Autodesk 15606-011408-9300 - MAP R6.3 UPG, Developer'S Manual

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Chapter 1 Introduction
Viewing Maps
The most common development goal is to allow Autodesk MapGuide Viewer
users to view and interact with maps. You can do this by embedding a map
in an HTML page, in which case the Autodesk MapGuide Viewer runs within
the user’s Web browser to display the map, or you can run the Autodesk
MapGuide Viewer from within a stand-alone application that you create.
With either approach, you will use the Autodesk MapGuide Viewer API to
interact with the map. For example, you might create a button that refreshes
a map or add text boxes that allow the user to add data to the map.
Querying and Updating Data
Beyond viewing maps, users want to retrieve data to answer questions. This
includes selecting map features and running reports on them, such as
selecting power poles and seeing when they were last serviced. You set up
these reports using Macromedia ColdFusion, Microsoft Active Server Pages
(ASP), or another server-side scripting language. Additionally, you can use
these scripts to enable the user to update the data. For example, you could
display the date of last service in a text field, where the technician in the field
could update it. Your script would then take the technician’s date and update
the source database, so that all other technicians viewing that power pole on
the map would see the new date of last service. For more information about
reports, see Chapter 6, “Using Reports to Query and Update Data Sources.”
You can also enable users to mark up the maps to edit the spatial data, such
as correcting the location of a fire hydrant by drawing its correct location on
the map. This process is called redlining. Autodesk MapGuide provides APIs
that allow you to add redlining functionality to your map. You can then
create a server-side script that retrieves the redlining data, processes it, and
updates the source data. For more information about redlining, see “Custom
Redlining Application” on page 136. If your source data is in SDF files, you
can use the SDF Component Toolkit to update the SDFs directly when
redlining. For more information about working with SDF files, see “SDF
Component Toolkit Applications” on page 171.