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tomasfa
182 post(s)
#02-Jun-18 00:56

Hi. Most of our clients and current developments still in M8. I love it and they too. Just checking what is going to happen to M8 in the near future, since some clients want new developments in Add ins and Forms, plus they already have operational environments and no need for new learning curves (for R9 for example). Would M8 be for a long time, or should we start migrating forcefully to R9?

I see and hope for a future with BOTHs software running hand in hand. New clients can choose if staying with the superb classical GIS in M8 or go to the new paradigm in R9, or maybe a wise recommendation would be to use both always. And use the best of each one... since they can talk to each other... I see no problem with that.

Manifold what do you recommend? Specially since the last official M8 8.30 was a long time ago... I guess was the last one ever???

I know we must evolve... must many many people think (at least that I know)... Don't fix what isn't broken. Or don't change it if it works and works very well... its hard to answer some of those ideas or force a change just for the sake of a new release??? even considering (I know you are going to say this) R9 is a different product and fully parallel platform... :-)

Comments...

adamw


10,447 post(s)
#02-Jun-18 14:30

We aren't considering adding new features to Manifold 8, but we aren't planning to take any special measures to kill it either.

If - for the sake of example - there appears a new version of Windows on which Manifold 8 wouldn't run and making it run on that version of Windows will not require rewriting big parts of it (which was never necessary before), then we will likely adjust Manifold 8 to run on that new version of Windows.

We will also continue making sure that 9 can interoperate with 8. 9 already contains a lot of special-case code for 8 in various areas: the ODBC driver, shared storage on third-party databases, etc. 9 will continue to have that code and the range of what 9 does to better interoperate with 8 will continue to slowly extend from various small additions and fixes like it does now.

If you are using 8, feel free to continue using it. We suggest you take a look at 9 - and take a new look from time to time, because we are adding many new things - but the decision on what to use is absolutely yours, we respect it, and whatever you decide to use we will accept and support.

tomasfa
182 post(s)
#03-Jun-18 01:08

Great straight answer. Thank you Adam. Manifold rocks, no matter which number.. :-)

dchall8
1,008 post(s)
#04-Jun-18 16:45

I have to say Adam's reply is a relief to me.

One of the things I find very interesting and a little exciting about M9 is the free viewer. We have a contractor who uses ESRI software to put maps on the Internet. One problem with that is that their imagery is fuzzy and out of date compared to what I use (Google Earth satellite). For my people in the office, I export a KML file from M8 every week so they can see parcels using Google Earth as their free viewer. Google Earth is a great free viewer, but once you've used a real GIS program, Google Earth is primitive at best. One user needs soil types so I have a KML layer for her use. Another one likes hillshading and topo lines. KML files don't lend themselves to that at all, so she's out of luck for now. Once I migrate to M9, my people can use the M9 free viewer and will have the same access I have to visualization. This will promote GIS literacy in the office and, hopefully, will identify my replacement when I retire.

tomasfa
182 post(s)
#11-Jul-18 00:11

Hi dchall. Tour strategy is right, but we do that combining M8 and R9, since both can talk to each other. M8 users keep doing their job on M8... and one R9 users grabs everything from there .map and displays and prepares for the Viewer in R9. So we don't have to force a migration yet, specially since they use concurrent users and licence server. Just in case might help you. The Viewer is great.

dchall8
1,008 post(s)
#11-Jul-18 14:29

Good point. No need to wait for a final version of M9. I'm going to try that. You did, however, make me think about our current state of computers. M9 on my computer slowly absorbs all the resources with these specialty maps I make (soils and the giant DEM with hillshading). Since mine is the most powerful computer in the building, we'll see how it works on other computers. I need to reduce a .map project down to soils and parcels without a lot of fluff. I think that will work.

Dimitri


7,413 post(s)
#11-Jul-18 16:28

I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. I use a 32-bit super-portable computer when traveling and 9 is astonishingly fast on it. The main thing with 9 is that you start using larger files that were too scary to touch with 8, so it is important to get a bigger disk drive.

For example, today I downloaded the Ordnance Survey's OpenData Local data set for all of Great Britain as a 14 GB compressed raster TIFF (!). A 14 GB image I wouldn't use casually with 8, but with 9 it is routine, even on a 32-bit machine.

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