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Internet Mapping Framework
ArcIMS Version
Technical Notes
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Introduction
The Internet Mapping Framework (for ArcIMS) is an application framework
used to develop and deploy customized web-mapping applications that use
ESRI's ArcIMS product. The Java object model and framework code are
compatible with all ArcIMS versions (3.0, 3.1, 4.0, 4.0.1, 9.0, 9.1 and 9.2).
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Management Overview
IMF is used for rapidly deploying multiple Internet mapping sites
within an organization with a common look and feel, while providing
an infrastructure for the management of web application software
and hardware. IMF sites are thin-client applications that operate
efficiently without plug-ins or applets.
The application framework is intended to provide common mapping tools
and processes for mapping web sites without needing to duplicate the
core application code. A set of powerful, configurable routines are
included, and the design of IMF makes it easy to add more.
Using IMF, most sites are deployed without any programming at all.
A site can be fully configured using XML configuration files and a
few HTML documents relevant to the site. It is far easier and more
cost-effective to develop a web-mapping application using IMF than
any other approach.
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Functional Overview
The following is a general list of pre-built IMF functionality. It is
very easy to add new capabilities. Note that this is not a complete or
final list of IMF capability.
- Sites easily configured using XML.
- WMS service support. Data and maps from multiple services combined in application with ArcIMS data.
- Forwarding routine to fetch images from secure servers.
- Geoprocessing capability (buffer, intersect, contains, etc.)
- Display your title document containing logo, etc.
- Multiple tab bar formats including rounded tabs, easy to add new tabs using XML.
- Button and tool bar with built-in tools that can be included in your site
- Zoom to full extent
- Zoom to previous extent
- Display index map. Index map refreshes automatically when extent changes and can be clicked to reposition the map.
- Create printable map at specific scale in Adobe PDF format.
- Send the map to yourself or someone by e-mail.
- Drill-down identify tool to display information from all visible layers.
- Identify tool to display information about active layer.
- Zoom in using mouse click or rectangle.
- Zoom out by mouse click.
- Pan (recenter) by mouse click or dragging the map.
- Measure distance tool drawing multiple segment lines.
- Measure area tool drawing a polygon.
- Pushpin tool adding marker and text to the map. Location text available.
- User redlining function. Draw a point, line, polygon or box to add to the map.
- Clear tool to remove user markup.
- Spacing control to separate tools and buttons into logical groups.
- Easily add new tools and buttons using XML.
- Support for multiple toolsets.
- Context sensitive help for active toolset.
- Auto-generated help from XML text associated with tools and tabs.
- Feedback link to send an e-mail message to your site administrator.
- Advanced layer control.
- Layers grouped into nested folders.
- Display order independent of drawing order.
- Folder controls, all on, all off.
- Support for radio folders where only one layer can be on at a time.
- Layers can be hidden from user control.
- A layer's labels can be turned off independently of the layer.
- Metadata availably by layer name hyperlink.
- Scale dependent layers.
- Virtual layers, layers organized into a group that appears as one layer.
- User restrictions preventing the user from changing visibility of a layer.
- Automatically refresh option.
- Layer naming based on XML setup rather than capabilities title.
- Advanced identify reporting routines.
- Automatic default report for queryable layers.
- Drill down identify report to show information from all visible layers.
- Field aliases or alternate display titles.
- Fields can be hidden from default reports.
- Fields containing URLs automatically hyperlinked.
- Field level metadata supported.
- Coordinate position reported in multiple coordinate systems.
- Links can be shown in report constructed from field contents.
- Open related reports instead of showing default report.
- URL to related reports automatically built from field contents.
- Database connectivity to insert selected record information in database for join filter.
- Map limits can be set (maximum extent, minimum scale, etc.)
- Real-time coordinate display when user moves mouse over the map.
- North arrow on map, automatically angled.
- Scalebar on map, configurable units.
- Map centre coordinates printed on map in desired coordinate system.
- Scale display in status bar.
- Zoom to user-entered scale.
- Copyright message on map.
- Display legend information
- Extensible find location routines.
- Zoom to latitude / longitude position.
- Zoom to UTM position.
- Bookmarks, save and restore a location extent.
- Gazetteer search and zoom routine.
- Zoom to place name from extents saved in database.
- Easy to add more, defined in XML.
- Predefined themes or views that can be opened by the user.
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Technical Overview
IMF is a pure Java / JSP application that is platform independent. It runs on
a variety of web servers and servlet engines on Windows, UNIX or Linux servers,
including the following:
- Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS)
- Sun One (formerly iPlanet)
- IBM Websphere
- Apache HTTP server
- Oracle OC4J
- Oracle 9iAS
- Apache Tomcat
- ServletExec
- JRun
- Resin
It requires Java v1.3.1 or later to be installed on the web server. This
product can be downloaded free of charge from
http://java.sun.com. The J2SE SDK is
recommended over a Java Runtime Environment (JRE) installation.
It is a server-side application, with all significant processing taking place
on the web server. This results in a very thin-client, low bandwidth application
for the user, requiring minimal client computer capability and network speed.
Supported browser clients include:
- Internet Explorer v4.0+
- Netscape v4.0+
- Mozilla v1.2+
- Opera v7.0+
The IMF application contains a package of Java classes that manage the
application properties and communication to the spatial web servers. The
classes also contain routines to handle projections and geoprocessing of
geometric shapes such as buffer, intersection, etc.
Most of the routines that the user interacts with are implemented as JSP
scripts. The JSP scripts use object-oriented methods of the Java class
objects to manage the user's session. The JSP approach was chosen to make
it easier for IMF licensees to learn from the core scripts and copy or
modify them to create new functionality.
The IMF is intended to be used for custom applications with a preset data
set and layers list. The map settings are predefined by the site developer
to specify the layers to include, their order and properties, and how they
are organized into folders.
Most of the time, map images are returned directly from the ArcIMS and WMS
servers to the user's browser, stacking multiple transparent images on top
of each other. In some cases, the image may come from the IMF server, if it
is forwarded or streamed for security reasons. IMF combines some images for
printing and e-mailing to users.
It is easy to set up layers to display dynamic reporting documents that can
be called with parameters from the associated feature on the map. It is also
very easy to create new interactive map tools where the user draws a point,
box, line or polygon on the map and something magic happens.
Please refer also to the IMF General Technical Notes
page for more general information about IMF. If you are interested in more
detailed information about the configuration of IMF sites, please feel free to
contact us for a copy of the applicable IMF Development Guide.
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