MapInfo Pro

I have a map consisting of regions with the regions classified by about a dozen integer values. How can I associated each value with a specific colour so that it shows up on the map using a colour lookup table (I don't want to use "Themes")

Thanks Burkhard

Do you want the colour to be associated with the region permanently (that is, do you want the colour applied to the style of each region object)? Also can you share further background on why you'd prefer not to use a thematic layer (this would seem to be well suited towards the requirement you described)?

Thanks, Ashley

The colour does not need to be applied permanently since I need the ability to change the colour (style) of a region by changing the lookup table. Further, I can use a lookup table across workspaces (this could be resolved by setting up a theme template). However, more importantly, changing the thematic style is cumbersome and if new categories or subdivisions are added requiring additional colours, the recalculation destroys the existing colour allocation requiring a redoing the template.

I have seen colour/style lookup tables done, but unfortunately I don't have access to these files anymore to check the process.

Thanks Burkhard

Yes I've seen colour/style lookup done via a MBX to create a thematic based on a "master" table. So any style updates are done once and then easily rolled out - nice solution to the problem you describe 🙂 . Perhaps someone in the Li360 community has an MBX that does this which they can share?

Alternatively, there is a Colour Look-up table function in Datamine Discover which is an add-on for MapInfo Professional. This might be another option to consider if you have a large number of these to build/maintain.

thanks, very helpful; the MBX you refer to would be very useful. I have Discover and will try and find the colour look-up table function.

I have done something like this using a view in a database where the base table is joined to the lookup table via a view. From the lookup table, the MI_STYLE column is taken which holds the style to apply for the indvidual objects.

When MapInfo Pro is rendering the objects, it will apply the styling from the MI_STYLE column to the objects. If you update or add new styling information to the loopup table, these will be applied when you refresh your DBMS table in MapInfo Pro.

One downside of this solution is that you can edit the spatial objects as the "object", here the feature and the styling, is stored in two separtate tables in the database.

The solution you propose sounds like the what I have been originally referring to so thanks for the tip. I will have to look up the functions since I have not used those aspects of MapInfo before and will give it a try over the next week.

That's a powerful idea from Peter - creating a single master styles table in the database makes it easy to manage, then using the database to do the "heavy lifting" by creating a view!

Look forward to hearing how it goes.

Hi Burkhard,

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Pitney Bowes Software India Pvt. Lt
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