Plotting

Choose PLOTTING from the main menu to display the PLOTTING menu.

ENTITY	MAP	SHEET SETUP	PLOTTING
Entity Copy	Map Copy	Sheet Sizes	Process Map
Entity Create	Map Create	Borders	Re-present Last Plot
Entity Delete	Map Delete	Drawing Areas	Plot Preview
Entity Modify	Map Modify	Grids	Plot Driver
Entity Load	Map Load	Title Blocks
Entity Rename	Map Rename		UTILITIES
Entity Report	Map Report		Lookup File Editor
Entity Unload	Map Unload		Edit Pens
			Edit Palette

The PLOTTING module allows you to produce high quality maps from data in string files, raster image files and note files.

You may define the information to be plotted on a map sheet in specific terms. This allows maps to be produced which are the most meaningful for your application.

Any map sheet can contain a variety of different graphical items, such as control stations, buildings, contours, roads, title block, notes etc. Great flexibility is provided in the specification of the plotted representation of each of these items, or entities. Each new entity is added to a 'library' and subsequent plots are specified simply in terms of these `user-defined entities'.

Once the features to appear on a map have been specified, they may be presented in a variety of ways, e.g. with a grid, a title block, at different scales, rotated relative to sheet boundaries and allowing for only selective overprint of lines, symbols and text. Having selected the final sheet presentation, the whole map may then be previewed or plotted on a variety of plotters.

Map Structure and Elements

The exploitation of the full potential of this plotting module requires an understanding of the general structure of any map. A map is a collection of different kinds of items or entities. Each of these entities has various characteristics, or attributes, which define the entity.

A map will comprise the following entities:

• String entities are physical features stored as strings in a string file, e.g. stockpiles, detail pickup, contours, boundaries etc.
• Note entities are tables printed from files containing simple formatted text data, e.g. description of stockpiles on the plot, Surveyor's Declaration panels and the like.
• Image entities are images plotted from external bitmap files, e.g. a photo of a pit wall or core sample.
• Sheet entities are presentation aspects of the map which are defined independently in a file of user characteristics at the time the system is implemented, e.g. title block, border, grids etc.

String, image and note entities are managed using the ENTITY and MAP management functions on the PLOTTING menu. Sheet entities are created and managed by the Sheet Setup functions of the Plotting module.

Plotting Configuration files

Various files are used by the Plotting Module to define the many different features that together define the features that appear on maps created by the Plotting Module. For a more complete description of these files follow the links below.

• Plotter driver configuration file (plotter.chr)
• Sheet setup files for sheets, borders, drawing areas, grids and title blocks
• Method of defining hatching patterns
• Standard hatching patterns with new software installations

Plot files

Traditionally, Surpac has stored plots in a plotter-independent proprietary format with a .pf extension. These files could only be read and written by Surpac products. Support for reading these files will continue to be supported, however any new plot files will be created in DWF format.

DWF is an open, secure file format developed by Autodesk for the efficient distribution and communication of rich design data to anyone who needs to view, review, or print design files. Because DWF files are highly compressed, they are small and fast to transmit. Autodesk provide an API to allow programmers to read and write DWF files as well as a free viewing application ("Autodesk Design Review" - which you can download from the Autodesk site). This allows plot files in this format to be easily circulated and viewed without the requirement of a Surpac product. DWF format files can also be embedded in web pages or word documents.

Plot Library Issues

It is common to put considerable time and effort into constructing a flexible and powerful plot library. Like any important data the plot library should be backed up regularly. This can simply be achieved by using the ENTITY UNLOAD and MAP UNLOAD functions which unload maps and entities to files. Each week (for example) all that is required is to unload everything in the library to a map file and an entity file which should be stored on a separate storage device to the plot library. Note that the ENTITY UNLOAD and MAP UNLOAD functions accept wildcards so to unload everything just enter "*" as the name of the object to unload.

Version 3.2 introduced a new format for the plot library with the "SSI_PLOTTING:library.plt" file being replaced by a suite of files. This removes the limit on the number or entities/maps and makes accessing information from the library faster. The new library is also more extensible allowing future enhancements to entities/map definitions which were not possible with the old format library. Old plotting library files will automatically be examined to produce a new format plotting library when plotting is first used. The "library.plt" file will not be deleted after the conversion process - allowing the file to be stored for safe-keeping. The change in format of the plot library corresponds to a change in format of unloaded map and entity files. This means that unloaded entity and map files from versions prior to Surpac 2000 cannot be loaded into the new plot library.