[Mapbender-users] where to get the map

[Lars-Hendrik Schneider]

Hi
smithveg schrieb:
> Hello,
> 
> I download a zip file form the url as below:
> http://www.cipotato.org/DIVA/data/DataServer.htm
> 
> Inside got a GRD and GRI file. I'm not sure how to use it. Is it get the 
> map and upload to mapbender?
> 
> But you say that mapbender not display the map for user, so, who display 
> the map? WMS?

Mapbender is only a client software that enabels you to get maps 
(images) from specialized mapserver services. In the backend Mapbender 
only (simply spoken) creates special URL requests to a program that 
delivers and creates the map then. Mapbender does not create the maps 
itself.

For the maps you need the data (shapes, aeral photos, TIFs ...) and a 
program that takes a picture from your data and delivers it to a client 
(Mapbender). Therefore you need s.th. like UMN Mapserver or ArcIMS.

So you currently just have the "remote control" for such kind of 
servers. Luckily many such servers are available in the internet and can 
be accessed by delivering their data in a standard format -> WMS (Web 
Map Service).

There you can a file that tells Mapbender which parameters the service 
expects - so that you can get maps from such a service using Mapbender 
as a remote control.

Hth a bit for the background...

Lars-Hendrik