php3-mapscript and symbology

[Doyon, Jean-Francois]

Everyone,

Allright, I got the TTF Symbology going, turns out the .ttf file I was using
had some
problems with the encoding in it ... I had to switch it to Windows Unicode
from
Windows Symbol, abd boum, everything fell into place ! Took me long enough
to
figure that out though !

Now for some more advanced questions :

Can I have multiple symbols for one point ? I have a city let's say, but I
want
3 symbols around it ... Can this be done ?

How do I create dynamic symbols ? I would like to create circles that
contain
a number, only this number will vary (Number of hits from a search, I'm
mapping
search results here). I vaguely recall seeing talk about this on the list,
but I 
can't find anything about it anymore :) And can I use a TTF symbol to do
this ?
Or do I have to create independent symbols for each possiblity ?

Thanks !
J.F.


> ----------
> From: 	Doyon,
> Jean-Francois[SMTP:Jean-Francois.Doyon at CCRS.NRCan.gc.ca]
> Sent: 	Thursday, August 31, 2000 4:43 PM
> To: 	mapserver-users at lists.gis.umn.edu
> Subject: 	php3-mapscript and TTF Symbology
> 
> Hello AGAIN :)
> 
> Allright, got the projection stuff going great, thanks again :)
> 
> Now I'm trying to get TTF Symbology working, and am running
> into some problems.
> 
> I'm using a file called "geosymb.ttf", no idea where it came from.
> 
> Then I define in marker.sym
> 
> Symbol
> Name 'capital'
> Type TrueType
> Filled
> Antialias
> Character "e"
> END
> 
> But nothing shows up ! Ever ! Even stranger, sometimes ALL my TTF stuff
> disappears off the chart (All city names and their symbols, which are
> vectors, I'm just
> trying to change the symbol on ONE city). In some instances, it seems that
> everything
> within a certain radius (the bigger the symbol size, the more disappears)
> of
> the said city
> disappears ! Things also seem to behave differently depending on
> extent/zoom
> level. 
> Basically, the minute I try to put a TTF symbol in there things go bezerk.
> 
> The Text (Labelling) is TTF, and that's been working fine all along.
> 
> I even tried using my arial.ttf file (Which I use for labeling) to do
> symbols, but ... same thing.
> 
> This is the TOP layer BTW, (i.e. the last one to be added) if that makes a
> difference.
> 
> Oh , an dI've of course tried a variety of "Character" ... Also, when
> windows says a character
> is "Alt+0168", how do I use that with a symbol file ???
> 
> Anybody have any problems with this ? Any idea what I'm doing wrong ?
> 
> Maybe I'll go try it with the Perl version if I have some time tomorrow
> ...
> 
> Thanks again, and again, and again ...
> 
> 
>