Map Viewer

Partner's Map Viewer is the basic component of the Partner System and is available with the complete system or as a stand-alone product for a one-time, site license fee. The Map Viewer's features are listed here as well as are available visually in the Map Viewer Quick Reference.

For details on cost, see the pricing page. For recommended hardware and software specifications, click here. To see the Map Viewer in action, call Partner at 800-964-1833.

The user guide for the Map Viewer and Palm OS^® Map Viewer is available in the HTML and printer-friendly versions.

About Map Viewing

Using a Map Viewer on any computer, you can:

• browse through the service area on the map;
• click a graphic feature on the map, and examine associated information from various sources;
• enter information on a graphic feature, and zoom directly to that feature on the map;
• print maps and information.

Every department, and in fact almost every employee, finds ways to use Partner's Map Viewer to speed and simplify work.

Finding Your Data

	When your data are in the Map Viewer, you can find it quickly using the Find Item feature with incremental search. To use the search, just start typing, and the Find Item jumps to the closest match while you type. To view data about an item, just switch to the View Data tab.
With the Map Viewer, you can view data from outside your mapping system.

Combining Data Sources

Behind the scenes of Partner's Map Viewer is the Map Translator, which translates your maps and data into the Partner-designed Read-Only Vector Engine for Rendering (ROVER) format. Partner's tools directly translate both graphics and data from ESRI shapefiles, Autodesk DXF files, GE Smallworld-based mapping systems, U.S.Census TIGER files, and stand-alone files.

You control the content and legend in a variety of ways. You can select the content that appears over various scale ranges, and how it is symbolized. In shapefiles you control what is displayed by theme and data field. In DXF files you use layers and blocks, and in data files you select fields.

The data files (e.g., billing, customer service, or meter department) must share a common data field with the map or GIS because the map or GIS serves as the base for the Map Viewer. Partner accepts ODBC databases, delimited or fixed text files, DBF, and XML files.

In addition to the ROVER format, the Map Viewer can display pure raster imagery such as USGS quadrangles or aerial photos. You can apply color reduction and variable image compression to raster translation. You can layer raster and vector layers to achieve any combination your map readers require.

Printing Reports

The Map Viewer provides multiple report formats, from simple printouts of the map itself to structured listings of data. Using the Map Viewer, you can design the reports your employees need and change them as requirements change. You can print Map Viewer reports even if the program is running from a CD or other read-only source such as a protected network drive.

Examining and Finding Data

Users of the Map Viewer can click a graphic feature and examine a table of information associated with that feature. This table is extracted directly from the ROVER dataset. With several translators (shapefile, DXF, and data file) already available, and more to come, a tremendous amount of your utility's data can be integrated and simply presented. You can use any of that data to seek out features on the map. Map Viewer users can enter or select information and zoom directly to its location on the map.

Map Viewer Features

Map Viewer features include:

• seamless viewing of the entire map set;
• elimination of expensive paper map books;
• fast panning and zooming;
• a simple graphical interface that is easy to learn and use;
• full control over legend, including visibility, scaling, icons, and line colors;
• display of grid coordinate or map page;
• sophisticated map and software update mechanism minimizes network traffic—makes keeping maps up-to-date easier.
• site license, allowing anyone in your organization to view map data.

Specialized data features are utility specific and include:

• integration of external data with GIS data (e.g., customer addresses, billing information with meter icons);
• integration with accounting and customer service data from all major vendors—SEDC, NISC, Orcom, Daffron, SCT, CSA, etc.;
• incremental search for any data field in the map set with millisecond response time when using Find Item;
• information for a selected location or point appears when you select View Data.

Fully configurable, the map redlining and annotation facility is simple and easy to learn and use. Symbols, lines, and text can be added, deleted, rotated, and moved on the map.

Use the print feature to generate:

• virtually any size plots—E-size, F-size and beyond—from a seamless map view;
• HTML or high resolution PDF printing and reports, incorporating map snapshots.

Partner's Map Viewer supports:

• running from network, workstation, laptop, CD-ROM, or Palm OS PDA;
• vector and raster image map data;
• AutoCAD DWG files and data, including all types of data embedding and linking (e.g., object data, DBLINK, XRECORD, block attributes, etc.);
• DXF files and data, either from AutoCAD or other DXF-compatible software;
• ESRI shapefiles, such as from ESRI ArcView or compatible systems;
• ArcInfo 8.x personal geodatabases;
• ArcSDE databases;
• combined views of multiple GIS systems (e.g., AutoCAD, ESRI, aerial photos);
• GE Smallworld-based mapping systems;
• U.S. Census TIGER files;
• linking to all SQL/JDBC/ODBC compatible databases, including MS Access, Oracle, SQL Server, MySQL, etc.;
• fixed-width and delimited text data files;
• DBASE DBF file format;
• raster aerial photos and raster USGS quadrangle data;
• viewing digital or scanned photos associated with a graphical item—e.g., switchbox wiring diagrams, substation plans, assembly photos, etc.;
• viewing MilSoft's WindMil analysis data;
• fully configurable data viewing, including ability to merge, transform, and massage incoming data from any number of GIS and other data sources.

How Do People Use Our Viewer?

Since Partner provides the Map Viewer as part of our site license, map viewing is an open resource to the utility. The Map Viewer is configured to present each user with the data he needs. The following are some examples of its uses:

• A customer service representative gets directions to a new service.
• A repair crew selects the customer next door to find their phone number.
• A construction crew finds a particular transformer.
• A meter reader finds a particular meter.
• The operations center uses multiple viewers simultaneously to manage disaster recovery.
• A dispatcher tells a crew how to find a consumer.
• The General Manager presents a proposed line extension to the Board of Directors.