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Graphics

Performance

Drawings, or Libraries, in GIS applications can easily become unmanageable. InFoCAD's high-performance graphic engine and organizational tools make working these large data sets easy. InFoCAD’s unrivaled graphic performance can be attributed to its COGO-based data structure and its high-speed clipping features.

InFoCAD’s graphic engine uses dynamic high-speed clipping routines that only draw the graphics contained in the current view. Another feature, called View Limits, is also provided. This feature allows users to define and work with a subset of a graphic Library. The combination of these features makes panning and zooming around a drawing almost instantaneous.

CADD

InFoCAD’s Computer-Aided Design and Drafting (CADD) Module is completely integrated and provides COGO and 3-D functions. Its features include Organizational, Drawing, Toolbox and Editing commands as well as translators.

InFoCAD utilizes a layering concept for the organization of graphics. Layers can be thought of as distinct drawing surfaces that reside directly on top of each other. Each of the 999 layers can be turned on or off, locked or secured, masked from certain users, and height filtered.

Layers may also be assigned any of 256 colors, 8 line thickness, and 999 pen colors for plotting. InFoCAD’s Layers Manager is used to organize all of the graphics contained in a Library file and provides a mechanism to save parameters and configurations into files for individual use.

Managing large sets can be cumbersome in systems that do not have the tools to handle them. Within InFoCAD, it is possible to separate graphic data into multiple Libraries. InFoCAD provides an External Library Manager to control the display characteristics of multiple libraries and also allows for their configurations to be saved for future use.

Layers and External Libraries

The Layer and External Library Manager provide users with the ability to create and efficiently manage unlimited continuos basemaps of information.

InFoCAD provides users with clear, concise instructions and powerful options, whether they’re drawing or digitizing graphics. InFoCAD easily accommodates lines, arcs, circles, text, splines, ellipses, polygons, and shape fills.

In addition to being able to snap to points, InFoCAD provides a dynamic toolbox that becomes available to users whenever they are digitizing a point on the screen. The toolbox includes the following functions:

• Locate a delta, X, Y from a point
• Locate X, Y, Z coordinates by entry
• Locate point ON a selected graphic
• Locate the intersection of two graphics
• Locate angle/distance from a point by keyboard entry
• Locate a point offset from an intersection
• Locate an existing point
• Locate a point 1/3, ½, ¼ of a graphics distance away from the start or end point
• Locate the center of an arc or circle
• Locate a COGO point by number
• Locate a point by Lat./Long entry

InFoCAD incorporates the concept of a Current Group to edit or modify graphics. The GROUP command provides 20 different tools for selecting graphic entitles to add or subtract from the Current Group. Once graphics are grouped, they may be copied, modified, moved, edge-matched, rotated, etc. as a single entity.

InFoCAD provides a wide variety of panning and zooming commands. These commands also use dynamic high-speed clipping routines to enhance graphic display performance. Additionally, InFoCAD provides a command that saves and assigns screens to function keys and always saves the last ten views, which may be recovered serially at the touch of a button.

The ability to translate data between different systems is essential to a GIS. InFoCAD therefore provides several graphic and database translators to import and/or export data from systems. Among the formats supported are: DAF, DXF, DLG, IGES, SIF, MOSS, Tiger, ETAK, and HPGL.

InFoCAD is not intended to be an architectural rendering package, but has a full 3-D data structure designed and built to accommodate GIS, civil engineering, and geology applications, among others. This facilities the following applications:

• Digital Terrain Modeling
• Contouring/Topology
• Cross Sectioning/Profiles
• Volumetric (Cut & Fill Computations)
• Civil Engineering Design
• Geologic Structure Elevation

Coordinate Geometry (COGO)

Since the 1960’s, Coordinate Geometry has been the accepted standard for Civil Engineering, Surveying, Cadastral Mapping, and Cartography because of its accuracy and guarantee of connectivity. By default, all graphic elements created or translated into InFoCAD use COGO.

COGO provides with the ability to use true geometric arcs instead of many small line vectors that emulate arcs. This not only improves performance during graphic display and analysis, but ensures connectivity and accurate geometric computations.

InFoCAD provides a management utility for COGO points, called COGO MAN. This utility controls the different COGO point management features such as numbering, locking, and autozooming, as well as descriptions for each COGO point.

In addition, InFoCAD automatically generates six different types of COGO point reports: a simple and detailed coordinate report, a simple and a detailed traverse-area report, a station-offset report, and a radial stake-out report. All reports include latitude and longitude information when available.

Additional COGO function includes:

• traverse adjustments
• radial stake-out;
• annotations such as bearing, distance, arc length, delta, radius, chord and tangent;
• station and offset;
• side shots; and
• curve tables

Every aspect of a COGO point can be controlled using the COGO commands in the CADD Module.