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Release 8 Formats

All the Formats You Need

Manifold System Release 8 Formats

Wow! Way more formats in Manifold Release 9! For the complete list of formats and data sources in Release 9, see the Release 9 Data Sources page. Release 9 is Manifold's phenomenal new GIS, with more data sources and formats than any other GIS.

Manifold System Release 8.00 works with over 100 different vector, raster, terrain and database formats. Many of the formats listed below exist in significantly different subtypes and so constitute more than one format. Manifold will automatically detect such subtypes and use the correct importer. Some "raster" formats can be used for terrain elevation data while some surface formats can be used for images. Some "drawing" formats such as SDTS can contain other types of data such as surfaces. Manifold will work with such variations to import the data correctly.

Although all editions can read .e00 format, Universal Edition or higher is required to write to .e00. Universal Edition or above is required for direct connections to IBM DB2 with DB2 Spatial Extender, Microsoft SQL Server Spatial, Microsoft SQL Server 2005 with Spatial Extender, Oracle or PostgreSQL/PostGIS when using the native spatial data types of those spatial DBMS products.

For information on direct links and connectivity to spatial DBMS products, see the Spatial DBMS topic in the online edition of the user manual.

For notes on ESRI geodatabases, see the ESRI Geodatabases topic in the online edition of the user manual.

Import

Formats used for images and for surfaces have some overlap, as depending on the particular format an image can be stored in what is normally thought of as a "surface" format and vice versa.

Raster Image Formats

ADRG NIMA ARC Digitized Raster Graphics
AVHRR Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer Level 1 B, .l1b
ADF ESRI .adf format, also sometimes called ArcGrid format. Note that .adf files can contain either raster or vector data.
BMP Windows bitmap, .bmp
CADRG NIMA Compressed ARC Digitized Raster Graphics
CIB NIMA Controlled Image Base
CSV Images as virtual tables in comma-separated or other text file tables.
DB Images as virtual tables in Borland Paradox files
DBF Images as virtual tables in dBase, FoxPro files
DNG An Adobe variation of TIFF used in digital photography.
DOQ USGS Digital Orthophoto Quadrangle, .doq, .coq, .jpg
DRG USGS Digital Raster graphics (scanned maps) in .tif format (used for DRG';s by USGS).
DSN Images as virtual tables in Microsoft Data Source files, .dsn
E00 ESRI .e00 files containing rasters.
ECW / JPEG2000 ERMapper .ecw Wavelet compressed or JPEG2000 compressed format. Any size ECW or JPEG2000 image may be imported.
EMF, WMF Windows Meta File and Extended Meta File, .emf, .wmf
ENVI IMG ENVI .img format image files.
ERDAS GIS ERDAS files in .gis, .lan formats.
ERDAS IMG ERDAS .img format image files.
ERS ERMapper .ers files.
GIF A well-known image format, .gif
GeoSPOT GeoSpot satellite multispectral rasters
GRASS US Army Corps of Engineers raster-based package.
GXF Geosoft .gxf, an ASCII grid format mainly used for terrain elevation data.
HTML Images as virtual tables in HTML files.
HDR GeoSPOT satellite files, .hdr
HDF SeaWiFS, EOS, NCSA (National Center for Supercomputing Applications) Hierarchical Data Format (HDF). Used mostly for images. Used widely in Earth Observation Satellite (EOS) projects.
IDRISI IMG IDRISI .img format.
IMDISP US AVHRR / Conterminus US Land Cover, .lbl
JPEG A well-known image format, .jpg, .jpeg.
LAS/LBL Log ASCII Standard (LAS) format used for well logging data. An ASCII format originally developed by the Canadian Well Logging society in the late 1980's and now used by USGS and others, .ddr
MDB Images as virtual tables in Microsoft Access 2000 or Access 97 .mdb format
NITF NIMA .ntf image format (different than UK Ordance Survey .ntf)
PCX PC Paintbrush format by ZSoft, .pcx
PIX PCIDISK, Silicon Graphics Alias / Wavefront .pix format
PNG Portable Network Graphics (pronounced "Ping"), .png - Just say no to .gif!
PPM Portable PixMap (PPM) format.  Intended as a "lowest common denominator" color image file format.  Used in UNIX systems, .ppm
RAW Raw text and raw binary files, .raw
IDRISI32 RST IDRISI .rst format files
SGI Silicon Graphics .sgi format files
SID "MrSID" images using LizardTech proprietary format. Requires prior installation of any one of several free import utilities. .sid
SPOT SPOT satellite .dat format files
SRTM  Shuttle SRTM data in .hgt, .inc,.mag, .pol and .err files.
SUN Sun Microsystems .sun files
TAB MapInfo TAB grid files, .tab
TGA Targa .tga files
TIF Regular .tif, .tif with .tfw "world files", etc.
TIFF .tif (geocoded) GeoTIFF, regular .tif, .tif with .tfw "world files", etc.
UDL Images as virtual tables in a Microsoft Universal Data Link connection, .udl
WKx Images as virtual tables in Lotus files, .wj, .wk
WMF Windows Meta File (see EMF), .wmf
WMS Links to images served by OGC WMS servers.
XLS Images as virtual tables in Microsoft Excel files, .xls
XLSX Images as virtual tables in Microsoft XLSX files (Microsoft Office 2007 and later), .xlsx
XYZ Generic XYZ
ADO.NET Images as virtual tables via generic ADO.NET data sources
ADO.NET ODBC Images as virtual tables via ODBC through ADO.NET
ADO.NET OLE DB Images as virtual tables via OLE DB through ADO.NET
ADO.NET Oracle Images as virtual tables via ADO.NET built in connection to Oracle.
ADO.NET SQL Server Images as virtual tables via ADO.NET built in connection to SQL Server
Oracle Data Sources Oracle Call Interface (OCI) for direct connect to Oracle tables or Oracle Spatial storage using GeoRasters. Requires Universal Edition or above.
ODBC Images as virtual tables via any ODBC driver.
OLE DB Images as virtual tables via any OLE DB Provider.

Vector Drawing Formats

ADF ESRI .adf format, also sometimes called ArcGrid format. Note that .adf files can contain either raster or vector data.
BNA .bna Atlas
CSV .csv, .asc, etc. Comma-separated tables containing vector information
DB .db Database files containing vector information
DBF .dbf Database files containing vector information
DGN .dgn Intergraph
DSN .dsn Microsoft data source files providing connections to data sources containing vector information
DLG .dlg, .opt USGS Digital Line Graph Optional
DWG .dwg AutoCAD versions 13, 14, and 15 
DXF .dxf AutoCAD versions 13, 14, and 15 
EOO .e00 ESRI ArcINFO "export" format.  All editions can read .e00.  Writing .e00 requires Universal Edition or above.
ESRI Geodatabase ESRI "geodatabase" format using .mdb
GDF .gdf European common format
Geocoding Database Manifold Geocoding Database files for import of roads, hydrography, etc. Requires Geocoding Tools extension.
GML .gml Ordnance Survey (UK) version of GML used in MasterMap. GML may well be the utterly stupidest format ever created by a committee of bureaucrats.
HTML Database files containing vector information
IDRISI VCT Idrisi vector format files
KML/KMZ Google Earth "Keyhole" KML and KMZ
LULC GIRAS
MAP Manifold 5.00 or 5.50 .map project files
ETAK MapAccess Proprietary ETAK format (Acquired by TeleAtlas)
ETAK MBS .mbs, .xbs ETAK MapBase (Acquired by TeleAtlas)
MDB Microsoft Access MDB database files containing vector information
MFD .mfd Manifold 4.50
MIF .mif MapInfo mid/mif
MWS Manifold 4.50 workspace files
NTAD .are, .lnk, .nod, .pnt BTS National Transportation Atlas Database
NTF .ntf UK Ordnance Survey including several NTF subformats.
S57 Vector format popular for marine navigation, a "bare bones" importer aimed at grabbing core vector information.
STDS US government Spatial Data Transfer Standard
SHP .shp ESRI ArcView, including 3D and measured Shapefiles
TAB .tab MapInfo Tab, including shapefiles referenced by a TAB file.
TAIF .nde, .edg, .fac Tele Atlas Interchange Format, Street Net, Multi Net
TIGER/Line US Bureau of the Census TIGER (TL '95, '97, '98, '99, '00 and '00 Redist, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2006SE)
UDL Microsoft Universal Data Link files providing connections to data sources containing vector information
VCT .vct IDRISI
VMAP .dht NIMA Vector Product Format: VMAP0, VMAP1 and VMAP2 (.vpf)
WKx .wj, .wk Lotus database files containing vector information
XLS .xls Microsoft Excel database files containing vector information
XLSX .xlsx Vector information in Microsoft XLSX files (Microsoft Office 2007 and later), .xlsx
ADO.NET Generic ADO.NET data source containing vector information
ADO.NET ODBC ODBC through ADO.NET containing vector information
ADO.NET OLE DB OLE DB through ADO.NET containing vector information
 ADO.NET Oracle ADO.NET built in connection to Oracle containing vector information
ADO.NET SQL Server ADO.NET built in connection to SQL Server containing vector information
ODBC Any ODBC driver providing connections to data sources containing vector information
Oracle Data Sources Oracle Call Interface (OCI) for direct connect to Oracle tables or Oracle Spatial storage using SDO_GEOMETRY.   Requires Universal Edition or above.
OLE DB Any OLE DB Provider providing connections to data sources containing vector information

Surface Formats

ADF ESRI .adf format, also sometimes called ArcGrid format. Note that .adf files can contain either raster or vector data.
AVHRR .l1b Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer Level 1 B
BIL .bil, .hdr ESRI BIL surfaces/terrain elevation
CEOS .vdf SeaWiFS Satellite
CSV Surfaces as virtual tables in comma-separated or other text file tables.
DAT .dat SPOT files
DB Surfaces as virtual tables in Borland Paradox files
DBF Surfaces as virtual tables in dBase, FoxPro files
DDR .ddr LAS files
DEM USGS Digital Elevation Module
DEM STDS USGS DEM using Spatial Data Transfer Standard
DEM ArcInfo .dem, .hdr ESRI ArcINFO
DEM GLOBE Global Land One-kilometer Base Elevation
DEM GTOPO30 Global 30 Arc Second Elevation Data Format
DSN .dsn Surfaces as virtual tables in Microsoft Data Source files 
DTED Digital Terrain Elevation Data (US Military / NIMA), DTED Level 0, Level 1, Level 2
E00 .e00 ESRI .e00 Grid files
ENVI IMG .img ENVI IMG
ERDAS GIS .gis,.lan ERDAS
ERDAS IMG .img ERDAS
ERS .ers ERMapper
ESRI ASCII Grid GRD .grd ESRI ArcINFO ASCII Grid
ESRI Fload Grid FLT .flt ESRI ArcINFO Floating-Point Grid
GeoSPOT .hdr GeoSPOT satellite
GRC .grc,.grd Northwood GRC/GRD Grid Files
GRASS US Army Corps of Engineers
GXF .gxf Grid Exchange File
HDF .hdf EOS
HDF .hdf SeaWiFS
HDR .hdr,.img ENVI IMG
HDR .hdr GeoSPOT
HTML .htm, .html Surfaces as virtual tables in HTML files.
IMG .img IMDISP
IMG .img IDRISI IMG
GRC .grc Northwood Grid Files
LULC CTG .ctg Land Use and Land Cover
MDB Microsoft Access MDB database files containing vector information
NTF .ntf NTF Grid
PIX .pix PCIDISK, Silicon Graphics Alias / Wavefront .pix format
RAW ASCII Flexible format raw ASCII
RAW Binary Flexible format raw Binary
SDTS Surfaces in Spatial Data Transfer Standard (SDTS) format.
SRTM Space Shuttle terrain elevation data in either 30 meter or 90 meter resolution.
Surfer GRD Surfer 6, 7 or ASCII GRD files, automatically recognizing the correct Surfer format.
TAB .tab MapInfo TAB grid files
TIF .tif Geocoded TIFF, generic TIF as surfaces
UDL .udl Surfaces as virtual tables in a Microsoft Universal Data Link connection.
VDF .vdf CEOS SeaWiFS
WKx .wj, .wk Surfaces as virtual tables in Lotus files.
XLS .xls Surfaces as virtual tables in Microsoft Excel files.
XLSX .xlsx Surfaces as virtual tables in Microsoft XLSX files (Microsoft Office 2007 and later), .xlsx
XYZ .xyz Generic XYZ
ADO.NET Surfaces as virtual tables via generic ADO.NET data source.
ADO.NET ODBC Surfaces as virtual tables via ODBC through ADO.NET
ADO.NET OLE DB Surfaces as virtual tables via OLE DB through ADO.NET
ADO.NET Oracle Surfaces as virtual tables via ADO.NET built in connection to Oracle.
ADO.NET SQL Server Surfaces as virtual tables via ADO.NET built in connection to SQL Server
ODBC Surfaces as virtual tables via any ODBC driver.
OLE DB Surfaces as virtual tables via any OLE DB Provider.

Database Formats

CSV .asc, .csv, .tab, .txt, etc... Text formats
DB .db Borland Paradox
DBF .dbf dBase, FoxPro
DSN .dsn Microsoft Data Source files 
HTML .htm, .html Tables in HTML pages
MDB .mdb Microsoft Access 2000 and Access 97 .mdb format
UDL .udl Microsoft Universal Data Link
WKx .wj, .wk Lotus
XLS .xls Microsoft Excel
XLSX .xlsx Microsoft XLSX files (Microsoft Office 2007 and later), .xlsx
ADO.NET Generic ADO.NET data source.
ADO.NET ODBC ODBC through ADO.NET
ADO.NET OLE DB OLE DB through ADO.NET
ADO.NET Oracle ADO.NET built in connection to Oracle.
ADO.NET SQL Server ADO.NET built in connection to SQL Server
ODBC Any ODBC driver.
Oracle Data Sources Oracle Call Interface (OCI) for direct connect to Oracle tables or Oracle Spatial storage using GeoRasters   Requires Universal Edition or above.
OLE DB Any OLE DB Provider.

Default OLE DB Providers

Microsoft Jet 3.51 OLE DB Provider (Access 97)
Microsoft Jet 4.0 OLE DB Provider (Access 2000+)
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for Indexing Service
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for Internet Publishing
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for OLAP Services
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for Oracle
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for SQL Server
Microsoft OLE DB Simple Provider
MSDataShape
Native SQL Client
OLE DB Provider for Microsoft Directory Services

Export

Some data may be exported in multiple forms, for example, as an image or as a surface. Although graphics arts formats like .ai or .pdf may be thought of as "vector" formats, they can contain rasters and are listed here as printing formats.

Printing Formats

AI Adobe Illustrator
EMF Windows Extended Meta File format
PDF Portable Document Format
PS PostScript

Raster Image Formats

BMP .bmp Windows bitmap
ECW .ecw ERMapper Wavelet compressed.
EMF .emf, .wmf Windows Meta File and Extended Meta File
GIF .gif
JPEG .jpg, .jpeg
KML / KMZ Google Earth KML / KMZ.
PNG .png Portable Network Graphics ("Ping") - Just say no to .gif!
TGA .tga Targa
TIF .tif
TIFF .tif (geocoded) GeoTIFF, regular .tif, .tif with .tfw "world files", etc.
WMS Serve images using Manifold's built-in WMS Server capability.

Vector Drawing Formats

DXF .dxf AutoCAD
E00 .e00 ESRI ArcInfo "export" format. All editions can read .e00.  Writing .e00 requires Manifold System Universal Edition or above.
KML / KMZ Google Earth KML / KMZ.
MFD .mfd Manifold 4.50
MIF .mif MapInfo mid/mif
SDTS US Federal Government Spatial Data Transfer Standard
SHP .shp ESRI ArcView, including 3D and measured Shapefiles

Surface Formats

ESRI BIL .bil, .hdr ESRI BIL surfaces/terrain elevation
ESRI E00 Surfaces in ESRI .e00 format. All editions can read .e00.  Writing .e00 requires Manifold System Universal Edition or above.
ESRI ASCII Grid GRD .grd ESRI ArcINFO ASCII Grid
ESRI Fload Grid FLT .flt ESRI ArcINFO Floating-Point Grid
SDTS Surfaces in SDTS format.
Surfer 6 GRD Surfer version 6 GRD format
Surfer 7 GRD Surfer version 7 GRD format
Surfer ASCII GRD Surfer ASCII GRD format

Database Formats

Manifold ODBC Driver Read data from Manifold .map project files directly into ODBC capable third party applications using the ODBC driver for Manifold .map project files.
CSV .asc, .csv, .tab, .txt, etc... Text formats
DB .db Borland Paradox
DBF .dbf dBase, FoxPro
HTML .htm, .html Tables in HTML pages
MDB .mdb Microsoft Access 2000 and Access 97 .mdb format
WKx .wj, .wk Lotus
XLS .xls Microsoft Excel
XLSX .xlsx Microsoft XLSX files (Microsoft Office 2007 and later), .xlsx
ADO.NET Generic ADO.NET data source.
ADO.NET ODBC ODBC through ADO.NET
ADO.NET OLE DB OLE DB through ADO.NET
ADO.NET Oracle ADO.NET built in connection to Oracle.
ADO.NET SQL Server ADO.NET built in connection to SQL Server
ODBC Any ODBC driver.
OLE DB Any OLE DB Provider.
Oracle OCI Oracle Call Interface native connection for Oracle Spatial, SDO_GEOMETRY and GeoRasters.   Requires Universal Edition or above.

Default OLE DB Providers (typical Windows installation)

Microsoft Jet 3.51 OLE DB Provider (Access 97)
Microsoft Jet 4.0 OLE DB Provider (Access 2000+)
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for Indexing Service
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for Internet Publishing
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for OLAP Services
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for Oracle
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for SQL Server
Microsoft OLE DB Simple Provider
MSDataShape
Native SQL Client
OLE DB Provider for Microsoft Directory Services

Image Servers usable by Manifold

Use of image servers requires image server modules that may be provided by third parties and can be downloaded for free from the web.  The following are typical examples of image server modules that are widely used within the Manifold user community.

Google Earth Satellite images
Google Maps Street map images
Manifold Image Server Generic, open source connection to any image server
Manifold IMS Image Server Manifold IMS web sites running as image servers
Microsoft Virtual Earth Virtual Earth satellite images and street maps
OGC WMS Open GIS Consortium "WMS" standard for image servers
TerraServer Very cool high resolution image server
Yahoo! Maps Street map images

Manifold Internet Map Server DefaultS

HTML/ ASP/ASP.NET General purpose Internet Map Server
Admin Administrator control interface web site
Manifold Image Server General purpose image server, like your own image content served like Google Earth.
OGC WMS Images served using OGC WMS image server protocols
OGC WFS-T OGC WFS-T Feature Server, includes transactions so that clients can have a read/write interface with the server to edit vector data on the server from the client.
OGC WMS Open GIS Consortium "WMS" standard for image servers
SVG Requires programming.  See the Free Stuff page example.
Tables Serve tables. Cool!
Terrains Display 3D views of surfaces. Requires programming.  See the Free Stuff page example.
Profiles Display "cuts" through surfaces. Requires Surface Tools and programming.  See the Free Stuff page example.

Format availability is subject to change without notice.

Suggestions for New Formats

Suggestions to improve Manifold are always welcome. If you would like to suggest a new format, please see the Suggestions page for tips on making effective suggestions.


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Radian

Click for larger image: Terrain elevations in Arizona colored on the fly with an elevation palette in a Radian Studio display, as seen in the Gallery page.

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