to Bob (and the list-members) -
The problem isn't with MapX - which is a great add-on to a general
programming language
to make single- or limited- purpose applications based on MapInfo datafiles.
[Rant on]
The problem is to automate and extend _MapInfo_. Today you can use MapBasic,
which has somewhat limited functionality (example: designing of
user-intefaces)
and is slow as an icelandic gletcher running upwards. Another method is to
write
dll's in traditional languages as C++ or Delphi and call these from MapBasic
"stubs".
That's where MapInfo falls short. You have only limited control over MapInfo
via Ole-automation and few possibilities to fecth geografical information
from
MapInfo to your dll. For example: If you want all the separate points in a
polygon you
have to write af function in MapBasic, that copies all point information
from the polygon
to an array, and then transfer the array to the dll as an argument. This
involes a double for-loop
- and MapBasic is slow, especially when you look at for- and while loops.
Why can't I get
that kind of information directly from MapInfo via an Ole-based interface??
Another example: A long time ago someone posted a mapbasic based convex-hull
program
on Bill Thoen's ftp-site. For testing purposes, i rewrote the core
functionality in a Delphi dll.
If you discount the time it took for mapbasic to collect the point
information and transfer these
to the dll, the dll based function ran 50-100 times faster than the similar
Mapbasic based function.
Granted that a bytecode interpreter runs slower than a compiled program, but
a factor 50 is
_way_ over the acceptable limit.
So I'm looking forward the version 6.0 and it's all singing, all dancing new
programming interface
with plug-ins (I'll hope), active-x and whatnot....
[Rant off]
Have a nice weekend !!
Bo Thomsen
GeoConsult I/S
Denmark
> -----Oprindelig meddelelse-----
> Fra: Bob Young [SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sendt: 17. september 1999 12:57
> Til: Kim Greenham
> Cc: Mapinfo-L
> Emne: Re: VB support for MI
>
> Dear Kim
>
> I am probably being very dim here but whats the problem with using MapX?
....................... rest of mail deleted................
----------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from this list, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put
"unsubscribe MAPINFO-L" in the message body, or contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
