Advanced Users might wish to check out the Case Studies page for very detailed, step-by-step examples of using Manifold in real-life business applications.  This is oriented for people who aready have Manifold on their systems, but the examples provide many screen shots and a detailed sequence of "real life" use for everyone. See how to create a custom, local map from a complex TIGER/Line map, find out how Frank's Catering finds all Zip+4 codes within a mile of its locations and more.  A favorite application that does not use analysis but simply creates pretty maps is the Creating a Map of US Regions case study example.

But first, Let's start with a really easy GIS example first, a simple example that's much harder to do in older, more expensive GIS systems.  What follows is an example of using a Manifold solver, a very simple one, to find problems in a map of roads that is intended to be used as a network in transportation analysis.

Find any Unattached Nodes in a Network

It's often the case with GIS data that points which are supposed to be attached really aren't attached at high magnification levels.  People import data from CAD drawings which look good when printed, but which are full of errors in key details.  Maps used in GIS work often have this problem, but network drawings used in telecommunications or computer networking can have similar defects.

Let's check for attached points in the National Transportation Atlas Database network of highways in central Mexico.   The picture shows a section of central Mexico with a Highways layer drawn over a layer showing the states of Mexico, which provide a background map.  The Highways layer shows roads in black and nodes as yellow dots.   Which of the nodes are not attached?

This is really easy.  We click on the Solvers main menu, drill down to the Networks submenu and select the Unattached Nodes solver.  There are many, many other Networks solvers in further submenus, but some of the more frequently used solvers appear in the main Networks menu. [Note: The illustration at right shows 3D View and Business solver headings. These headings are installed by the optional 3D View and Business Tools solver package products sold by manifold.net for $45 each.]

The solver pops up a dialog asking what we want to run it on, and we select Highways from a list box.  The solver immediately selects all unattached nodes.  We can animate them to make them flash in red so they're more visible.

Let's zoom in further in stages to see that the points picked out really are "unattached."  Points selected by the solver are highlighted in red, the current selection color.

Keep your eye on the node pointed out with the yellow arrow. As we zoom to extreme magnification you can see the node does not actually lie at the intersection of the highway line segments.  This would cause real trouble for many applications.  Manifold also includes an Attach Nodes solver to fix problems like this automatically.

Discover and draw networks and maps with cool styles

Manifold System can automatically discover many different types of networks and draw them as beautiful maps and diagrams. Hundreds of formatting capabilities allow you to display networks using thousands of icon, line and area styles and millions of colors.    See the screen shots page for examples.

The Manifold CD includes over 600 megabytes of geographic maps and other data sets which you can use to provide a "real world" context for your networks.

Once you've discovered and displayed your network, you can apply Solvers to it just by pointing and clicking. Solvers encapsulate a wide variety of networking mathematics to solve problems for you. If you can diagram your system as a network, Manifold solvers will solve important tasks for you, automatically. Solvers can do networking math, figure out geometric arrangements, apply statistics, or use SQL to find information in the database behind your network.