[mapserver-users] how to access dbf files?

[Steve Lime]

With perl use Xbase.pm. It's very stable and fast. I would imagine most other scripting languages
would have similar modules. The DBFInfo stuff was added solely to support the tk/tcl msworkbench
application and was not intended for general use.

If time permits I will properly wrap the shapelib DBF functions so that a common set of methods 
will exist- version 3.7.

Stephen Lime
Data & Applications Manager

Minnesota DNR
500 Lafayette Road
St. Paul, MN 55155
651-297-2937

>>> Michael Schulz <mschulz at webgis.de> 08/20/02 10:00AM >>>
Hello,

could somebody give me a hint on what would be to "right" way to access
attribute information from a dbf file using mapscript.

I am a little bit confused since there seem to be variuos ways to do so.
php/mapscript obviously uses its own dbf functionality, perl/mapscript
uses sometimes the xbase module but also the DBFInfo object that can be
accessed directly from mapscript. For python/mapscript i rewrote the
perl/mapscript sample shpinfo.pl to a shpinfo.py using msDBF...
functions and the DBFInfo object.  But i experienced pretty often that
these functions were rather unstable (lot of segfaults when doing
writes). Then i switched to the dbf functions that come with the
pyshapelib.

Is this confusion real and are there changes to this subject going on,
or is there no "normal" mapscript way to do so and each language
adresses this issue differently?

TIA, Michael

--
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Michael Schulz                                in medias res
Dipl.-Geologe                              Gesellschaft für
                                Informationstechnologie mbH
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mschulz at webgis.de                             www.webgis.de