I have used both packages extensively but rely increasingly on Maptitude and
its big daddy TransCAD to do my routine map work. The main reason is
Caliper's GISs produce better looking maps in less time than Mapinfo. When
you compare output, you notice a big difference immediately: Maptitude's
maps come with a proper legend and a scale bar that is drawn automatically
and not distorted by projections; Mapinfo sort of gives you a legend but it
is cumbersome to use and I'm still waiting for a proper scalebar. One of
the key features of any map and Mapinfo comes up woefully short after how
many chances?
The other big difference is in thematic mapping: Maptitude rules here,
hands down. It can graduate lines as well as points, where Mapinfo still
can only do the latter; this is a huge shortcoming, especially in the
transport field where bandwidth maps are frequently used to display traffic
counts or highway lanes. Another thing Maptitude does really well is allow
multiple themes to be shown on the same map. For example if I want to
depict traffic counts as well as the number of lanes, I can create a
bandwidth map illustrating traffic levels and overlay a colour theme on top
of the traffic bands with different colours indicating different numbers of
lanes. Mapinfo can do bivariate thematics but in a very limited way.
The other feature I use a lot with Maptitude is shortest path routing. If
you have a line map that is topologically clean (i.e. no breaks between line
segments) you can pick two or more points in the network and Maptitude will
draw in the shortest path connecting these points. Mapinfo? no way. This
functionality is useful as well for detecting topological errors in line
files. You can quickly find gaps or incomplete joins where in Mapinfo,
unless you zoom in very closely, you can easily miss bad topology.
Another feature that is underappreciated is the ability in Maptitude to
preset fixed zoom levels with markers. This is a clever way to navigate
around big areas; I can jump to the Maritime provinces from British Columbia
with a couple of clicks of the mouse where in Mapinfo I would have to zoom
out and pan numerous times to cross the country. A real time saver.
Other features:
Translation utilities are superior in Maptitude; Mapinfo has made strides
with its universal translator but still lags behind.
Bands, overlays and related spatial analyses are handled better in Maptitude
owing primarily to its use of topology, I think.
These features alone justify Maptitude's use over Mapinfo for routine work,
but the program comes up short in two areas relative to Mapinfo.
In map development, the flexibility of Mapinfo's spaghetti topology makes me
reach for it when I need to revise line files and the like. I can cut and
paste line segments between .tab files in MI with ease, move lines around
the map and edit nodes with no problem, and append two tables together with
no effort. There is simply complete control over the vector objects in MI
that is largely absent from Maptitude. The latter with its rigorous
topology model does not allow appending records from other files into a
given file or messing around with line segments in the way MI does.
Everything is joined in Maptitude so if you change one line all of its
neighbours change accordingly. This is fine for analytical work later on
when you have a clean file, but immensely difficult if you don't have a
clean file to start with. I use MI exclusively for line editing but use
Maptitude as a helper to find topological errors.
The other thing MI is superior in is SQL. Constructing queries of a layer
is the bread and butter of the program and is so good, MI could probably act
as a dedicated database program for many people even if they didn't have any
graphic objects to display. The function set is more extensive than
Maptitude's by a long shot and its ability to group and aggregate data is
without peer. I frequently do queries in which I tally the number of km of
road by various groups (e.g. province, road number). In MI it is a simple
sum and group query; in Maptitude I have to do a select by condition, open
the subset's dataview (i.e. the browser table) and then calculate statistics
on the subset. These extra steps in Maptitude frustrate a very simple
procedure and make me pine for MI when I am doing aggregations.
Another thing Maptitude could beef up on is producing graphic output. Its
paper map output is absolutely top-notch but leaves something to be desired
when you want to save to a metafile or bitmap. It seems as if the graphic
file resolution is much lower than the screen resolution and is a source of
some frustration. Mapinfo's metafile output is identical to its screen
resolution.
Lastly, the other thing I would like to see improved in Maptitude is
labelling. There is not enough control over labelling compared to MI, which
is very thorough indeed.
To sum up, MI is great as a map development tool but lacking on the
analytical and presentation side, while Maptitude is strong in the opposite
direction. The key message is both products have their niche and should be
viewed largely as complementary products than as competitors. If you have
the money buy both; if you tend to produce paper maps from good, clean data
and don't want to mess around with the geographic objects get Maptitude; if
you are developing maps from scratch, stick to MI. If you want the best
value for money, it's Maptitude, hands down.
I hope this helps,
Bob Leore
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