TopoFusion Pro 3.0 User Maps are AWESOME!

[brian.r.hamilton]

You guys did a great job with the user maps & new updated version in general!  '>

I finally had some time to play with the new User Map feature.  The execution is nearly perfect & zero crashes so far.  Being able to tweak the calibration with the mouse is very very cool.

One minor thing that would be nice would be a setting under the Options, General tab to set a directory for User Maps.  I have a bad habit of constantly re-organizing my files & I'm sure I'm not alone.

I'm so glad I didn't have to buy another product to get the User Map feature.  I'll send you guys a little "upgrade" cash & hope others do the same.  I know I saw a way to do that somewhere.

[brian.r.hamilton]

Regarding the User Map file location, prompt the user for the location of the User Map file if it cannot be found where it last was.  This might get a little messy if there are a bunch of User Map files open (enabled) at the same time that were moved between sessions though.  Just thinking out loud here.

[Krein]

Thanks, glad you like the new version!

I did think a bit about having a set directory for user maps, but it seemed a little to restrictive for someone that just wants to get a map up quickly.

Some way of handing missing/moved files needs to be worked out.  Probably not on startup, but maybe when you go to the user map (to find out why it's not there), there could be a message when you click on the actual map you're looking for.  That way ones you don't care about that are missing don't bother you.

What do you think?

[brian.r.hamilton]

That makes sense.  I think I got 3 errors when I moved a single User Map file.  With more User Map files enabled (layered), that would be a mess.  Whatever you decide, if the file is not readily available, it would be nice if TF didn't automatically delete the calibration info.

By the way, is there any performance difference between the various image formats?  I've only used PNG & JPG so far.  I assumed JPG would be fastest since the tiles are also JPG, but I don't know the details about decoding PNG.  Both seem to work fine.  PNGs with transparency set to the map background color (usually white) makes for some really useful maps.  A writing tablet would be really handy to draw new tracks to explore!

Also, I noticed that long paths are an issue.  Can't see the full name & the base filename is the same on some that I have been messing with.  It's a minor annoyance.  Maybe just display the filename in the window & mouse-over shows the complete path?  Isn't this actually a Windows problem?  I think I've seen similar behavior in other applications.

[brian.r.hamilton]

Now I'm not able to add any maps that are PNG files.  JPG files still work fine.  I'm not sure what I did to trigger this.  I cleared all the User Map stuff out of the INI file, but TF still refuses to load any PNG file.  I wonder if this is a problem with 3.04 only?  I'll try rebooting, but I don't see how that could have anything to do with this problem.

[brian.r.hamilton]

TF 3.04 won't load my PNG file User Maps but 3.0 will!  Let me know if you need the PNG file to help track down the problem.

[Krein]

Yep, PNGs are no longer loading.  Thanks for finding that.

It's an easy fix.