News | alta4 Geoinformatik AG - ESRI-Partner - GIS - ArcView Extensions - internetmapping

ESRI International awards alta4 Geoinformatik AG for outstanding achievements in 2007

Palm Springs/CA, 2008/03/16. On this years worldwide ESRI Business Partner Conference in Palms Springs alta4 received the 2008 Partner of the Year Award.

The award is given to US regional offices as well as international distributors. It recognizes partners that achieved strong sales, business growth, innovative product marketing, successful teaming with ESRI on a project, successful teaming within their region, developed a new market area from their specialized knowledge and expertise, or other acts of excellence noted by the region.

The barcode scanner SE-4 is now available as part of the data-imaging-solution

The complete solution for the logistics branch consisting of a digital camera, a barcode scanner and photo-management-software.

Trier, Germany. Now there finally is a device for all the needs of data-imaging: the digital camera „RICOH 500SE“ with the new barcode scanner „SE-4“ and the software „ExifExtractor“ by alta4 Geoinformatik AG.

This solution of a high quality digital camera and a barcode scanner has been developed for the transportation and logistics sector. In this sector goods and containers are identified by their barcodes. Condition and completeness of the goods are standardly documented by taking pictures.

Simplification of the workflow as well as the higher grade of automation and the resulting factors of time saving and decreasing the amount of potential error sources are key elements of this solution.

The photographic standard of the camera 500SE beats that of cell phones and PDAs with small implemented scanners by far. The RICOH Caplio 500SE is a high quality digital camera with 8 MP, 3x optical zoom, macro-mode und wide-angle zoom lens. It is built very robustly and the large control buttons can be handled while wearing gloves. The 2,5’’-LCD-display allows the user fast processing.

The SE-4 is a professional class-2 laser scanner that even works under difficult lighting conditions and reads all popular 1D barcodes (e.g. EAN 128, Interleaved 2 of 5). The scanned barcode is written with the associated information into the so called Exif header of the picture. That way the data and the pictures are connected to each other. If requested the barcode can be visualized in the picture as an imprint.
The WLAN function of the digital camera version 500SE-W allows you to send the datasets directly to a server.

The software ExifExtractor by the alta4 Geoinformatik AG reads out the barcode information discarded in the picture and makes it available as data-name or as text- or database information.

For more information about the data-imaging solution contact
Uwe Hain, sales manager
phone: +49.651.96626-18
uwe.hain@alta4.com

The performance of your GIS-Server is a key element to your success - especially in internet business. As long as ArcGIS Server supplies you with maps quickly everybody is happy. But if you are dealing with a slow server, it can turn into a more than unpleasant experience.

Slow servers can process less requests and the hardware resources being used have to be upgraded, which implies additional licensing of the GIS-Server-Software, racking up tremendous costs.

The feedback from users is mostly very general ("the server is too slow") and does not really get you anywhere.

If the performance is lacking, there are number of possible reasons:

- Which layers are slow?
- slow database connections?
- cartography too complex?
- how "expensive" are labels?

Tuning your server and services is complex and requires knowledge, experience and facts.
alta4performanceTool helps you to fill this gap. This little piece of software helps you identify bottle necks and gives you exact numbers on which layers take how long to draw at which scales.

With this tool we managed to speed up our map services by 400%.

alta4performanceTool is built to test map services on ArcGIS Server Java Edition (ESRI).

With the Tile-Manager you can generate ArcGIS 9.2 Server-conform picturetiles of your whole ImageMapper-Project in no time. The expanded features in build 22:

The new Batch function is just the right thing for temporary datasets. Now an intiutive interface has been added to the existing Batch-Function which enables the user to save several ArcGIS projects for automatic processing. You can process your Image-Mapper project fully automatic without having to start ArcMap or even be in front of your computer. The execution is performed by the HTML ImageMapper NG BatchGUI.

Always the latest version! The Auto-Update-Function checks whether there are new patches or releases for ImageMapper NG available. For maintenance customers latest versions are included.

With 1.000 visitors this year's EUC ended on 28th September in Stockholm. A multifaceted conference program contained the topics utilites, local government, transportation and logistics, defense, education and others. The tracks were accompanied by a fair with ESRI distributors from whole Europe.

alta4 presented the GPS camera Ricoh 500SE with the attachable GPS receiver SE-1 and the software GPS PhotoMapper, an ArcGIS extension for the integration of GPS photos into ArcGIS. Mr. Horonori Tajima from Ricoh completed the alta4 team and contributed his deep knowledge of the Ricoh products.
The alta4 ArcGIS server expertise was also of high interest for the conference attendees.

ESRI Sweden had promised a very special event and invited to a gala dinner into the City Hall of Stockholm on thursday night. With a very exquisite flair, international entertainment program and swedish party mood this night definetly contributed to a special event.

16.500 visitors found their way to this year's conference and trade fair for geodesy, geoinformation and land management, once more fulfulling the expections of exhibitors and organizers.
Attendees from more than 50 countries emphasized the international importance of this event.

A lot of visitors were attracted to the alta4 booth by the GPS camera 500SE from Ricoh and the new attachable GPS receiver SE-1, also a Ricoh product. People interested in the camera were also interested in the Geo-Imaging software developed by alta4, GPS PhotoMapper, ExifExtractor and Fodysseus RE.

alta4 customer took the welcome opportunity to take a first look at the web publishing extension HTML ImageMapper NG - AJAX, which is currently on beta status.
Big topics were also alta4's ArcGIS server expertise and the new Earth Extension, a flatrate aireal photograph service for ArcGIS users.

Through the last few years a nice idea has become a tradition. Each year on the Intergeo alumni from the university of Trier are invited to the alta4 booth to meet new people or refresh old acquaintances, exchange news and ideas. We are looking forward for the next get together on the Intergeo in Bremen 2008.

Very broad and open-minded audience at the 4th edition of the regional IT Fair 2007 in Trier.

Approximately 300 visitors came to the "little Cebit" that took place at the convention center of the Chamber of Industry and Commerce in Trier. 30 well-known exhibitors presented products and solutions in the special fields of IT, web and geo-informationsystems. The event adressed above all medium-sized businesses. Like in the previous years the fair was used as an opportunity to award the grant for small and medium-sized enterprises. 7 businesses from the Region Trier received the award this year.

The visitors were particularly interested in the 55 workshops that were integrated in the regular exhibition goings and picked up the most interesting topics and solutions. Microsoft top-scored with the workshop "Migration from Windows XP to Vista". 46 visitors registered for the presentation. "Infrastructure for IP calling in medium-sized enterprises" from Netgear could be ranked second best in the audiences favor.

With 4 workshops in total alta4, GIS specialist and ESRI business partner, presented the topic Geo-informationsystems.
The first day of the fair was dedicated to ArcGIS users. Apart from new developments on the desktop part of ArcGIS 9.2 alta4 emphasized the unique interaction between desktop and the product ArcGIS Server.

Visitors interested in the GPS camera and the documentation solution GPS PhotoMapper were adressed mainly on the second day. Many people appreciated the opportunity to take a closer look on the GPS camera Ricoh Caplio 500SE.

Potencials, chances and opportunities of geomarketing for enterprises were presented in the 4th workshop. How can you evaluate the purchasing power of a region, map and analyse existing customers and develop new clients and markets?

The hosts, IT-Haus, rdts Ag und alta4 Geoinformatik AG strike a positive balance after the event. Crucial to the sucess, they state, is the concept to combine an expert exhibition with workshops.

alta4 would like to invite HTML ImageMapper users and resellers for the first international HTML ImageMapper user group meeting. One of the big topics will be the brand new HTML ImageMapper 10 - AJAX which has just been released.

We hope to provide a forum for the exchange of ideas, tipps and trick among our users.

The event will take place in the scope of the ESRI User Conference in San Diego, August 7 - 11, 2006.

HTML ImageMapper 10 - AJAX is based on latest web technologies like AJAX and DHTML and manifests a huge jump in the development of this product.

Full screen maps, dynamic zoom, a powerful search function and the GPS PhotoMapper integration to name only a few of a long list of new cool features.

The concept behind HTML ImageMapper remains the same: Create fun to use, attractive online GIS maps from your ArcGIS projects with only a few mouse clicks.

Not only the software will change, also the way we interact with our clients will be different: from now on we'll give anybody access to our bug tracking system so whoever enters a bug or a feature requests will get a ticket number and will be informed of the status of his request. Also the online documentation has been changed from static pfd format to a more dynamic wiki format everybody is invited to contribute to.

Many thanks to all participants in the beta program who contributed with their feedback to a more stable, user friendly and even more fun-to-use product. More than 150 issues were addressed in during the three week beta phase.

Those of you who are current with your HTML ImageMapper 9.2 maintenance contract will automatically receive the new HTML ImageMapper 10 - AJAX key code by email. All others will get 40-50% off the list price when migrating to the new version.

Good news also for the academia: Special educational pricing is more attractive than ever, colleges and universities do not need to pay for the license and rather start with a maintenance contract.

Students will get a free license to be used for 90 days.

The new HTML output is much more attractive, like GoogleMaps! It is not only the awesome and most practicable map style – it is just fun to browse the maps. You can see all the map attributes simply and easily by moving the mouse over the different map features. Of course, the advanced programming users get a chocolate cake as well: Now there is a brand new batch routine. These two new features are only a few of all the new ones included.

HTML ImageMapper Release Special
Place your order before the 30th November 2005 and get a 100€ discount on your new commercial software license.
Shop

Curious? Then download your free HTML ImageMapper 9.2 demo software and test for 30 days.

In Mid 2005 the first and only museum solely dedicated to hops as a cultural heritage has opened its gates in Wolnzach, a small bavarian city.
While todays growing area of hops in germany is limited to some wellknown regions, the historic coverage has been much wider. Todays proof are many placenames, area denotations, namings that still have to do with hops. When designing the museum the idea arowse to allow people to search for evidence of hops farming in "their region" by placenames and regional selection.

Because the interface has to be easy and the results are static, the alta4 team did all the preparation within ArcGIS but the final solution is a pure web-based image maps solution genereated with the alta4 software HTML ImageMapper, an extension to ArcGIS.

The visitor can navigate easily through the hops database, using a touch screen termianl with clickable maps. The results can be viewed on two additional screens that are integrated into the backwall on eye level. The left screen displays the same picture as the touch screen, the selected information can be viewed on the right screen.

alta4 presents the brand new product GPS PhotoMapper - the extension for ArcGIS 9 for integration of digital photos in GIS.
The bundle from alta4 includes a digital camera capable of GPS, an external GPS receiver and the software GPS PhotoMapper. This package makes an easy and efficient object documentation for all application areas possible. Tourism, real estates, disaster control, ...

ESRI Inc. presented itself united at the logistics exhibition ITS in Hannover with collegues from the USA, France and Germany and chosen ESRI business partners.
alta4 was one of the two business partners, presenting german competence in the field of logistics and transport.

alta4 presented together with the technology partner from Liechtenstein, WAYcoor Anstalt, a solution portfolio for the field of mobile tracking.
The solution ensures that you always know exactly where your vehicles are. With a web mapping service the positioning data is provided in real time on appropriate map material over the internet. Changes at short notice, such as additional loading or delivery points, altered routing etc. can be taken into consideration immediately.
On the technology side the solution is built on the interaction of a Bluetooth GPS receiver and the data transaction via GPRS.

Release of HTML ImageMapper 9.1 - The web publishing extension for ArcGIS 9 (2005/02/24)

HTML ImageMapper 9.1 contains over 50 improvements reflecting the feedback of HTML ImageMapper users. With version 9.1 alta4 released an application that is easier to use and more robust.

Among the most exciting new features is the HTML ImageMapper API, that allows developers to program customized, database driven search functions and integrate HTML ImageMapper pages smoothly into existing websites.

HTML ImageMapper 9.1 creates nicer maps due to GIF and PNG graphic format.
The map tiling functionality of HTML ImagMapper can now also be used to create maps for other GI systems or users since worldfiles can be created (*.gfw, *.pgw, *.bpw, *.jpw).

The functionality of the HTML output has been improved by adding a crosshair to the overview map and by layout changes of the print output.
The HTML pages now fully meet the XHTML standard recommended by the World Wide Web Consortium. This allows a larger percentage of browsers or code parsers to properly parse
the output map files produced by HTML ImageMapper.

Users with a valid maintanance contract für HTML ImageMapper 9.0 automatically receive a free upgrade.

With the simultaneous release of HTML ImageMapper version 3.5 for ArcView 3 and 9.0 for ArcGIS 8 and 9, HTML ImageMapper versions now have the same features though different user interfaces.

The new versions 9.0 and 3.5 of HTML ImageMapper reflects many changes and feature improvements requested by our customers. It works together with ArcGIS 8.x and ArcGIS 9.x. The most significant improvement is the new software module "ThemeBrowser 1.0" which is a stand alone software component delivered with either HTML ImageMapper 9.0 or 3.5.

Requirements on geographic information systems have changed considerably in the past years. In the beginning data capture and building of geodatabases combined with high-end analysis was the basic reason for implementing GIS. But nowadays with comprehensive geodata being available, the focus has turned to questions like possible integrations into other systems, cost and revenue aspects of a GIS.

More productivity at minimum costs with GIS and how to choose the right technology for your IT-environment – these questions will be in the spotlight at ESRI 2003. Efficient organising and structuring of geodata is heavily influenced by metadata administration and user specific distribution methods (Internet or Intranet). At ESRI 2003 we will show you concepts on how to implement and optimize your GIS in your organisation successfully.

Theme Browser
ImageMapper now comes with a theme browser which enables you to combine several gis projects into one web page.

Zoom to Objects
In response to the many requests we received from users we've decided to re-implement the Zoom to Objects feature. Zoom to objects allows the user to zoom from the main map directly to the extent of one of the objects. This feature is useful e.g. for parcel maps or street maps where you want to give the user the option to zoom directly to a specific parcel or street. A link list with all object names for objects which can be zoomed to will be generated automatically. The hirarchical zoom by the factor of 2 will remain the other alternative.

Try the software yourself and download a free 30 day evaluation version. HTML ImageMapper customers with a current maintenance contract receive the new version automatically for free.

alta4 continues a sucessful story. The new HTML ImageMapper 3.3 for ArcView GIS now approximates the "8 version". New features: Web users now have the possibility to search the attribute data. The results are shown and highlighted in the map. Also new is the support of stylesheets. It's now able to adapt the layout of the webpage through a stylesheet, also after processing the map. In addition there's a print mode, to print extents of a map with legend and overview map.

Try the software yourself and download a free 30 day evaluation version. HTML ImageMapper customers with a current maintenance contract receive the new version automatically for free.