MapInfo Pro

  • 1.  MapInfo Point Symbols

    Posted 11-11-2019 00:26
    I can't help but noticing, that on quite a bit of the MapInfo branding for products and events, as well as within the alpha release of MapInfo Pro 2019, the "inverted teardrop" symbol seems to be in fashion for representing point locations.  It would be great to see a symbol set in MapInfo which has some variants on this symbol style.  It's certainly a good way to represent point locations on cartographic products.

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    Kalu Ribush
    Senior Mapping Specialist
    Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources (DEDJTR)
    Melbourne
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  • 2.  RE: MapInfo Point Symbols

    Posted 11-11-2019 04:29

    Hello Kalu,

     

    The Google Maps inverted teardrop is a nice symbol and, when sufficiently sized, accommodates some additional symbology in the main disc.

     

    I'm a big fan of Font Awesome (https://fontawesome.com/icons?d=gallery) which is a huge variety of symbols, including map pins. It comes in many vector formats, including a TrueType font, but doesn't show up as an option in MapInfo Pro, presumably because the "icon" flag is not set within it. I wonder if it's possible to edit this flag with a font editor, but I would then be concerned that MapInfo Pro may not be able to show more than just the first code page or two. The set currently had 7345 icons and I don't see that working well in the symbol picker. Perhaps this could be an area for development in Pro?

     

    Regards,

    Warren Vick

    Europa Technologies Ltd.

     






  • 3.  RE: MapInfo Point Symbols

    Employee
    Posted 11-11-2019 06:11
    We added a number of versions back some Custom Symbols for this exact purpose: Custom Symbols PinPoints

    We could consider adding the "pin" into a TrueType font too if that's required.

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    Peter Horsbøll Møller
    Pitney Bowes
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  • 4.  RE: MapInfo Point Symbols

    Posted 11-11-2019 17:17
    Thanks for your Warren and Peter.

    Sorry I hadn't noticed the Custom Symbols PinPoints symbols.  Most of the MapInfo fonts have "MapInfo" at the start of the name.

    The Custom Symbols PinPoints are pretty good, although still look a little coarse (the edges of the symbols aren't very smooth).  It would be helpful to be able to add a halo to the symbols too.

    I admit I haven't played around much with importing my own PNG point symbols, and I can see there are some good resources which can be downloaded to use within MapInfo.  I suspect this process could be made a bit more intuitive through enhancements to the ribbon tab.  It would be handy to be able to select point symbols directly on the STYLE ribbon tab.

    Kalu

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    Kalu Ribush
    Senior Mapping Specialist
    Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources (DEDJTR)
    Melbourne
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