GEMS: (Gas and Electric Mapping System)

An automation application for Autodesk MAP and Raster Design that allowed a Mapper to Check out a Hybrid Grid Map through an Oracle database, Load Adjacent maps, Save Project maps, Check in or Cancel Checkout of the maps, and Place Commodities and Facilities on the maps

This was an extensive application with over five years of specifications and coding. Below you will find an overview of the Document Management portion. There were also automations for inserting Commodities and Facilities that will not be overviewed here to preserve the confidentiality of the client

Key Benefits:

• Allowed Check out of a grid map to prevent another Mapper from performing simultaneous edits
• Allowed Load Adjacent of multiple grid maps to map information across borders
• Allowed Save Project without disassociation of queried entities in the session
• Allowed Simultaneous Boundary break, and Save Back by area of Vector and Raster entities
• Allowed Check in or Cancel Check out to finalize or throw away edits respectively
• Allowed Automated Commodity and Facility insertions

The Login command

Allowed the current user to log in to Oracle. The User field was read directly from the Autodesk MAP session. When the current user entered a valid password, it was encrypted and stored in the registry. All GEMS commands looked for the encrypted registry entry. If it didn't exist, they were funneled through the Login code stream to validate the current user. If the current user canceled the login, the GEMS command issuance was terminated

The Create New command

The basis for new maps to be generated, and subsequently placed into the active grid in True World Space. The dialog box entries were the required entries to populate the Oracle database. Extensive database validation prevented a map of the same Office, Drawing Name, Drawing Type, and Scale from being generated. All new maps were at status level Inactive | New

The Register command

Allowed the current user to Register a map into the Oracle database, and move the source files used to create the map up to the file server. The dialog was automatically populated with the data entered during the Create New command with the exception of either the Lower Left coordinate or the Upper Right coordinate, which were variable based on the scale of the map. All maps were Created and Registered with a status level of Inactive | New. The map had to be Checked out, and Checked back into the system with a Status Change to be placed in the Active Grid

The Checkout command

Allowed the current user to Check out a map of a current Office and Drawing Type by Drawing Name or by Coordinates. The Browse button would pull a record set from Oracle for the selected Office and Drawing Type. The Browse button was only active during a Check out by Drawing Name. During a Check out by Coordinates, if two or more scales of maps were found on the entered coordinates, the current user was presented with a list of scales found, and had to select a scale to filter the session. All Load Adjacent commands were locked in to Office, Drawing Type, Scale, and Map Status level to ensure the proper commodity was loaded

The Check in and Cancel Checkout commands

Allowed the current user to finalize or throw away map edits respectively. During a Check in the current user could also change the Status Level of a map rendering it a part of the Active Grid, or taking it off line as Inactive

The Open Project command

Allowed the current user to open an existing project that had been closed to the harddrive... and yes, we did figure out a way to save an Autodesk MAP query session and re-open it without disassociating and duplicating the queried entities!

There was also an extension of this project providing a batch plotting mechanism for plat maps

GEMS Batch Plot