[OpenLayers-Users] Sample OL site...

[Steve Lime]

Sure, no problem. You can find it at:

  http://maps.dnr.state.mn.us/compass/compass_sample.map 

Things to note:

  - I use includes heavily so this file is the result of serializing a much simpler map file which is why 
you'll see scientific notation for some numbers and particularly verbose layer descriptions.

  - As mentioned in a follow-up by Chris, setting labelcache_map_edge_buffer eliminates shield getting
cut off. I had started with a TileCache MapServer layer which set that automatically and then switched
to a WMSLayer which doesn't. Setting explicitly fixed any issues.

  - I'm using the dev version of MapServer which introduces a new label processing option. If you see a
line like "PROCESSING "LABEL_NO_CLIP=1" it is telling MapServer to compute a label point before clipping
the feature. This results in stable label positions for polygon and line features (but is most useful with 
polygons). I'm just experimenting with it by fixing label positions, but it's another tool to help deal with edge
labeling issues.

  - in order to create as small of tiles as possible I'm forcing AGG output through a pre-computed palette.
The results are dramatic in terms of file size. I'm not able to achieve Goggle-sized tiles but that's to be
expected since the maps contain far more information. The trick was to render a large sample 24-bit 
sample image (http://maps/compass/compass_color_sample.png) and generate a 8-bit palette from it. I
used Photoshop in this case.

Steve

>>> On 4/17/2008 at 1:42 AM, in message <C42CBE05.20B2%kobben at itc.nl>, Barend
Kobben <kobben at itc.nl> wrote:
> Great inspiration! Would you care to share your .map file with us
> (dataconnection passwords deleted of course ;-) so other can see how you
> achieved the nice symbology...?
>