MapInfo Pro

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Paula M
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Hi Paula,

For each area/region, can you buffer your line to create a polygon, then erase half of your buffer polygon (the half that is outside the region)?  You could then apply a style to the polygon.  How would that look?

To erase half of the buffer, you could probably split the buffer with your line, then erase.  Or if your lines are the boundary of polygons, use the polygon to "erase outside".

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James Nolet
GIS Manager
CAF Consulting
Melbourne office, VIC, AustraliaJames Nolet
GIS Manager
CAF Consulting
Melbourne office, VIC, Australia
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2026 23:47
From: Paula Morrissey New
Subject: Line inside style

Hello community,

I am trying to replicate something similar to this image. 

I want to be able to highlight certain areas from the rest, preferably with another thicker and transparent line but it must be inside that area's line.
The best I can do is with one of the line styles which includes marks inside the outline. But this is a nicer look.

Thanks for any help I can get. 

------------------------------
Paula M
------------------------------

Hi James, Thanks for your reply. I will try your method. Cheers.

------------------------------
Paula Morrissey
Senior Data and Spatial Analyst
Department of Health (VIC)
Melbourne VIC
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2026 00:05
From: James Nolet
Subject: Line inside style

Hi Paula,

For each area/region, can you buffer your line to create a polygon, then erase half of your buffer polygon (the half that is outside the region)?  You could then apply a style to the polygon.  How would that look?

To erase half of the buffer, you could probably split the buffer with your line, then erase.  Or if your lines are the boundary of polygons, use the polygon to "erase outside".

------------------------------
James Nolet
GIS Manager
CAF Consulting
Melbourne office, VIC, AustraliaJames Nolet
GIS Manager
CAF Consulting
Melbourne office, VIC, Australia

Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2026 23:47
From: Paula Morrissey New
Subject: Line inside style

Hello community,

I am trying to replicate something similar to this image. 

I want to be able to highlight certain areas from the rest, preferably with another thicker and transparent line but it must be inside that area's line.
The best I can do is with one of the line styles which includes marks inside the outline. But this is a nicer look.

Thanks for any help I can get. 

------------------------------
Paula M
------------------------------

Hey Paula

I second James's approach.

Don't look for a line style but create a region that lies within your polygons and style this region using the region styles instead.

Now, the cool thing is that since MapInfo Pro v2019, you have been ale to create derived spatial objects in queries and use these objects instead of the original objects.

SQL to the rescue, so to speak.

To create your border area, you need ot create a negative buffer on your polygons. That will return a polygon smaller than the original. You use this negative buffer as a cutter object using the Erase() function to cut out a hole in the original polygon so that you end up with a border polygon.

And, the good thing is that you go do this with a Select statement:

Select t.*, Erase(t.Obj, Buffer(t.obj, 72, -500, "m")) Object 
From Postal_Sectors As "t" 
Into qBorder NoSelect

To use this on your data, I would sugget opening the SQL window and pasting the query from above. Now change the name of the table. Ad change the query to be added to your map and not shown in a browser. That's it. 

------------------------------
Peter Horsbøll Møller
Principal Presales Consultant | Distinguished Engineer
Precisely | Trust in Data
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2026 23:47
From: Paula Morrissey New
Subject: Line inside style

Hello community,

I am trying to replicate something similar to this image. 

I want to be able to highlight certain areas from the rest, preferably with another thicker and transparent line but it must be inside that area's line.
The best I can do is with one of the line styles which includes marks inside the outline. But this is a nicer look.

Thanks for any help I can get. 

------------------------------
Paula M
------------------------------

Hi Peter, I'm so sorry. I haven't been getting any notifications from this thread, so I didn't know anyone had replied. I will take a look. What I can see, it looks nice.

------------------------------
Paula Morrissey
Senior Data and Spatial Analyst
Department of Health (VIC)
Melbourne VIC
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 03-04-2026 03:28
From: Peter Møller
Subject: Line inside style

Hey Paula

I second James's approach.

Don't look for a line style but create a region that lies within your polygons and style this region using the region styles instead.

Now, the cool thing is that since MapInfo Pro v2019, you have been ale to create derived spatial objects in queries and use these objects instead of the original objects.

SQL to the rescue, so to speak.

To create your border area, you need ot create a negative buffer on your polygons. That will return a polygon smaller than the original. You use this negative buffer as a cutter object using the Erase() function to cut out a hole in the original polygon so that you end up with a border polygon.

And, the good thing is that you go do this with a Select statement:

Select t.*, Erase(t.Obj, Buffer(t.obj, 72, -500, "m")) Object From Postal_Sectors As "t" Into qBorder NoSelect

To use this on your data, I would sugget opening the SQL window and pasting the query from above. Now change the name of the table. Ad change the query to be added to your map and not shown in a browser. That's it. 

Push the Run button to execute the query.

Finally, you can style the resulting query in the way you'd like to using a layer style override or using a thematic. You can of course also save the result as a native table and change the styles on the objects individually.

Below, I have use a layer style to make all the objects orange, no line style, and make the layer 50% translucent.

I hope this helps

------------------------------
Peter Horsbøll Møller
Principal Presales Consultant | Distinguished Engineer
Precisely | Trust in Data

Original Message:
Sent: 03-03-2026 23:47
From: Paula Morrissey New
Subject: Line inside style

Hello community,

I am trying to replicate something similar to this image. 

I want to be able to highlight certain areas from the rest, preferably with another thicker and transparent line but it must be inside that area's line.
The best I can do is with one of the line styles which includes marks inside the outline. But this is a nicer look.

Thanks for any help I can get. 

------------------------------
Paula M
------------------------------