BorlandTalk.com Borland discussion newsgroups   Archives   FAQ   Search   Memberlist   Usergroups   Register   Profile   Log in to check your private messages   Log in  New to graphics programming          BorlandTalk.com Forum Index -> Delphi Graphics View previous topic :: View next topic   Author Message Peter Hartlén Guest Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 9:11 am    Post subject: New to graphics programming Hi! Are there any recommended guides I could read to learn best practices in graphics programming with maps. I want to add a map module to my application. The module should: 1. Be able to open maps in jpeg formats with .tfw coordinate file 2. I want to be able to paint bitmaps or simple shapes ontop (not in the actual file) of the map, based on coordinates, and indicating certain objects throughout the terrain. 3. Allow the user to click on these painted objects 4. Use the mousescroll to zoom 5. Load parts of the map-file as it could be really large. Possibly using the screen resolution as tile-size and cache the map-tiles closest to the active tile Mainly I am interested in common techniques to prevent flickering when loading large maps. What component(s) should I use when loading the map(s). Should I use a transparent componentontop of the base component displaying the map? How easy/hard would it be to implement support for dxf (and various autocad formats)? Thanks in advance! / Peter Back to top willem van deursen Guest Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 9:11 am    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming Hi Peter, there are some real GIS components around for Delphi (look at TatukGIS at www.tatugis.com), but that might be a little bit overkill for your application. Maybe you want to start with something like G32 (http://www.graphics32.org/wiki/) that can load quite large bitmaps and allows you to zoom. You have to create your own coordinate system based on the information in your world files, and convert from and to bitmapcoordinates yourself. If you have only a few objects you want on top of your map, you can use components for that (they will give you an onclick event), otherwise you have to draw them on one of the G32 layers and maintain a list with coordinates which ou can use to search for clicks near your objects. If you have the money available, go to the professional GIS components, if you don't have the money, I would recommend G32. Willem Peter Hartlén wrote: Quote: Hi! Are there any recommended guides I could read to learn best practices in graphics programming with maps. I want to add a map module to my application. The module should: 1. Be able to open maps in jpeg formats with .tfw coordinate file 2. I want to be able to paint bitmaps or simple shapes ontop (not in the actual file) of the map, based on coordinates, and indicating certain objects throughout the terrain. 3. Allow the user to click on these painted objects 4. Use the mousescroll to zoom 5. Load parts of the map-file as it could be really large. Possibly using the screen resolution as tile-size and cache the map-tiles closest to the active tile Mainly I am interested in common techniques to prevent flickering when loading large maps. What component(s) should I use when loading the map(s). Should I use a transparent componentontop of the base component displaying the map? How easy/hard would it be to implement support for dxf (and various autocad formats)? Thanks in advance! / Peter -- Willem van Deursen, The Netherlands wvandeursen_nospam (AT) nospam_carthago (DOT) nl replace _nospam@nospam_ for @ to get a valid email address www.carthago.nl Back to top Peter S. Guest Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 9:11 am    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming Hello, You may also try this http://www.ecostats.com/software/shapeviewer/svobjectsdelphi.htm Regards Ï "Peter Hartlén" <ph.no (AT) sib (DOT) spam.se> Ýãñáøå óôï ìÞíõìá news:45bef669 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com... Quote: Hi! Are there any recommended guides I could read to learn best practices in graphics programming with maps. I want to add a map module to my application. The module should: 1. Be able to open maps in jpeg formats with .tfw coordinate file 2. I want to be able to paint bitmaps or simple shapes ontop (not in the actual file) of the map, based on coordinates, and indicating certain objects throughout the terrain. 3. Allow the user to click on these painted objects 4. Use the mousescroll to zoom 5. Load parts of the map-file as it could be really large. Possibly using the screen resolution as tile-size and cache the map-tiles closest to the active tile Mainly I am interested in common techniques to prevent flickering when loading large maps. What component(s) should I use when loading the map(s). Should I use a transparent componentontop of the base component displaying the map? How easy/hard would it be to implement support for dxf (and various autocad formats)? Thanks in advance! / Peter Back to top Nils Haeck Guest Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 3:49 pm    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming How big are the bitmaps? If they are larger than.. say 4000x4000 pixels you will need a special tiled class reading them. If they're not, you can just load them into memory (off-screen), and "blit" parts of this bitmap to the screen using the StretchBlt command. I can also help you perhaps by writing a demo with Pyro. Can you perhaps send me a sample jpeg file, and a sample .tfw coordinate file (with a description of it's format)? Pyro isn't free but it would do the trick very well (allowing all kinds of objects over a map, in a scrollable / zoomable window). Info here: http://www.simdesign.nl/forum/viewforum.php?f=13 Preventing flicker is easy: just override the WM_EraseBkgnd message in your form / panel / paintbox, and make sure the background is not "erased", or painted white, by Windows: TMyPanel = class(TCustomPanel) private .. procedure WMEraseBkgnd(var Message: TWMEraseBkgnd); message WM_ERASEBKGND; procedure TMyPanel.WMEraseBkgnd(var Message: TWMEraseBkgnd); begin // No automatic erase of background Message.Result := LRESULT(False); end; Another (slower) option is to set the control to "DoubleBuffered". Kind regards, Nils Haeck www.simdesign.nl "Peter Hartlén" <ph.no (AT) sib (DOT) spam.se> schreef in bericht news:45bef669 (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com... Quote: Hi! Are there any recommended guides I could read to learn best practices in graphics programming with maps. I want to add a map module to my application. The module should: 1. Be able to open maps in jpeg formats with .tfw coordinate file 2. I want to be able to paint bitmaps or simple shapes ontop (not in the actual file) of the map, based on coordinates, and indicating certain objects throughout the terrain. 3. Allow the user to click on these painted objects 4. Use the mousescroll to zoom 5. Load parts of the map-file as it could be really large. Possibly using the screen resolution as tile-size and cache the map-tiles closest to the active tile Mainly I am interested in common techniques to prevent flickering when loading large maps. What component(s) should I use when loading the map(s). Should I use a transparent componentontop of the base component displaying the map? How easy/hard would it be to implement support for dxf (and various autocad formats)? Thanks in advance! / Peter Back to top Lord Crc Guest Posted: Tue Jan 30, 2007 11:18 pm    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 10:49:08 +0100, "Nils Haeck" <bla (AT) bla (DOT) com> wrote: Quote: If they are larger than.. say 4000x4000 pixels you will need a special tiled class reading them. I guess that's driver dependent then (I'm not considering 9x here). I've successfully opened a 8192x6000 bitmap in TImage, and manipulated it without problem. But I agree with your general idea, it's not something I would count on working ;) - Asbjørn Back to top Nils Haeck Guest Posted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 2:54 am    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming Indeed.. and the worst thing, it might work on *your* computer, but if your software is used by many, there's always a user somewhere with a Win 95 system and horrible graphics card, where it crashes. I think even the 4000x4000 is rather stressing, I once heard it's only "safe" to create a bitmap the size of the user's screen resolution. So in order to be really safe, one would have to query the screen resolution and use that as upper bound. Nils "Lord Crc" <lordcrc (AT) hotmail (DOT) com> schreef in bericht news:hbvur2dggbda8egq3jhhk92cjfoao4fe79 (AT) 4ax (DOT) com... Quote: On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 10:49:08 +0100, "Nils Haeck" <bla (AT) bla (DOT) com> wrote: If they are larger than.. say 4000x4000 pixels you will need a special tiled class reading them. I guess that's driver dependent then (I'm not considering 9x here). I've successfully opened a 8192x6000 bitmap in TImage, and manipulated it without problem. But I agree with your general idea, it's not something I would count on working ;) - Asbjørn Back to top Chris Morgan Guest Posted: Wed Jan 31, 2007 6:05 am    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming Quote: Are there any recommended guides I could read to learn best practices in graphics programming with maps. I want to add a map module to my application. The module should: 1. Be able to open maps in jpeg formats with .tfw coordinate file 2. I want to be able to paint bitmaps or simple shapes ontop (not in the actual file) of the map, based on coordinates, and indicating certain objects throughout the terrain. 3. Allow the user to click on these painted objects 4. Use the mousescroll to zoom 5. Load parts of the map-file as it could be really large. Possibly using the screen resolution as tile-size and cache the map-tiles closest to the active tile Mainly I am interested in common techniques to prevent flickering when loading large maps. I would investigate the available 3rd party Delphi components and COM controls first to see if any do what you want. If you cannot find a 3rd party set which suits your needs, your requirements will involve a lot of work. We have developed some in-house mapping components for some of our applications. We also use ArcGIS components from ESRI (www.esri.com) (which are not cheap). You will need to investigate coordinate transforms (between floating point and integer coordinate systems), possibly involving spheroidal coordinate systems, depending on the scale and projection systems used in your maps. You will also need to use a combination of bitmap and vector graphics. Vectors are useful for indicating selection, since you can 'undraw' them to remove the selection (if you draw with an XOR pen). Getting maps to scroll smoothly without flickering or delay is also quite tricky. You need to have a fast spatial index of your data so that you can quickly determine the parts which need to be redrawn. Cheers, Chris Back to top Loren Pechtel Guest Posted: Thu Feb 01, 2007 2:03 am    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 18:18:14 +0100, Lord Crc <lordcrc (AT) hotmail (DOT) com> wrote: Quote: On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 10:49:08 +0100, "Nils Haeck" <bla (AT) bla (DOT) com> wrote: If they are larger than.. say 4000x4000 pixels you will need a special tiled class reading them. I guess that's driver dependent then (I'm not considering 9x here). I've successfully opened a 8192x6000 bitmap in TImage, and manipulated it without problem. But I agree with your general idea, it's not something I would count on working Yeah, that's the bugaboo--it is driver dependant. Just because it works on your box doesn't mean it works on someone else's. Back to top Bryan Guest Posted: Sat Feb 03, 2007 12:21 am    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming Peter, Take a look at TGlobe (www.tglobe.com). It is a very nice component for mapping etc... - Georeference images - Shapefile, MIF, E00 and others. - 100% user interactive, panning, zooming etc.... You can download demos to see if this is what you want. Cheers, Bryan "Peter Hartlén" <ph.no (AT) sib (DOT) spam.se> wrote: Quote: Hi! Are there any recommended guides I could read to learn best practices in graphics programming with maps. I want to add a map module to my application. The module should: 1. Be able to open maps in jpeg formats with .tfw coordinate file 2. I want to be able to paint bitmaps or simple shapes ontop (not in the actual file) of the map, based on coordinates, and indicating certain objects throughout the terrain. 3. Allow the user to click on these painted objects 4. Use the mousescroll to zoom 5. Load parts of the map-file as it could be really large. Possibly using the screen resolution as tile-size and cache the map-tiles closest to the active tile Mainly I am interested in common techniques to prevent flickering when loading large maps. What component(s) should I use when loading the map(s). Should I use a transparent componentontop of the base component displaying the map? How easy/hard would it be to implement support for dxf (and various autocad formats)? Thanks in advance! / Peter Back to top fei hongbin Guest Posted: Thu Apr 12, 2007 4:47 pm    Post subject: Re: New to graphics programming Please try TCAD package. visit it at http://www.codeidea.com to get more information. hongbin.fei "Loren Pechtel" <lorenpechtel (AT) hotmail (DOT) invalid.com> ??????:45c0f5fc (AT) newsgroups (DOT) borland.com... Quote: On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 18:18:14 +0100, Lord Crc <lordcrc (AT) hotmail (DOT) com wrote: On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 10:49:08 +0100, "Nils Haeck" <bla (AT) bla (DOT) com> wrote: If they are larger than.. say 4000x4000 pixels you will need a special tiled class reading them. I guess that's driver dependent then (I'm not considering 9x here). I've successfully opened a 8192x6000 bitmap in TImage, and manipulated it without problem. But I agree with your general idea, it's not something I would count on working ;) Yeah, that's the bugaboo--it is driver dependant. Just because it works on your box doesn't mean it works on someone else's. 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