[OpenLayers-Dev] layer class for ArcGIS Server MapServer Object web service

[Christopher Schmidt]

On Wed, Nov 29, 2006 at 11:28:33PM -0500, Brian Hatchl wrote:
> Hello all,
> 
> I'm working toward creating a layer class for the ArcGIS Server 9.1
> MapServer Object web service.  So far I've created the AGS layer class by
> extending OpenLayers.Layer.Grid and it seemed that I also needed to create
> an AGS tile class by extending OpenLayers.Tile.Image.
> I'm looking for any suggestions as to where I might be going wrong.  Maybe I
> need to move the SOAP request away from a getURL() method and into the tile
> draw() method like the WFS tile class?  Or maybe there's another inherited
> method that I need to override to get the proper behavior?  Any guidance
> would be appreciated.  

My first instinct is to say that "getURL" isn't quite the right place
for this. The reason I say that is that I consider getURL to be an
action which doesn't have any results -- however, I'm not sure that
we've designed OpenLayers such that we have a good hook for what you
want in any other place.

It seems like the problem you're having is that although the draw()
function of your tile works, the moveTo function does not -- in the
Image tile, moveTo uses this.url = this.layer.getURL(bounds). I'm not
sure how relevant this is -- it would depend a lot on how you set things
up -- but my first guess would be that you should look at moveTo and see
if it's doing the right thing for what you want. 

In order to make the collaboriative debugging process as easy as
possible, one way to go would be to move the work you've done so far
into an OpenLayers SVN sandbox: that way multiple people could check it
out, look at it, and offer advice. If you are interested in checking
your code into an OL SVN sandbox, visit
http://openlayers.org/mkpasswd.cgi , and enter a username  
(no spaces) and password, then email the result to psc at openlayers.org.

(This would also ease a transition to the OpenLayers main branch, should
you desire to have the code included in this way.)

If you're not interested in checkind the code into a sandbox at this
time, if you can share either the code or a page where the code is
running, so that I could look at it, I might find it easier to help you
debug your current problem.

> Maybe the OL development team already has some ideas,
> as the approach should be similar to adding an ArcIMS ArcXML request layer
> to OL, which I see has an open ticket.

The open ticket was only a placeholder, since I've occasionally been asked
for this functionality, but never gotten anyone who lasted after I said
"You can also just install the free ArcIMS WMS connector".  :)

Sorry I can't be more helpful at the moment -- and welcome to
OpenLayers!

Regards,
-- 
Christopher Schmidt
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