TransDEM Forum

In Gisa's third tutorial on Handling WMS he a created Simple Path so that mapping could be done. The Vector was Called Map Path 1.

In the fourth tutorial on Handling Map tile vectors, he went to the route section to retrieve his simple path, however in this tutorial not
only was there a Map Path 1 vector there was also a Map Tile Vector. This is the one he clicked on to start the tutorial.

My question is, how did he create the Map tile vector? This was not shown in the previous tutorial.

When I entered my Simple path into map tile server there no map co-ordinates on my path even though I did save my simple map in the WMS
as instructed. I looked in my WMS folder and all the tiles are there, however the dem with my simple path does not show them.

Thanks

Loadman

A simple path, suitable for acquiring WMS or Map Tile clippings can be and usually will be created with the TransDEM built-in polyline editor, named "Simple Route Editor".

This editor is more or less intuitive to use. See tutorial 7 in the TransDEM main manual (starting on page 130) for the general approach and part 3 therein about drawing polylines.

The reference chapter for the Simple Route Editor starts on page 60 in the same manual.

Vector data in TransDEM always require some DEM or raster map loaded first. Without a DEM or a raster map, vector data will be invisible or not available.

Files and folders in TransDEM: TransDEM maintains different directory paths for different geo data types. All paths can point to the same directory, of course, but you will have to explicitly set the path.


Did you try and succeed with one of the WMS or the Map Tile tutorials from the TransDEM manual? They are less complex, compared to Gisa's rather large route.

Hi Loadman,


Got your email.

In the tutorial, it looks like I clicked on the map tile vector path but if you look really carefully, I actually did click on the map tile vector. Wink (the program I used to make the tutorial) is great for freeware but the speed at which it captures mouse movements is hard to estimate. Sometimes it does things really fast and at others, it does them very slow. I can't complain for freeware though.

Regardless, you would want to make your own rail path map tile vector. One does not need to be accurate so much to get the web maps but one should try to be more accurate to trace the simple vector path for the rail vector (because the size of the tiles and image size/quality is much smaller/higher respectively).

I apologize for the misleading caption and instructions there. Hopefully, this explains the first problem you noticed (good eye BTW).

For the second part...I'm a bit confused by what the problem is but I'll take a stab at it. If I misunderstand, please try to explain again and we'll try to help you.

There is a difference between the the web maps and the map tiles.

- the WMS server (web maps) is for painting the terrain and your minimap with textures. It seems like you got this correctly
- the map tiles are images (usually google earth images) that are fit to tiles which are placed in your route.

These are two totally different things and are not related.

For this reason, you should have one folder for your WMS map data and one different folder for your Map Tile Data. Once you have opened up the simple rail path vector (you could even use the wms simple vector path if you wanted to as a test) then open up the map tile box, set up the connection, and click on the map path radio button. It will ask where to save the images for you (put them in an empty folder called map tiles) and then let it do it's thing.

If you restart the process at a later date from scratch, just open up your DEM, your wms data (click on the first map image in your wms maps folder and it should load all of them) then open up your simple map path/simple rail vector path (doesn't matter which for the sake of the tutorial) then connect to the map tiles server and go from there.

I hope this helps. If not, take a screenshot and we'll try to help you out.

Good luck!

8)

Gisa ^^

Thanks for your reply. I will be out of town for a couple of days so I will not be able to look at it
until the weekend.

Thanks again

Loadman

You're welcome Loadman. I did not expect my tutorials to be so popular...I'm glad they are helping out others though. Take your time of course and reply here if you are still stuck and Dr. Ziegler, I, or someone else will help you out.

Have a safe trip!

8)

Gisa ^^

Hi Gisa,

I have succeeded in the importing of my Galt Sub East, from Mississauga to just west of the Wolverton siding. The western portion to London
will be done once I can get the track done on the eastern half.

I has a couple of small glitches. The wms maps were in the mini map at first, however they seem to have disappeared with only the baseboards
and the vectors showing. The utm tiles are all there, though the image is not that sharp but it will suffice.

The rail and power line vectors are there but the actual track and power line from trainz are not there. Only the white lines and spline circles show,
this I think was my fault as I did not enter the correct kuids. The watercourses showed up as advertised.

Overall I am very satisfied with this program. Thanks to Geophil for this.
Also thanks to you for your video tutorials.

Gerry Lee ( Loadman )

Hi Gerry,


First, thank you for your appreciation of the tutorial. Geophil's program is very powerful indeed and every serious prototypical route builder should really consider it. For me, it's a great feeling to do all that work and then have your map in trainz, with textures, tiles and (some) vectors ready to go?

As for the bugs, here are my thoughts:
- did you delete the textures from your copy of trainz? I'm sure you know you need to have them installed to see the textures on the map. You said they showed up the first time though, which seems kind of odd. Maybe try to look at it again? You have to export the wms maps first, then the UTM tiles (took me a while to figure that one out).
- UTM tiles - you can zoom in and if you have a stronger computer, possibly export better quality images. What zoom level did you go with the first time around? What kind of specs does your machine have?
- You are correct (about the double-dashed white lines). That means you tried to export a vector with a KUID that you don't have (or which can't be exported). Which version of transDEM are you using? The latest has support for built in track/powerlines, etc...although you could just export another temporary version of each and then use the replace tool in surveyor to replace the spline there. I'm really glad that they implemented that in trainz.

If I were you, now that you've done a *practice run*, I'd try again. No need to get the DEM or WMS maps. Just start the process again by loading up your data but this time, get better quality map tile data again (zoom in closer if you can but know that you can't really do much with regards to the quality for rural regions though). Export the map again and use proper/temporary kuids and you should be good to go.

You can also export pipelines (for gas) but I thought this wasn't really necessary. I prefer to export rail, powerlines, watercourses, trails, overpasses, and walls and fences but that's just me.

The good news is, the more you use this to export, the easier it gets. Good luck and enjoy!



Gisa ^^

p.s. Looking forward to your route. Would love to drive through Brampton (my hometown) through Mississauga, past Kelso park...