOCASE, and return less data than they should.

382. The type for a new index in CREATE / ALTER statements is no longer optional. (It was optional with a silent default of BTREE. We found that too confusing.)

383. The query engine can cancel queries in the middle of evaluating WHERE or JOIN.

384. Changed script functions: the parameters in Application.CreatePointObj, Application.CreatePoint3Obj, Application.CreatePoint4Obj have been made optional to allow COM clients creating point objects with default coordinates, similarly to .NET clients.

385. New script function: Database.CanMigrate - checks if the database supports migrating data from Enterprise storages.

386. New script function: Database.CanRefresh - checks if the database supports refreshing components.

387. New script function: Database.IsMigrateNeeded - checks if the database contains an Enterprise storage with changes that have not yet been migrated.

388. New script function: Database.IsReadOnly - checks if the database is read-only.

389. New script function: Database.Migrate - migrates an Enterprise storage contained in the database or changes to that storage, if it has already been migrated.

390. New script function: Database.Refresh - refreshes components in the database.

391. Converting coordinate system data to PRJ has been extended and improved. Exporting a SHP file writes coordinate system data as PRJ.

392. Importing or linking a ERS file or an ECW file recognizes many coordinate systems that were previously unrecognized.

393. (Fix) Exporting boolean values to a CSV file puts them in quotes.

394. (Fix) Exporting a table with binary / geometry / tile fields to a CSV file no longer sometimes mislabels (other) fields.

395. Exporting a table to a CSV file exports xN and UUID values.

396. Exporting text values to a CSV file replaces line breaks with spaces to make sure exported data can be imported by as many products as possible.

397. Schemas for views on SQL Server, PostgreSQL and other databases are extended to include a spatial index on each geometry field. This allows drawings created on these views to use existing spatial indexes if the view preserves them.

398. The SQLITE dataport automatically chooses between Spatialite and ESRI's STGEOMETRY extension based on spatial data in the database. (These extensions cannot co-exist and cannot handle each other's data.)

399. The SQLITE dataport supports adding geometry fields for ESRI's STGEOMETRY extension.

400. (Fix) The MySQL dataport no longer sometimes fails due to wrong cursor type.

401. The MySQL dataport requires the version of the client library to be at least 5.1. Older client libraries cannot be used due to incompatible changes to the MySQL ABI.

402. The NC dataport (NetCDF) recognizes 'latitude' and 'longitude' variable names and interprets them similarly to 'lat' and 'lon'.

403. (Fix) Exporting a BIL file or a FLT file forces pixel scale values to be non-negative.

404. The SQLite dataport can read compressed metric created by SpatiaLite without SpatiaLite.

405. The SQLite dataport can read geometry (without indexes) without any spatial extensions.

406. (Fix) The MIF dataport no longer sometimes misreads numeric data from MID files if system locale is non-English.

407. (Fix) The MIF dataport no longer sometimes (rarely) misreads data due to the incorrect default value for the delimiter (comma instead of tab).

408. Connecting to an MDB / ACCDB / XLS or similar file automatically uses Access Database Engine for Office 2016, if it is available.

409. The GPKG dataport detects an attempt to insert a second geometry field into a table and fails it early (the operation cannot succeed).

410. (Fix) Inserting or deleting drawings in GPKG no longer sometimes fails to refresh the Project pane.

411. Dataports creating virtual components no longer override names of existing components.

412. The GCDB dataport reports supported geocoding functions via the 'API' comments component.

413. (Fix) Database dataports correctly handle mfd_meta tables with fixed-width fields created by Manifold 8.

414. Database dataports automatically adjust object names in mfd_meta to include schema names, to help Manifold 8.

415. (Fix) Database dataports correctly handle schema names with backslashes (frequently found when schema names coincide with names of Windows users, as is common practice on SQL Server).

416. The dataport for personal ESRI geodatabases allows renaming or deleting drawings.

417. The dataport for Enterprise storages merges storages from different database schemas together.

418. The ArcGIS REST dataport supports the EXPORT service, which is the default service supported by all ArcGIS REST servers that expose maps. If the server implements the TILEINFO service, the dataport uses TILEINFO (because it is faster), otherwise it uses EXPORT.

419. The ArcGIS REST dataport exposes an image for each layer in a multi-layer server, in addition to the image for all layers (with visibility and styles being set to the defaults provided by the server).

420. The WMS, WMTS and similar dataports work around issues with old-style servers that do not properly decode space characters in URL parameters.

421. The WMTS dataport tries to re-create the bounding box of a layer for which it is not provided from an approximate bounding box in the default coordinate system, if it is provided.

422. (Fix) Attempting to export a TIFF file no longer fails to switch to BigTIFF if the image is bigger than 4 GB.

423. (Fix) Exporting a TIFF file no longer sometimes fails to recover from a failure and shuts down the application.

424. (Fix) Exporting a PNG file no longer sometimes fails to recover from a failure and shuts down the application.

425. (Fix) Exporting a BIL file with INT16U pixel values no longer fails.

426. The .PSV file extension is mapped to the CSV dataport. (Importing or linking a .PSV file using the 'All Files' filter will automatically choose the CSV dataport.)

427. Connecting to databases with lots of virtual components performs faster.

428. (Fix) Exporting an image no longer sometimes moves the progress bar too fast.

429. (Fix) Reading data from a GDB no longer sometimes misreads date values, producing errors on copy and paste.

430. The CTG (LULC) dataport is adjusted to accept no-extension files and autodetect no-extension files that are CTG (LULC) when they are linked or imported using 'All Files'.

431. (Fix) Attempting to import or link a SPOT file no longer sometimes fails because the dataport tries to locate a file in the wrong folder.

432. The DEM (USGS) dataport interprets pixel values lower than -32767 as missing to correct a common error in software that produces DEM files.

433. (Fix) The DEM (USGS) dataport no longer rounds pixel values unnecessarily when there is fractional scale.

434. Database dataports optimize reading metadata for SDE components to help slow database connections.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold Viewer Now Available

adamw — Wed, 28 Jun 2017 06:49:13 GMT

Manifold is pleased to announce the release of Manifold Viewer, a new product that is delivered free of charge. See the Manifold Viewer page for information and links to the downloads page for Viewer.

About Manifold Viewer

Manifold Viewer is based on the same Radian engine as Radian Studio. Manifold Viewer is a read-only subset of Radian Studio, Manifold's new spatial engineering environment that blends geospatial and traditional data capabilities within a single, all-inclusive product. Viewer is not demo ware or a trial edition but a standalone product aimed at viewing that provides massively useful capabilities for free.

Although Viewer cannot write projects or save edited data back out to the original data sources, Viewer provides phenomenal capability to view and to analyze almost all possible different types of data in tables, vector geometry, raster data, drawings, maps and images from thousands of different sources. Viewer can open multiple sources at once to blend, extract, transform, analyze, validate, visualize and explore data. Viewer retains many of Radian's abilities to transform data and combine it with other data sets for visualization. Manifold Viewer is built on the Radian engine so Viewer retains Radian parallel CPU speed and Radian parallel SQL.

Limitations

Manifold Viewer is a subset of Radian Studio: Viewer is view-only / read-only, Viewer cannot save projects, cannot export data to any format or link data sources in read/write mode. Viewer can display, but not edit, files such as shapefiles. Viewer can browse and analyze, but not modify, databases. Viewer provides fully CPU parallel SQL, but it does not use GPU.

Summary of limitations compared to Radian Studio:

View only / Read only.
No saves of projects.
No exports to any format.
No ODBC driver to use Viewer from external applications.
No scripting and no add-ins.
No GPU parallelism.
No technical support.

Updates

Viewer is built on Radian so improvements to Radian, like new formats, will improve Viewer. As Radian is updated, Viewer will automatically be updated as well.

Applications

Viewer can open all data sources that Radian can, so Viewer will provide general-purpose database, GIS, web server and image server, large imagery and spatial data browsing. Viewer can open and work with Radian format .map files as fast as Radian Studio.

Radian users can publish huge data in astonishingly fast Radian format that Viewer will instantly pop open for anyone. Viewer delivers amazing performance and outstanding usefulness for anyone working with GIS, spatial data, enterprise DBMS or just wanting to connect to the world of rich data around us.

Enjoy!

Radian Studio 9.0.162

adamw — Wed, 28 Jun 2017 06:37:47 GMT

A new update for Radian Studio is now available.

The update adds support for LIDAR data (LAS and LAZ), parallel triangulation and Voronoi diagrams, and many improvements to the UI including reworked dialogs for creating new components and the info tool (Record Values). The object model has been extended to expose all its features to COM languages such as VBScript. The documentation for the object model has also been extended and now includes many examples in VBScript and in IronPython.

The installation packages are now EXE instead of MSI and include all pre-requisites with the exception of .NET.

Changes

251. There is a new LAS dataport for LIDAR data sets. The dataport exposes LAS data as a table with the fields set up according to the LAS record type used in the file.

252. The LAS dataport can work with LAZ files, which are a compressed version of LAS files.

253. The LAS dataport analyzes the layout of LAZ files and caches uncompressed data accordingly. This significantly improves performance.

254. The LAS dataport parses coordinate system info from GeoTIFF tags (a variant of storing coordinate system info for LAS files).

255. The LAS dataport exposes classification table stored in the data set, if it is available.

256. The LAS dataport exposes extra fields added via variable-length records.

257. The LAS dataport can export table data as a LAS or LAZ file. Record type is deduced automatically from the supplied fields.

258. The 000 dataport (S-57) supports ISO 8859-1 and ISO 10646 string values.

259. (Fix) The WFS dataport no longer requires the metadata for each layer to provide an URL for the GetFeature command (the standard allows specifying the default URL, the dataport now uses it correctly).

260. The MFD, MIF and TAB dataports no longer sometimes fail to return data without .MAPCACHE.

261. (Fix) Attempting to perform a compacting save on a SHP file in the same location no longer fails.

262. Parsing a coordinate system from WKT recognizes additional WKT sequences (FITTED_CS, etc).

263. The query builder shows syntax for joins.

264. Dropping a layer with data into a map window with an empty map (either with no layers or with layers that are all empty) automatically zooms the window to the extent ot the new layer.

265. (Fix) Traversing a BTREEDUP or BTREEDUPNULL index in a MAP file in the order of decreasing keys no longer sometimes skips the initial key value.

266. (Fix) Double-clicking an error in a script window scrolls the script text to the error location.

267. The table window shows boolean values as 'true' and 'false', the same format as accepted on input.

268. The query engine allows converting boolean values to numeric values and back via CAST.

269. The table window shows xN values with square brackets. Editing an xN value accepts them either with or without square brackets.

270. The table window can copy and paste individual values to the clipboard, via right-click menu. Attempting to copy or paste a value from the record that is being edited works with the values that have not yet been sent to the table. Attempting to paste a value into a record that is not being edited changes the record without putting it into the edit mode (and cancels all pending edits to other records if there are any).

271. The Set to NULL command used to clear the value of the edited record in the table window is renamed to Delete and can be used with records that are not being edited. Attempting to delete the value in a record that is not being edited changes the record without putting it into the edit mode.

272. Copying a table value into the clipboard allows pasting it as text into other applications (useful for viewing long strings). Pasting a table value from the clipboard accepts text copied from other applications.

273. GeomOverlayXxxPar and GeomOverlayTopologyXxxPar query functions no longer take the number of threads as a numeric value and instead take a JSON string with the description of a thread configuration. The number of threads is encoded in JSON as "threads". There is a new query function named ThreadConfig that takes a number of threads and returns the JSON string with the thread configuration.

274. New query functions: GeomTriangulatePar and GeomTriangulateLinesPar, parallel versions of triangulation functions. The functions have the same parameters as their non-parallel versions plus an additional string parameter for the thread configuration. Accepted values in the thread configuration are: "threads" - desired number of threads, the default is 1; "batch" - minimum number of coordinates to allocate for a thread, the default is 1000.

275. New query functions: GeomVoronoiPar, GeomVoronoiLinesPar, GeomVoronoiPointsPar, parallel versions of functions building a Voronoi diagram. The functions have the same parameters as their non-parallel versions plus an additional string parameter for the thread configuration. Accepted values in the thread configuration are the same as for parallel triangulation.

276. The Transform dialog uses parallel versions of triangulation and Voronoi functions as long as the 'Allow using multiple threads' option is turned on.

277. The Delete command in the layer context menu is renamed to Delete from Map.

278. The Toggle command in the layer context menu is renamed to Visible and has a checkmark indicating whether the layer is shown or hidden.

279. The layer context menu includes the Open Table command to open the table with the layer data.

280. (Fix) Map window no longer sometimes continuously blinks in the presence of layers referring to non-existing tables or fields.

281. (Fix) Attempting to update a batch of records in a MAP file table disallows altering values of the key fields for the index used to update.

282. GeomTriangulateXxx functions can use multiple threads when triangulating lines or areas (constrained triangulation), and perform significantly faster even with a single thread. Triangulating an area only keeps the triangles inside the area (to get the previous behavior, which was to keep all triangles in the convex hull, convert the area to a line prior to performing the triangulation).

283. New Transform dialog template: Decompose to Triangles - decomposes areas to triangles.

284. The new Edit - Export Results command allows exporting the results of a query. (For example, this command can be used to export a subset of a LAS file as a new LAS file.)

285. The New Xxx dialogs used to create new components no longer show target folder path and no longer include means to specify description. If a new component is created in the context of the root MAP file, the data source path is hidden as well, otherwise the dialog shows the info regarding the target data source in a special area at the top. The OK buttons are renamed to Create <component type>, made larger and moved to the left, similarly to Transform, Select and other dialogs.

286. The New Xxx dialogs used to create new components include the Edit Query button. The button generates the query for the dialog actions without performing these actions.

287. The New Xxx dialogs used to create new components check names of components and fields prior to performing any operations, to fail early instead of mid-way through a create sequence.

288. The New Table dialog edits table schema using the standard Edit Schema dialog. If the target data source is not a MAP file, the dialog sets initial table schema to use an INT32 ID field (instead of an INT64 MFD_ID field) and a BTREE index on that field.

289. The New Drawing dialog is reworked to ask for the name and type of the geometry field, the coordinate system, and whether or not to create a spatial index. If the target data source is not a MAP file, the identity field is an INT32 field named ID, similarly to New Table.

290. The New Drawing dialog allows creating a drawing based on an existing table and geometry field. If the specified geometry field does not have an associated spatial index, the dialog suggests creating one. The coordinate system associated with the field can be edited.

291. The New Image dialog is reworked to ask for the names and types of the X and Y fields, the name, pixel type and size of the tile field, the coordinate system, the initial rectangle of the image and whether or not to create a spatial index. If the target data source is not a MAP file, the identity field is an INT32 field named ID, similarly to New Table.

292. The New Image dialog allows creating an image based on an existing table and tile / X / Y fields. If the specified combination of fields does not have an associated spatial index, the dialog suggests creating one (an RTREE index on X-Y-tile fields is used for MAP files, a BTREE index on X-Y fields for all other data sources). The coordinate system associated with the tile field can be edited. Using the same field for X and Y is disallowed.

293. The New Image dialog allows creating an image based on an existing image, adjusting its bounds. The new image uses the exact same fields and indexes as the original image. If the original image uses a level field, the dialog shows its name and type.

294. The New Image dialog verifies the bounds of the new image to be valid.

295. The New Labels dialog is reworked to ask for the name and type of the display field, and the coordinate system. The created drawing uses a GEOM field and includes a spatial index. If the target data source is not a MAP file, the identity field is an INT32 field named ID, similarly to New Table.

296. The New Labels dialog allows creating a labels component based on an existing drawing.

297. Invoking the New Drawing dialog from the Project pane via right-clicking a table automatically selects the clicked component in the dialog. Right-clicking a drawing or labels automatically selects the producing table as long as it is in the same data source.

298. Invoking the New Image dialog from the Project pane via right-clicking a table or an image automatically selects the clicked component in the dialog.

299. Invoking the New Labels dialog from the Project pane via right-clicking a drawing automatically selects the clicked component in the dialog. Right-clicking a labels component automatically selects the producing drawing as long as it is in the same data source.

300. The names for new components suggested by the New Xxx dialogs are cleaned up from component type postfixes and short numeric postfixes like '2' in 'Labels 2'.

301. (Fix) Connecting to a data source set to use a temporary .MAPCACHE file no longer reports that cache is going to be rebuilt.

302. Localized strings may include '{productname}' escape sequence that expands to product name.

303. Product icon includes hi-res versions with true transparency.

304. Installation packages include Visual C++ runtime modules. Installation packages are now EXE instead of MSI.

305. The About dialog reports the name of the available GPGPU device, if there is only one.

306. The About dialog checks for latest available version of the product. The check is performed in background, the dialog can be closed without it completing. The Help - Check for Updates command is removed.

307. Alt-clicking a drawing object in a map window displays field values for the object record in the new Record Values dialog. Alt-clicking a different object updates the dialog.

308. Alt-clicking an image tile in a map window displays field values for the tile record in the Record Values dialog.

309. The Record Values dialog highlights context object or tile in the map window.

310. The Record Values dialog automatically adjusts the width of the column with the field names. The column uses between 20% and 40% of the total list width.

311. (Fix) Updating a record in a MAP file table by setting the values of the MFD_ID field and one or more other fields simultaneously no longer sometimes fails.

312. (Fix) Switching the component type filter or sort order in the Project pane no longer sometimes crashes.

313. (Fix) Building a triangulation or a Voronoi diagram using multiple threads no longer sometimes produces no result due to a misallocation of work between threads.

314. The TileBuilder object supports IDisposable to allow extending it to contain resources that have to be disposed of explicitly in the future.

315. (Fix) The collections exposed by the Schema object have non-generic names, complying with the documentation.

316. The ExpressionParser.CreateExpression script function has a variant that does not take expression parameters.

317. The Expression.Evaluate script function has a variant that does not take expression parameters.

318. Renamed script function: TypeConverter.GetType is renamed to TypeConverter.GetTypeClr.

319. Renamed script function: TypeConverter.GetTypeName is renamed to TypeConverter.GetTypeManifold.

320. Changed script function: Curve.Type now returns a string instead of an integer value.

321. Changed script function: Geom.Type now returns a string instead of an integer value. GeomBuilder.StartGeom now accepts the type of a new geom value as a string as well.

322. New script function: Tile.TypeClr returns pixel type as a .NET type object.

323. Changed script function: TileBuilder.StartTile now accepts pixel type as either the name of a Manifold type or as a .NET type object.

324. Changed script function: Value.Type now returns the name of a Manifold type. Value.TypeClr returns a .NET type object.

325. New script function: Schema.Field.TypeClr sets or returns field type as a .NET type object.

326. New script function: Schema.IndexField.TileTypeClr sets or returns pixel type accepted for a tile field as a .NET type object.

327. Renamed script function: the variant of TileBuilder.StartTile that takes an existing tile object is renamed to TileBuilder.StartTileCopy.

328. New script function: ValueSet.GetValueNames returns the names of all values as a string array (which can then be passed to one of the Table.SearchXxx functions).

329. Script functions working with .NET type objects are made unavailable for COM languages. (After the additions above this no longer harms functionality, because for each function taking a .NET type there is now a function taking the name of a Manifold type.)

330. Script functions that have multiple variants can be used from COM languages. (Previously in these cases all but one variants were getting renamed, and the writer of a script in a COM language had to guess the name of the variant he needs. Eg, instead of ValueSet.AddValue, one had to call ValueSet.AddValue_2.)

331. Script functions that take arrays as parameters accept arrays created by COM languages (in VBScript, Array(x, y, z)).

332. Script collections can be used from COM languages. Collections that allow indexing by integer or string value determine which particular type of indexing is being performed by a COM client at runtime. All collections expose the EnumObj property which returns an object that can be iterated by a COM language using For Each (instead of writing 'For Each field in schema.Fields', write 'For Each field in schema.Fields.EnumObj').

333. New script functions: Application.CreatePoint, Application.CreatePoint3, Application.CreatePoint4 create point objects. Application.CreatePointObj, Application.CreatePoint3Obj, Application.CreatePoint4Obj create point objects that can be used from COM clients ("regular" point objects use generic types that can not be used by COM clients directly, the new functions return wrapper objects that can be used to work with underlying generic point objects).

334. New script functions: TypeConverter.ConvertObj, Value.DataObj, ValueSet.AddValueObj take and return point objects from COM clients.

335. Changed script functions: constructors for curve objects have been replaced with GeomBuilder.AddCurveCircle, GeomBuilder.AddCurveCircle3, GeomBuilder.AddCurveEllipse, GeomBuilder.AddCurveEllipse3, GeomBuilder.AddCurveSpline, GeomBuilder.AddCurveSpline3 functions that can be used from COM clients.

336. New script functions: CurveCircle.CoordObj, CurveCircle3.Coord3Obj, CurveEllipse.CenterObj, CurveEllipse.CoordObj, CurveEllipse3.Center3Obj, CurveEllipse3.Coord3Obj, CurveSpline.CoordObjs, CurveSpline3.Coord3Objs take and return point objects from COM clients.

337. New script functions: Geom.Branch.CoordObjs, Geom.Branch.Coord3Objs, Geom.CoordObjs, Geom.Coord3Objs return point objects to COM clients.

338. New script functions: Tile.PixelObjs, TileBuilder.PixelObjs take and return point objects from COM clients.

339. New script function: PropertySet.EnumObj exposes a enumerator for COM clients.

340. New script function: Database.GetComponentType returns type for component with a specified name.

341. New script function: Application.GetTechnologyForFile attempts to detect technology for a file with the specified name.

342. New script function: Database.ExportFile exports a component to a file with the specified name, detecting export technology from the name.

343. New script function: Sequence.Recompose takes a sequence and returns a new sequence with rearranged or filtered output values. The function is used with batch updates.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Radian Studio 9.0.161

adamw — Wed, 10 May 2017 17:20:38 GMT

A new update for Radian Studio is now available.

The primary focus of the update is the object model for .NET scripts, which has been significantly extended and improved. The update also adds read-only support for MrSID rasters and read-only support for any data set that can be accessed via GDAL/OGR libraries frequently used by open source mapping applications.

There are various improvements in other areas, too.

Changes

144. There is a new SID dataport for MrSID image files. The dataport uses MrSID Raster SDK. The required DLLs are included in the installation packages. There are no additional installation pre-requisites.

145. The SID dataport supports reading pixel values of arbitrary type.

146. The SID dataport supports rendering intermediate image levels.

147. The SID dataport reads EPSG coordinate system info.

148. The SID dataport supports reading multispectral images. Individual channels are split into different tile fields.

149. The SID dataport supports reading JPEG2000 files and has been made the default dataport for JPEG2000 files due to an issue in the current version of the ECW SDK.

150. There is a new GDAL dataport for reading data through GDAL / OGR. The dataport uses GDAL DLLs already installed on the machine. The DLLs have to be either in one of the Radian folders or in system path (preferable). GDAL drivers are treated as thread-unsafe by default.

151. The GDAL dataport reads coordinate system info.

152. The GDAL dataport reads raster data (in addition to vector data).

153. The GDAL dataport reads palettes for indexed color data.

154. The GDAL dataport automatically recognizes "folder" data sets as classified by GDAL (GDB, TIGER/Line) and sets up GDAL connection accordingly. (Third-party software using GDAL usually have separate dialogs for "file" and "folder" data sets. Our dataport attempts to distinguish between these two types of data sets seamlessly.)

155. The GDAL dataport exposes indexes on vector data.

156. The GDAL dataport reports used driver in the log.

157. (Fix) Converting a geometry value with coordinate system to GeoJSON using the GeomJsonGeo no longer fails to escape the coordinate system string.

158. Pasting data into the Project pane tracks progress and can be canceled.

159. Adding a new geometry object in the map window reports errors if they occur. (For example, a drawing built on the GDB table will reject an object of a wrong type. Previously, the rejection was silent.)

160. (Fix) The DWG dataport no longer sometimes produces incorrect boundaries for hatch objects.

161. The GDB dataport preserves circular arcs, ellipsoidal arcs and cubic splines when writing geometry values. Curves that can not be translated to GDB are linearized.

162. (Fix) The GDB dataport no longer sometimes misreads ellipsoidal arcs.

163. Dataports that use .MAPCACHE files allow writes to metadata. This allows formatting linked drawings and images, correcting their coordinate system in case it was missing or has not been read correctly, etc. Edits to metadata are saved in .MAPCACHE. Metadata synthesized by the dataport is provided as a read-only system MFD_META_SOURCE table.

164. (Fix) Attempting to open a data source which uses a .MAPCACHE file no longer sometimes makes the data source icon stuck in the 'discovering' state.

165. (Fix) Attempting to connect to a data source which uses a .MAPCACHE file via the ODBC driver no longer sometimes fails.

166. (Fix) Linearizing an ellipsoidal arc no longer sometimes creates an arc in the wrong direction.

167. (Fix) Writing a geometry value with an ellipsoidal arc to GDB correctly orients the arc.

168. (Fix) Prototypes for GeomNormalizeTopology, GeomIntersectLinesPair and several other geometry functions displayed in the query builder use clearer names for return values (<table> instead of <drawing>, etc).

169. (Fix) The ODBC driver no longer sometimes rejects writing geometry values from Manifold 8.

170. The ODBC driver flags special key fields such as the OBJECTID field in GDB tables as autogenerated for Manifold 8. This allows Manifold 8 to insert drawing objects into such tables. Editing or deleting the objects that have just been inserted requires refreshing the table (this is a limitation of Manifold 8).

171. The ODBC driver ignores values for computed fields provided by Manifold 8. This allows Manifold 8 to operate on tables with computed fields (their values are computed by the database, not set by client).

172. The SHP dataport no longer fails to return table data using BTREE index on the ID field if used without cache.

173. The New Data Source dialog classifies dataports for files like CSV as 'File: xxx' instead of 'Database File: xxx'. (We felt the real distinction is between 'Database:' - the user has to specify the server to open, 'File:' / 'Folder:' - the user has to specify the path to file or folder to open, and 'Web Server:' - the user has to specify the URL to open.)

174. Web dataports that have been allowed to use cache (the default) allow writes to metadata. This allows formatting drawings and images exposed by these dataports, etc.

175. The GDB dataport allows changing table schemas (to the extent supported by the ESRI's GDB SDK).

176. (Fix) Altering the schema of a GDB table increments its version to update windows that show its data.

177. The ODBC driver includes an adjustment that allows connections from R via DBI.

178. (Fix) LIMIT is no longer a reserved keyword in queries.

179. The 000 (S-57) dataport performs significantly faster.

180. The 000 dataport exposes labels and map.

181. The 000 dataport recognizes way more coordinate systems.

182. The 000 dataport automatically reads updates stored in 001, etc, files.

183. The DDF (SDTS) dataport uses significantly less memory.

184. The object model underwent a series of architectural changes which improve its performance.

185. Script services are removed. The Services pane is removed. (The object model previously needed script services to hold critical data for running scripts. Changes to the object model made script services obsolete, they are no longer needed.)

186. The object model eliminates locks on many of the key objects. This allows multiple threads of the same script to perform calls on the same object in parallel. The performance increases for multi-threaded scripts are dramatic.

187. The object model optimizes transferring data via sequences. The performance increases depend on the scenario and are frequently 2x or more.

188. The object model optimizes transferring data to and from expressions.

189. The Values script object is renamed to ValueSet.

190. New script function: Application.CreateValueSet - creates a new value set object. Creating a new value set object via 'new' is no longer possible.

191. New script function: Application.CreateExpressionParser - creates an expression parser object that can be used to create expressions.

192. New script function: Database.CreateExpressionParser - creates an expression parser object that can be used to create expressions in the context of the database.

193. New script function: ExpressionParser.CreateExpression - takes expression text and parameters, and creates an expression object to evaluate it.

194. New script function: Expression.Evaluate - evaluates the expression for the specified parameter values.

195. New script function: Expression.GetSource - returns expression parameters. Each call returns a new ValueSet object that can be used for evaluation.

196. New script function: Expression.GetTarget - returns expression results. Each call returns a new ValueSet object, similarly to Expression.GetSource.

197. New script property: Expression.Text - returns expression text.

198. New script function: ValueSet.AddValueType - takes a name and a type, and adds a value with type info and no data. The function allows conveying type information to objects like expressions without using model values.

199. New script property: Value.Type - reads the value type.

200. New script function: Value.CreateCopy - creates a copy of a value.

201. New script function: ValueSet.CreateCopy - creates a copy of a value set.

202. New script function: ValueSet.CreateLocked - creates a copy of a value set with locked structure. Attempting to add or remove a value in a locked value set will throw an error. In return, using a locked value set to pass data to functions like Table.Insert performs much faster.

203. Script functions that return ValueSet objects like Sequence.Fetch or Expression.Evaluate perform noticeably better and include optimizations for values with many items.

204. Attempting to access an item with an unknown name in a ValueSet object or in one of the schema collections returns a null object instead of throwing an error.

205. New script property: Database.CanDesign - returns true if the database supports changes to table schemas and false otherwise. The property is mainly used to determine if creating a new table in order to alter its schema later is not going to be possible.

206. New script property: Database.IsSaveAsNeeded - returns true if saving changes to the database will change its format (used to indicate when saving a MAP file will upgrade its format from Manifold 8 to Radian and make it unreadable in Manifold 8).

207. Script functions for Database and Table objects no longer reserve an opts parameter for extensibility.

208. New script function: Application.CreateSchema - creates a new schema object. Creating a new schema object via 'new' is no longer possible.

209. New script property: Schema.IndexField.IgnoreAccent - controls the use of accents for a text field in a btree index.

210. New script property: Schema.IndexField.IgnoreSymbols - controls the use of symbols for a text field in a btree index.

211. New script property: Schema.IndexField.Collation - controls collation for a text field in a btree index.

212. New script property: Schema.IndexField.TileReduce - controls the method of building intermediate levels for a tile field in an rtree index.

213. New script property: Schema.IndexField.TileSize - controls the size of tiles for a tile field in an rtree index.

214. New script property: Schema.IndexField.TileType - controls the pixel type of tiles for a tile field in an rtree index.

215. Reworked script function: Schema.DeleteItem is replaced with Schema.DeleteConstraint, Schema.DeleteField and Schema.DeleteField.

216. Composing geometry values using a script performs significantly faster.

217. Composing tile values using a script performs significantly faster.

218. Accessing tile pixel values using a script performs significantly faster.

219. Script objects representing vector values are converted to lightweight objects. This allows scripts to use arrays of such objects with much lower overhead.

220. Using script functions from queries performs significantly faster.

221. Script functions exchanging data with tables represent GEOMWKB values via a new GeomWkb object that allows accessing WKB data as an array of bytes.

222. New script function: Geom.GetBytes - retrieves a binary representation of a GEOM value.

223. New script function: Tile.GetBytes - retrieves a binary representation of a TILE value.

224. New script function: Application.CreateTypeConverter - creates a new TypeConverter object that allows converting values from one Radian type to another. The conversion is done via TypeConverter.Convert function, which takes an object and a name of the Radian type to convert to.

225. The TypeConverter.Convert function allows specifying the type to convert to as a .NET type.

226. New script function: TypeConverter.GetType - takes a name of a Radian type and returns the corresponding .NET type.

227. New script function: TypeConverter.GetTypeName - takes a .NET type and returns the name of the corresponding Radian type.

228. The ValueSet.AddValueType function allows specifying the type of a new value as a .NET type.

229. The Schema.AddField and Schema.AddFieldComputed functions allow specifying the type of a new field as a .NET type.

230. New script function: TypeConverter.ConvertTilePixels - takes a tile and converts its pixels to the specified type.

231. New script function: Database.Export - exports a component to the data source specified via technology and connection string.

232. New script function: Table.SearchBatchBTree - searches a table using a btree index similarly to SearchBatch, but allows specifying whether the search will go in ascending or descending order.

233. New script function: Table.SearchBatchRTree - searches a table using an rtree index similarly to SearchBatch, but allows specifying whether the search will return objects with any part in the specified rectangle or objects entirely within the specified rectangle.

234. New script function: Database.RunCompile - compiles a query, possibly with parameters, and returns a new Command object which can then be used to run this query multiple times without recompilation.

235. New script function: Command.GetSchema - returns the schema of a table that is going to be returned by a command.

236. New script function: Application.CreatePropertySet - creates a new PropertySet object used to access metadata properties. The PropertySet object contains a set of Property objects with names and string values. The PropertySet.SetProperty function adds a new property or overrides its value. The PropertySet.DeleteProperty function deletes a property. The PropertySet.Clear function deletes all properties. Existing properties can be accessed via an enumerator (for each), by index or by name.

237. New script function: PropertySet.ToJson - prints a property set into a JSON string.

238. New script function: Application.CreatePropertySetParse - takes a JSON string and parses it into a new PropertySet object.

239. The PropertySet.SetProperty function allows passing property value as a number, a boolean, a primitive vector (Point, Point3 or Point4 type), or as another PropertySet object in addition to a string.

240. The Database.Insert script function accepts an additional PropertySet parameter which allows specifying additional values for the schema (for example, notify the database that a specific geometry field will be used to store 3d geometry values).

241. The Table.Design script function accepts an additional PropertySet parameter which allows specifying additional values for the table schema, similarly to Database.Insert.

242. New script function: Database.Design - attempts to change the table schema of a specified table component. Any passed properties are saved to component metadata.

243. New script property: Database.Connection - returns database connection string.

244. New script property: Database.Technology - returns database technology.

245. New script property: Database.TechnologyResolved - returns resolved database technology. For example, an ODBC data source might return 'oracle' if it detects that the target database is Oracle.

246. New script function: Database.GetProperty - returns the value of the specified metadata property for a component.

247. New script function: Database.GetProperties - returns all metadata properties for a component, or a set of specified metadata properties.

248. New script function: Database.SetProperty - changes the value of the specified metadata property for a component.

249. New script function: Database.SetProperties - changes the values of the specified metadata properties for a component.

250. Launching a script reclaims memory in undisposed objects at the end. The change has little effect for well-written scripts, but makes for a big difference for less-well-written ones where it helps to conserve memory and pinpoint coding errors.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Radian Studio 9.0.160

adamw — Fri, 24 Mar 2017 07:19:22 GMT

A new update for Radian Studio is now available.

The primary focus of the update is read-write support for ESRI file geodatabases and interoperability with other applications via ODBC. The ODBC driver in Radian allows accessing data in formats supported by Radian from applications which wouldn't normally be able to do so, like Microsoft Office or LibreOffice applications. The ODBC driver in Radian includes special provisions for Manifold 8, to make exchanging data with Manifold 8 as smooth and effortless as possible.

The update also includes a lot of improvements in other areas.

Changes

58. The ODBC driver supports relative scrolls for dynamic cursors.

59. The ODBC driver supports relative and absolute scrolls for static cursors. Static cursors cache returned data on the fly.

60. The ODBC driver recognizes Manifold 8 as a connecting application and enters a special compatibility mode which provides for better interoperability with Manifold 8. The version of Manifold 8 must be at least 8.0.30.

61. The ODBC driver automatically converts Radian geoms to the format supported by Manifold 8, if used from Manifold 8.

62. The ODBC driver overrides metadata exposed to Manifold 8 with automatically generated values for drawings. If a particular table in the MAP file operated by the driver contains multiple geometry fields with drawings bound to each, Manifold 8 will see one of them (a limitation of Manifold 8).

63. The ODBC driver exposes coordinate systems for drawings to Manifold 8.

64. The ODBC driver supports opening MAP file in read-only mode, via a dialog option. Using read-only mode allows connecting to the same MAP file concurrently from multiple processes.

65. The ODBC driver supports connecting to a data source inside a MAP file, via a dialog option. The user has to specify the name of the data source. This allows using the ODBC driver to access data in any format supported by Radian.

66. (Fix) The ODBC driver no longer fails to correctly mark up NULL values in some ODBC views.

67. The ODBC driver registers under a different name for working update builds.

68. Attempting to use the ODBC driver to connect to a MAP file which is already opened in another connection in an incompatible mode (read-only vs read-write) fails with a descriptive error message.

69. The ODBC driver supports delayed binding of parameters in parameter queries. This solves many issues with traditional office applications like Microsoft Access, which may bind parameters either before or after asking to compile a parameter query, depending on the scenario.

70. The ODBC driver supports updating records using cursors. This allows making changes to linked tables from Manifold 8 and other clients that do updates via cursors.

71. The ODBC driver supports inserting and deleting records using cursors.

72. The ODBC driver returns keys for the inserted record to Manifold 8. This allows records inserted from Manifold 8 to appear in the components immediately without having to refresh component data.

73. The ODBC driver supports streaming writes of record values. This extends the number of applications that can use the driver in read-write mode.

74. (Fix) Attempting to edit a record in a Radian table connected via the ODBC driver to Microsoft Access no longer sometimes fails with the 'This record is already being modified by another user' message.

75. The ODBC driver supports datetime parameters.

76. The ODBC driver supports named parameters and mixes of named and unnamed parameters when running query statements.

77. There is a new GDB dataport for ESRI file geodatabases. The dataport uses ESRI FileGDB SDK 1.5, the latest version. The required DLLs are included in installation packages, there is no need to install anything extra. The SDK supports opening file geodatabases created with ArcGIS 10, but not ArcGIS 9.

78. The GDB dataport supports spatial indexes on vector data.

79. The GDB dataport supports datetime fields.

80. The GDB dataport exposes btree indexes on GDB data.

81. The GDB dataport allows running queries using ESRI FileGDB engine. As usual, the user can switch betwen GDB queries and Manifold queries via '!native' and '!manifold' commands in the command window.

82. The GDB dataport refers to components using their query names whenever possible.

83. The GDB dataport exposes coordinate system data.

84. The GDB dataport reads multi-patch geometry.

85. The GDB dataport reads geometry with curves, including circular arcs and ellipsoidal arcs.

86. The GDB dataport reads geometry with Z values.

87. (Fix) The GDB dataport forces index names to not coincide with field names.

88. Reading data from GDB tables reuses SDK objects and performs significantly faster.

89. (Fix) The GDB dataport correctly reads GUID fields.

90. The GDB dataport automatically adjusts variants of produced BTREE indexes for unique / nullable field properties.

91. Selecting all records without an index in a GDB table performs significantly faster.

92. (Fix) Running 'SELECT Count(*) FROM t' on a GDB table no longer fails.

93. Indexes on the OID and similar special fields in GDB tables are forced to be unique (the SDK may sometimes fail to describe them as such).

94. The GDB dataport logs errors returned by the SDK if the geodatabase fails to open.

95. The GDB dataport caches data for btree indexes on the OID field on demand. This makes searches on those indexes significantly faster.

96. The GDB dataport allows inserting, deleting and updating records in GDB tables. The SDK snaps coordinates of the geometry objects to an internal grid, so the final coordinates of the written geometry values slightly differ from the supplied coordinates.

97. Writing geometry data to a GDB table verifies the type of geometry values to match the type specified for the table. If the type of a new geometry value does not match the type of values in the table, the write fails.

98. (Fix) The GDB dataport no longer fails to expose a drawing for a table with geometry field but no spatial index on that field.

99. The GDB dataport optimizes the amount of used memory during reads.

100. (Fix) Linking DHT and VDF files using 'All files' filter resolves them to correct dataports.

101. Action queries track progress and allow canceling at data collection phase.

102. DISTINCT, INTERSECT / EXCEPT / UNION and several other query constructs allow canceling.

103. The CSV dataport distinguishes between empty strings (1,"",2,3 - the string in the second slot is blank) and NULL strings (1,,2,3 - the string in the second slot is NULL).

104. The CSV dataport attempts to determine encoding for files without byte order marks by looking at the placement of zero bytes and then, if the result is inconclusive, by inspecting statistics.

105. The CSV dataport minimizes the number of internal data conversions for a (very) significant boost in performance.

106. The GPKG dataport renders images with bilinear filtering.

107. The query builder displays a context menu for list items. New commands: Insert Code / Insert Name - insert item code / name into the query text. Insert Definition - inserts the definition of a table into the query text. Insert Field List - inserts the list of fields for a table into the query text.

108. The query builder lists available data types.

109. Selecting a menu item or canceling a menu removes the description for the last selected menu item from the status bar.

110. Tooltip for the default mouse mode button includes a brief description of keys used to pan, zoom, select.

111. The query engine allows converting binary values to any data type, with verification.

112. New query function: BinaryStringBase64 - takes a binary value and converts it to a base64-encoded string. Transform template: Compose Base64 String - allows composing a string for any value type.

113. New query function: BinaryStringHex - takes a binary value and converts it to a hex-encoded string. Transform template: Compose Hex String - allows composing a string for any value type.

114. New query function: StringBinaryBase64 - takes a base64-encoded string and converts it to a binary value. Transform template: Parse Base64 String - allows parsing a string into any value type.

115. New query function: StringBinaryHex - takes a hex-encoded string and converts it to a binary value. Transform template: Parse Hex String - allows parsing a string into any value type.

116. New query function: StringEncrypt - takes a string value and a key, encrypts the value. Transform template: Encrypt.

117. New query function: StringDecrypt - takes an encrypted string value and a key, decrypts the value. Transform template: Decrypt.

118. New query function: TypeName - takes a value, returns its type as a string.

119. The New Field dialog generates a default name for the new field.

120. (Fix) The New Field, Transform, Select dialogs correctly handle expressions on fields whose names contain '{<number>}' character sequences.

121. (Fix) The query builder correctly escapes names of constraints, fields or indexes which contain '[', ']' or other special characters.

122. The log window splits multiline error messages. Message source is appended to each of the resulting lines.

123. The command window splits multiline error messages in the Log tab.

124. SELECT with implicit group on the whole table always outputs a single record, similarly to other databases.

125. Loading Radian DLLs logs failures similarly to loading third-party DLLs, like DLLs for SQLITE.

126. Attempting to load a Radian or third-party DLL which fails due to missing dependencies no longer sometimes displays a system error message in addition to a Radian error message / log line.

127. Attempting to launch Radian on a system with no installation prerequisites shows a descriptive error message and opens the System Requirements page on the Manifold web site using the default web browser.

128. (Fix) Coordinate systems with multiple possible transforms to WGS84 no longer sometimes fail to select the transform with the best accuracy.

129. The default coordinate system for GeoJSON data is changed from EPSG:4326 to urn:ogc:def:crs:OGC::CRS84, reflecting changes in the GeoJSON standard. Writing GeoJSON data writes bounding box.

130. (Fix) The Hotine oblique Mercator projection variant used for Switzerland and Hungary no longer sometimes produces wrong coordinates.

131. New query function: CoordSystemXml - takes a coordinate system definition and converts it to Manifold 8 XML. Not all systems can be converted (example: EPSG:5515 can not be converted, because the system type is modified Krovak and Manifold 8 does not support that), but the vast majority can.

132. Pasting data reports time to complete the operation.

133. Pasting data into SQLITE data sources in the Project pane performs dramatically faster.

134. The table returned by SELECT without joins / WHERE / GROUP supports inserting and deleting records. Deleting records from such a query in a command window requires re-running the query to make deleted records disappear.

135. (Fix) The result table of ORDER BY no longer sometimes reports to include an index that refers to non-existing fields.

136. (Fix) Attempting to connect to a data source with invalid or missing technology fails. Previously, attempting to connect to such a data source was producing a blank database.

137. Attempting to connect to a data source in the Project pane reports errors.

138. (Fix) Opening SHP or DBF files with cache turned on no longer disables compacting saves.

139. (Fix) The ERS dataport correctly parses lat/lon coordinate system denoted as 'LL'.

140. (Fix) The DBF dataport no longer fails to report changes to table field versions to requesting windows.

141. (Fix) The SHP dataport no longer sometimes to analyze the contents of the attached DBF file to determine whether it makes sense to perform a compacting save.

142. (Fix) The SHP dataport no longer fails to check whether a compacting save will reduce the file size significantly enough to perform it if the check is done from a script immediately after opening the file and before the dataport returned any tables.

143. (Fix) The table returned by SELECT with WHERE filtering on a btree index correctly handles requests with partial key on that index.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Manifold System 8.0.30

adamw — Fri, 24 Mar 2017 07:16:42 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

The primary focus of the update is interoperability with Radian Studio via ODBC. This allows Manifold 8 to access tabular and vector data in any format supported by Radian Studio, opening the door to using formats not previously supported by Manifold 8, like ESRI file geodatabases.

Changes

567. (Fix) The CSV import and other imports no longer sometimes try to allocate too much memory, which makes them very slow.

568. (Fix) Linking a drawing using the Radian ODBC driver no longer generates wrong queries if the drawing's table contains a dot in the name.

569. (Fix) Linking a drawing or table using the Radian ODBC driver correctly handles 64-bit integer fields like mfd_id.

570. Splash screens are updated for 2017.

571. The ODBC code recognizes the ODBC driver for Radian and asks it to enter a special compatibility mode for better interoperability. The version of Radian must be at least 9.0.160.

572. The ODBC code recognizes the ODBC driver provided by working updates for Radian and treats it like the ODBC driver for an official build of Radian.

573. Inserting data into a table linked from Radian ODBC driver recognizes the mfd_id field and lets the driver set values for that field automatically.

574. Attempting to open a MAP file created in Radian Studio fails with an error message that suggests opening the file in Radian Studio.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Radian Studio 9.0.159

adamw — Mon, 20 Feb 2017 15:26:15 GMT

Manifold is pleased to announce the release of the first official update to Radian Studio.

Changes

1. (Fix) Opening an SQLITE database with spatial data no longer spams log window with messages about 'mfd_meta' not being found (the messages themselves are harmless and indicate no errors).

2. (Fix) Transferring WKB data from PostgreSQL to dataports other than PostgreSQL automatically converts EWKB (PostgreSQL extension) to WKB.

3. (Fix) Tools - Scan Raw Binary File / Scan Raw Text File dialogs write configuration files in new format as requested by RWB / RWT dataports (JSON instead of XML).

4. (Fix) Importing data from GPKG and similar files correctly waits until all components are discovered. (Previously, the import could miss components like images due to a race with discovery thread.)

5. (Fix) Map window reloads layers after changes to their table references. (Example: changing the properties of a drawing so that the drawing refers to a different table will automatically refresh the drawing in all opened windows.)

6. (Fix) Attempting to access a virtual component on a slow data source no longer fails to wait until the data source completes component discovery if that data source has already been opened in the Project pane and slowly populates itself.

7. (Fix) ODBC driver no longer sometimes fails with an error when asked to return statistics for an index (a fairly rarely used ODBC function).

8. (Fix) Copy / pasting or importing images from SQLITE / GPKG no longer fails due to wrong metadata.

9. Activation dialogs no longer suggest to correct proxy server settings on failure.

10. TerraServer images in MAP files created by 8 are automatically converted to Bing Maps images on migration. TerraServer has been discontinued for some time.

11. The Project pane context menu for tables includes a command to edit table schema. This allows freely altering tables on data sources which allow some changes only when the table is not used in any running statements (ie, SQLITE disallows dropping an rtree index on a table that is currently being fetched via SELECT - and a table window can keep SELECT opened / re-opened until the window is closed, if the table is long enough).

12. (Fix) Dropping components from the Project pane into the query builder window ignores folders.

13. (Fix) Parsing coordinate system encoded as PRJ / WKT no longer sometimes fails due to a race condition. (The failure requires multiple threads to invoke the parser simultaneously, this may occur, for example, when the same component with the coordinate system encoded as WKT is rendered in multiple windows at the same time.)

14. (Fix) TIFF dataport correctly parses user-defined ellipsoids.

15. (Fix) BIL and other exports that produce .MAPMETA write JSON values for local scales and local shifts as numbers. (This is a minor fix, the values were being correctly parsed back even as strings.)

16. (Fix) SQLITE and GPKG dataports correctly adjust coordinate system for images that use units other than meters or degrees.

17. (Fix) RWT dataport no longer sometimes misreads the last pixel.

18. (Fix) MDB and other dataports that use OLE DB no longer sometimes fail on strings ending with double zeros.

19. MDB, XLS and other dataports based on Jet support runtimes for Access 2010 (ACE 14) and Access 2013 (ACE 15).

20. XLS export skips fields with binary data like GEOM or TILE.

21. MDB export creates starter file using the latest version of Jet / ACE installed on the system. Previously, the export was using a copy of a blank MDB file stored in EXT.DLL, this could potentially fail the export if the installed version(s) of Jet / ACE were incompatible with the version used to create the fixed file.

22. XLS export creates starter file using the latest version of Jet / ACE installed on the system.

23. DB and WKx exports are removed as outdated, following latest versions of ACE.

24. (Fix) FLT export no longer requires the exported image to use FLOAT64 pixels (can use pixels of any numeric type). Byte order is switched from MSB to LSB.

25. BIL dataport recognizes multi-channel data interleaved by band and by pixel.

26. (Fix) E00 export uses correct padding for pixel values.

27. E00 dataport is better at reading pixel values that are not correctly padded.

28. Renamed query functions: GeomBox -> GeomBoundsRect, GeomUnionBoxes -> GeomUnionRects, GeomUnionBoxesPair -> GeomUnionRectsPair, GeomOrtho -> GeomSnapToGrid.

29. New query function: GeomBoundsRectRotated - takes a geom value and returns minimal enclosing rect as an area. The rect might have a smaller area than the bounding box, because it is not forced to align with XY axes. Transform template: Enclosing Rect, Rotated.

30. New query function: GeomBoundsCircle - takes a geom value and returns minimal enclosing circle as an area. Transform template: Enclosing Circle.

31. GeomClip query function allows clipping a line with another line. (Examples: Intersecting 0:0-5:0 with 3:0-8:0 produces 3:0-5:0. Subtracting 3:0-8:0 from 0:0-5:0 produces 0:0-3:0.)

32. GeomClip query function allows clipping a (multi)point with another (multi)point or a line.

33. New query function: GeomIntersectLinesPair - takes two lines and returns their intersection points as a (multi)point.

34. Map window allows refreshing components. The View - Refresh command (F5) refreshes the opened component if it is not map, and all map layers otherwise. The Refresh command in the context menu for layer tab (Ctrl-F5) refreshes the active layer.

35. Images stored in MAP files are rendered with bilinear filtering. This improves the visual quality of the images (thin lines no longer sometimes break, thick lines have more stable width, labels are much more legible, staircase effects - particularly with shading - are removed) at a small performance cost.

36. Images in all file dataports are rendered with bilinear filtering.

37. Images in imageserver dataport are rendered with bilinear filtering. In addition to improving legibility, this also reduces the amount of data fetched from the server, making the image render noticeably faster.

38. (Fix) Map window automatically adjusts shading strength according to current zoom level.

39. The Style dialog for images allows specifying Z scale to use during shading. The specified value is a ratio of Z scale to XY scale, ie, if the image pixels are 5x5 meters and the height is expressed in meters as well, Z scale should be set to 1/5 = 0.2. (In the future, we are going to set this value automatically from the coordinate system.)

40. (Fix) Map window no longer sometimes blinks multiple times or closes dialogs after changes to big components.

41. (Fix) Export to E00 supports exporting images with any pixel type (have to be single-channel).

42. (Fix) Export to E00 writes pixel stats in the STA section with correct alignment.

43. (Fix) E00 dataport no longer sometimes fails to construct part of areas.

44. (Fix) IMG ERDAS dataport no longer sometimes reverses channels for 1-bit / 2-bit / 4-bit multi-channel images.

45. (Fix) ADF, TIFF and other dataports correctly merge image registration data (local offset / local scale) into coordinate system.

46. CSV dataport has been reworked to perform significantly faster.

47. CSV dataport allows text values to contain quotes escaped as double quotes. CSV export automatically doubles quotes in string values.

48. CSV dataport automatically detects Unix and Mac line ends in addition to Windows line ends.

49. CSV dataport automatically detects delimiter using the following list: , (comma), (tab), ; (semicolon), : (colon), | (vertical line). (Previously the dataport always used commas.)

50. CSV dataport automatically detects UTF8 and UTF16 (both low-endian and big-endian) encodings. The default encoding remains ANSI. CSV export uses UTF8 (always).

51. CSV dataport is better at determining field types and determining whether or not the first line contains field names.

52. Portable installation package includes default localization file (DEFAULT.UI.TXT).

53. (Fix) SHP export no longer writes wrong data values for some fields.

54. ArcGIS REST, TMS, WMTS images are rendered with bilinear filtering.

55. Oracle GEORASTER images are rendered with bilinear filtering.

56. (Fix) The New Field dialog in table window no longer fails to add a new component via Add Component.

57. (Fix) The Style dialog skips computing field / channel stats for equal intervals and exponential intervals.

The update is available on the Product Downloads page.

Enjoy!

Radian Studio Now Available

adamw — Mon, 30 Jan 2017 14:39:52 GMT

Manifold is pleased to announce the release of Radian Studio, the first of Manifold's new technology products. Manifold today also is introducing new pricing and simplification of the Manifold Release 8 GIS product line as well as an updated design for the Manifold web site.

The Radian Studio product is an evolutionary development of the Radian product line discussed in the initial beta announcement.

About Radian Studio

Radian Studio provides a spatial engineering console that is an integrated, interactive environment leveraging the power of Manifold's Radian® Spatial Data Engine to explore, analyze, view and manipulate spatial data. The Radian engine powers Manifold's newest generation GIS products as well as other applications involving both spatial and non-spatial data.

Radian Studio is designed for data-centric users who are comfortable with SQL and with database concepts. Although Radian Studio is not intended as a GIS, the visualization capabilities it incorporates for reviewing data provide many GIS-like benefits when working with spatial data.

Radian SQL is automatically parallel SQL. Radian itself is a parallelized database engine that stores its own data within file databases using a very fast format. Radian by default automatically launches parallel threads to utilize as many cores as are available on as many CPUs as are available. If one or more NVIDIA GPUs are installed, many Radian functions can launch massively parallel utilization of thousands of GPU cores, all automatically optimized against the use of CPU parallelization.

Spatial Data Engineering

Radian is a spatial data engineering tool serving a related but different need than GIS products like Manifold System Release 8.00 or the upcoming Release 9.

The difference between a spatial data tool like Radian and a GIS like Manifold is the difference between a data-centric emphasis and a more presentation-centric emphasis.

GIS products usually have some data manipulation capabilities. Some, like Release 8.00, have profoundly powerful Spatial SQL. Other GIS products are often weaker, provide no Spatial SQL or depend upon external packages, such as a DBMS, to provide spatial capabilities.

Pure database packages of course have superb data manipulation capabilities but few have any visualization capabilities and most are lacking in some way when it comes to spatial data engineering. They may not have point-and-click capability, they might not have automatic CPU or GPU parallelism, they may lack an extensive roster of spatial functions or suffer from weak integration with visualization, for example, no automatic display of image servers.

For now, there is no single tool, not even from Manifold, which provides both everything desired in a GIS and also everything desired in a spatial data engineering tool. The current state of the art is that one must use both a GIS and also a more data-centric tool.

For GIS users, including ESRI users as much as Manifold users, Radian is that tool. Radian is that tool for DBMS users as well because it augments and adds capabilities, such as massively parallel computation or specialized spatial functions, that database server products such as Oracle, PostgreSQL and others either do not have or which are difficult to use.

See the FAQ.

Non Spatial Data

Radian is also the data manipulation tool of choice for applications involving non-spatial data. The power and flexibility of having multiple connections to so many different sources together with the point-and-click power of templates plus SQL plus scripting means that database people who need to blend, extract, transform, load, analyze, validate or otherwise manipulate their data will pay back the cost of a Radian license in the first few hours of use.

If nothing else, the supreme power of automatically CPU parallel operation plus automatic, massively parallel GPU speed for analytics will provide the ability to crunch data and perform tasks in seconds or minutes that would take hours or days with other tools.

SQL and Non SQL

If you are not an SQL expert do not be intimidated by Radian - the product features extensive point-and-click templates within the Transform dialog that harness the power of Radian with no need to know SQL. Radian also will automatically create the SQL behind a template for you, so you can see how it works, learn more about SQL and customize what a template does to do something different. SQL is easier to learn if you learn by customizing something that already works.

Localization

Radian supports languages other than English via user-customizable localization files. Starter files are available for English and German with partial examples in French, Spanish and Portuguese. See the Localization page and the Localization topic in the user manual.

Readiness

Radian is bulletproof. There is no known way to crash Radian and in over a year of testing no beta tester has ever reported a crash. Radian is massively more reliable than any other tool we know for working with spatial data, including Release 8.

As of release there are a handful of known, minor bugs within Radian but at such a deep and exotic level that Manifold believes no new user will be able to get far enough into the system to encounter them until long after they are fixed.

Updates

Most technical work going forward will be new features and improvements in Radian, including improvements to support integration with other products. Radian connects to a vast range of database servers and other sources, some of which have thousands of features. Whatever Radian can do to make such connections easier will happen without regard to whether it is an error in Radian, an error in the other product or simply an integration convenience.

Radian updates will be free and will be frequent in the months ahead. Working updates will be issued approximately every week but not automatically announced. Users who want the latest build can download a working update. Any bugs will be immediately repaired in working updates.

Announced updates will happen less frequently, every two weeks at first, then once a month and then regularly as needed. Numerous new features are planned with hundreds of small improvements in the pipeline and several very major improvements planned as well. All will be free to Radian licensees.

Suggestions

When sending in suggestions for Radian, please keep in mind that Radian is a DBMS tool and Release 9 will be the new generation GIS product. Please make it clear when suggesting an addition if you would like to see it in Radian, in the upcoming Release 9 product or in both.

Connecting Back and Forth with 8

Radian opens Manifold Release 8 .map files and will save them as Radian files, so going from 8 to Radian is trivial. To exchange data on a regular basis from Radian back to 8 the best way is to use the DBMS you prefer as a spatial storage for both.

Futures

For now, the current state of the art in GIS is there is no single tool that combines all of the needs of GIS with all of the needs of data engineering. That will change when Manifold issues Release 9 later this year. Given that Manifold Release 9 is based upon Radian technology, using exactly the same engine, formats and localization files as Radian, we expect Radian users will be able to seamlessly upgrade to 9.

Great care has been taken throughout Radian develoment and will continue to be applied to ensure that from a user's perspective Release 9 will be a seamless upgrade and superset to Radian. For example, the native format Radian uses is known as Manifold 9.00 .map format.

If interested in 9, get Radian and build expertise in Radian. Early access for 9, for example through the beta test program, will be offered only to Radian licensees.

More Information

Study the new web site for information about Radian, including the extensive online user manual.

Limited Time Offer

As a special introductory offer, until 15 February 2017 Manifold is offering a bundle of Radian Studio Universal x64 plus Manifold Release 8.00 Universal Edition x64 for a combined price of $395.

Release 8 GIS Products

Manifold is also pleased to announce changes in the Release 8 product line providing simpler licensing options plus significantly better pricing. Other than repricing and consolidation of the product line there are no technical changes in Release 8 which, surprisingly, continues to have the greatest breadth and depth of any GIS.

Highlights:

Release 8 licenses are now all x64 and will enable either 64-bit or 32-bit installations.
Release 8 is now available in Personal, Professional, Universal and Ultimate editions, plus the 30 Day Lease of Universal Edition.
There is now a single, Universal Runtime.
Extensions plus Option pack continue as before, but with better prices.
No changes to support and service products.

Better prices include significantly reduced prices for Manifold System Release 8. The intention is to provide easier access to Release 8 and to open up headroom for Release 9 when it is issued later this year. Release 9 is expected, like Radian, to be announced as a single, Universal, all-inclusive edition that will be priced at a higher level than Release 8 Universal.

See the products page for details.

Manifold would like to thank all beta testers who helped bring Radian to life. Your patience, endurance and contributions made the difference!

Radian ® Studio Beta / Release 9 Outlook

Mike Fisher — Thu, 24 Dec 2015 11:15:19 GMT

This announcement provides details on how to apply for participation in the beta test program for Manifold's new Radian ® Studio product. In addition it provides outlook for Manifold products to be released in 2016, including Manifold System Release 9.

The Radian Engine

Manifold's Radian engine is a new generation DBMS and GIS engine that is the foundation for all new generation Manifold products, including Radian Studio and Manifold System Release 9. The Radian engine is technology originally developed for OEMs. Today that technology powers new Manifold retail products.

Radian Innovations:

Dramatic speed and capacity increases - Radian can easily handle GIS and DBMS projects in the tens of gigabytes range on the professional desktop. It has been designed for routine, comfortable work with projects in the hundreds of gigabyte range. Radian instantly opens and saves projects of almost any size. Radian easily works with huge raster images and with vector drawings containing millions of objects.

Parallel Performance - Radian is highly parallelized. The engine automatically utilizes multiple CPUs, multiple CPU cores and multiple GPUs. It will automatically utilize massive parallelism with many thousands of GPU cores for hundreds of functions. Parallelism provides better user interfaces, faster routine tasks and unmatched analytic performance.

Parallel SQL - Radian exposes virtually all capabilities through fully parallel SQL. Virtually all aspects of data sets in use, massively parallel analytics, Radian infrastructure and other operations are accessible through SQL. Radian allows SQL to be executed locally or on other DBMS servers or in a combination of local and remotely executed SQL within the same query. Radian offloads many operations to GPGPU for unmatched, massively parallel performance.

Any data format, any data source - Radian can connect to and be a full-power partner and front end to any industry standard DBMS. Radian can read a vast range of GIS file formats and can write some of the most common formats directly without having to do import and export. Radian can work with data supplied over the web using OpenGIS and other protocols. All that data can be freely combined for analysis or presentation.

Fully programmable - The Radian engine provides a great development platform for building applications. The object model and SQL allow accessing and controlling all aspects of the system. The object model can be accessed from any .NET or COM client. There is built-in support for many of the popular programming languages, a built-in Javascript engine, support for addons, REPL consoles for dynamic languages, and other tools.

Internationalization - The Radian engine and products built on it by Manifold enable easy localization, by VARs or by users. The engine has been designed from the start to support working with text data in languages other than English.

Manifold Products using Radian

Manifold will introduce a range of retail products powered by the Radian engine. The first two such products will be Radian Studio, for both GIS and non-GIS users, and Manifold System Release 9, a dedicated GIS product. These products serve an evolving market in which general purpose DBMS and other non-GIS applications have high demand for Radian capabilities in addition to GIS demands for Radian.

Manifold is introducing Radian Studio in addition to and ahead of Manifold System Release 9 for three reasons:

1. Non-GIS users are not well-served by a dedicated GIS. Non-GIS users usually are confused by the GIS orientation of a dedicated GIS and by many features and many pages of documentation provided for GIS users. DBMS and other non-GIS users are best served by a more general product.

2. To develop GIS applications for Release 9 developers must first learn the sophisticated, data-centric world of Radian technology. Radian Studio lets them get started sooner for a faster, stronger development effort with Release 9.

3. Radian Studio is ready now for DBMS users and applications developers. It can be put to work immediately by power users to view, analyze and transform GIS and non-GIS data. It would be unfair to those users to make them wait while additional features for interactive GIS or to support point-and-click users are configured and deployed.

Therefore Manifold has packaged the Radian engine in two products, a generic product, Radian Studio, for general purpose DBMS and GIS data applications that will be released first and a dedicated GIS product, Manifold System Release 9, to be released next.

Radian Studio

Manifold is introducing a new product, Radian Studio, to deliver the Radian engine in a developer/power user configuration for both GIS and non-GIS users. Radian Studio also allows GIS developers to start learning Manifold's new technology.

Radian Studio is not intended as an interactive GIS even though the visualization capabilities it provides to facilitate data manipulation will make it a fine tool for many GIS purposes in the hands of power users. Radian Studio will work side-by-side with any existing installation of Manifold 8 or prior with no conflicts, and can open any project file created by Manifold 8.

One inspiration for Radian Studio was Manifold's Database Commander product of years past, a DBMS-oriented product that provided a "control panel" for manipulating data. Commander delivered the power of Manifold's selection and data transformation capabilities in a table-oriented interface for general DBMS and non-GIS use. Radian Studio is analogous to a vastly expanded Commander product with immensely greater native DBMS, programming, analytic, parallelization and SQL capabilities and vastly expanded, modern user interface.

The Radian Studio product provides the Radian engine packaged within an interactive GUI designed for:

* Power users seeking a "Swiss Army knife" universal tool for GIS and DBMS data - Radian Studio's interactive GUI provides sophisticated access to data, queries, scripts and other elements of complex projects for viewing, editing, transformation, analysis and execution with a primary emphasis on SQL and programming languages. A vast range of capabilities, functions and operators enable interactive editing, transformation, analysis and modification of data. Numerous import and export and data source capabilities provide access to an enormous range of data.

* GPGPU developers seeking faster time to market - Automatic GPGPU parallelization within Radian SQL and Radian functions enables applications developers to prototype and to create third generation GPGPU applications without spending years learning how to code such applications in lower level environments.

* DBMS applications developers seeking better analytic infrastructure - Hundreds of pre-built functions and operators enable DBMS developers to create faster and better analytic applications. Radian Studio can be used as a standalone environment to power the application or as an interchange and control panel application utilizing data within other DBMS servers or as both.

* DBMS users seeking an agnostic control panel - Radian Studio's ability to connect to many different data sources - such as all the major DBMS products - using Manifold's sophisticated new dataport technology provides a "one stop shop" for simultaneous, combined access to many different data sources at once, allowing data to be moved between data sources and new combinations of data and local and remote queries to be created. Radian's performance means Radian Studio will not be the bottleneck.

* GIS applications developers - With Radian Studio developers can prototype and then build new, value-added GIS applications utilizing the power of Radian. More and more vertical markets require the combination of superior analytics coupled with superior capacity and rendering speed that only Radian provides. Radian Studio provides the full, unlimited Radian engine API so developers targeting GIS markets can begin learning the model right away.

* Power users seeking a head start on Release 9 - Radian Studio provides a head start on learning the new technology also utilized within Manifold System Release 9. Because both Radian Studio and Release 9 are built on identically the same Radian engine they both share the same SQL and many of the same GUI interfaces. Experience with Radian Studio will directly translate into a faster start with Release 9.

Radian Studio Beta Test

Manifold would like to invite any interested Manifold licensees to apply for participation in a beta test program for Radian Studio. Beta testing is expected to be brief, one to two months, followed by commercial product release.

To apply to participate in beta testing for Radian Studio, on or after 4 January please write from the email address used for your Manifold license to tech support at the published tech email address with a subject line that includes "Radian Studio beta test" with a statement that you would like to participate. Please briefly describe your use of Manifold to date as well as any DBMS, SQL or development expertise you have outside of Manifold. Please do not use this subject line or contact method for any other purpose, such as asking questions about Radian or other products.

Tech hopes to acknowledge all letters but that may take a few days or a week or more. If you are selected for participation you will be notified by email. If you are not selected you will not receive an invitation but will not receive a decline. Manifold cannot provide further guidance, information about Radian or feedback on the selection process. Some applications not selected initially may be invited into subsequent programs.

Beta testers interested in exploring localization options will be able to do so from the beginning of the beta test.

Manifold System Release 9

Manifold System Release 9 is a dedicated GIS product built on Radian that is the new technology successor to Release 8. Manifold is not at the present time announcing a beta test program for Release 9, nor is Manifold announcing sales of Release 9. Manifold expects to issue Release 9 for sale after Radian Studio, most likely in the first half of 2016.

GIS power users interested in Release 9 should procure Radian Studio when available. Power users will be able to accomplish many GIS tasks involving the manipulation of GIS data with Radian Studio. They will also be able to begin learning fundamental Radian technology and technical capabilities that are used in Release 9.

Release 9 will overlap Radian Studio since both are built on identically the same Radian infrastructure. In many ways 9 will be a superset of Radian Studio given that it also will have the full Radian engine API but in addition will provide dedicated GIS capabilities and dialogs to serve interactive GIS users and casual, point-and-click needs.

Manifold expects that many participants in the Radian Studio beta will also be Release 9 users. Their feedback in the beta will help guide final configuration decisions on Release 9 and thus will guide the timing of Release 9 publication.

One hallmark of Radian technology is it is highly configurable. This design feature enables easy creation of new applications and new features both by Manifold and by users. Manifold expects to utilize Radian configurability to issue many updates to Release 9 in 2016.

Licensing

Both Radian Studio and Release 9 will follow existing Manifold licensing methodologies using serial numbers to distinguish specific product configurations from a limited set of common download and installation packages.

Radian Studio licenses will not be offered in a License Server configuration. Runtime licenses will be offered some reasonable time after initial release. All Radian Studio and Manifold 9 licenses will be 64-bit licenses, authorizing both 64-bit and 32-bit capability on 64-bit Windows systems and 32-bit capability on 32-bit Windows systems.

Radian Studio and Release 9 products will be licensed for use on Microsoft Windows operating systems. Manifold at present does not plan to offer non-Windows versions in 2016.

Comments, Suggestions and Further Information

Manifold welcomes all comments and suggestions following the tips given on the Suggestions page at http://www.manifold.net/info/suggestions.shtml

Manifold cannot provide any additional public information on either Radian Studio or Manifold System Release 9 prior to release of these products. When these products are released the web site will provide detailed information.

Acknowledgements

Special thanks go out to Art Lembo and Tim Baigent for their contributions in the Radian Test Platform program. Thanks also to Cyril Perret for contributing the first native-language translation of the Radian localization file, into French.

Manifold would also like to thank all Manifold licensees for their patience during the extensive development of this spectacular new technology. Radian parallelism is the first time in the history of the computer industry that any company has succeeded in creating such general purpose, automatic parallelism in a commercial product. Many other teams that have tried to accomplish this task, including large and well-funded teams backed by some of the largest companies in computing, have failed to accomplish what the Radian engine now delivers.

Thanks to the patience and the support of Manifold licensees, Manifold users will be the first to enjoy the performance and power of a truly parallel, uniquely modern GIS.

Radian is a registered trademark of Manifold Software Limited.

Manifold System 8.0.29

adamw — Thu, 24 Oct 2013 11:56:32 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) The Coords and Branches split functions in queries no longer sometimes return wrong data for certain cases of complex joins.
(Fix) Importing a malformed TIFF file no longer sometimes produces garbage data instead of failing with an error message.
(Fix) Refreshing data in a linked table no longer fails to update the number of selected records shown in the status bar.
(Fix) Importing a TIFF file with 4 16-bit channels no longer sometimes reverts channels for R and B values.
(Fix) Docking or undocking panes no longer sometimes fails to repaint them.
(Fix) Opening or closing component windows no longer sometimes fails to repaint docked panes, particularly add-in ones.
(Fix) Importing a raw binary file no longer fails to recognize fractional missing values.
Installing Manifold requires having a full version of .NET 4.

For download links as well as instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Compatibility Notice

Due to the shift from .NET 2 to .NET 4, all third-party modules that bind to Manifold DLLs such as Manifold.Interop.dll or Manifold.Interop.Scripts.dll have to be recompiled. This includes standalone applications, class libraries and custom controls using Manifold objects, statically compiled extensions for web sites using Manifold objects, add-in panes for Manifold, custom image server and geocoding server modules for Manifold, etc. Built-in image server and geocoding server modules for Manifold are an exception to this and should continue to work seamlessly.

While in many cases, modules using Manifold DLLs built for versions of Manifold prior to 8.0.29, may continue to work after the upgrade to 8.0.29, this behavior is not guaranteed unless these components have been specifically tested against .NET 4.

Update: Installation Issue on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003

The original release of Manifold 8.0.29 had an issue that was preventing it from installing correctly on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 systems (both 32-bit and 64-bit). The issue has been fixed and the installation files have been updated.

If you had problems installing Manifold 8.0.29 on Windows XP or Windows Server 2003, please re-download the installation packages and try again.

SHA1 hashes of the updated MSI files:

manifold-8.0.29.msi

SHA1: fb07473c9535634aa50990d72743e1351de993ff

manifold-8.0.29-x64.msi

SHA1: 2ee68359bb1d65f457721ca12e415dcf49051965

Manifold System 8.0.28

adamw — Fri, 29 Jun 2012 13:04:32 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Creating bounded areas no longer sometimes creates areas with holes or overlaps.
(Fix) Creating a topology overlay no longer sometimes fails to correctly handle areas with shared boundaries.
Messages for errors occurring during activation are made more specific.
(Fix) Exporting a drawing to MIF / MID replaces end of line characters in text values with spaces, to avoid breaking MID files (was: end of line sequences, the fix extends handling of end of line sequences to non-Windows and malformed ones).
(Fix) Querying import options for formats that pre-scan data to be imported no longer makes the actual import process start at 100% progress.
Importing a SHP file with complex metric performs noticeably faster.
Importing a DBF file performs noticeably faster.
(Fix) Transferring heights from a surface onto a drawing with areas no longer double-counts some of the pixels on area boundaries.
(Fix) Pasting an image as a table no longer reverses color components in the values of the Color (I) field.
(Fix) Importing a TIF file correctly handles 3-channel and 4-channel 16-bit data.
(Fix) Importing a LAS file no longer sometimes misreads projection parameters.
Importing an ADF data set supports sets with multiple pixel data files.
(Fix) Rendering a compressed image no longer sometimes renders duplicate pixel lines shifting further lines slightly up or down depending on rendering direction.
(Fix) Importing a JPEG or PNG file no longer ignores data in the accompanying world file.
(Fix) Copying and pasting a labels component no longer sometimes loses custom label formats.
Importing a DNG file supports more variations of raw pixel data.
(Fix) Exporting a coordinate system to PRJ correctly handles Mollweide systems.
(Fix) Exporting a coordinate system to PRJ no longer sometimes exports UTM systems as plain Transverse Mercator.
(Fix) Importing an ERS file no longer sometimes fails to set coordinate system units to US Survey feet.
(Fix) Converting text characters into vector shapes when rendering a layout to AI, PDF or PS with the "Text as graphics" option turned on no longer sometimes skips curve points on character glyphs.
(Fix) Attempting to delete records from a linked table via a DELETE query no longer fails with an error.
(Fix) Docking and undocking panes no longer sometimes fails to redraw the contents of the frame and component windows.
(Fix) Computing a triangulation or a Voronoi diagram no longer sometimes produces incorrect results on regular grids of points.
(Fix) Computing a triangulation of an area can no longer produce flat triangles at the area boundary.
(Fix) Attempting to import a malformed E00 file no longer sometimes crashes.
(Fix) Importing county data from a geocoding database no longer sometimes imports roads that do not belong to the specified counties.
(Fix) Reading block data in a DWG file no longer sometimes misreads Y coordinate of the block insertion point.
(Fix) Importing an RST file no longer misreads datums for some of the projections used in South Asia.
(Fix) Exporting a drawing to SQL Server 2008 or higher no longer ignores requested format for geometry data (and always writes WKB).

For download links as well as instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.27

adamw — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 15:27:56 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Computing variance or similar statistics in a query no longer sometimes produces incorrect values due to overflow.
(Fix) Performing spatial computations in a query no longer sometimes misoptimizes distance scans by ignoring the value of the location precision parameter (eg, objects that are very close to each other are not reported as touching since the optimizer is too aggressive).
(Fix) Performing containment or adjacency tests in a query no longer returns wrong results for certain rare cases of segment intersections.
(Fix) Exporting a drawing to MIF / MID replaces end of line character sequences in text values with spaces, to avoid breaking MID files.
PostgreSQL data sources include preliminary support for PostGIS 2.0.
(Fix) Computing minimal containing circle or centroid of an object no longer sometimes produces wrong results if the object contains a pair of points that are not equal, but very close to each other.
(Fix) Computing weight centroids no longer sometimes produces wrong results for areas with more than one branch.
Computing weight centroids performs significantly faster and is more accurate.
(Fix) Removing a DSN for the Manifold ODBC driver no longer sometimes fails to clear all relevant data in the registry.
(Fix) Performing a query with an outer join no longer misoptimizes the WHERE clause (by attempting to apply the conditions in that clause to subjects of the outer join individually).
(Fix) Attempting to create bounded areas no longer sometimes fails with an 'unknown error'.
(Fix) Exporting a coordinate system based on Eckert IV or Eckert VI to GSR no longer exports incorrect values for the center longitude parameter.
Exporting a coordinate system to PRJ writes values of datum parameters with full precision.
(Fix) Importing a coordinate system from PRJ no longer ignores values of datum parameters written in the PRJ file in case the datum name does not match these values or is not recognized.
Performing a transform in a map window preserves the transform target, if this is possible. (For example, previously, applying a transform to [Selection in <layer>] was resetting the transform target to [All Objects]. With the change, if the target layer still has selected objects after the transform, the target will stay at [Selection in <layer>].)

For download links as well as instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.26

adamw — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 15:58:21 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

Fetching data from Oracle data sources via native Oracle interface performs significantly faster.
(Fix) Computations done with CUDA on certain Fermi devices no longer sometimes fail to produce invisible pixels.
(Fix) Compressing MAP file data no longer sometimes leaks a small amount of memory.
(Fix) Building Bounded Areas no longer sometimes (rarely) produces incorrect results.
(Fix) Attempting to convert a blank Geom value to WKB no longer fails.
(Fix) Reading curvilinear data from DGN no longer sometimes produces areas instead of lines.
(Fix) Reading data from JPEG2000 no longer sometimes leaks memory.
(Fix) Reading data from RLE-encoded BMP no longer sometimes produces incorrect pixel values on the right edge of the image.
(Fix) Attempting to connect to DB2 data source in 64-bit mode no longer fails.
(Fix) Attempting to read certain types of malformed PNG and TIFF files no longer crashes.
The installation logic is updated to allow running Manifold 8 together with future versions of Manifold on the same machine.

For download links as well as instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.24

adamw — Sat, 19 Feb 2011 16:55:32 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Performing Undo Check Out operation on a shared theme component no longer sometimes corrupts memory and / or resets formatting of theme objects.
(Fix) Performing Get operation on a shared theme component no longer sometimes corrupts memory and / or resets formatting of theme objects.
(Fix) Using shared theme components in the context of a web site no longer sometimes corrupts memory.

For download links as well as instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.23

adamw — Sat, 05 Feb 2011 14:16:46 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Importing data from a geocoding database no longer skips some of the streets.
Invoking Help falls back to the remote help URL in case the local help file can not be found.
The help file is now a separate download (see the Updates page below). Installation packages no longer include it.

For download links as well as instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.22

adamw — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 06:51:49 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Importing a LULC GIRAS file no longer sometimes fails to create areas.
(Fix) Importing a SDTS data set no longer sometimes leaks memory.
(Fix) Importing a PIX file no longer sometimes fails to import selected components (and imports other components or no components at all).

For download links as well as instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold 8.0.21

adamw — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 10:06:24 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Creating a layout with a template no longer leaves half-created layout in case the template could not be applied.
(Fix) Importing an XYZ file with only one row or column of pixels no longer supplies created components with a malformed coordinate system.
Activation dialogs no longer try to fetch activation keys and disable relevant UI elements in case the user lacks administrative rights.
Web site links displayed in activation dialogs are made clickable.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold Toolbar 1.0.5

adamw — Sat, 18 Sep 2010 22:47:12 GMT

A new update for Manifold Toolbar is now available.

The Manifold Toolbar provides easy access to popular online mapping services in Internet Explorer. Connections to online mapping services are done via Manifold geocoding server and Manifold image server modules. The Toolbar automatically downloads the default collection of geocoding and image server modules on first launch, that collection can be extended with modules supplied by the user at any time. All versions of Internet Explorer starting with Internet Explorer 6 are supported.

Latest changes:

There is a menu command to re-query tiles in the visible area (shortcut: F5).
There are performance improvements for the beta version of Internet Explorer 9.

The update is available on the Manifold Toolbar page.

Manifold System 8.0.20

adamw — Sat, 18 Sep 2010 07:44:21 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Assigning to the Scale and ScaleAbsolute properties of the MapControl object no longer incorrectly multiplies respective scale by submitted value.
(Fix) More Like This Cell and other commands working with rank columns treat lookup columns as text.
Attempting to import or link an HTML file in 64-bit mode tries to use the 64-bit version of Microsoft Access Database Engine 2010.
(Fix) Using the 64-bit version of Microsoft Access Database Engine 2010 no longer sometimes crashes.
(Fix) Rendering an image linked from an image server no longer sometimes (very rarely) rejects a tile returned by the server in favor of data rendered from a less detailed zoom level, due to a race condition.
(Fix) Applying a layout template to a bound layout can no longer convert main layout elements to ordinary layout elements displaying the same component.
Attempting to use a table with more than 2 GB records (eg, a virtual table for a large image) in a query throws a descriptive error message.
(Fix) Importing or linking a CSV file no longer converts large numeric codes to 32-bit integer values and instead imports them as text, preserving all data.
The coordinate system dialog shows the full name of the selected datum in a tooltip, if that name is too long to fit into the combo box.
The change coordinate system dialog shows the type of datum conversion to be applied near the bottom right corner of the coordinate system parameter list. Available datum conversion types are "NADCON", "NTv2" and Molodensky (default, shown as a blank string).

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.19

adamw — Thu, 26 Aug 2010 05:04:56 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) The Manifold OGC WMS server no longer reports wrong coordinate boxes for systems other than lat/lon.
(Fix) Random number generators used by the query engine no longer share the same seed.
Maximum size of a table component can exceed 4 GB.
(Fix) Importing a HDF, HDF EOS or HDF SeaWiFS file no longer sometimes leaks memory.
(Fix) Reading data for a built-in coordinate system on Oracle no longer sometimes ignores measurement units for parameter values.
Maximum dimensions of an image or surface are increased.
The Link Manifold Image Server Data dialog includes means to set the extents of the linked image to whole Earth (this also is the default).
(Fix) Linking data from an OGC WMS server correctly handles relative service URLs in the capabilities document.
There are coordinate system presets for coordinate systems used in Poland and Romania.
The Link Manifold Image Server Data dialog includes a link to the Image Servers and Geocoding Servers page on the Manifold web site.
The installation packages no longer contain geocoding servers for Geocoder.US and Microsoft Virtual Earth.
Attempting to import or link an MDB or XLS file in 64-bit mode tries to use the 64-bit version of Microsoft Access Database Engine 2010.
Attempting to connect to a Jet data source in 64-bit mode no longer throws a "no 64-bit Jet" error message on failure.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.18

adamw — Fri, 14 May 2010 07:07:58 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Rendering compressed images (imported or linked) at high zooms no longer produces wrong results in case the coordinate system used for rendering differs from the coordinate system of the image (a regression).
(Fix) The Manifold WMS server no longer sometimes reports wrong bounding box coordinates for coordinate systems other than lat/lon or that of the served component.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.17

adamw — Thu, 13 May 2010 06:59:42 GMT

A new update for Manifold is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Importing NetCDF files no longer sometimes incorrectly imports image or surface masks.
(Fix) Setting the MissingValue property of an ImportRawBinary object no longer sometimes loses precision.
The maximum allowed length of a formula entered in the Surface - Transform dialog has been increased to about 1 MB.
(Fix) Rendering an ECW or JPEG2000 image no longer inverses the alpha channel.
The scripting engine supports IronPython 2.6.1+.
The CUDA engine supports Fermi devices.
All CUDA kernels have been adjusted to work on devices with very low amounts of memory.
Importing a coordinate system from a PRJ file recognizes several new variations of German datum names.
Importing KML files preserves CDATA information.
(Fix) Exporting a coordinate system to a PRJ file no longer sometimes exports extra closing bracket.
(Fix) Attempting to select several components in the Project pane no longer fails to work on Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008 and Windows 7.
(Fix) Scanning a PostgreSQL table no longer sometimes mistakes a foreign key for a primary key.
(Fix) Computing a bearing no longer sometimes loses accuracy.
(Fix) The IntersectionPoint query function has been adjusted to never return multi-point geometry.
(Fix) The AspectHeight, SlopeHeight and HeightCurvXxx query functions no longer ignore planar scale of the underlying surface.
(Fix) The HeightXxx and similar query functions no longer sometimes take values from wrong pixels (offset by 1).
(Fix) Editing a rank column no longer sometimes crashes.
(Fix) Selecting records via More Like This commands in a table window no longer selects wrong records in case the table is sorted by values of one or more columns.
(Fix) The Surface - Contours dialog no longer fails to suggest contouring intervals for some cases of round height ranges (eg, 0 to 100).
(Fix) Inserting new objects into drawings via queries no longer fails to format them.
(Fix) The Surface - Transform dialog formulae can use the CurvGauss function.
Exporting a DBF file translates NULL values (eg, coming from a linked drawing or table) to blanks or zeros, according to column type, instead of throwing an error.
(Fix) The area adjacency check no longer fails to account for containment or equivalency.
(Fix) The area adjacency check no longer sometimes fails to work correctly for areas with multiple branches.
(Fix) The area containment check no longer sometimes fails to work correctly for areas with multiple branches.
The Rnd query function has been reworked to significantly increase entropy.
(Fix) Attempting to compute a drive-time zone via a script using centers and roads taken from different drawings no longer sometimes crashes.
(Fix) The ScaleXxx query functions no longer return NULL values for trivial scales (if a scaled object equals the original object).
(Fix) Resizing an image or surface no longer shifts pixel values to left and top.
(Fix) Attempting to access the Center or Box property of a GeomSet object no longer sometimes crashes.
(Fix) Reading the Box property of a Map object no longer fails in case a map does not have any drawing or theme layers.
(Fix) Rendering compressed images (imported or linked) at high zooms no longer produces blurry, shifted and incomplete results.
The GPGPU readout in the Help - About dialog indicates the presence of Fermi devices.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.16

adamw — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 06:49:44 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Importing an ERDAS Imagine file sets offset and scale of the created image even if there is no other projection information.
(Fix) The InStrRev() query function no longer sometimes returns incorrect data.
(Fix) The definition of the Dutch Grid (Rijksdriehoekstelsel) projection and the Amersfoort datum have been updated with correct values.
(Fix) Printing a geom value to WKT no longer sometimes loses precision.
(Fix) The Virtual Earth geocoder module has been updated for the current version of Virtual Earth.
(Fix) The PostgreSQL storage driver has been updated for PostGIS 1.4 / 1.5.
(Fix) The Spline transform no longer sometimes produces incorrect results.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.15 (merged with 8.0.14)

adamw — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 07:15:44 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Registering the Manifold ODBC driver no longer sometimes crashes.
(Fix) Running a query with a join and a HAVING clause no longer sometimes produces incorrect results.
(Fix) Importing a TAB file no longer sometimes produces wrong results unless all fields are selected.
Getting an activation key via the Web displays a confirmation dialog.
(Fix) Attempting to print a theme component from a theme window no longer prints the parent drawing.
(Fix) Reading a coordinate system from a MIF or TAB file no longer fails to scale false easting and false northing values to the specified units.
(Fix) Reading a coordinate system of an Oracle or PostgreSQL drawing or loading a coordinate system from a WKT value no longer maps certain south american datums to WGS84.
(Fix) Reading and writing 64-bit integer values from and to remote databases no longer sometimes throws an error.
(Fix) Retrieving properties of a DB2 drawing no longer fails to detect version triggers.
(Fix) Reading data in a rectangular window in a DB2 drawing no longer reads all data.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

(For those curious about 8.0.14, that build was never released for public consumption. As we were preparing to release it, we discovered a potential crash in the registration routine for the ODBC driver and held off the build in order to fix that bug.)

Manifold System 8.0.13

adamw — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 07:02:31 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Database Console and other tools no longer sometimes fail to work with SDE geodatabases on Oracle.
(Fix) Importing KML files no longer fails to correctly parse metric without Z coordinates.
(Fix) Importing VMAP data no longer sometimes misses areas made out of lines with multiple branches.
(Fix) Importing TAIF data no longer sometimes uses incorrect metric for areas with multiple branches.
(Fix) Importing BNA files no longer sometimes uses incorrect metric for objects with multiple branches.
(Fix) Creating contours on a surface with invalid pixel values no longer creates objects with invalid metric.
Error and status messages used by the geocoding engine have been made more descriptive.
(Fix) Detection of read-only tables on OLE DB data sources no longer sometimes marks certain SQL Server tables as read-only.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.12

adamw — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 08:06:43 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) The Spline transform no longer sometimes produces jumps due to lack of normalization.
(Fix) Parsing an Oracle SDO_GEOMETRY value no longer crashes on a multi-point entity with exactly one point.
(Fix) Creating new table with fields via a script no longer sometimes creates an invalid table if the fields were taken from another table object.
(Fix) Searching for the topmost modal dialog via user interface scripting correctly ignores the help window.
(Fix) Parsing a coordinate system from a WKT no longer fails to recognize some coordinate systems found in DB2 installations.
(Fix) Interpolating a surface from contours using DEST no longer sometimes fails to complete or produces erroneous results.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.11

adamw — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 06:38:24 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

There are coordinate system presets for Finnish EUREF coordinate systems.
(Fix) Querying field names and text data values via the Manifold ODBC driver no longer sometimes crashes.
(Fix) Using the InterpolateRow function in the Surface - Transform dialog no longer crashes on certain configurations of invisible pixels.
(Fix) Attempting to display the area of a component covered by a layout bound to it no longer crashes if the layout does not contain the body element for the component.
(Fix) Attempting to use certain flavors of JPEG2K files such as those generated by NAIP no longer sometimes crashes.
(Fix) Switching between components no longer sometimes produces screen garbage.
(Fix) Layout windows no longer disable the File - Print command for blank layouts.
(Fix) Scale escape sequences used in text layout elements correctly truncate scale values to the desired number of decimal digits.
(Fix) Degree-minute-second lat/lon escape sequences used in text layout elements no longer display decimal minutes.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold 8.0.10

adamw — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 06:03:53 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

The GPS console is more tolerant to GPS receivers that are slow to respond.
(Fix) Pasting Unicode text into comments, query and script windows no longer fails.
(Fix) Geocoding data against a geocoding extension file with the 'Address' field no longer sometimes returns incorrect results.
(Fix) Importing a CADRG data set using a script no longer sometimes creates multiple instances of the same component.
(Fix) Using the Variables pane when debugging a script no longer sometimes crashes.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.9

adamw — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 05:43:30 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

Reading and writing GEOGRAPHY values on SQL Server 2008 uses XY coordinate order, according to changes in the final release version of SQL Server 2008.
(Fix) Reading and writing text data from / to PostgreSQL no longer loses national characters (a regression).
Reading several common variations of malformed ECW files no longer sometimes hangs.
(Fix) Updating values of the "Selection (I)" field in drawings no longer overwrites masks for saved selections.
(Fix) Invoking a command which directly or indirectly closes a component window via a script no longer sometimes crashes.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page

Manifold System 8.0.8

adamw — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 07:25:52 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Updating the notes of a currently active component no longer fails to redraw the Notes pane.
The error message displayed by the query engine in case of code page mismatch in a pair of text fields (eg, used with a comparison operator) is made more descriptive.
(Fix) Attempting to use the Document or Component property of the event arguments object passed to the WindowActivated event handler of an add-in pane no longer fails.
(Fix) Launching a complex action which opens a dialog via UI scripting no longer sometimes misfires due to appearances of the progress dialog.
The IntersectLine query function can split a line using a point or point set.
(Fix) Selecting or deselecting a layout element using a script no longer fails to redraw layout windows showing the altered layout.
(Fix) Importing a coordinate system from a PRJ file correctly recognizes several cases of the single-parallel variant of the Lambert Conformal Conic projection.
(Fix) Attempting to manipulate the Go To dialog and several other dialogs using a script no longer sometimes fails due to timing problems.
(Fix) Importing a drawing from a DWG file no longer creates two copies of each intrinsic field.
Connecting to PostgreSQL data sources forces client encoding to UTF8 whenever possible, to avoid misinterpreting text data with non-English characters.
(Fix) Reading WKB values with Z and M data no longer sometimes fails.
(Fix) Altering data in a table or drawing using a script with UI scripting objects no longer sometimes fails.
(Fix) Converting geometry values to WKB correctly handles branched lines.
Exporting geometry values to an Oracle data source converts values with too many coordinates to NULLs.
(Fix) Reconnecting to a PostgreSQL data source no longer sometimes produces duplicates in the list of available drawings.
Reading and writing data from PostgreSQL and native Oracle data sources caches types of complex fields, reducing the number of queries issued against the data source.
(Fix) Importing 16-bit contiguous TIFF files no longer sometimes produces garbled results.
(Fix) Exporting data to a E00, MFD, MIF, SDTS or SHP file using a script no longer requires specifying names of exported fields in case-sensitive manner.
(Fix) Setting properties of a table field using UI scripting no longer sometimes fails to work.
(Fix) Selecting pixels using the Select Touch tool in palette images no longer produces incorrect results.
The Custom toolbar used for add-in commands preserves docking state between different sessions of Manifold.
(Fix) The IN query operator no longer sometimes produces incorrect results.
(Fix) Exporting a layout to an AI file no longer fails to correctly clip rotated data.
(Fix) Exporting a layout to an AI file no longer fails to correctly rotate text elements.
(Fix) Exporting a layout to an AI file no longer sometimes fails to correctly render area patterns.
Geocoding incomplete addresses works better.
(Fix) Geocoding data using MapPoint Europe no longer reports success even if there are no matches with usable lat/lon coordinates.
(Fix) Importing Z values for a 3D entity in a DXF file no longer produces wrong data for coordinates with Z values inherited from the entity.
(Fix) Attempting to use the ConvertForward and ConvertInverse methods of the CoordinateSystem object no longer sometimes fails.
(Fix) Using the Diversity, DiversityIndex, MeanValue and similar functions with CUDA on large surfaces no longer sometimes crashes.

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.7

adamw — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 05:16:23 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Using an Oracle table with no columns whose type can be recognized by Manifold (eg, all columns being set to use a user-defined type) no longer hangs.
(Fix) Capturing a modal dialog for UI scripting no longer considers dialogs launched outside the Manifold process.
(Fix) Changing formatting of a theme no longer fails to repaing layouts displaying that theme. (First reported by John Mechalas.)
(Fix) Importing a DXF file from a script no longer fails.
(Fix) Importing a spline from a DGN file no longer sometimes joins coordinates in incorrect order.
(Fix) Importing a NITF file no longer sometimes fails.
Writing metadata to Oracle 9i no longer sometimes fails (a workaround for a problem in Oracle code). (First reported by James Rutter.)
(Fix) Using CUDA no longer sometimes fails after a few successful runs (a regression). (First reported by Arthur Lembo.)

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.

Manifold System 8.0.6

adamw — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 01:48:38 GMT

A new update for Manifold 8 is now available.

Changes since previous update:

(Fix) Exporting a drawing to a MIF file converts '-' in field names to '_'.
(Fix) Importing a drawing from a TAB file no longer converts fixed-length text fields to variable-length ones.
(Fix) Attempting to interpolate a surface from a set of points with constant Z using Kriging no longer hangs. (First reported by Ketch Lorne.)
(Fix) Geocoding data to a zip code centroid no longer returns incorrect data due to a problem in the Manifold Geocoding Data set. (First reported by Tanya Unangst.)
(Fix) Importing an image from a Northwood GRC / GRD file no longer shifts the image half-pixel up and right. (First reported by John Gilmer.)
(Fix) Exporting a drawing to a MIF / MID file pair writes variable-length text fields as 254-character ones, not 255-character.
(Fix) Importing or exporting a coordinate system from or to a PRJ file correctly handles Greek coordinate systems. (First reported by Alexandros Malounis.)
(Fix) Adding a coordinate to a segment of a drawing object in a map window no longer uses wrong coordinate values if the coordinate system of the drawing differs from that of the map. (First reported by Asko Kontinen.)
Importing an image or surface from an ERDAS IMG file performs significantly faster. (First reported by Dan Borman.)
(Fix) Importing an image or surface from an ERDAS IMG file no longer sometimes fails to correctly uncompress tiles. (First reported by Dan Borman.)
(Fix) Editing a drawing linked from SQL Server 2008 using versions no longer fails.
(Fix) The Value() function in the Surface - Transform dialog no longer fails to work.
(Fix) Performing a transform on a linked drawing no longer fails to stop with an error if it can not write data to the drawing during the metric normalization phase.
(Fix) The report of the number of coordinates in the surface interpolation dialog is no longer misleading. (Thanks to Colin Driscoll.)
Components linked from the same PostgreSQL data source shared the same database connection.
(Fix) Using data on a PostgreSQL data source no longer sometimes leaks a database connection.
(Fix) Attempting to delete a running script (eg, while it is stopped on a breakpoint) no longer succeeds. (First reported by Klaus Engelberg.)
(Fix) Using CUDA on a large surface no longer sometimes runs out of resources due to module leaks. (First reported by Ben Sigrist and Kevin Ross.)

The update is available for Manifold 8 editions and Manifold 8 x64 editions.

For instructions on installing and using updates, see the Manifold System Updates page.