[mapserver-users] point labels conflict with other dots, not other labels

[Walt Lin]

Hi-- I have a problem with the way mapserver labels my cities layer
for the US (points).  I'm trying to get good priority labelling-- ie at
higher levels, the more important cities show up.  So here's the
problem: it seems that mapserver won't draw the label for a point if
that label will conflict with another red dot representing a city
point-- *NOT* another city *label*, which is what I want.

e.g.:  St. Paul and Minneapolis are right next to each other, so
mapserver won't label either of them, because each of those labels
conflicts with the dot representing the other city.  However, I would
like mapserver to label one of them (the most populous), and then not
label the other because it would conflict with the first *label*.

I've tried combinations of LABELCACHE and POSTLABELCACHE but those don't
do what I would like.

Can I accomplish this?  Any suggestions?  Besides deleting points that
are close together, because I want to keep all the red dots.

Also, without reading code (or, could Steve/someone else point me to
where in the code I should start reading), could anyone explain briefly
how mapserver does the labelling conflicts, especially with multiple
layers?  Does it just start last layer first, drawing labels that don't
conflict with any drawn features or other drawn labels, and move towards
the first layer?

Thanks.
Walt