Dear Developers
After using Openjump for a while I wrote some
observations and ideas that I had (as user, not as
developer).
I do not want to open a discussion, and probabily some
of these points have no "common feeling" or probabily
always had answer.
I want only to share with you my experience as
newcomer in Openjump, and also the feeling I had from
other people I bring to Openjump
I write them in order of importance (my personal
point of view, of coarse!)
1) Export display parameters of a layer to other
projects.
The displayed parameters of a dataset (colours of
lines, polygons, fill, winth, etc) are saved only in
the program file (.JMP). Neverthess, if people want to
use the same dataset in a different project, they must
setup again the displayes parameters.
At the beginning I thought that "View>Tranform layer
Style into SLID" was the function to use. I had to
change my idea.
A function in Openjump that saves displayed
parameters of a dataset to, for example, a sepatate
extra XML or TXT file, would be fine. This file wuold
be used to display again the same parameters when the
dataset is opened again in other projects
I have no idea about the difficulties for developers
to build this function.
The proposal is to have two extra functions on Layer
Menu: "Save Layer Properties to (?) file" and a "Load
Layer Properties from (?) file".
2) Setup question.
I started to suggest Openjump to my friends or
students.
The main difficulty I found with people is connected
to Java machine.
Some people do not setup well JAVA machine so
Openjump does't work.
Some other "Windows" people simply don't understand to
"click on Openjum.bat" file to run Openjump. They
expect the launcher on the desktop (and .bat still
remember them the ol'good difficult DOS).
I started to give people a version of Openjump 1.2B
with Java embedded, similar to Openjump Merge.
Proposal: I think it would be fine to have on the web
site two versions of Openjump: a) one with setup and
Java embedded for easy people, b) the second one - no
java no stup - for smart people.
3)DXF/DWG
Openjump is becoming, thanks to edit/drawing tools
and SVG export, a good mapping software. A lot of
mapping datas are in dwg format and some people cried
the absence of a dxf/dwg import option. I always
recomand them the good Michael's dxf plugin.
Proposal: If Michael agrees, this plugin could be
embedded in Openjump.
Regarding dwg I image it is only a problem of time.
4) Save file observation.
There is still some confusion for newcomers about the
difference betwee "Save Datasets as file..." and "Save
dataset as..". (See Michael and Uwe discussion in
[JPP-Devel] Load/Save dataset design).
I tried to point out in a help documentation I posted
some weeks ago. Nevertheless there are still newcomers
who use "Save dataset as.." ... and they forget the
suffix! I belive, like Uwe, that it is important to
have a suffix built automatically.
5) PostGIS
I think it's time to transalte Uwe's Portgis tutorial
in English (if Uwe agrees, of coarse) maybe integrated
with how to use Orbiscad and Openjump together.
Proposal: Does somebody thranslate from German to
English (otherwise this summer I will try to refresh
my scarse German with Uwe's documentation)?
6)Editing tools (not very seriuos!)
It would be nice to have some editing tools in a
"Inkscape-like" style.
Examples, tranfering some editing tools on the mouse:
a) one left-click mouse>edit/move object
b) two left click mouse>edit/move verticles
c) three left-click mouse>free rotation
This probabiy makes Openjump editing tools more
"international-ized"
Is this something difficuld to build?
Thanks for your attention
Peppe
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