Headlines 08 - Archived What's New?

This is archived news information.  Some items may be superseded by more recent news items.   

See the What's New page for the latest news and notes from Manifold.  Visit our Headlines  page to see a list of archived news items pages.    Check out the new Press Releases page for links to press releases issued by manifold.net and see the Customer Comments on Manifold Products page for sample comments from our customers about Manifold and its products. 

Release 6.50 is Now Shipping! 

Release 6.50 has now replaced Release 6.00 for all orders on the online store. Release 6.50 includes over 630 items in the release notes, many of which are very substantial and powerful new features.  See the 6.50 Highlights page and the Upgrade to 6.50 Frequently Asked Questions page for more information on Release 6.50.  

Price Increases:  Due to introduction of advanced hydrology functions into the Surface Tools package, the price of Surface Tools, Option Pack and, possibly, Universal Edition may increase on August 15, 2005.  Users interested in these packages who do not yet have their licenses are advised to order before that date to beat any price increase.

Free 6.50 Upgrades / Limited Time 6.50 Upgrade Offer for Manifold 6.00 Licensees

All Manifold System orders received on June 1, 2005, or later in addition to delivery of Release 6.00 also will include a free automatic upgrade to Manifold System Release 6.50.  If you ordered Manifold System on or after June 1, you will automatically receive a free upgrade.  There is no need to order any upgrade or to register or to follow any other procedure: you will receive an upgrade at no charge.

(image at left) 6.50 allows automatic download of TerraServer images. Combined with the ability to "extrude" areas it can create cityscapes. The image at left combines a TerraServer image with building heights. Image used with permission of Cornell University.

All Manifold System 6.00 licensees who ordered before June 1, 2005, may take advantage of limited time upgrade offer via the Online Store to upgrade to 6.50 for only $50 (until September 15, 2005) plus $5 shipping anywhere in the world. After September 15, 2005 the Online Store price for the upgrade will increase to $150 until December 15, 2005, at which time the upgrade will no longer be available at a discounted price.  The discounted upgrade offer requires a valid Manifold 6.00 serial number.  If you do not possess a valid Manifold 6.00 serial number, you cannot order the discounted Upgrade to 6.50 product.

Very important: the 6.00 serial number must be the original, true serial number sent to you by manifold.net. The version with "X" characters at the end from within the Help About dialog will not work (that version is deliberately masked with X characters so that someone with physical access to the machine cannot steal your serial number).  To avoid typographical errors, use Copy and Paste to copy your serial number from the original email sent to you (or from a backup file) and paste it into the checkout order form in the online store.

Upgrades to 6.50 may now be ordered by 6.00 licensees on t he Manifold Online Store.  For detailed information on the upgrade, see the Upgrade to 6.50 Frequently Asked Questions page.  This offer expires September 15, 2005.  This discounted upgrade offer is available only on the Online Store. If you acquired your Manifold 6.00 license via PO, payment by check or other method, see the Save money and upgrade now! 

User Meetings Held in London and Lausanne

Following up the recent East Coast Manifold User Meeting at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, Manifold user meetings were held in June, 2005, in Lausanne, Switzerland, and in London, the United Kingdom.   Upcoming meetings in 2005 will be the West Coast Manifold User Meeting in San Mateo, California, this fall and in Australia in December, 2005.  See the User Meetings page for photos and news of upcoming user meetings.

(above) Manifold focus groups in action.  After detailed presentations by manifold.net technical staff, smaller focus groups are formed to discuss specific topics for one hour to one and a half hours.  Focus group leaders then report back the conclusions of their groups for discussion by the entire meeting. 

Service Pack 1 (SP1) for 6.00 Delivers 320 New Features

Service Pack 1 (SP1) has been released for Manifold System Release 6.00.  Download SP1 here.  A previous installation of Manifold System Release 6.00 from the Manifold CD is required for SP1 to function. View complete release notes here listing all 320 new enhancements and bug fixes.  View installation instructions here. You must have SP1 installed in 6.00 to qualify for technical support.

• OGC WMS Client: Manifold can link images from OpenGIS (OGC) WMS servers so Manifold can now act as a client to OGC WMS servers.
• OGC WMS Server: Manifold can now also function as an OpenGIS WMS server, to provide images to any OGC WMS client over the web. Setting Manifold up as an OGC WMS server is as easy as setting up an IMS page. 
• Simpler Labels Programming: Bound labels components have been re-engineered to make programming Manifold labels components easier and to simplify the user interface for interactive users. A labels component bound to a drawing is now always synchronized with the drawing. T
• Curved labels: Line labels follow the lines they are bound to, aligned character by character. This results in "curved" labels following curved lines.
• Zoom Box: Web pages generated by the File - Export Web Page dialog for the Standard and Standard (framed) templates include a Zoom Box tool.
• Faster Geocoding: Geocoding speed has been improved to run approximately twice as fast as before.
• Multi-Field Instant Data: Instant Data mode has been improved using the Object Fields dialog, which allows Instant Data functions on more than one field at a time.
• Export to Adobe Illustrator: Layouts can be exported to Adobe Illustrator AI format in addition to PDF, PS and EMF.
• Spatial SQL Extended to Images and Surfaces: Images and surfaces now have virtual tables, which allows manipulation of images and surfaces via queries. 
• Dynamic Images and Surfaces from Tables: The File - Link - Image command and the File - Link - Surface  command allows linking images or surfaces from tables or queries. Each record produces a pixel.
• USB Support for GPS: The GPS Console works with GPS units connected via USB.
• Extended NMEA Interfaces: The GPS Console supports more than 20 additional NMEA sentences including the ability to capture depth, humidity, temperature and other data.  Use Manifold to ride along in a boat and automatically capture georegistered bathymetry! 
• Read/Write MAP for Dynamic Applications: IMS opens MAP files for both reading and writing. This allows doing sophisticated analysis that involves creating temporary components, such as running queries the text of which is supplied by the user.  It also allows dynamic IMS applications where served projects are changed on the fly.
• See Terrain Windows in Applications: There is a new TerrainWindow object with means to control the camera, allowing terrain window pop-ups in third party applications or even in IMS applications.
• ADRG Import: Manifold can now import ADRG images as well as CADRG.
• Inner Centroids: The Transform toolbar for drawings includes a new Centroids (Inner) transform, which creates area psuedo-centroids that are guaranteed to be created within area, thus eliminating the problem of a true centroid being positioned outside a crescent-shaped area in applications that require an internal centroid.
• Sounds: The Tools - Options dialog includes a new Sounds page, which allows setting a sound to play after completion of a lengthy operation. The Sound file option specifies the sound file to play.  Set Manifold cooking on immense tasks for hours and have a sound played to let you know the job is done.
• ADO .NET Support: Manifold now fully utilizes ADO.NET data sources for all import, export and linking operations. There is a "generic" import and four "specific" imports for standard ADO.NET providers included in .NET 1.10 (ODBC, OLE DB, Oracle, SQL Server).
• Tuned Autoscroll: Autoscroll options in Tools - Options - User Interface include the new Distance option, which controls autoscroll speed, and the new Require Alt key option, which requires pressing the Alt key for autoscroll. Settting these options as desired allows adjusting autoscroll behavior to user preferences (sometimes you want it and sometimes you don't). 
• Faster Georegistration: The speed of the Affine (scale, shift, rotate) and Affine (triangulation) registration methods has been greatly increased, by a factor of 15 on average.
• Enhanced Project Pane GUI: Dragging components between folders in the Project pane preserves expanded component nodes as well as the selected and the topmost component nodes.
• Explode: The Transform toolbar for drawings includes a new Explode transform, which explodes lines to individual segments.
• Render Zoom: Manifold windows can now be forced to exhibit "paper map" behavior, if desired, so symbols enlarge when zooming in.
• New Label Tools: There are two new tools to add labels: Insert Line Label and Insert Freeform Line Label.
• Proxy Servers Supported: The Tools - Options dialog includes a new Proxy Server page, which allows specifying the parameters for a proxy server to use for Internet connections, (for example, when linking images from OGC WMS servers.
• S-57 Import: Manifold can import vector data in S-57 format (widely used for nautical charts).
• TIGER/Line 2004 Import:  TIGER/Line import supports TIGER/Line 2004.
• .NET Reuse Facilitated: All .NET assemblies (including Manifold.Interop) have been installed into the global assembly cache to facilitate reuse.
• Oracle Extensions Supported: Manifold geometry data routines now support Oracle extensions to OGC WKB and WKT formats.

Whew!  ...and the above items are less than 30 out of 320 listed in the full release notes! Check out the full listing to see if a wishlist item you've contributed has appeared in SP1, and see all the other cool items built for the Manifold user community by the manifold.net engineering team. 

GISAdvisor.Com Releases Two Day Manifold Training Video

Gisadvisor.com has released an outstanding training video for Manifold System.  Based upon a two day training schedule, the video uses screen recording technology to provide a solid introduction  to Manifold 6.0.  Users can download the data and 13 separate tutorial sessions. These are not static HTML pages seen in other GIS training products, but rather a video stream of gisadvisor.com trainers guiding you through the actual steps for performing the tasks.  Gisadvisor.com is not affiliated with manifold.net, but this product is so good that the manifold.net team enthusiastically endorses it for a superb training session at an unbeatable price.  Click here to visit the gisadvisor.com home page.

Cornell University Compares Manifold and ArcGIS

Cornell University has just published a massive study comparing Manifold System 6.00 to ESRI's ArcGIS 8.   The study considers 50 common GIS tasks that were defined by USGS approximately ten years ago, as part of a USGS effort to review different GIS systems.  For each task, the study reports the necessary steps in both Manifold and ArcGIS with side by side listings of workflow, commands and screenshots.  Although the "common GIS tasks" are now somewhat dated and do not include a review of the numerous modern GIS features available in Manifold, nonetheless the study provides a first rate, detailed review of how various tasks are done in the two systems.  The astonishing result is that even though the Cornell study makes no subjective judgments and simply reports procedures in a neutral way, in virtually all tasks the reader cannot avoid reaching the conclusion that Manifold is obviously superior to ArcGIS.  The study was authored by a group of graduate students under the supervision of a Cornell professor and was then peer-reviewed by invited experts from the ESRI and Manifold communities.  Manifold had no influence in the study and neither originated the study nor financed it.  In fact, Manifold's sales and marketing personnel did not learn of the study until after its completion.  The result is an outstanding, independent comparison of the two systems.

View the Cornell Study by clicking this link.  (PDF format)

More News

Wow! That's only the news for the last few months.  Check out the Headlines page to see a summary of news items for previous months, with fast links to previous What's New? pages.  You'll be astonished at the range, power and productivity that a relationship with manifold.net provides.