So I am curious about using MapServer inside an existing C++ program. A previous query about this suggested I shell out to the OS and call shp2image to create the image which I could then read in. Shelling to the OS is not my prefered way of doing anything (there are limitations in the C system() call I would prefer to avoid). So, I would rather use MapServer as a library call.
Looking at the makefile generated by MapServer, I see that the CGI program can be compiled as a library (the shp2img program uses a static library version), so that should work for me. Looking at the PHP/MapScript documentation (http://mapserver.gis.umn.edu/docs/reference/phpmapscript-class) and the code for shp2img, I see how the mapObj is created which creates an imageObj which writes out to a file. I could (I suppose) write out to a file and use GD to read the file back in to I can get access to the pixels for my display. I would prefer to skip the write to file/read the file part for speed. Is there another reference on the classes I am missing? The online docs don't seem to give an indication of what the actual classes do, just methods in the classes. Is there a better place to look for this? Is this more of a question for the DEV list rather than the USER list? I haven't actually installed MapScript itself. From the Readme in the MapServer download, it says it is a module, and does not list C or C++ as a language it supports. Thanks in advance for any help... - Brian
