MSConsole

Well, MSConsole project has started. MSConsole is about converting axl project files in valid mapserver configuration files, ready for use. In this way you can configure your mapserver applications with the easiness of use of the well-known, industry standard ESRI tools, save the project in AXL format and then convert it in a ready to use mapserver file.
MSConsole is written in Java and should run an any operating system, but the primary target will be *NIX because that’s the platform it is being developed on.
The first release will probably be available in two weeks’ time, but I count on having code on sourceforge CVS earlier.

I wish I had graphics/artistic abilities, but I don’t (I can code intead) so if ant of you readers/users of MSConsole wants to create a logo for it just email it to me and I’ll put up a small contest.

Here’s a small preview of what MSConsole can do: in the first image you can see a map created with Arc Explorer 9. It features labels and a thematic coloring based on the value of an attribute.
In the second image there is the same map in a different size. The map file that was used was generated entirely by MSConsole, without extra editing. Note that the theme colors have been preserved, even though labels haven’t. Labels are instead supported on single colors classes, but work is in progress.

More screenshots will be uploaded in the screenshot section.

Symbols support added

I have just checked into cvs new code that adds symbols support to MapServer Console. The symbols that are supported are all those allowed by the axl DTD.

Polygon fills:

• solid fill
• vertical and horizontal lines
• upward and downward diagonal
• cross and diagonal cross
• light, gray and dark screen

Lines:

• solid
• dash
• dot
• dash-dot
• dash-dot-dot

Image fills are not supported yet. The symbols are in a separate symbols.sym file that will be copied from the src/resources directory.

This weekend I managed to find a couple of spare hours and add support for GEOTiff Layers. Incorporated in version 1.0.

After some inactivity I have published a new release, mainly to add support for Windows paths in the SHAPEWORKSPACE directory attribute. This resolves an issue that produced obscure errors when trying to convert axl files produced on Windows.
Unix users are unaffected.