| 1 | Zero Suppress. Optionally have the ability to suppress zeros from the browser window.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 0.8 Response: 77% Rank: 128/151 |
| 2 | Report Format / Report Generator. Improvements and options for tabular reporting (fonts, shading, etc). Even if it was as simple as some sort of savable file specifying column content and widths. There is nothing (well, apart from all the other things ...) as frustrating as changing columns with Pick Fields and then finding that you have to redo all the column widths.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.6 Response: 87% Rank: 17/151 |
| 3 | Browser Navigation. Most any database program will allow you to use the cursor keys to move around the cells like a spreadsheet (not just tab forward / back). This makes editing quite cumbersome in MI.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 96% Rank: 30/151 |
| 4 | Effects. Support fills, points etc (cf re-districter), and cell/column-specific fonts.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 0.8 Response: 73% Rank: 132/151 |
Coordinate Info:
| 5 | Easier Native Coordinates. There should be a menu / dialog for changing the map's native coordinate system, instead of having to go through the MapBaisc window.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 69% Rank: 100/151 |
| 6 | DDMMSS. Provide Degrees / Minutes / Seconds as an alternative way of displaying longitude / latitude.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 79% Rank: 116/151 |
| 7 | World Ends at 180 Degrees. For Pacific customers, need to wrap at 180 degree line. Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 61% Rank: 138/151 |
| 8 | Bounds Clauses. Opportunity for entering coordinate bound data should be provided when a new mapper is defined and when a mapper is saved with "Save As". This would allow users with smaller areas to improve MI's precision. The current level of detail in MapInfo tables is not fine enough for civil enginerring and land work with default bounds.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 71% Rank: 83/151 |
| 9 | "Save as" for raster files. "Save as" for raster files should provide an opportunity to change the projection of the registration data in the raster TAB file.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 0.8 Response: 73% Rank: 126/151 |
| 10 | Non-north coordinate systems. MapInfo should (at a minimum) allow non-north "non-earth" coordinate systems, and (preferably) rotated coordinate systems for all projections.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 68% Rank: 121/151 |
| 11 | Default state plane definitions. Default state plane definitions should have default bounds that allow definition of coordinates to the hundredeth of a foot or thousandths of a meter.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 1.0 Response: 48% Rank: 147/151 |
| 12 | NAD83 English Units SPCS. Bounded default NAD83 SPCS definitions should be provided in meters and feet.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 1.1 Response: 40% Rank: 151/151 |
| 13 | Posting coordinate data to attributes. Eliminate the need to enter "set coordsys ..." in the MapBasic window when posting coordinates to attribute fields.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 63% Rank: 127/151 |
Documentation:
| 14 | Natural Break. This question has been asked a number of times, with fuzzy answers: "Exactly how does MI determine range breaks under the "Natural" selection?" This should be outlined in the user manual or on-line help.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 85% Rank: 80/151 |
| 15 | Cross References. Point 'get' functions to cross-reference equivalent 'set' commands and vice-versa. (eg FrontWindow() should have 'Set Window Front' listed in the SeeAlso section).
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 72% Rank: 109/151 |
| 16 | Improved Indexing. Both the paper and online versions. For instance, suppose that you want to find the function call to determine ROWID() of the current record. I defy you to search for ROWID and come up with... "commandinfo(CMD_INFO_ROWID)".
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 83% Rank: 36/151 |
General:
| 17 | Speed. After witnessing a couple of day long sessions of ArcView 3.0, MI needs to improve the speed of its drawing "engines". Thematic mapping with over 10,000 pts is painstakingly slow (especially after watching ArcView do it MUCH faster). Seemingly simple operations using MapBasic applications bog down with medium sized datasets and can cause program termination. General redraw with complicated mapper's can be speed up.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.5 Response: 92% Rank: 6/151 |
| 18 | File Save As... When working in MS-Word or Excel, and you choose File>Save As, your current working document becomes associated with the NEW file. Any changes/edits that were made to the original are saved to the NEW file, and the ORIGINAL file is closed unchanged. When working in MapInfo, and you choose Table>Save Copy As, your current working table remains associated with the ORIGINAL file. Any
changes/edits that were made to the original are saved to the NEW file, but the NEW file is closed and the original file remains open and changed. When you exit MapInfo or choose Table>Close All, you then get asked to save/discard changes to the orginal file - a confusing situation! Proposal: If MapInfo behaved in a similar way to MS Office products, and one issued Table>Save Copy As on a temporary query or modified table, one could expect the current table to be dropped and replaced by the permanent table which was saved to disk. This would simplify the saving of workspaces which result from
temporary queries, or modified tables.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.9 Response: 87% Rank: 46/151 |
| 19 | Batteries Included. MapInfo Professional should include MapBasic, Data Developers' Kit and other tools in the base price as a package.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 1.0 Response: 83% Rank: 89/151 |
Graphs:
| 20 | Map vs. Graph Integration. Improve the Histogramic (read pie and others too) functions of the
graphics module to include the same distributions (and themeing) as seen
in the legend(s).
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 76% Rank: 101/151 |
| 21 | Show Selected Items between Mapper & Grapher. Improve the XY scatter-grams with hot links in the scatter (read all) graphic types for objects selected - bars, pie slices, scatter points AND their spatial objects. This will enable cluster or outliers selection of non-spatial trend relationships between two variables. This should be both ways - spatial selections versus XY scatter or other
graph types. Select the top quartile - where are they, or these two "natural-break" classificaions, or .... ? Graphics can help determine non-spatial tred in data. Scatter diagrams and others should theme to the same distributions in the active window.
Any point in a scatter diagram or other graph should hot select and vice-versa. Also need a frequency histogram for distribution look see.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 76% Rank: 125/151 |
| 22 | Graph Multiple Selections.Easily compare two populations/samples/selections ON THE SAME
Graph. This neighborhood is really different from our whole mailing list. - Can'nt you see it in this comparison graph ?
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 80% Rank: 85/151 |
| 23 | Regression Analysis. Add some simple regression and correlation functions to find non-spatial trends and relationships between variabales and (and dare I say it maybe hope, hope, hope) layers. Make certain these can be displayed (trend line vs data poits, CI, and regression/correlation values and parameters. Quality stuff for business trenders who need the light of geographers - a new bridge to untapped marketers ?
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 76% Rank: 106/151 |
| 24 | Improve Graph Labeling. Make the graphic's scaling and lableing as good as the rest of the package.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 80% Rank: 74/151 |
Interface:
| 25 | Retain Info Tool "Focus." When you click on a multiple-layer mapper, you get an Info Tool showling a list of tables, and the current Label value. When you choose a particular table to see all of the column values, it should remain viewing that table's info on subsequent clicks until the user chooses "List" again (this is how version 2 operated). Or at least, have that as an option for how the Info Tool works.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 87% Rank: 45/151 |
| 26 | Projections Change the projection definitions to standard cartographic nomenclature for projection and datum. This could be done by supplying an alternate projections file. For example, the Lambert Conformal Conic projection for the U.S. is (poorly) identified as a "regional conformal projection for the United States", and the datum is not identified at all.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 65% Rank: 114/151 |
| 27 | Topmost-layer. Ensure that a particular layer is always at the top of the Z-order (ie just below the cosmetic layer), even when other layers are added. It would be nice if this could be set in the same way that 'selectable' is currently.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 80% Rank: 94/151 |
| 28 | Marquee Select Tool Option. MI sould allow users the option of selecting objects that *touch* the marquee box, rather than have their centroid in the box. Atlas has a nice way of implementing this: You set an option within the preferences dialog, and can choose a)touching or b)contains as selection methods. If we got these added to MI's standard "centroid" method, we'd have the best of both worlds.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.7 Response: 85% Rank: 57/151 |
| 29 | Automatic Execution. On those dialog boxes that ask for you to choose which file to apply whatever function to, it should not be displayed if there is only one file active (or active in that layer). For instance, "View Entire Layer" requires you to choose a layer, even if there is only one open in the mapper. It should execute without intervention.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 83% Rank: 48/151 |
| 30 | Cool Tools and other included MBX Routines Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.7 Response: 87% Rank: 43/151 |
| 31 | Keep Windows Maximized. If current window (mapper, layout, browser) is viewed as MAX and you open another file, open it as MAX also. Do not restore all the other windows to non-maximum size and open the new file into a non-maximized window.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 1.0 Response: 79% Rank: 95/151 |
| 32 | Button Order The order of "OK" and "Cancel" buttons on dialog boxes are inconsistant from one to the next.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 83% Rank: 64/151 |
| 33 | Dithered Colors. MapInfo's RGB screen output is great if you can run your display at a resolution you want and at 16 bit color depth. Many of us are running at 8 bit (256 color) mode, and only getting 16 dithered colors. This is unacceptable. MI should detect display color depth and map their RGB colors to 8 bit colors when running 256 color mode.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 71% Rank: 97/151 |
| 34 | More "Sticky" Options. More user options should be "sticky" to prevent (for example) repeatedly asking for coordinates to be displayed instead of the "zoom" level. the user needs control over the default values of practically everything, from window sizes and positions, to map window coordinates. Implement a "table-driven" set of default values for virtually everything the user enters, with the user able to specify
different values for the defaults for his copy of MapInfo (.INI file), for a session (.WOR file), and for certain layers (.TAB file). "Sticky" would only override the default until changed by the user. The control might be a "Set Defaults" button somewhere which would bring up a dialog box asking the user if he wanted the changes he is going to make sticky, session default, or global default.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 85% Rank: 21/151 |
| 35 | Programmable "Snap to" Provide ability to set "snap to" option through a MapBasic command.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 71% Rank: 102/151 |
| 36 | Info Tool Not Consistant. Click on a map item with the "i" tool, then enter data in the Info Tool window. You can then click on another map item, and the insertion bar will remain in the Info Tool window allowing you to enter data again without activating the window with the mouse. however, the next time you click, the insertion point is gone. Every other time you click an object, you must click in the Info Tool window.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 87% Rank: 33/151 |
| 37 | Windows Clipboard Keys. Cut / Copy / Paste keys don't always work in Info Tool window. Also, old clipboard keystrokes (Shift-Insert, Ctrl-Insert, Shift-Delete) don't work in all windows (ex: the MapBasic window).
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 80% Rank: 60/151 |
| 38 | Style Frustration. MI is not consistant with dimmed menu items and buttons. The Option > Style menu items and style buttons should not be selectable unless you are in an editable layer (mapper OR BROWSER).
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 72% Rank: 124/151 |
| 39 | Window Names. Allow user to name a Map or Layout window, and have that name retained in the workspace.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 79% Rank: 49/151 |
| 40 | 32-bit Controls. Currently there is no use being made of the newer 32-bit user-interface elements eg: Tab-controls (eg on ‘Modify-thematic map’ dialog);
List-views (eg in the layer-control list);
Tree-views;
Sliders;
etc.
This is not a big problem for a MapBasic program but when used within an
‘integrated-mapping’ application it means that the user-interface of the
MapInfo component starts to look rather ‘dated’ in contrast to the rest
of the application.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 60% Rank: 131/151 |
| 41 | Show opened tables. Provide a "Tables Open" display - a list of every opened table by the name used in MapInfo plus the full path to the stored file.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 91% Rank: 40/151 |
| 42 | Show origin of layer data. Provide a "Layer Data" display under the "Map" pulldown to show the file name (with full path) used to generate each layer of mapper.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 85% Rank: 69/151 |
Labels:
| 43 | Label-positioning. A rather better algorithm that tried to re- locate labels so that they don't overlap would be useful. It need not be very sophisticated to be useful eg something like: While (label will overlap another) try AlternativePosition(i) i = i+1 Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.7 Response: 85% Rank: 39/151 |
| 44 | Vertical Text Alignment. I have trouble with the alignment of text if I use a background color. My text is always aligned with the top of the background color. I would prefer the text to be centered or have the ability to adjust it.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 75% Rank: 96/151 |
| 45 | Add arrow tool drawing capabilities. To do that today, we draw an empty text and move its position. It would be good to be have different arrow styles, and the ability to manage the arrow line and arrowhead style, as in the Excel drawing tool.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 85% Rank: 76/151 |
| 46 | Curved Text. Allow labels that are curved to fit an arc.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 85% Rank: 31/151 |
| 47 | Symbol Placement Certian symbols have an implied "hot spot" (ex: the flag or push pin symbols). In MIv3, the "point" of these symbols was on the map object's centroid. In MIv4, these are centered over the centroid, giving the appearance that the indicated point is south of where it actually is located.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 80% Rank: 70/151 |
| 48 | More Attribute Control. It is common to need to underline or bold just a word or a phrase in a label or text box. We need to be able to turn various font attributes on and off via a tool bar or even control codes in the "expression" dialog.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 88% Rank: 24/151 |
| 49 | Globally Rotated Lables. Ability to rotate all the labels for a layer. I often print a grid of 7.5' quadrangle boundaries and I want to rotate all of the labels so they print like USGS quad index maps. Currently, I have to double click each label individually and type the rotation value. Needless to say, I don't do that, the labels stay "flat."
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 84% Rank: 67/151 |
| 50 | Label Alignment. Have the option of making labels slant to align with lines of latitude or longitude; nice when plotting data for a whole continent. I'm not talking just the labels for lat/long, but the labels for any object.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 1.0 Response: 75% Rank: 120/151 |
| 51 | Label Order. Have the option to make the dynamic labels assigned to each layer, so that they would not
overwrite certian layers above it.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.7 Response: 69% Rank: 79/151 |
Layout Window:
| 52 | WYSIWYG. Layout window is still not printing properly (objects / text being cut off).
Ranking: High + STDS: 0.5 Response: 93% Rank: 2/151 |
| 53 | Font Halo. Not working with Hewlett Packard Laserjet.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 63% Rank: 130/151 |
| 54 | Index Page. Need a utility that creates an index page for multiple page maps.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 0.8 Response: 68% Rank: 136/151 |
| 55 | Text Limitations. increase the limit set for adding text in the layout page to larger than 255 characters.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 81% Rank: 52/151 |
| 56 | Saved Settings. All printer settings (printer name, orientation, graphics
options, etc.) should be saved in the workspace using a new MapBasic
statement provided for that purpose, and should be independant for each
layout window. In other words, we should be able to have several layout
windows opened that can be pointed to various printers at differing
orientations all in one sessions or workspace.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.7 Response: 91% Rank: 14/151 |
| 57 | Rotate Frames. The ability to rotate frames within a layout would allow better
utilization of paper space for "diagonally" oriented projects.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 81% Rank: 63/151 |
| 58 | Packaged Variables. Create a number of system variables which can be placed in the layout window (SystemDate, FileName, FilePath, LayoutName, WorkspaceName, etc.)
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 87% Rank: 20/151 |
| 59 | Legends. MapInfo needs to have a legend generator, that will (as a default) make entries of the style and filename of either the first line / region / symbol from every layer open in the window, or the display Style Override. Also, that it will create a scalebar in the legend that prints accurate scale on output.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.6 Response: 92% Rank: 9/151 |
MapBasic:
| 60 | Internationalisation for MapBasic. There is little or NO
provision for abstracting interface text from Mapbasic
programs in order to simplify the development of multiple
language versions.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 1.0 Response: 48% Rank: 150/151 |
| 61 | Use of MapBasic RGB values. Why on earth can't statements like:
Symbol(34, BLUE, 14)
Symbol(34, RGB(0,0,255), 14)
Symbol(34, Variable, 14)
be supported in MapBasic-Window (and programs). Not everyone
knows the 24-bit numbers for all colours !!
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 65% Rank: 119/151 |
| 62 | Windows 95 Integration. Edits to the MapBasic source code do not appear on the START button's Document History for easy retrieval.
Ranking: Low + STDS: 0.9 Response: 52% Rank: 148/151 |
| 63 | Print with 'integrated-mapping. Debugging efficiency of an integrated-mapping app would be substantially improved if output from the MapBasic 'print' statement was properly supported.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 51% Rank: 143/151 |
| 64 | MapBasic Thematic Building. Here's something MapBasic oriented MapInfo could improve upon: the ability to thematic map in various ways. Currently, it is very easy for a thematic
map to get out of control (e.g. when thematic mapping based on simple
results or complex "conjunctions" of fields, Field1+Field2+Field3+...). When this happens, you as a programmer can no longer use the Shade statement directly. You have to build a string which represents the Shade statement and then execute that string using RunCmd?!?!? This one has a corollary... I have found myself making thematic maps to represent something of an index. Say, one thematic map for an index of sites (for example) with details beside the side id and a second thematic map on top of that for sites in general. In order to create the "index" you have to build a nasty little (huge) string and execute it using RunCmd. I once proposed an "Individual" "flag" for the Shade statement to accomodate this "indexing" of records in the legend. Haven't heard a response. The existing syntax for shading by individual values (which, you'd hope, is what you are doing if you are creating an index of sites):
Shade [ Window window_id ] This syntax does not shade the individual values as you'd expect (yet another case of poorly written software/help. I think the issue of creating arrows automatically and having them display without "forcing" the user to move the labels by hand is another example of poorly written software/help. (That is, where the help says one thing and the performance of written MapBasic does, or doesn't do, something else).
Anyway, so I proposed including an [ Individual ] clause somewhere in the
shade syntax above (of course, I feel that would be redundant, but who
knows).
|
| 65 | Mouse coordinate in a handler. MapBasic should provide for reading coordinates of the current mouse position after entering a tool handler.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 60% Rank: 99/151 |
| 66 | Button faces/icons. A custom button face/icon editor should be provided.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 1.0 Response: 71% Rank: 134/151 |
| 67 | Debugger. Need a step-thru debugger for MapBasic.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 72% Rank: 54/151 |
| 68 | Error Handling. Functions in MapBasic returning values for errors rather than having to use OnError or other workarounds.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 67% Rank: 93/151 |
| 69 | 'Rebuild All'. Need 'Rebuild All' menu option/button for projects.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 56% Rank: 140/151 |
| 70 | Syntax Coloring. Show commands, variables, conditions, etc. in various color codes, which can be customized by the user.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 69% Rank: 123/151 |
| 71 | Alignment of numbers in dialog boxes. Need improved report structure for results. I have programs that return statistical results in a dialog box but there is no way to align decimals - results are hard to read.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 67% Rank: 113/151 |
| 72 | More Functionality. Add these to MapBasic to support the 'runtime' product: Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 63% Rank: 103/151 |
| 73 | Definifions. When using the MapBasic window I continually find myself having to refer to associated .DEF files to get the values of certain constants (eg MAPPER_INFO_ZOOM for the MapperInfo function). When this text is then pasted into C++ code as ‘Do’ commands I then have
to swap in the defined constant (in case it ever changes in the future) which is all rather tedious and somewhat error-prone. Would it be possible to: 1) Enhance MapBasic parsing to recognise (and handle) such constants; or 2) Document ‘current’ values in the MapBasic manual itself? Either solution is likely to save a lot of people un-necessary time and effort !
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 59% Rank: 133/151 |
Map Drawing:
| 74 | Interactive Drawing Precision. Need some method to allow precision key-in of coordinates
when drawing objects, without having to rely on the MapBasic window or MIF
files.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 72% Rank: 81/151 |
| 75 | Line Drawing Tool. Need a drawing tool that would open a dialog box for you to enter a start point, then distance and direction to the end point. The user could also select the line tool and click on the starting point, then invoke the "draw to" portion of this dialog by pressing a certain key sequence.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 87% Rank: 62/151 |
| 76 | Arc Drawing. Need to be able to draw arcs by using a three-handle drawing approach (two end points and arc point). Also be able to define the number of nodes per [whatever measurement].
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 80% Rank: 92/151 |
| 77 | Symbol Rotation. Symbols should be able to be rotated, and the rotation controlled by a pointer to some database column containing the rotation values.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 79% Rank: 86/151 |
| 78 | Snap To... Implement snap to line, polyline, polygon, circle....etc.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 87% Rank: 41/151 |
| 79 | Duplicate Nodes. The dialog for "Move Duplicate Nodes" is in Options > Preferences > Map Window. This is fine for a default, but there needs to be either a keystroke (like the "snap" on/off) or a check box in the Layer Control dialog to change the duplicate node status.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 77% Rank: 90/151 |
| 80 | Duplicate Nodes in Different Layers. It would be useful if you could set multiple layers as editable to be able to move duplicate nodes in different layers.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 72% Rank: 110/151 |
| 81 | Reshape Mode. It is too easy to miss one of the nodes when you are reshaping an object, then you are often bumped out of that layer and out of reshape mode. When in Reshape, the you should have the option (preference) to be locked into that one object until you turn reshape off.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 83% Rank: 68/151 |
| 82 | Editing. Need the ability to edit more than one layer at once.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 1.2 Response: 83% Rank: 135/151 |
| 83 | Concentric Rings. Enhance the buffer command to be able to draw concentric rings with spacing of 'x' as a buffer.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 0.9 Response: 65% Rank: 141/151 |
| 84 | Snapping rectangles to rectangles, etc. (currently can only snap polylines
to objects.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 69% Rank: 117/151 |
| 85 | Resizing objects. Resize by single edge and not corner (which changes dimensions
of two sides).
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 75% Rank: 115/151 |
| 86 | Rotating objects. Be able to grab a point and rotate an object around its centroid.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 87% Rank: 51/151 |
Map Objects:
| 87 | Working Line Styles. There need to be better line styles that can be used to depict divided highways and roads, and not show them with visible ends of line segments. Also, whenever the object uses some dashed line style, the adjacent regions' dashes and gaps are at different positions rendering the style useless. The chosen line style needs to appear as shown in the dialog box.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.6 Response: 88% Rank: 13/151 |
| 88 | Point Dispersion. Re-implement the automatic point disperse option the was included with Mapinfo for DOS.
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 0.7 Response: 68% Rank: 129/151 |
| 89 | Offset attribute to polylines. This disply attribute would allow drawing pararell lines, for instance
different routes sharing the same streets. The route could be manually created from the street map using snap and then displayed as parallel to the streets setting the offset.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 75% Rank: 112/151 |
| 90 | Edits. Self-intersecting polygons are unacceptable. There needs to be a built in error check, as well as a warning whenever the user draws or alters an object that is self-intersecting.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.9 Response: 79% Rank: 61/151 |
| 91 | Node Limitations.The 32k node restriction is limiting. Need to increase limit.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 76% Rank: 53/151 |
| 92 |
Better Centroid Placement. Centroid needs to be placed more at a "center of mass" rather than the center of the MBR. Also, when splitting or combining polygons, the centroid location needs to be recalculated, else the centroid is way off.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 84% Rank: 23/151 |
| 93 | Clean & Build Utility. Add a function like what is in ArcInfo to import drawing files as polygons.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.8 Response: 77% Rank: 34/151 |
| 94 | Improve DWG. Make the import / export of DWG files and data more functional.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.9 Response: 63% Rank: 108/151 |
| 95 | Cosmetic Layer DXF. Need the ability to save cosmetic layer to a dxf in a projection other than lat/long (otherwise it takes three steps 1 - save cosmetic layer, 2 - save file as with correct projection, 3 - open projected file and save as dxf.)
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 0.9 Response: 60% Rank: 146/151 |
| 96 | Re-draw Order MapInfo needs to set object precedence within a layer so that your larger regions/symbols/lines are always drawn first, then the smaller ones, to keep objects from being hidden behind others.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 85% Rank: 105/151 |
Map Window:
| 97 | Save Window As... Need to improve the method of copying a mapper or layout for inclusion as a graphic in other applications. The "Save window as" command only saves the window at screen resolution, rather than at the underlying vector resolution. The only other option is to print to a PostScript file, but this is awkward at best.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 87% Rank: 16/151 |
| 98 | Table Maintenance. Packing a table (or other table maintenance) should not remove that layer from the Mapper window.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.6 Response: 93% Rank: 7/151 |
| 99 | Aspect Changer. Have function that would change the height and width of the non-maximized mapper window to typical full page portrait or landscape.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 81% Rank: 72/151 |
Metadata:
| 100 | Better Utilities. MI should provide a better way to enter, search and print metadata.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 75% Rank: 78/151 |
| 101 | Provide Metadata. All *.TAB files sold or provided by MapInfo should contain metadata documentation.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 72% Rank: 87/151 |
New Functions:
| 102 | Union, Intersect, Update, Identity command. These analysis commands are found in programs like ARC/INFO and seem to be lacking in MapInfo. They represent different ways two tables can be combined into one or how overlapping reions in a single table can be
combined. I have attached a image that more clearly explains each operation. (Click image to enlarge.)
Ranking: High STDS: 0.7 Response: 81% Rank: 28/151 |
| 103 | Random Numbers and Seeding. My wish is for a function that will supply random numbers. I have to move my data in and out of Excel to get these, and I do use them often.
Ranking: Low + STDS: 0.8 Response: 69% Rank: 139/151 |
| 104 | Add a XYZ surface.The marketing (business) nerds know there are strong relationships between AGE x EDUCATION x CONSUMPTION of "Z"ed.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 72% Rank: 111/151 |
| 105 | Network Functions. Calculate the minimum distance between two nodes and show
the corresponding path through a network of connected line/polylines.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 84% Rank: 65/151 |
| 106 | String Substitution. Replace string "A" with string "B" when found in column "ColX" of a table or selection. For instance, in Atlas GIS, the command would be Replace(ColX,"A","B"), or Substitute(RangeName,"A","B") in Excel.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 83% Rank: 73/151 |
| 107 | Spell Check. Entire table, layout, workspace, or selected objects. (Maybe Microsoft will even let you call their MS Office spell checker.)
Ranking: Medium - STDS: 1.0 Response: 89% Rank: 122/151 |
| 108 | OLE Container. Allow inserted objects with transparent background, to add paragraphs, pivot tables, etc. to a layout.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 76% Rank: 91/151 |
| 109 | Memo Fields. Support for memo fields in tables be they dBase, Access or ODBC. Perhaps a
hotkey to toggle between memoview and single line browsing.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 1.0 Response: 76% Rank: 104/151 |
Other File Types:
| 110 | Lotus. MapInfo needs to support more current versions of Lotus spreadsheet files than just the "*.wk1" format. They used to show the 3D formats in the File Open dialog, but they would lock up the system if you tried to use them. The answer provided in the current release was to only allow us to open *.wk1 files.
Ranking: Low STDS: 1.0 Response: 64% Rank: 149/151 |
| 111 | ArcView Shapes. MI able to read/import ESRI's ArcView Shape file format. AV2&3 already have a
mid/mif import.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.9 Response: 77% Rank: 55/151 |
Printing:
| 112 | Speed. Faster printing of transparent fills.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 79% Rank: 42/151 |
| 113 | Printing Defaults. Need to be able to define the default printer (other than windows default), default font, etc.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 79% Rank: 50/151 |
| 114 | Pattern Bitmaps. Install multiple sets of fill pattern bitmaps for various output devices' DPI. Paterns on most laser printers come out looking like shades of grey instead of patterns.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 83% Rank: 38/151 |
| 115 | Line Thickness. Need thinner lines, and more fine breaks between current line thicknesses. Also, same problem with line patterns as in fill patterns above.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.7 Response: 85% Rank: 15/151 |
| 116 | Print Options. Include the printer setup within the print menu option as in eg. Word.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 85% Rank: 35/151 |
Raster Images:
| 117 | Composite Raster files. In addition to displaying 24-bit RGB files, provide a
mechanism to display 3 gray-scale images as a composite RGB image. This is
needed because a lot of multi-spectral imagery is supplied as individual
bands.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.7 Response: 47% Rank: 142/151 |
| 118 | Transformation. Support full affine transformation in the display of raster images. Currently, the vectors are transformed to the raster image,
which ruins the display fidelity of the vectors. In addition, if multiple images are displayed, an affine transformation should be applied to each individually (currently, the transformation applies to only one of the displayed images).
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 65% Rank: 107/151 |
| 119 | Zoom Layering. Currently, when you open an image, its display is often turned off through zoom layering, even if the image would occupy a substantial part of the screen. This problem seems to be most prevalent with large images. MapInfo needs to improve the algorithm for calculating the zoom values or allow the user to turn off default zoom layering.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.8 Response: 65% Rank: 118/151 |
| 120 | B/W Images Provide for changing the non-white color of a B/W image to any color.
Ranking: Low + STDS: 0.8 Response: 60% Rank: 145/151 |
| 121 | Alternate types of image registration Provide for least-squares "true" rotation
and least-squares perspective transformation for raster images.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 52% Rank: 144/151 |
SQL & Selections:
| 122 | SQL-optimisation. SQL is meant to say WHAT query is to be
performed not HOW it should be done. Therefore it would be
appropriate for Mapinfo to handle: Select * From Tab1,Tab2 Where Tab1.Id=Tab2.Id Select * From Tab2,Tab1 Where Tab1.Id=Tab2.Id in the same, optimal, manner. Ranking: High STDS: 0.6 Response: 80% Rank: 18/151 |
| 123 | DBF Indexes. MI needs to use indexes for DBF tables more efficiently.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 73% Rank: 71/151 |
| 124 | Inverse Selection. We need a function that will turn all unselected items in a layer to selected and vice-versa in one step.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 87% Rank: 32/151 |
| 125 | Saved Queries. Queries and joins should be able to be saved independantly or as part of a workspace and recalled as needed.
Ranking: High + STDS: 0.4 Response: 89% Rank: 1/151 |
| 126 | QBE. Have the option of writing queries in "Query by Example" form.
Ranking: Meduim STDS: 0.9 Response: 85% Rank: 98/151 |
| 127 | Progress Bar. The various select / query functions need a progress bar to let us know if the machine is working or not, and how far along it is in the process.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 92% Rank: 29/151 |
| 128 | Selecting Grouped Records. Users often need to see the individual records that were grouped together in an SQL call. The easiest way would be to select a row (or rows) in the summary table, that would then hilight the underlaying data in the source table(s). Now, we have to go back and write individual queries again on each one.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 79% Rank: 88/151 |
| 129 | Increase Limits. Increase the 255 character limit for SQL group by's and order by's, and increase the number of group by and order by clauses from 5. Complex querying is definitely hampered by these restrictions.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 87% Rank: 19/151 |
| 130 | Selected Layer. Status bar should show which layer the selected object(s) are in.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 88% Rank: 25/151 |
| 131 |
"Selection" bug. Performing a change on a large selection (like a delete) does not always get applied to all records.
Ranking: High + STDS: 0.5 Response: 80% Rank: 11/151 |
| 132 | Zoom to Selection. Query > Find Selection is okay, but it centers the current selection at whatever zoom level you were at. It should be optional (perhaps at the preference level) that the zoom is changed to the MBR for the selected object(s).
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 80% Rank: 44/151 |
| 133 | Outer Joins. Implement 'outer' (or non-equi) joins.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 67% Rank: 84/151 |
| 134 | Robust SQL. Support a bigger sub-set of the SQL-language (eg sub-selects, unions, views etc).
Ranking: High STDS: 0.5 Response: 88% Rank: 10/151 |
| 135 | Improve Overlay Query. Using a point in polygon is just not good enough. Especially as MI only uses a bounding rectangle. Sometimes the 'centroid' is not even within the polygon (cresent shapes etc). Add a the ability to use a "Proportion of overlap" percentage threshold.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 80% Rank: 26/151 |
| 136 | Seeing Selection. If multiple selected objects overlap (especially points), you may not be able to tell they are selected. We need to be able to tell what is selected. A special select symbol or fill shouldbe used for indicating selected objects with identical coordinate definitions.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 88% Rank: 27/151 |
Thematic Maps:
| 137 | Numeric Format. Simple choice of format for thematic range elements (i.e. comma, percentage, rounding, etc.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 83% Rank: 56/151 |
| 138 | Adjacent Colors.
"Individual" thematic maps often have colors for adjacent regions coded with colors that are too similar. Maybe compare values, or randomize them on demand. Perhaps even use combinations of patterns and colors.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.7 Response: 87% Rank: 37/151 |
| 139 | Templates. Often we are called on to create a series of maps that will need to be displayed with the same range breaks, color schemes, fonts, etc. There needs to be a way to save thematic map settings to be used with other maps or data sets.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.5 Response: 91% Rank: 4/151 |
| 140 | Negative Bar Chart Values The bar charts need a line or "whiskers" at the zero point, else you cannot tell which values are going up vs. down.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 81% Rank: 66/151 |
| 141 | Dot Density Variety. Let users pick color, symbol, and size for dot density maps.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 76% Rank: 75/151 |
| 142 | Multiple legends. Enable multiple legends to be visible on the screen at the same time. (Currently the legend changes according to which map window is active. Anyone using multiple windows for screen presentations whether they be seminars or demos to clients need legends for all maps showing simultaneously.)
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 83% Rank: 47/151 |
| 143 | Better Bivariate Control. Should be able to make bivariate maps using character data as well as numeric.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.7 Response: 75% Rank: 58/151 |
| 144 | Thematic Legend Element Control. Additional control over legend content/layout (eg spacing, sizing, fonts, positioning etc).
Ranking: High STDS: 0.6 Response: 88% Rank: 12/151 |
| 145 | Additional Thematic-Type. 4-colour algorithm as an additional thematic-type. (Might address the existing point about 'adjacent-regions').
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.8 Response: 76% Rank: 82/151 |
Workspaces:
| 146 | Workspace errors: How about displaying a dialog with:
Abort, Continue, Edit options whenever an error is encountered rather than just
'bombing-out' as now !
Ranking: High STDS: 0.6 Response: 93% Rank: 5/151 |
| 147 | Saved Queries. Selections used in mappers, browsers or layouts should (at the user's option) be saved so the workspace can truly be re-created. Differentiate between display and query parameters so that these could be saved separately OR together.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.5 Response: 92% Rank: 3/151 |
| 148 | "Copy Files..." Need an option that will let you save all the files associated with a workspace to another drive / directory.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 88% Rank: 22/151 |
| 149 | Recovery. Better fault recovery on opening workspaces with errors loading.
Ranking: High STDS: 0.6 Response: 91% Rank: 8/151 |
| 150 | Clean workspaces. Now, if you open up a workspace containing a thematic map and want to use this same workspace to create another map you have to remove the thematic layer in layer control. After having created and saved the new workspace evidence of the old thematic is retained in the workspace.
Ranking: Medium + STDS: 0.9 Response: 77% Rank: 77/151 |
| 151 | Network workspace control. Currently if you want to open a workspace on another computer you need to edit the workspace from c:\..... to eg. f:\..... to provide the correct path for the files.
Ranking: High - STDS: 0.8 Response: 73% Rank: 59/151 |